So let me be honest, I’ve not had time for many interesting musings lately. Scratch that- just as I’m writing this my 3 year-old cousin whom I’ve been babysitting 80% of the time since I got here just walked up to me with a pair of scissors (which she calls “sisters”) and her favorite stuffed animal/ blanket thingie. She thinks that cutting the “yucky” tag “out” will improve her treasure, but clearly if I were to allow her to go at it then her favorite stuffed animal would probably be ruined and all the stuffing would fall out, right?
There are so many things in our lives that we wish we could just cut out, then everything would be so much better, right? Like school, or some of our family members, or some past experiences, but all of those things made us who we are. Every experience we’ve ever had was allowed in our lives by God for some reason. What that reason is isn’t always clear but it’s there for a reason. It’s there to form us into something or urge us along this path called life towards His goal for us. Taking out those experiences and people would leave us as only shells. Those things that we don’t really want to deal with create some kind of odd balances in our lives that we can’t fully understand. But they are there for a reason.
That tag is a part of the creation of that stuffed lion. It’s not pretty, it’s not soft, and it’s not there for aesthetics, but it needs to be there for safety and informative purposes. It had a reason to be there. We are created with “Care Tags” but we are given the Bible, the word of God. In it He offers some guidance on how to take care of ourselves and those around us. When the fabric of said stuffed animal or our clothes or some other textile are stained, what do we do? We look at the care tag to see how to properly clean it. When our souls are stained or just who we are, what do we do? Do we look at the care tag we’ve been offered to see how to get clean so that our souls are pure as newly fallen snow? Why not? Usually the manufacturers know more about the fabrics they choose and used to make their product than we, the consumers do. Shouldn’t we trust our manufacturer about our care? After all, He did give us His care tag for a purpose and reason too.
Love and warm wishes!
Friday, May 27, 2011
Friday, May 20, 2011
Go in Faith
Sorry, I didn't get around to posting last week- I moved. It's crazy and I sometimes feel like I've moved into a different dimension since there's not one corn or bean field in view of my current address, but it's only for a couple a months so I'm sure I'll survive. Actually, I'm more afraid that I might actually start to like this city life. It was kind of a last minute thing. Out of how many applications/resumes for internships I have floating around out there in the industry, until the last week-ish of school, I hadn't heard back from any business. God and I had more than one chat about what He wanted me to do this summer, then I recieved my sign: I heard back from a company.
It happened so fast! In two and half weeks my bags were being packed and I was driving 400some miles and a lifestyle away from my comfortable and normal. Although the two are far from being related, I couldn't help but think of the story in Matthew when God told Joseph to get up and go. He immediately got up, took his family and fled to a different country just because God told him through an angel, to do so in a dream. No hesitation. Just trust and faith in God. Well, first off, how often does God talk to us and we hear Him? Let alone actually following His desires. Plenty of things He desires us to do are laid out for us in a book, but often we fall short of acheiving the goals He has set for us.
Taking a leap of faith like Joseph did though, is almost impossible! I mean, it would be like standing on the edge of something and hearing God say, "Go. Jump." It's the unknown. You have no idea what exactly you're getting into or what the result will be, but because God has asked you to do it, you trust Him. Wholly. Totally. You're basically flying blind, but still have complete trust in God that this leap won't end in total disaster. However it is more common for us to do what is natural and what is comfortable, rather than when God is telling us to do just the opposite.
"Christ came to make the comfortable, uncomfortable." -Matthew Kelly. We're faced with choices everyday that put us on the edge: do I jump and speak out against a nasty comment someone makes or do I sit quietly and let the moment pass because it's more normal, more comfortable? Is God trying to tell me something and I'm ignoring Him? God has led me this far, now do I jump and trust that He'll catch me? How much faith do you put in God when He's urging you to do something?
Love and warm wishes!
It happened so fast! In two and half weeks my bags were being packed and I was driving 400some miles and a lifestyle away from my comfortable and normal. Although the two are far from being related, I couldn't help but think of the story in Matthew when God told Joseph to get up and go. He immediately got up, took his family and fled to a different country just because God told him through an angel, to do so in a dream. No hesitation. Just trust and faith in God. Well, first off, how often does God talk to us and we hear Him? Let alone actually following His desires. Plenty of things He desires us to do are laid out for us in a book, but often we fall short of acheiving the goals He has set for us.
Taking a leap of faith like Joseph did though, is almost impossible! I mean, it would be like standing on the edge of something and hearing God say, "Go. Jump." It's the unknown. You have no idea what exactly you're getting into or what the result will be, but because God has asked you to do it, you trust Him. Wholly. Totally. You're basically flying blind, but still have complete trust in God that this leap won't end in total disaster. However it is more common for us to do what is natural and what is comfortable, rather than when God is telling us to do just the opposite.
"Christ came to make the comfortable, uncomfortable." -Matthew Kelly. We're faced with choices everyday that put us on the edge: do I jump and speak out against a nasty comment someone makes or do I sit quietly and let the moment pass because it's more normal, more comfortable? Is God trying to tell me something and I'm ignoring Him? God has led me this far, now do I jump and trust that He'll catch me? How much faith do you put in God when He's urging you to do something?
Love and warm wishes!
Saturday, May 7, 2011
No One Mourns the Wicked?
“Let us be glad
Let us be grateful
Let us rejoicify that goodness could subdue
The wicked workings of you-know-who
Isn't it nice to know
That good will conquer evil?.....
No one mourns the Wicked!
Now at last, she's dead and gone!
Now at last, there's joy throughout the land….
No one mourns the wicked!”
Ok, first let me start off by rejoicifying over this, my first Wicked! posting. Wicked! is amazing and let be honest that sometimes when I listen to the soundtrack I get teary eyed just hearing it and thinking about it. No need to say that it’s my absolute favorite musical! Well actually this isn’t a post about Wicked… it’s a post that was inspired by the lyrics quoted above.…
Last Monday Bin Laden “lived by the sword and died by the sword.” (Cardinal Francis George) There is no need to question how wicked and evil his actions were, and yet when I logged into Facebook I was faced with a question that I had never considered before. When I heard the news, I was on the phone, and I was completely shocked. I couldn’t believe that our armed forces had finally caught the monster that had terrified so many and murdered so many. Excitement echoed in the voices of two of my best friends as we understood the importance of what had just happened. My roommate and I quickly turned on the tv just in time to see Obama walk up to his podium and give the world an extremely important and monumental speech. The sight outside the Whitehouse was reminiscent of the sight outside Buckingham Palace just a few days earlier, but on Facebook, it was evident that not everyone was excited and rejoiceful about this man’s death.
I was almost as surprised at other people’s reactions to the news as actually hearing the news. Some of these people were clearly upset and speaking out against those who were happy about Bin Laden’s death. Before reading those statuses I never would have believed that there were people in this world who were not happy that this man, who was responsible for the murder of thousands and sowed so much hate, was dead. It shocked me. It took me a little bit to understand why someone would not be happily excited about this event, even though I continue to disagree with most of the FB postings (some of them just made no sense what so ever!).
After some time to think about it and read different quoted reactions, the response that we as Christians should have to this man’s death is something to the effect of being happy about the end of a terror, but we should not rejoice over the man losing his life. The Vatican’s official reaction was this: “Osama Bin Laden - as everyone knows - has had the gravest responsibility for spreading hatred and division among people, causing the deaths of countless people, and exploiting religion for this purpose.
Faced with the death of a man, a Christian never rejoices, but reflects on the serious responsibility of everyone before God and man, and hopes and pledges that every event is not an opportunity for a further growth of hatred, but of peace.”
Personally, I think the Vatican, in taking their time to release an official reaction, said exactly what needed to be said. To say anything more on this subject I think would not only be over kill, but also dangerous- it is so easy for us to trip over our words. It is important though that we know what our own opinions are, but remain able to understand other people’s perspectives. We don’t have to agree with them, but just understanding them can help us grow and further our understanding in other matters too. That goes for lots of different situations. For now though, I’m going to leave you with some more food for thought;
“Are people born Wicked? Or do they have
Wickedness thrust upon them? After all, she had
a father. She had a mother, as so many do…” ;)
Love and warm wishes!
Let us be grateful
Let us rejoicify that goodness could subdue
The wicked workings of you-know-who
Isn't it nice to know
That good will conquer evil?.....
No one mourns the Wicked!
Now at last, she's dead and gone!
Now at last, there's joy throughout the land….
No one mourns the wicked!”
Ok, first let me start off by rejoicifying over this, my first Wicked! posting. Wicked! is amazing and let be honest that sometimes when I listen to the soundtrack I get teary eyed just hearing it and thinking about it. No need to say that it’s my absolute favorite musical! Well actually this isn’t a post about Wicked… it’s a post that was inspired by the lyrics quoted above.…
Last Monday Bin Laden “lived by the sword and died by the sword.” (Cardinal Francis George) There is no need to question how wicked and evil his actions were, and yet when I logged into Facebook I was faced with a question that I had never considered before. When I heard the news, I was on the phone, and I was completely shocked. I couldn’t believe that our armed forces had finally caught the monster that had terrified so many and murdered so many. Excitement echoed in the voices of two of my best friends as we understood the importance of what had just happened. My roommate and I quickly turned on the tv just in time to see Obama walk up to his podium and give the world an extremely important and monumental speech. The sight outside the Whitehouse was reminiscent of the sight outside Buckingham Palace just a few days earlier, but on Facebook, it was evident that not everyone was excited and rejoiceful about this man’s death.
I was almost as surprised at other people’s reactions to the news as actually hearing the news. Some of these people were clearly upset and speaking out against those who were happy about Bin Laden’s death. Before reading those statuses I never would have believed that there were people in this world who were not happy that this man, who was responsible for the murder of thousands and sowed so much hate, was dead. It shocked me. It took me a little bit to understand why someone would not be happily excited about this event, even though I continue to disagree with most of the FB postings (some of them just made no sense what so ever!).
After some time to think about it and read different quoted reactions, the response that we as Christians should have to this man’s death is something to the effect of being happy about the end of a terror, but we should not rejoice over the man losing his life. The Vatican’s official reaction was this: “Osama Bin Laden - as everyone knows - has had the gravest responsibility for spreading hatred and division among people, causing the deaths of countless people, and exploiting religion for this purpose.
Faced with the death of a man, a Christian never rejoices, but reflects on the serious responsibility of everyone before God and man, and hopes and pledges that every event is not an opportunity for a further growth of hatred, but of peace.”
Personally, I think the Vatican, in taking their time to release an official reaction, said exactly what needed to be said. To say anything more on this subject I think would not only be over kill, but also dangerous- it is so easy for us to trip over our words. It is important though that we know what our own opinions are, but remain able to understand other people’s perspectives. We don’t have to agree with them, but just understanding them can help us grow and further our understanding in other matters too. That goes for lots of different situations. For now though, I’m going to leave you with some more food for thought;
“Are people born Wicked? Or do they have
Wickedness thrust upon them? After all, she had
a father. She had a mother, as so many do…” ;)
Love and warm wishes!
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