mmmmm

Friday was nice, well mostly. After a VERY stressful mid rags meeting, I took the day off and went to Disneyland with my friend Lauren. It was truly beneficial. I got to forget, for the day at least, all the worries and stress I had been under for the past couple of weeks preparing for my ASL presentation/mid rags/American lit test(Thursday night, Friday morning, and Monday morning respectively) and just have FUN. Seriously, thank God for Disneyland. While we were there we got to ride Space Mountain(I had never been on it). While we were in line, we entertained ourselves by taking pictures and singing the "move it move it" song from Madagascar. :) We just hung out. I haven't been able to do that in a while. It was nice. No worries about how much we were spending, or getting to all the rides(cuz we both have passes) all in all a very relaxing day. (and in case you were wondering, I didn't COMPLETELY ditch my homework for the day, I read King Lear when we got back to her house.)

:)

Just thought I'd throw this out there: Dr. Reynolds likes Twilight. :)

Reynolds Session

I had my second Reynolds session on Tuesday. It was great! part way through, he was asking one of the guys in my group what his name but wasn't getting a complete answer, I think he must have asked three different times, and each time got part of his name. So in the middle of session, Dr. Reynolds called Drew's(that's the guys name) mom, and asked her to corroborate what Drew had told him! It was hilarious!!!

musings

I've been thinking on and off for a little while now about some stuff. Mainly why after I thought I had dealt with what happened at Calvary I was still kind of bitter and angry. At Ladies Night during Torrey Convocation after the games were done they had us sit down and think for a while. I don't really remember what the thinking exercise was, but it made me realize something: 1) part of the reason why I took the year at Calvary so hard was because I wasn't exactly emotionally stable to begin with, and 2) if that's true, then everything I've felt stems from one major event in my life: the death of my aunt. Thinking about it, I think that's right. She died when I was nine. Later that same year, my best friend moved away. Shortly after that the only friend I had at the church I was going to moved, so I had no friends at church because I didn't fit in with the other girls there. Three years later, I went to Calvary. A year after that I had another major blow up with a close friend, and two years after that a girl I thought I was friends with, pretty close friends with actually, starts ignoring me. A year CSUN, and it's general unhappiness, although that last one wasn't really a bad experience, just a growing experience. Now, after seeing the sequence of major hurtful things in my life, I think each was worse than the last because I let the hurt from the previous carry over into the next. I.e. my aunt died. I think in retrospect that I got pretty mad at God for that one. I was really close with her. I prayed for a year and a half for her to get better and she didn't. I think I felt either abandoned by God or that maybe He was never there to begin with, that He just didn't care enough. I know in my head that that's not true, but getting my heart to believe it is another story. So, assuming that my feelings on that case are correct, then my best friend moving was just another score against Him, why should I have to deal with two major losses in one year? My other friend moving, leaving me totally alone at this church, again, why would God allow that? Why me? Three years later, the hurt of having no friends at that church still haunts me sorta, because it's a fear now. If I had no friends at one point then there must be a reason for it right? Something wrong with me? If God didn't care enough why should anyone else?(these weren't really my thoughts at the time. I had no idea why I was so angry when the other girls didn't really do anything to me, just that I was) So I go into Calvary with self-esteem issues. Self fulfilling prophecy maybe? Maybe, maybe not. Anger at them for rejecting me so completely, anger with God for letting happen, again. A year later it happens again. I have a blow up with a friend. I see a pattern start to develop, so I pull away from a lot of people, keep to myself, don't let myself get close to people. It's better that way. I'm a book worn by nature, so why not utilize that passion? I bring books to school now and spend most of my time reading. Books can't hurt you. Two years later I start feeling distant from the one friend I had let myself get close too. She was hurting too, so I figured it was probably safe. Wrong. She just got tired of me. Decided that I was judgmental because I had different conservative opinions, even though I mostly kept them to myself. Another score against God. Every person I ever got close to was taken from me. (Except for Jenny and Lauren, but I've had a hard time getting even them to stay as close as we once were) Anger, anger, anger. I realized that I really have not felt God's presence since as long as I can remember. That when I pray, all I feel like is happening is that I'm talking to myself. I know I say the right words and do the right things, but that's really easy when you know what Those are. I haven't had a real relationship with Him since my Aunt died. I don't doubt my salvation, just the depth of the relationship. I think the fact that I'm here at Biola of my own free will, that it was something I wanted is a good sign. I know I'm moving in the right direction, and I feel a connection now and then. It's not great, but I'm working on it. Maybe I'm finally starting to accept my life occurrences, and to let go of the anger. I know that maybe I'll never really understand why it happened, but I think I'm getting to the point where I'm ok with that.

fires

It's fire season again. this year there happens to be a fire in Porter Ranch. Porter Ranch is 10 minutes from Northridge. I still have friends up there, and apparently it's bad enough for them to have closed school at least for today. I also just found out that there's a fire in San Bernardino. My family is there. So please pray for those two areas in particular, as well as a general prayer for all the other areas being affected. Thanks.

Abiding in Him

I was at After Dark(Biola's Wednesday night chapel)with my friend Seth. During the first part, the people in charge read John 15:1-11 to us(you know, the passage about He is the vine we are the branches, if we abide in Him, He'll abide in us, we need to bear fruit, and those who don't will be cut off...very rough paraphrase) then put a few questions on the screen. The first one was "What does it mean to abide in Him?" after showing us a couple more questions, they told us to get into small groups and discuss our answers to the questions. Seth asked me what my answer was, and I told him that my dad had told me a few years ago, as part of a Bible study, about being filled with the Spirit, and that that's what I thought to abide in Him meant. That we were essentially drunk with Him, that He would effect all the decisions we made. Seth said then that he thought that my definition of it wasn't quite right, that if you were a Christian you would be filled with the spirit. According to the part where it says that you will be cut off you don't exhibit fruit, you probably aren't saved if you're not exhibiting fruit. I mentioned what Phil told me about this passage, that God will allow you to die if you're a christian, but hurting your witness, and the witness of others by your actions, like someone who drinks, does drugs, etc, and God knows they won't turn back to Him. That lead into a definition of what was meant by "fruit" if it were both the outward, and the inward, or if just having inward fruit would count as showing fruit. I said that having just inward fruit was enough, basically, personality fruit, like kindness, faithfulness, gentleness, etc., the fruits of the spirit. He was saying that if you have the inward fruit, you should be showing outward fruit, like not using bad language, dressing modestly, going to church etc. That where Paul says that you know a christian by his fruits is not just referring to others knowing you are a christian, but you yourself knowing you are a christian. That if you don't have the outward fruits, you probably don't have the inward fruits, and therefore probably aren't saved. We didn't come a conclusion. Any ideas on what we talked about?

haha!!!

this just recently appeared on the BUBBS classifieds listing:

Selling friend!

His name is Jonathan and he will go with you to ALL your classes! If you need a friend, Jonathan is for YOU!!! Best offer. Starting at $10.00 BUBBS me back.

Connections

Hey guess what? Apparently one Tiana's friends who did Bible bridge with her, who is also from the Chicago area originally, has a mom, and a brother who work for Awana. How cool is that? :)