So this weekend has been interesting... from eating ice cream out of a kiddie pool to doing that arm thing during songs in front of a ton of people I don't know (that probably didn't make sense in writing, oh well). Anyway, it was a good weekend. On another note, I've been missing last year again. Like, in the fall of this school year I really missed all the craziness and randomness and good friendships of last school year. But then by the time November came around I had another group of friends that I hung out with almost every night. And then I came back from Christmas break and things just aren't the same. Like I don't see them all the time anymore and even when I do it's just different. It's hard to explain. And I realized too that this year I have more groups of friends, like I don't just hang out with the same three or four people like I did last year. But I also don't have the closeness that I had last year. There was something special about it... I'll never forget all the good and bad times we had together. And spring break is coming up and it's going to be the first time I've seen Ryan since October. So I think it will be good to have the three of us together again, but at the same time it will be really weird, because I haven't talked to either of them much lately. Actually it seems like I haven't talked to any of my friends, here, home, away, any of them very much lately. And I really miss all the random times. It was good to be home for my birthday last week, good to have a little of that randomness... like going to Adam's concert, that was cool. But nothing beats Kentucky. I've been thinking about Kentucky a lot lately. I really think that by far is in my list of Top 5 Memories Of All Time... definately. And it's not something that could ever, ever be repeated. So to all my friends reading this, I love you all, but an extra special love to those of you who have really, really impacted my life: Krista, Lisa, Ryan, Holly, and Katie - I don't know where I would be without all of you!

So I had a paper due today at 10:00 am. And you know me, little miss procrastinator. Well, yesterday morning I woke up at 5:00 am because the heat blows right on my bed and I was so hot I woke up, and couldn't fall back asleep. So by the time late night came, which is when I normally would have written my paper, I was sleepy. So I went to bed around 12:30 and decided to wake up at 5:00 am this morning to write my paper. So I did, and I finished the paper at 6:30. I don't have class until 9:00 am so I decided to go back to sleep until 8:30 am. Then when I woke up at 8:30, I felt really relaxed and refreshed, more so then if I had just woken up at 8:30 without waking up earlier, which is weird. But I decided, why not do this regularly? Wake up early in the morning and spend some time with God, and then go back to bed for a few hours. I'm gonna try it for a week or so and see how it goes. If I can't get up, then I'll stop, but it's worth a shot, aye?

I'll be twenty-one on Saturday. It's a scary thought. Scary because, even though logically I know that I'm still young and "have my whole life ahead of me", part of me can't help but feel that I'm old. Older, at least, and that's of course true. But I feel younger than a lot of my peers, even the ones that really are younger than me. Today I've been questioning whether or not I've been living up to my full potential. Am I really everything that I can be? Is it possible to be everything that I can be? I stated thinking about the future a little bit too. I usually don't, I'm very much a "live in the moment" kind of person, but I started thinking about some stuff... a lot of my friends are doing clinicals for nursing majors and doing internships for their other majors and stuff like that. I have worked at The Chapel and that is sort of like what I want to do, but not really. I think also that I want to do some sort of family counseling or something. And I know next semester one of the classes I'll be taking will require an internship, and I am excited about that. And next year I'll be living off campus in a house, with three roommates, and I'm excited about that too. But this isn't real. It's not the "real world" - and that's scary. A lot of professions - and I think especially ones that involve counseling - take years upon years upon years to "perfect" (no one's perfect but you know what I'm saying). And I feel like no amount of classes or internships or whatever are going to really prepare me for what I want to do. Like, I LOVE my classes, don't get me wrong, and I learn a lot in them. But there is a huge difference between reading a book, writing a paper, and taking a test than there is giving someone actual sound advice, helping someone change a distructive behavior, etc. It's scary. I have two years left of college after this semester. I know I can grow and change and mature a lot in two years - I have the past two years. But can I grow and change and mature enough? Is four years (or in my case, 5) enough for anyone to really be prepared for life? Twenty-one. Twenty-one. That number keeps repeating in my head. I'm old enough to vote, to get married, to drink alcohol, to drive a car, to live without my parents. At least that's what government says. All I can do is trust in God. He asks that we love Him with all of our mind, our strength, our body, and our soul. I trust that in return he will give my mind the knowledge, give me the strength, prepare my body, and protect my soul as I venture further down the path He has set before me...

Verses to ponder...

The unfailing love of the Lord never ends! By his mercies we have been kept from complete destruction. Great is his faithfulness; his mercies begin afresh each day. I say to myself, "The Lord is my inheritance; therefore, I will hope in him!" The Lord is wonderfully good to those who wait for him and seek him. So it is good to wait quietly for salvation from the Lord.
~Lamentations 3:22-26

Random lyric...

Maybe you could take a look at yourself lately, things keep coming and I keep wondering and I start feeling the walls close in, things keep coming and I keep stumbling I start feeling strong enough to break
~Strong Enough to Break, Hanson, from the upcoming album Underneath

Our Father asks that we live in constant worship of Him. Worship is more than going to church on Sunday and singing praise songs to Him. Worship is thinking of Him all the time. If we use a song, we should have that song written in our heart and have it repeat through our thoughts all through our day. Sunday morning church is just rehearsal for the way we should live our lives. I have been working on having a song in my heart and in my mind, constantly on my thoughts. Currently I find myself identifying with the hymn "Come Thou Fount"... maybe because we did it last weekend so I've sung it a lot, but I've been keeping it my mind and heart and it really does change my attitude throughout the day to one of praise.

Come thou fount of every blessing, tune my heart to sing thy grace Streams of mercy, never ceasing, call for songs of loudest praise Teach me some melodious sonnet sung by flaming tounges above Praise His name - I'm fixed upon it, name of God's redeeming love Hither to my love has blessed me Thou hast brought me to this place and I know they hand will bring me safely home by Thy good grace Jesus saught me when a stranger Wandering from the fold of God. He, to rescue me from danger, bought me with His precious blood. O to grace how great a debtor daily I'm constrained to be Let thy goodness like a fetter bind my wandering heart to thee Prone to wander, Lord I feel it prone to leave the God I love Here's my heart, o take and seal it, seal it for thy courts above

I just had a great weekend! The group I'm in does worship for different churches, and we went to Ohio Saturday and stayed the night with some families there. Everyone was so kind and it was a blast, a great experience. Yay for mini road trips! Yay for worshipping God! Yay for the kindness of strangers! Yay for Stacy's mom (she's got it goin' on, and even though she wasn't there with us, she's here at AU now).

Simplicity

I was just thinking about simplicity... how we forget about it, and yet how amazing it is. Last night I was at Gene's house and everyone was over there, and we were all just sprawled out on the couch and floor, and I was looking around and Keri was giving Tabby a backrub, Jeremy and I were both just kinda sitting there, and Gene was helping Jon with his Spanish homework. This is the simplicity of friends. We all see it, it happens every day, we just don't pay attention to it. It's when Katie, Chris, Holly, Krista and I are sitting on the bluff on a late summer night, it's when Lisa, Ryan and I end up in Kentucky, it's when Gene randomly starts helping Jon and Keri loves on Tabby. I think it is in these moments of simplicity with our friends that God is reminding us of the simplicity of the cross. When we're with our friends sometimes we get too caught up in "is she mad at me?" or "he forgot to call" and "we're late!", etc. And it's the same with God, we spend so much time worrying "what does He want me to do" and "I forgot to read my Bible today" but we constantly need to go back to the simplicty: He loves us. He died for us. We are free.

As promised, here's some stuff from Sacred Romance, let me say again, GREAT BOOK

"Indeed, if we listen, a Sacred Romance calls to us through our heart every moment of our lives. It whispers to us on the wind, invites us through the laughter of good friends, reaches out to us through the touch of someone we love....Something...rouses an inconsolable longing deep within our heart, wakening in us a yearning for intamacy, beauty, and adventure. This longing is the most powerful part of any human personality....Sadly most of us watch the oil level in our car more carefully than we watch over the life of our heart."

The subtitle of this book is "Drawing Closer to the Heart of God" and really that's what it's about. I'm so excited to keep reading in it. †

Currently Reading
The Sacred Romance: Drawing Closer to the Heart of God
By Brent Curtis, John Eldredge



So yeah, I'm only on chapter three, but everyone needs to go out and buy Sacred Romance and read it, it's FANTABULOUS! And I almost never use that word It's a great book and I can't wait to read more of it tomorrow afternoon. It's beautifully written, and already only after two chapters I can already see that it has life-changing abilities, that is of course if I actually apply the stuff. hehe. but yeah, I've underlined a bunch of stuff, it's just a GREAT book. Maybe tomorrow sometime I'll put in a little quote from it or somethin'. Yeah, definately more on that later...

Currently Playing
Way You Move
By Outkast
see related
- I Like The Way You Move -



Today was a good day. I overslept through chapel and my only class, waking up at 1 pm, but it was grood. I mean good. And great. Great and good. Anyway, so I spent my first hour awake very sad and upset. Because I found out that my favorite band, amDrive, is no longer together. They have like 3 more concerts and then that's it, so boo on them. But then @ 2 I watched some TV, and then I did my homework, finished that around 4, then I just talked to some friends online. Around 5 I took a movie back and while I was out got some Taco Bell. I was cravin' it for some reason. Then I watched last night's American Idol with DeeDee, and then watched Friends (recorded Survivor), CSI, and then Survivor. All while scrapbooking some stuff from last fall. It was a nice, relaxing day. I'm glad tomorrow is the weekend though. YAY and Cheap Thrills - this comedy show thingy one of the Social Clubs puts on here @ AU.

yay for friends who make ya feel better just by bein' stupid at Arby's

So... that test? Totally easy! There were only 2 questions I didn't know. As far as the life-change thing, we have some time to "fix" them like make them more specific and stuff, after we spent the class time today talking about it. And he said we can totally change our mind about what we want to do, so I'm still trying to think of something that would be really good for me. He was talking today about prayer. How when we pray for someone we usually take it too lightly. I wish I could remember his exact words because they just made me totally stop and go "whoa." But it was something like Are we praying to tell God what to do or praying to ask God what we should do? God doesn't need us to tell Him what to do, He's not a vending machine where we put "prayer" in and get what we want out of it. When we pray for someone else we then have a responsibility, otherwise why are we praying for them? We had a specific example of praying for a friend who is trying to make an important decision. We can pray something like "God give her wisdom in this decision." But what was the point of us praying that when she can pray that herself? (And besides, what makes us think God wouldn't give her wisdom?) Instead, when we pray that, we have become involved, and therefore we must do something about that. We need to help that friend make the decision. Help them weigh the pro's and con's, or just do something. I dunno it sounded better when he said it, I should have taken better notes haha. I wish everyone could take this class. But I'm definately going to think more about what I'm praying for. When I pray for my friends I'm going to follow-up with them on that prayer request and do all I can for them in that area. †

I just want to start out this morning by saying it's 7:05 am and I have a test at 10:00 that I feel 134% UNprepared for. Ah well. Hahaha. I get to do a fun little project @ lunch w/ Gene though, so that'll be fun. And I have Living Christian Faith... today, so yeah. Awesome class. I just gotta figure out my life change thing before then ha. I'll keep you posted.

"I love how God can take the most nastyest thing and turn it into the most beautiful thing." ~ Wise words from my best friend [referring to mold on a rock under a waterfall, but great quote there K-Dawg!]

I'm really excited about this semester. It's going to be spiritually challenging. Last semester, for a number of reasons I won't go into right now, I was really broken. And it's in that brokenness that God can create new life, and reshape us the way He wants us to be. I feel like that is going to happen this semester. With the relationships I'm in (school, home, and far away) as well as the classes I'm in. One particular class I'm really excited about. It's called Living The Christian Faith in a Post-Modern World. It's a Psych class, and one of main assignments is to change something in our life. He just assigned it to us yesterday. He said to base it off 1 Peter 1 and he reminded us that "Christianity is not about what you are not supposed to do, it's about what you are supposed to do." You have to think positively. He gave us two examples. Lust, and drinking. For lust, he said you can't tell yourself "don't think about that girl that way" (or in my case, that guy) because it's like someone saying to you "don't think about a flying hippopotamus" because then that's all you'll be able to think about. So instead we need to think positively, a postive action we can do. In this case it would be look at the girl/guy's eyes. If you're looking at their eyes you're not lusting their body. And for the example of drinking he said not to think "I can't go to a bar" or "I can't order alchohol" instead think "I'm going to order a soda". This really put a new perspective on things, and he used some other examples in the text of 1 Peter 1 that really showed how you can easily apply scripture to your life. So I think tomorrow in class I'm supposed to know what I want to do, so today I'm going to be praying about it and reading and re-reading and reading again, 1 Peter 1.

I'm also reading Job for another one of my classes. This is such a great book. He went through all this suffering and he had no idea why, and yeah, he got mad at God, but he still loved God and he still praised God, and in all of that he did not sin. Just some things to think about...

So today in my English class (of all places) we were assigned a paper (no way!!) Anyway, we're supposed to either write our personal mission statement or a paper about which Bible character we want to model our life after (other than Jesus). And anyway, she was giving us an example of a paper one of her former students did. He said he was a lot like Joshua. Joshua was out there in the desert for 40 years waiting to lead the Isrealites into the Promised Land. This student said he felt like he also had some leadership abilities, but God was wanting him to wait to use them because He was busy preparing him for something. And that just got me thinking about my own life. What is God preparing me for? What am I supposed to wait on? And to anyone out there - if you're having problems figuring out where to use your gifts, maybe God is just telling you to wait, too.

I've been noticing lately that my brain is stimulated a lot. And sometimes I don't even know what it's about, but maybe I'll find out one of these days...