All I Do...

All I do anymore is write for class.  (And go to the beach.  I live in Southern CA after all).  So this is a response I wrote for my Essays class.  Every Monday we're assigned an essay to read and on Wednesday we bring in our response to it.  This particular piece was on Virginia Woolfe's The Death of a Moth.  (You can read it here. It'll take 15 minutes of your time.  It's worth it).


Hannah Moody
C352-Essays
Dr. Simons
February 12, 2013

The Death of a Moth Response

People compartmentalize their lives; placing things in categories makes it easier. We make our own proverbial window frames to fly back and forth between like Virginia Woolfe’s moth.  The biggest problem with these frames is you can’t always see quite where they are.  A part of me wonders where my frame is.  But figuring that out is scary, jumping into a boundless ocean. Yet Virginia Woolfe’s moth flutters, “from side to side of his square of the window-pane” (Woolfe 174).  “That was all he could do, in spite of the size of the downs, the width of the sky, the far-off smoke of the houses, and the romantic voice, now and then, of a steamer out at sea” (Woolfe 174).  The moth had no reasoning or capability to understand the limitations of the window pane, “What he could do he did” (Woolfe 174).
 
The first thing I always ask before beginning something new is, “How do I do it?”  I have a crippling fear of failure at times.  I like lists, steps, instructions, and do-it-yourself manuals.  At times, I sit and wonder what I miss because of it.  The world—196 countries, countless cultures, untold adventures—is my oyster, or so I’ve been told.  It lies outside my window, beyond my limited view of the taupe and speckled wall of the college dormitory so many will limit their greatest life experiences too.  Still, consider the moth, “little or nothing but life” (Woolfe 174).  

“It was as if someone had taken a tiny bead of pure life and decking it as lightly as possible with down and feathers, had set it dancing and zigzagging to show us the true nature of life” (Woolfe 174).  What, possibly, does the true nature of life have to do with almost careless flight?  After all, zigzagging is not efficient and everyone knows the quickest way from point A to point B is a straight line.  But is it the most worthwhile way?  I am a dreamer by nature—the love of lists a result of my tendency to over-react to faults and fall off the other side of the horse. I become “apt to forge all about life, seeing it humped and bossed and garnished and cumbered so that it has to move with the greatest circumspection and dignity” (Woolfe 174).  Throwing off dreams as irrelevant, I get lost in a mound of papers and tests and textbooks and coffee cups in pursuit of the hallowed ‘A.’ There is a certain drudgery in walking to 8 AM classes, and a definite dullness to grocery shopping. The shimmering quality of life is lost in the midst of stale-Styrofoam coffee and 7:50 AM and half-cartons of milk for $2.49.

What is the point of all of it, then? The Bible commands believers over and over again to be thankful.  G.K. Chesterton said, “gratitude is happiness doubled by wonder.”  There is something to the moth and his propensity to live well and excitedly and thankfully.  It is true a moth can be neither excited nor thankful, but it can live, and I maintain living well and as we ought is the best form of thankfulness.  This require a mentality shift: to recognize that 7:50 AM is the only time that day the baseball field glitters with cold as the sun, with its own iridescent quality, slowly melts away the frost.  Grocery shopping is possibly a beautiful thing allowing me to drive in silence and notice, for a moment, the velvety hills caught behind the haze of late afternoon. I still haven’t figured out the wonder in coffee cups, except for acknowledging coffee as a means of God’s grace to finish homework.

Back to the beginning: my need to know how to do things.  As much as I want understand the window frame I’m flying within, I can’t.  Most of the worthwhile things in my life right now aren’t coming with instruction manuals. But the zigzag flights of life are more fun than understanding the steps from point A to point B. I never want it said of me that I didn’t value or keep life well.

    "Letting go is a repetitive theme at camp. You receive a group on Sunday and wave goodbye on Friday.  The surfaces of the girls sometimes seem barely scratched, but somehow a unity emerges. Through silly games, 5 minute life stories and discussions about love over ice cream, personalities start to emerge. The person unfolds, leaving their shell and melding into one another as a distinct group.  Then on friday morning, when talking with each other has become the most natural thing in the world, suitcases are loaded into cars and we say goodbye. Sunday we do it all over again."
      The above were some scribbles I took down in the back of lecture about a month ago. I've had a total of   18 small groups, 3 staff teams, and an indeterminable amount of goodbyes. At times it seems impossible to partake in such a rapid exchange of lives. God brought us together- whether staff to student or staff to each other- for the purpose of the Gospel. C.S. Lewis speaks of us as eternal souls, pushing one another to the glories of Heaven or the depths of Hell. We are eternal creatures with eternal impact.
      The thought of eternal impact seems almost laughable as I perform some of the same tasks for the umpteenth time.  Only when I consider it as an action for the furtherance of the Gospel do I start to glimpse the eternalness of it.  Take, for instance, a cafeteria lunch with a student. Cafeteria lunches hold no special significance, and neither do the people partaking of them. Ordinary people sharing a mundane meal.  However, in light of the fact that we truly are immortal souls, this lunch is one shared between 2 eternal beings pushing each other towards glory. Nothing about that is laughable, because it is the Gospel.
      Francis Schaeffer writes, "...man projects the wonder of his personality- his thoughts, his emotions, and the determinations of his will- into a historic, space-time world through the use of his body, and especially his hands." Last night, Dell Cook expressed a similar thought as he charged the students to manifest in their flesh  the truth, goodness, and beauty of the Gospel. In other words, live the Gospel. Walking to lecture, eating lunch, organizing lists, filling schedules-  as Dell says- "Every moment is an opportunity to teach how to love."  What I do at camp, what the staff and directors and faculty do, is live the Gospel in front of students. Yes, we speak it with our tongues, but we also let it come from our fingertips as a frisbee is tossed or hair is braided.  They are experiencing Christ's love through us, and, hopefully, being pushed further into eternal glory.
      There are days when camp is hard. Days when you cry more than once. Last night I gave one of the faculty kids, Lauren, her good-bye hug. I reminded her of something I told her at the end of last summer, that  these tears only come because of the incredible friendships that have been forged. And I told her never, ever, to think that the cost of painful goodbyes was greater than the gift of these relationships. This morning on the way to staff meeting, I realized that I had the privilege of saying goodbye to Lauren 3 times. I've made memories with the Cook family, and said goodbyes, 3 times over. I can't ever ask for more than that. I'm crying again as I write this because it has become so clear to me over the past few weeks how our lives need to be be lived for the sake of the Gospel. How our relationships and interactions and steps need to be driven by God's glory. How wet goodbyes are only reminders of adventures further up and further in.
     

Camp Musings- Week 2 or Thereabouts

 June 17, 2012

       There are ‘click’ moments at camp. Moments when a friendship happens, a group bonds. All of a sudden, things snap into place and some of the craziness of what I do starts to make sense.
To pin point the beginning of a friendship, glimpsing the start of a deeper connection, is a beautiful thing.  Though there are many beginnings that span time and place, traverse age and race, they all have one commonality- they are fleeting. Often it is as simple as being able to laugh over a room switch that had to take place in less than 5 minutes (the result a tousle of clothings and toiletries, sheets and papers and general whirlwind chaos).  Sometimes it’s a challenge from one person to another that becomes joint camaraderie   in the pursuit of excellence.  Yet to catch and see the beginnings  is to witness the miracle of 2 people coming to see each other a little more as God sees them- excellent saints in whom to delight.
It would follow that if to experience the formation of a friendship between 2  is miraculous; to watch a group come together is a tiny bit mind blowing. God works marvelously through the seemingly inane to do this.  Picture a lawn, damp from evening, and a group of giddy 14 yr olds reveling in the joy and giggles produced by a game of Dizzy Dizzy Dinosaur. A trivial game brought 6 girls together through the delight of laughter.  This is not to say games are the only way to bring people together.  Prayer brings a powerful unity – members of the Body of Christ coming before the same King, their mutual Father.  The recognition of weakness, the appeals for grace, the songs of praise are spoken around a solid wood table.  A team connects in the mutual give and take of each other, in the sublime privilege of lifting one another up in prayer before their immanent God.
Dell Cook says in his lecture on the Triune Life, “If you’re not loving someone, you’re dying.”  This is the give and take principle above.  To love someone is to give life to them and to live is to give love.  Cut off love and you’ve cut off life.  I this way we reflect our Creator, who creates and gives life (love) because He is life- and love.  Live this way and relationships and unity serve the purpose of reflecting the image of God Himself.
For this purpose, a group of strangers assembled. The flurry of logistics and schedules and the mental power it takes to navigate the mind of a 15-year old threaten to de-centralize this.  All of a sudden, though, God dazzles you with a ‘click,’ the beginning of a togetherness designed to reflect Himself.  And camp craziness becomes worth it.

Crossing the Delaware

       It always strikes me, the rapidity of which spring sunshine sneaks up behind you. Storm clouds give way in surrender before clear skies, though not without a fight. Those showers gifted with the peculiar task of bringing forth May flowers grace many a morning with their presence.

     And as I mused last year at this time, there is no lack of activity to fill these days. As spring ushers in a renewed delight in sunshine, so it also brings the chaos of finishing off another school year (and all the ensuing tests and paperwork!). 

    “Memory is not what the heart desires” (Tolkien). Yet those memories leaving us the nostalgia of wanting more inevitably proceed from a moment well-lived. C.S. Lewis writes in Perelandra of the remembrance of things bringing joy twice-over. This makes sense to me, as I keep seeing Jesus in the Upper Room instructing His disciples to “Do this in remembrance of me.” Why bother with communion if it weren’t for our tendency to forget the Cross and the ensuing joy?  We need reminders.

  My family likes to drive. Mostly to far-away coffee shops or beaches. Or someplace obscure no one has really heard of. On these trips a certain member of my family has a tendency to point out, rather voraciously, the passing-by of something we should all take note of.  In the case of crossing the Delaware, we were aroused from our jet-lagged sleep numerous times.  These ‘announcements’ used to scare my dad, because he thought the shrieking meant he was about to hit a small child. Now he knows better, and that we are probably near a coffee shop. Or crossing the Delaware.

    Joshua was told to collect memorial stones. God instructed him to take one for each tribe of Israel to commemorate certain events.  Inquisitive children wondering what the piles of rocks meant would ask, leading to a conversation on all that God had done. Said children would then grow up and have little questioners of their own, so eventually “all the peoples of the earth may know that the hand of the Lord is mighty, that you may fear the Lord your God forever” (Joshua 4:24).

    We need our own memorial stones. We need the person unafraid to draw our swayed attention to the moment that should not be missed. People forget. Or we simply never pay attention during the process of living, and then complain when the good stuff is gone. Hence those ‘undesirable memories.’ Though what if we look for, revel in, and return those moments to the Giver of all good things?. I can't help but think they must be numbered among those memories that bring joy twice-over. We can relish life for the wonder it holds, for the glory of God revealed in it. So if spring sunshine is sneaking up behind you and you're about to cross the Delaware, don't forget to make a memory that will bring joy--- twice over. 

Adventure Boots

    "April 24, '02  
     Airplane

      We just took off. We're heading to Vietnam where we will adopt a little boy named Sinh. We are really             excited. ..."
      Matthew Sinh Moody turned 14 years old this past week. Almost 10 years earlier, my 10-year old self was sitting in a plane staring into the big blue expanse of sky, kicking my feet for adventure. I was writing even then, but apparently I didn't know about contractions or the differences between "where" "wear" and "we're" so I amended all that for the first bit above. It was the beginning of a grace adventure.
     My experience of Vietnam was something that belonged in one of the books stuffed in my backpack, it seemed to me at the time. I traipsed around everywhere with my family, as brown as a walnut, shodded with Teva's and equipped with a hot pink Barbie Polaroid around my neck. According to my journal Matthew was quite taken with that camera the first time I met him. I don't remember that, but I do remember the amount of film he used on pictures of the ceiling fan. I was happy in this exotic corner of the earth, sucking down fresh-squeezed watermelon juice every chance I got and avoiding any meat-like substance after the discovery that my parents had been sneaking me squid. There were water buffalo and monkeys, puppet shows and pagodas. I remember being in awe of the sheer masses of people, watching the crowds from the balcony of a noodle shop. Having a new little brother was fun: he ate french fries with chopsticks and blue playdough and he giggled all the time. We all got to take a 'cruise' during which I have vivid memories of the cockroach that crawled over my feet at night. I chose to sleep on the deck after that.
    Coming home was 'topsy-turvy'- another one of my small self's observations. I think that's the only time of life I've ever used that phrase, but I have always associated it with the circus, so it made sense to use it- coming home felt like a circus. The thought had never crossed my mind that this little boy hadn't lived with a family before and didn't really know how they worked. It didn't cross my mind that he had his own will that maybe wouldn't always assimilate to ours. This was the other side of adventuring. No more treks overseas, just home, living, day in, day out.
    I got a text (from my mom) this summer saying love was a grace adventure. Me- being the clever daughter I am- listened to that piece of wisdom and decided to expound upon it: life is a grace adventure. Adventures appeal to my 20-year old self just as much as my 10-year old self. See, the key element to an adventure is excitement. They are never, ever boring. For clarification, I'm not sure excitement always equates with the sense of euphoria that comes from sucking helium. Take for example all the adventure books you read as a child. Ok, I didn't read many, but I read lots of fairy tales and those are mostly the same thing. Scary things happened in those stories: evil spells, enchanted forests, goblins, etc. It wouldn't be an adventure without the scary stuff, and, in the end, it was always worth it.
   Life, then, is a grace adventure. Adventure because it's full of crazy, exciting, scary, weird stuff. Grace because we've been given the perfect amount for every minute of un-expected adventure. I can't help but close with a Winnie-the Pooh quote, a pithy prod to go and find your own  boots and the accompanying adventure-
       “When you see someone putting on his Big Boots, you can be pretty sure that an Adventure is going to happen.” 
 Or, maybe, it could be said another way:
      "Therefore put on the full armor of God...with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the Gospel of peace" (Ephesians 6:13 & 15, NIV). 

   
  



 
 


   

749 Words

     I've hardly written over the past couple months. The words just weren't there. I hate not having words because I can't stand trying to push past that barrier. So I don't.

    Maybe I wasn't totally truthful: I wrote a ton. I just didn't finish 90% of it. There's a litany of drafts on my blog dashboard and a scattering of them in my journal, but they never seemed quite right. And I can't finish something if I don't know where I'm going.

    Even now, the first sentence you read? I re-typed it 10 different ways in 3 minutes. I'll probably re-type it again before I'm done. If I ever finish.

    School breaks are lovely things for sleeping and not doing much, but horrible things for thinking. With no 8' by 11' To-Do list governing my hours, I had time for lots and lots of thoughts. So many thoughts I couldn't write them all down or trace them to completion. I began to wish I was multiple persons so I could direct each one of me to compose my ideas into neat, 750 word bundles. At the moment there are several optional endings for this post in a puzzle box in my head. It's like those horrible adventure activity books at the dentists where

 If you would like our hero to go to the jungle, turn to page 53.

 If you would like to see what happens at the volcano, turn to page 20.

I hated those because some part of me thought it was necessary to find each and every story, along with the inevitable ending, in those books. And it took forever.

   The same part of me that needed every part of the story wants just the right combination of words for everything. As funny and possibly cliche as it sounds, I would like to be a writer. I would like CS Lewis and Truman Capote to inhabit my pen (or keyboard) and change the world with my words. But I am the writer who doesn't write.

   The ever-relevant A.A. Milne said: “Pay attention to where you are going because without meaning you might get nowhere.” Going nowhere is not a biblical idea. We are commanded to run the race, fight the good fight. Neither of those are accomplished by merely sitting.

    A nobleman went into a far country to receive for himself a kingdom and then return. He left his servants with the instructions, "Engage in business until I come." Each was given a certain amount of money proportionate to his capabilities. The nobleman returned, calling each servant to him in turn and inspecting their profit. The last servant came to him, timidly, a small amount of cash crumpled up in a dirty handkerchief.  "Lord, here is your mina, which I kept laid away in a handkerchief; for I was afraid of you."  (Paraphrase of Luke 19: 11-21). 

   I have been given my own 'minas' in a sense, to invest in the kingdom. I can't bury them for fear of doing wrong or of not being good enough. There's another parable in Luke about a dishonest manager. Facing the loss of his job and the inevitable poverty that would follow, he lowered the debts of certain of his boss's clients in the hopes that when he was down and out they would return the favor. Luke says his master "commended" him- not for his dishonesty, but for his shrewdness.The manager took what he had and used it well. Granted, it was to his own advantage and not his master's. Still, the general principle applies: we aren't given certain gifts/talents to just bury. We are called to be shrewd as serpents. It takes some creative thinking and probably a fair share of risk. 

   What it doesn't take is fear of exploring whatever may be around the next corner. "For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind" (1 Tim. 1:7 NKJV). Finishing this post is a bit of commitment for me. It means I actually have to follow through on the call of action that every good persuasive essay ends with. This is my own  750 -word package. A persuasive letter to stop being afraid of things and just do them. An almost-empty 2 day stretch lays ahead, a rare thing in days lost under homework and classes. Time like this is a gift: for thinking and sitting still and figuring out where to go.

Reading, Writing, Coffee, & Surrender

         I'm a fan of online classes. They're more flexible than Gumby and make it possible to take more units. They also make it possible for me to study on my couch in the presence of  central heating, instead of in classrooms where central heating belongs in the same category as the Easter Bunny and Santa Clause. Anyways, those classes require students to type up self-introductions, answering prompts such as: "My hobby is..." My answer usually goes something like this:

     Mostly for fun I read and I write and I drink lots of black coffee. This also happens to be what I do for school- I'm a Communications major- so reading and writing and drinking coffee is probably what you'd find me doing at any given point during the day.

This semester is no exception to my reading/writing/coffee lifestyle. There  hasn't been a ton of time to just blog for fun. Over the past couple weeks, though,  I had an assignment to read through the book of Matthew and put together several informal responses for a discussion forum- I thought I would share one. The idea of surrender has been on my mind quite a bit lately, and these were some of my thoughts. ...

     In reading these chapters, the concept of dying to self kept sticking out to me. Maybe a better way to term it would be surrender, or the idea of poor in spirit. I’m thinking they all mean more or less the same thing, but I haven’t thought through it all yet.

                It starts with Jesus having compassion on the hungry- the 5,000+ hungry people following Him merely for the physical benefits. John had just died and Jesus had retreated to somewhere ‘desolate’. His cousin and dear friend had just been beheaded. Yet all these people still followed Him, and He had compassion.

                And then He walks on water. (This is related, promise!). I love this account because it is very true, yet also makes for a timely metaphor of the veritable storms of life. Jesus is there during my trials- He was there as the disciples cried out in fear in the midst of the thunder and waves-  and He reprimands, “O you of little faith, why did you doubt?” (14:31). Why do I doubt Him? Why did the disciples? For all doubt should be blotted out by the voice that proclaims: “Take heart, it is I. Do not be afraid” (14:27). I- protector, come to save, the one who controls the storm with a word and holds the molecules of the ocean together- it is He; do not be afraid. Commanding a storm with your voice is definitely a supernatural ability. Jesus was doing more than stopping the storm, He was revealing Himself as Messiah to the disciples. He was doing all this because it was His Father’s will and brought His Father glory. Nothing in His ministry was for His own glory- He had emptied Himself and surrendered His will to the Father.

                Jesus says to deny myself. To serve as He gave Himself to the 5,000 when I would have kept myself to one. The command to take up my cross is really one to surrender, to die to self. Because dying is living, giving of myself.

                Take the example of the Rich Young Ruler. He had done almost everything right. He was even double- checking, “What good deed must I do to have eternal life?” (19:16). But there was one significant factor that kept him from the Heavenly gates: he wouldn’t surrender.

                On the surface, he was just asked to give up his wealth. Of course this is an enormous request and undertaking. Typically I read this as an encounter designed to teach believers about the dangers of wealth. This is true, but there is more to it than that. It’s about the unwillingness to surrender everything- especially the idea that we can do the right combination of “good” and earn eternal life. Jesus even says it, “Why do you ask me about what is good? There is only one who is good.” (19:17).

                Who  is good. Not a thing or a deed, but a Who. That ‘Who’ is Jesus Christ, who lived out “so the last will be first and the first last” (Matthew 20:16) and “whoever would be great among you must be a servant” (Matthew 20: 26).  Jesus was a servant, absolutely everything He did was under the guidance of His Father. He is the picture of surrender. 

Chicken & Dumplings: A Slice of Life

I love Chicken & Dumplings. I have fond memories from my childhood of poking around the fat, gooey dumpling until it became many small gooey dumplings, equally distributed among bites of carrot I didn't really want to eat. Tuesday, I decided, via my loving mother drafting me as head cook for that night's meal, to make Dumplings.
I will begin with a disclaimer: my first experience with chicken was not so good. When I was 16, mom enrolled me in a serious cooking crash-course. Read: The You- can't live- on- sweets- and -rice- for- the- rest -of- your- life course. My first project, with her instructing, was to roast a chicken. The day of this endeavor was a toasty 100 degrees. All fine and good and HOT until I dropped the chicken on the floor. Yes, you read that right: I dropped the entire chicken on the floor. Let's just say my family have strong immune systems.
On to Thursday's chicken endeavor! I stared down into the sink with a whole chicken in the colander below me. I hate whole chickens. Foster Farms boneless and skinless are my forte, and, in my mind, the only sort of chicken they should produce. Here's why: whole chickens entail things such as chicken hearts, chicken livers, chicken guts. Disembowling a chicken is not my idea of a pleasant morning-time activity. It's not as if Foster Farm's is lazy and doesn't take the time to remove the unwanted detritus. No, they take the guts out and then put them back in. I am still mystified as to why exactly they do this. At the very least, they could have the chickens with hearts in tact for those who want them, and the gut-less ones for squeamish people like me.
Enough with that. I gutted the chicken and stuck it in the pot, happy to know the worst was over. Right. Time comes to remove the chicken from the pot and shred it. No big deal. As soon as I manage to lift the ungainly thing out, it splits. Lying their in the sink it looks like something of the cover of "Chicken Undead: Editor's cut, Unrated." Or maybe some sort of rotting zombie head. I shredded the thing and pondered how familiar I was becoming with chicken anatomy.
The rest was easy as pie, and I got my dumplings. I even made new fond memories in my adulthood of cooking the undead chicken and then enjoying it during a Once Upon A Time marathon with my corny-tv-watching-Partner-in-Crime. Here's to happy memories and slices of life and Christmas break!

{This is my family, and I like them a lot. My best friend took the picture. I like her a lot, too}

It's one o' clock in the morning and freezing. 3-blankets-and-tea-freezing. At least in my room, anyway.

As yesterday-or the day before yesterday, since technically it's Saturday- was Thanksgiving, I've been thinking quite a bit about thankfulness.

People are broken. Broken and torn up by sin, battling constantly-most the times on the verge of being just plain worn out. No amount of super glue, duct tape, or glossy varnish can hold us together or pretty up decay. Even if duct tape is a miracle-worker. Holiday's are funny things because they are generally harbingers of joy and delight and all manner of colored lights and yet, simultaneously, the harshest backdrop to the brokenness around us. I've never really understood why.

Thanksgiving then: a holiday set aside specifically for the purpose of gratitude. This is easy when presented with turkey and cranberry sauce and sweet potato casserole. Also, Christmas (since as soon as Thanksgiving/s done I break out The Carpenter's Christmas, I might as well blog about it too): a holiday for remembering and celebrating the birth of Christ. Somewhat harder to do when surrounded by mounds of glitter-y wrapping, unless you remember the outlasting glitter of eternal glory with Christ. Two holidays: an entire month to be lost in enough sugar to rival a snow storm, in ribbons and tinsel and pine needles, in jingle bells and Christmas carols over-played in Macy's. Time spent forgetting instead of remembering.

Maybe this is only my experience, but sin always seems more apparent around the holidays. Maybe it's lack of sleep and lack of space on the calendar, or maybe it's because black is easier seen against the glow of the most wonderful time of year. Either way, I see it. This is how I remember.

I cannot be held together by glooey bits of tape or triple shots of espresso, as much as I wish and think I can during finals. I cannot be thankful only in the presence of a turkey. I cannot celebrate Jesus' birth only in the light of a Christmas tree.

I'm held together by grace. I need to be thankful in the gritty moments. I need to remember Jesus' birth because I sin. Because of all the brokenness in and around me, I have cause to celebrate. True cause, because I am free from it.

I told you I was thinking about thankfulness. I am thankful for remembering and God who reminds.

{Some other things I'm thankful for: friends and Crixia Cakes and Berkeley and Coldplay and my brother who is better with directions than I am}

Follow the Leader

{My brother and I, goofing off in the food prep room and studying intelligent things involving lots of numbers}

"We have slipped into an adventure of our own unmaking. We play the game of our lives, indeed, the game of life. And it is meant to be played by exuberant, daring, and fun-loving amateurs."

~Terry Lindvall

This is one of my favorite quotes right now. An adventure of my own unmaking- life, this month, this weekend, today- is an adventure. One that I could not create.

Conference. Cupcakes. Coffee. Need I say more? These three words sum up the last two days, though I suppose you could throw in a heavy dose of Pascal and his lovely triangle and call it good.

I don't really know where to lead smoothly into my idea, so I'm just going to jump right in. Call it a sugar rush, if you like. (Or possibly a crash).

Have you ever played follow the leader?

Let's call that transition a crash...

It's the game every kid plays to make dull walks exciting and every teacher plays to get their students to do what they want. Me? I hadn't played in years, but I wasn't facing another ten minute walk back to the dorms in awkward silence, so I turned around to my girls and said, "Ok, we're going to play Follow the Leader!"

The stares I got were incredible:

"What. "

"I've never played follow the leader...."

"In front of the cafeteria?- In front of all these people??"

"Um, yes. It'll be fun!" I'm not sure my enthusiasm for the game carried over. Regardless, the ten minute walk became more of a 15-minute hop-skip-twirl-fly-like-a-plane jaunt. I'm sure it made quite a funny picture: 13 girls weaving and winding through 100 other people, the movements of the leader slowly disintegrating into bent-over giggles by person 9. No one in the back could really tell what the leader was doing, so we just sort of made it up and stumbled along.

Now making it up and stumbling along in game of Follow the Leader is all fine and good, but what about in real life? Really, if you think about it, life is a game of Follow the Leader. As a follower of Christ, I am supposed to imitate Him perfectly. Just as if I was in a line and the leader was pretending to fly, I would pretend to fly. As I end up 1 person back, 2, 3, 4, 5, I start to lose sight. Movement is slower and sloppier and, towards the end, isn't much like imitation at all.

I heard one conference session this weekend, but the illustration of us as believers Following the Leader- Following Christ- stuck with me. So I come back to my quote: life is an adventure. My life is an adventure of Christ's making.

Exuberant.

Daring.

Fun-loving.

Amateur.

I love these words! They're full of life and color and wonder and grace. We can dare to follow Christ, knowing He provides the grace for us to do so. And as His children, we are commanded to be like Him. It takes exuberance, because sometimes imitation is on the very bottom of our to-do list. Exuberance is defined as abounding in vigor, and following is vigorous work. Fun- loving? Yes, because there are too many surprising twists and turns along the way that I am convinced would sometimes shatter the soul if it were not for the gift of laughter. And because life abundant is a gift of grace to rejoice in! Finally, amateur. This is my favorite. This is grace. We were not chosen for our excellent skills of mimicry. For if it were so, we might as well just do it on our own thank-you-very-much. We were chosen because we were bad followers. Horrible, actually, because we weren't even following- we were running the other way!

Here I am then, full of hope and amateurishly living life and loving it in in a way I hope can point only to Christ. I've tried not following. Not aggressively turning around and running the other way of course, but passively. Slipping behind one person and another until I lose sight. Following doesn't come easy. It doesn't come in a happy cup of feel-good tea alongside a cupcake and sunshine and roses. Sometimes it does. A lot of times, though, it comes with vigor.

It comes with a hard days work where you purposed to wake up on time to get things done.

It comes with setting aside time to learn how to follow.

It comes with an investing attitude- choosing to invest time wisely, choosing to invest in people.

It comes with exuberance and crazy-fun and sleepy-happy and one humongous dose of amateur.

{Hooray for conference, coffee, and cupcakes!!}

Confetti from the Sky

I'm in denial that it's already October. I'm in denial that my mind is currently living in November, and that an entire month became booked in the space of a weekend. There it is though, disintegrating planner and all.

Funny thing though- as full-speed-ahead as life is right now-, I'm oddly detached from it. Not detached from it in a negative sense at all, but a sort of transcendence beyond the chaos. The sort of feeling that comes from the realization that being caught up in all the 'to-do's would just about drown you, and so you just live in the grace for the moment. Not in the grace for tomorrow's 6 am to 11 pm schedule (you don't have that yet), not in the grace for the homework project tonight (because it's only 2 pm), not in grace for anything 4 years down the road (especially since you don't even know where you'll be!)- no, just grace for today. For right now.

It's scrawled on my wrist, 'grace for today,' to fight the constant desire to know- to know more or less how my entire life will work out.

That's ridiculous.

It was phrased once that God doesn't burden us with knowing His exact path in life for us. He has one, for sure, and He's told all I need to know: His will is for me to know Him. To know and love and glorify. So there it is, the grey ink reminding me to not fret about tomorrow. Reminding me to enjoy this moment for all the wonder it holds.

The other night we were reading Jonathon Edwards after dinner. He was talking about time, about our lives, and how, when we stand before God and look back at all we've done, what will we tell Him?

Time. It goes too fast. Here though, I'm going to take that back. Because time goes exactly the speed God wants it to. Isn't it my own flurry of activity and rush letting time slip through tired hands? My own sin filling it with things better left undone? My own in-attention causing me to wonder where it went?

Confetti came from the sky today. Multitudes of clouds un-furled sheets of iridescent, symphonic rain. Earthy, spicy-I could almost taste the clean in the air. A new season was ushered in as stacatto downpours peppered students mad-cap dashing for their classes. There was an awe and wonder in it all. The newness of the rain that caused a few to set aside textbooks and lean against the doorframe, forgetting the dates and names of history tests to revel in the rain. Grace came in the rain.

Those are my 10-to-11 musings. My hopes to stand before God and not have tell Him I missed my life because it went too fast. My prayer to seek grace in the right-now and not always be tripping and falling my way into tomorrow, scrambling for what I can't have yet.

" ...if you listen real close, you can hear them whisper their legacy to you. Go on, lean in. Listen, you hear it? - - Carpe - - hear it? - - Carpe, carpe diem, seize the day boys, make your lives extraordinary." John Keating Dead Poets Society

Quiddity

Quiddity: it's my new favorite word.

{ quid-di-ty: (noun) whatever makes something the type that it is: essence }

The Quiddity of Life

Coffee shop voices: the hum of the espresso machine, the chime of coffee mugs, murmers of conversations- drown out the sound of my typing. Cracks climb the creamy wall and my mind climbs out the window into the sunshine and lull of Berkeley in the early afternoon. Thoughts leave my fingers and find completion within a word, a sentence, a paragraph.

Leaving the House:

"Are you ready yet?" keys rattle at my door, an expectant face behind them.

"It's not 1:15," I reply under an avalanche of shoes.

"No, really, it's time to go!" Urgency

"No, really, it's not!" Found the shoes.

"I'm in the ca-aaar." door slams as he drags out his words. He likes to be early.

7:55 AM: Quiet. Gray sky, gray cement. Hushed and sleepy faces. Gray carpet, gray desk. Soft thumps of textbooks on desks. Coffee mugs raised as pillars on each desktop. Voices barely raised. People barely awake.

By the Kitchen Counter: It's one of my favorite places- leaning against the cool edge, my body eased awake by the ice of the tile floor and the steam curling from the battered Little Mermaid mug in my hands. Standing by it, confirming my belief that folding melted chocolate into pretty much anything is one of the most wonderful things in the world. Wiping it down, clean and silky once the remnants of 3 sleepytime teas are gone.

Maps:

"It's easy. I looked at the map," Malcolm looks at me, waiting for a response.

"That's nice."

"Ok, so," his hand waves aimlessly out the window, sunglasses cover his eyes as he coolly explains a massive web of directions. "Didn't you look at the map- see, the roads converge like this, see" he bumps my arm and makes a weird fish-like shape with his hands. No. I don't see.

"No, I didn't look at the map." I hate maps.

"How did you not look at a map? Didn't you get directions? How did you get the directions??" To describe his tone as shocked is an understatement. Apparently, looking at maps is as normal an activity for him as, say, eating.

"I got them from google maps. Like I always do."

"Right, you looked at a map!"

"No. I looked at the written directions next to the map." I win. Or not. He sighed loudly, I'm sure ashamed at my ineptness when it came to maps.

Books: Stacks and stacks and stacks. On the bed, under the bed, by the bed. Textbooks dishelved across two shelves. Everything else arranged by color. Pages wrinkly from water- summers spent by the pool and the ocean; fairytale after fairytale bound with childhood magic; battered second-hand Shakespeare, smudged with late Friday night scribbles and chocolate; black mysteries tinged on the edges from coffee- they couldn't be put down, no matter how late. So many stories helping to make mine.

Night: Microwave beeps. The milk is foaming and bubbly. "What did he say?" I shout from the kitchen, peering through to the tv. 4 of us occupying 2 couches along with pillows and blankets and cats. "Did they really just do that? Really?"

"SHHHH." Dad doesn't like commentary. Clattering: Malcolm finds the ice cream. "SHHHH" from the rest of us. Somehow he has managed to reach the decibel of "elephant herd" while getting his dessert. He's gifted. 10:00 pm. Dad pronounces it midnight. Some retreat to sleep. Me? Balanced book and mug and cat on my lap. Only 100 more pages. Empty mug now on the window sill, Big Dipper twinkling behind it. The silence of sleep. Glow of lamplight. Page turns. Outside reaches a hazy color only achieved at 11. Goodnight.

{ quid-di-ty: (noun) whatever makes something the type that it is: essence }

The Good I've Got

Sunday night I set my alarm for 5:20. 5:20. Usually any alarm set before 6 means I get to do something exciting, such as going to the airport. But today it meant I was going to the gym. Black- deep, dark, thick- was the first thing I saw. The next thing was Malcolm’s face telling me he was going back to bed instead of suffering along with me at the gym. Just as a little background: I've never been to a gym before. Most the stuff in there looks pretty similar to what I imagine the Spanish Inquisition may have used- and all I’ve ever seen of treadmills are the YouTube videos of people falling off of them. At 5:30 in the morning, I was pretty sure that was destined to be me. I got through it without incident, however, and 2 hours later I was in the car arguing with Malcolm over whether or not it was a viable option to listen to Pink before 8 am. I (barely) made it through U.S. History, escaped to Sweetie Pies for café au lait, and made it back in time to find a spot in the madhouse known as the NVC parking lot before Theatre 100. Lunch break. Homework. Read. Email. Class. Home. Breathe.

Bright- not the soft buttery light bright, but a hot, white blaze- rivaled with my alarm this morning. Today I don’t have to go to class. Today is an everything day. Homework-clean-errands-read-write-everything day.

Wednesday: Monday’s twin.

Thursday: another Everything day.

Friday: Happy-Weekend(!) day.

In the great scheme of things, most of my time is filled with pretty normal stuff: classes, homework, essays, conversations, losing paperwork, driving, novels, writing. Mundane.

Is it really, though- mundane? I’m not so sure I want to confine life under the constrains of those powerful 7 letters. As soon as any day-in-day-out becomes labeled ‘mundane’ it tends to remain there. And before I know it, whole slices of time are lost in the whirlpool of ‘everyday life’ and forgotten. Gone, with only the thrilling left to occupy. And when the thrilling becomes dull? Time is rushed- rushed for the next big thing, rushed to finish what doesn’t seem to count anymore, rushed and gone. Never to be seen again.

I haven't decided if then I should seek the extraordinary in the ordinary, or merely take joy in the mundane things. Maybe both. Either way, I never want today- or any day for that matter- to remain just another day.

Mondays, then- instead of treadmills and driving to school and wasting away in History class- hold the beauty of a black sky and the stillness before the world wakes up; bring the laughter that comes when Malcolm gives me his logic for driving around with a dead black rose on our dash; inspire thankfulness for the means to go to school.

" 'You could send your soul after the good you had expected, instead of turning it to the good you had got. You could refuse the real good; you could make the real fruit taste insipid by thinking of the other' " (Perelandra)

* http://hannah-tomorrowisamondaymorning.blogspot.com/p/1000.html *

Life at the Moment

{2 of the crazy people living in my house right now}

I am thankful for cream + sugar+ egg yolks+ cornstarch because together they make custard.

And there's nothing more wonderful than watching melted chocolate ravenously engulf silky cream custard as they slowly become one rich and wonderful entity.

I am thankful for leftovers. For the 4 leftover shortbread pieces that give mom and me an excuse to brew tea and sit down and watch E.R. We haven't done that in awhile.

I am thankful for laundry. For a washer and dryer that function as they are supposed to. For the assurance my clothing will not be swimming in a soupy mess of un-drained water when I go to dry it.

On the other hand I am thankful for the washing machine that never drained. Because though it left me with soggy clothes and $1.50 less, it also left me with a happy memory of being doubled over with laughter- if it weren't for nebulous laundry rooms and equipment, laundry parties would be so much less fun.

I am thankful for having to figure out how to share a gas tank with my little brother. I'm glad I have a little brother to share it with.

I am thankful for gray mornings with pearly light.

I am thankful for the very last cup of black coffee. For every drop of bittersweet and warm. For the line of my favorite mugs on my windowsill that represent night hours spent writing and lazy mornings spent doing nothing much.

I am thankful for friends that live far away and for spontaneous Skypes.

I am thankful for friends that live 5 min. away who have a mutual love of strawberries and awkward symbols and who are not-so-great at Rock Band but rock "Walking on Sunshine" like we composed it.

I am thankful for the 5 crazy boys { My 2 little brothers and 3 who think they are }who have practically lived here the past 2 weeks, drinking all the coffee and taking up all the couch space and filling all the silence.

I am thankful to be rooted and grounded in the Solid Rock, and so to be able to offer thanks.

Tonight I thought a lot about tomatoes. Tomatoes.

I was making the salad tonight, pretty much like any other night. First of all, let me just make it clear how happy I am 'salad' no longer means iceberg lettuce,watery tomatoes and weird croutons drowning in honey mustard just to make it taste. Other than that, there's nothing much exciting about making salad. There I was, cutting up cherry tomatoes and musing over what generally disagreeable things they were. To start, the tomato plants harbor the mother of all Godzilla-like spiders. This alone is enough to persuade me to relinquish tomatoes. And then they taste weird. In spite of all these detractors, God could have made every single tomato the same shade of red.

Really.

If you stop to think about it, there's no reason for tomatoes to be anything other than red. There's no reason for them to have color at all. But as I cut them up and tossed them on the salad, I couldn't help but thank God for color. For the tiny jewels bleeding saffron and the ruby-red half moons cresting over the tops of the romaine leafs, for the sunset coloring that pervaded a dingy cutting board, making it beautiful.

I'm still wondering why I thought so much about a fruit I don't even like.

"Count your blessings" goes the old saying.

Some days blessings are brilliant neon signs in the middle of your life. Most days, though, they're brilliant and tiny tomatoes causing me to give thanks.

Coffee and Cinnamon Rolls

As much as I abhor airports, I've found some of my best memories are made in them. Saturday morning all of the staff packed up in the vans one last time to head off to Philadelphia International Airport and then home. For the most part I held up some sense of put-togetherness on the 45 min. trip there, and then promptly began to lose it as we pulled up to the terminals. 2 hours of sleep were a lovely thing to blame for the absolute puddle of tears I became, but in all truth I had just been hit with the realization of how much everyone I was saying goodbye to had become a part of my life. Goodbyes are messy and wet and mostly incoherent (at least on my part) when exchanged between dear friends. In the midst of all the hugging and sobbing, though, there was something beautiful. As cheesy as it may sound, our summer ending and all the heart-wrenching goodbyes it entailed was the result of a love that goes beyond understanding.

It would make sense that in over the course of 8 weeks, spending 24/7 with each other and sharing almost everything, people would come together. It just happens naturally. What made the difference, though, was that these people were "the excellent ones" (Ps. 16:3) who were made that way by Christ because it delighted Him to do so. Every Sunday night at t-time (a time where students are able to chill and consume copious amounts of Cheez-Its while debriefing the day), I told my girls that. I followed with the challenge to treat those around them as excellent and to delight in them as Christ did- because the knowledge of Christ choosing to make us excellent beings and to delight in us in order to please Himself should so thrill and draw our souls to loving Him that all our love spills over on to others. Here then, I find the love that passes understanding. Christ's love was filling each of us as staff, and so was poured out among our team. We loved each other with a love not our own as we saw Christ being manifested in each other.

I come back to goodbyes. Several hours after the team had divided among numerous airlines and had been separated by the 'wailing wall'( as Lydia aptly dubbed the obnoxious glass wall between us and security), Lydia and I sat in the Phoenix airport waiting for her flight. We had come off our first flight exhausted and eager for coffee. Cinnabon was the closest thing to her gate, so she came up to me as I stood with our bags and said "Let's have coffee and cinnamon rolls." Those 15 minutes in that dingy airport with mediocre coffee hold one of my favorite memories of the summer: to sit with one of my dearest friends and share the joy of completing a good summer- fully knowing its goodness and simultaneously its time to end- was total joy and satisfaction. Even in saying goodbye and joking about joining her in Idaho just so I wouldn't have to do that anymore, it was wonderful to know our relationship went beyond camp and summer and distance.

So here I sit in my bed with my cat, happy and content. Being home is good. Hopefully over the next couple weeks I'll be able to share some of my stories and thoughts from the summer, but for now- bed, because sleep is also good. Very good.

Staff Training: WVA 2011

I'm riding once again in a Worldview 15 passenger van, traveling through Kansas. I'm not sure what number state this is. :)

Staff training finished up not even an hour ago. I'm pretty sure we all just stepped off the plane into Tulsa and into so many loving arms. "Surreal" is how I would describe the week. Training was held on the Oklahoma Weslyan campus ,where my team had spent 2 weeks the previous year. I kept expecting to see their faces or hear their laughs as I passed certain spots, jerking quickly back to the present. I realized I was transferring the relationships from the end of last summer and expecting them to materialize among 18 strangers. A friend told me I couldn't re-create what I had never created in the first place. So over games resulting in multiple bruises, lots of cafeteria food (for me this was a steady diet of yogurt and granola, waffles, pb&j, soft serve ice cream and salad), and rolling numerous t-shirts, our team has started to come together. We also discovered a mutual love of good, strong, black coffee and are so equipped with 2 drip coffee filters and 1 french press.

A lot of logistics were discussed, from setting up banners and small groups to skits and opening day procedures. A morning Bible study held by one of the camp directors explored the theme of mercy throughout the Psalms. My mindset coming into training wasn't really one of dependence on God- I was so excited to be at camp and wrapped up in doing a 'good job' I lost some of my reasons for being there. I was hit soundly over the back of the head within these Psalms, facing God- whose power and might and justice should terrify us- and realizing my absolute helplessness before Him. But (and this is a wonderful thing) His steadfast love and faithfulness precede Him. And God keeps the promises He makes, not because any of our actions merit it, but because He is God and completely faithful to His word. We walk then with strength and dignity, knowing that through no action of our own the God of the Universe is behind us.

Tonight we had a girls' night: Olive Garden and Starbucks, where we quoted "Emperor's New Groove" like nobody's business and then had the opportunity to share our testimonies with each other. Sitting around that table in the warm Missouri air I could almost feel God's grace around us. Each of our stories was different in a way, but each one there had been gripped mightily by the grace of God. It was just the beginning of some of the truly awe-some things God will do this summer, and I revel in it.

Pray For Us :

1. Continue to pray for unity: again, our team is still learning to know each other and work together, now with the addition of running camp.

2. Pray for wisdom: For some of us, it's the very first week of camp ever; others, their first time staffing; still more us coming back for the 2nd or more year. However, the camp is still new, the students are different and we all need wisdom in leading it and them.

3. Pray for the students: Pray all the knowledge and truth they learn this week will be strongly tempered with grace. Pray a deeper knowledge, and then love, of God will be rooted deep in their hearts.

Spring and Camp Preparation

Spring has once again worked its magic and found a way to cram an event into every nook and cranny of these bi-polar May days. The weather simply refuses to co-operate and rain rapidly chases sunshine away for days at a time, only to give way to the sun again. It doesn't stop, and neither do I. I haven't stopped since April, May is manic. Beach trips, coffee shops, ladies' luncheons, girls' nights, brownie sundae Sunday's, graduations, retirement parties and so goes the circus. Oh, and finals, too. I managed to incorporate Calvin and Hobbes into my psychology final. I was immensely pleased with myself for finding a textbook example of the Pre-operational period in Cognitive Development. Running on a combination of coffee and adrenaline and sugar seems to be par for the course these last 2 weeks. This week, I'm heading full throttle into summer and pulling together all the last minute odds-and-ends before camp on Sunday.

Tonight I decided I would crawl into bed while the family was otherwise occupied and just read. I've been doing a ton of that lately, mostly for school and then because I want to finish all these books before I leave for camp. Otherwise they end up on the I-became-otherwise-occupied-so-abandoned-you-to-remain-forever-here-shelf. Those of you who read undoubtedly have a similar sort of location for those books. I just finished up Unfashionable by Tullian Tchividjian this afternoon and my next stop is Think by John Piper. At the same time I'm trekking my way through 993 pages of glorious fantasy in The Wise Man's Fear. Honestly, this is my favorite item on my "To-Do-Before-Camp" list. I love reading, especially in my backyard with iced coffee and strawberries. (I'm considering making that a part of my daily routine). Another thing on my to-do list is finishing the 5th season of E.R. My friends inform me this is old school, but I love the show and mom and I are trying desperately to finish before I go. Also on the list are important things like packing.....but that's boring, so I won't elaborate.

Sunday morning the sunday school lesson was on Psalm 16- God is for Us. Psalm 16 is one of my favorite Psalms, and I'm going to try and memorize it this summer while I'm away at camp.

"I say to the Lord, 'You are my Lord; I have no good apart from you.' As for the saints in the land, they are the excellent ones, in whom is all my delight." (vs. 2-3).

Two things come to mind reading these verses:

Firstly, there comes a point during camp where you truly say "I have no good apart from God"- the point where you're so exhausted emotionally, physically; when you don't want to think through yet another mealtime conversation; where you have such a tendency towards irritability it's obvious any good is not from you. This is not what I want. I want to be able to say I have no good apart from God right now. When my only problems are how to pack my suitcase under 50 lbs and finishing required reading before camp.

Secondly, "saints...in whom is all my delight." I meet a lot of people throughout the course of 8 weeks. Fellow saints. Some I rub shoulders with from 7 am to 11:30 pm for 5 days straight. Those are my students- my girls. The rest are my teammates. We work together all day, every day. Sometimes we rub each other the wrong way. Mostly, though, we learn to work as a team. From the very moment we step onto the Oklahoma Weslyan Campus, it is my prayer that my team sees each other as "excellent ones" in whom to delight.

For the next 8 weeks, then, I will travel all over the East Coast with Worldview Academy. As much as it is possible, I will update you weekly. This will probably be in the form of pictures more than writing, but we'll see. In the meantime, I ask that you would keep the Northeast team in your prayers. We need as much of it as we can get, as it is only God's grace that keeps us running strong for His glory. Here are a few specific things you can be praying for during our first week of staff training:

1. Pray for unity in our team. This first week sets the tone for all 7 weeks of camp and is crucial to developing the sort of team that will encourage, edify, and build up its members.

2. Pray for energy. For all of us it is an adjustment to a non-stop schedule, but for those of us coming from the West Coast (me!), it's also an adjustment to the time zone, which is 2 hrs. ahead of CA.

3. Pray for love. Amidst all the logistics of camp crammed into 4 short days, it's easy to let quiettimes and my desire to love God fall to the wayside. I get so caught up in doing and glorifying I forget I must first love God before I can glorify Him. Pray then, for love, that the faculty and directors and staff would not forget why we have gathered together in the first place.

My room is in turmoil at the moment. Everything needing to be packed is half in my suitcase, half out. I am excited! I am confident God will work marvelously this summer, in Worldview's three teams, in all the students attending camp- and I can't wait to see it. I can't wait to share it with you, thank you for all your prayers!

Speaking of Joy

"...The salt of joy is sorrow, a touch of tears. If we in our present mortal state met joy in her fullness, we would drown in laughter. We would be blinded and struck dumb by gladness and mirth. This may sound a pleasant way to die, but it probably would be undendurable. To be struck by unmanageable shafts of infinite sweetness would quake and crack our being into a billion pieces- it would break our hearts. Thus, instead of being explosive in us, joy is calmed and watered down like a potent wine with a note of gravity, loss, and sorrow."

~Suprised by Laughter: The Comic World of C.S. Lewis by Terry Lindvall (emphasis my own)

Day-to-Day

March 14, 2011

I didn't want to get up this morning. I feel that this is somewhat a common theme among my posts lately, and I apologize, but it is also rather a common theme in my life. I wish it was exclusive to my blog world. I actually went back to bed after being up for an hour and rolled myself into something that looked like a caterpillar, hoping I wouldn't have to wake up until Spring Break started. The alarm cruelly shattered my delusion. I thought if I started listing off all the things I was thankful for in today (which started out something like "Thank you God that I'm breathing and was capable of opening my eyes this morning...") and taking to God everything I wasn't thankful for, I would actually start to be thankful and stop whining. It took about 30 minutes. At that point I was kicking myself for not being joyful because things weren't going my way. I tend to exaggerate when I'm tired, so, for instance, things like tests and speeches=instant death. As I said, exaggeration. I had to stop for a moment and tell my self I wasn't going to die, the day would be over soon enough, and if my hope was anchored firmly in Christ it should not waver because of speech class.

Now it's almost 7 pm and- obviously- I haven't died. Today was actually a really good day. I got a good grade on an exam, got through my speech without forgetting much important, received a wonderful gift from a friend, and got Over-the-Top and Sonic with another. This brings me to God's goodness. I realize that today became a good day and so an easy one for me to be joyful in. It really didn't start out that way, though, and I honestly didn't deserve any of it in the least. I've been reading through Knowing God by J.I. Packer for my Theology 1 class and one of the chapters I read tonight was on God's goodness and severity. Packer is talking about the most prevalent facet of goodness being generosity, and this is what he says:

Generosity means a disposition to give to others in a way which has no mercenary motive and is not limited by what the recipients deserve but consistently goes beyond it. ... Generosity is, so to speak, the focal point of God's moral perfection; it is the quality which determines how all God's other excellencies are to be displayed. ... Theologians of the Reformed school use the New Testament word grace (free favor) to cover every act of divine generosity..." (Packer 162).

It's the 'free favor' part that gets me. Free. Favor. It makes me think of party favors, except you only get the favor if you attend the party. God's grace is not just if you attend the party. It's favor. For free.

March 25, 2011

I love the sound of rain. It's a good thing, because for the past week it has been pouring. I try to think of rain as 'confetti from the sky,' if only because it makes going to school in a downpour a little less....gray. Depressing? Bleak? Wet? Anyways, I still love the sound, especially when I am indoors and warm. The best part, though, is after the storm when everything is green and glittering with the wet and so fresh and alive. After all the oppressive clouting from the rain, the hills still rise triumphant and once-blossomed trees now display fresh coats.

April 15, 2011

41 days until the last day of Freshman year. 43 until camp. *happiness* Mom and Dad got me a book for my birthday, Suprised by Laughter: The Comic World of C.S. Lewis, and as soon as I finish this post I'll go start it. On one of the opening pages a quote stuck out, a defiant one I can only imagine came from a sad man: "If any cleric or monk peaks jocular words, such as provoke laughter, let him be anathema" (Ordinance, Second Council of Constance, 1418). I'm not sure how familiar he was with Psalm 100:1- "Serve the Lord with gladness." It is good to serve God with joy, because if we are not joyful in Him no due glory is given. A thought has been lulling in the back of my brain- God's glory and joy are inextricably intertwined. And if your joy is merely circumstantial, it isn't really glorifying because it's not joy in God, merely joy in the circumstance. And that is another post.