Radical

I'm reading this amazing new book called "Radical" by David Platt. It's really amazing and I'm learning a lot from it. He talks about how our Christianity has been put into a nice little box for our nice little culture. We can't make Christianity seem unappealing, we can't make it sound hard, we can't be straightforward with people about it. According to our culture, it's all about the advertisement. He goes back into Scripture and shows us how Jesus was quite blunt. "Take up his cross and follow me" doesn't exactly sound fun. In those days, a cross was a torture device. So basically, Jesus was telling people "take up this torture device and follow me"..............oh yay. That sounds like SO much fun. The Bible even tells us that Jesus had very few followers. 120 was the max by the end of his time on the Earth. Christianity is hard, it's dangerous, it can even be scary at times. But, the point is, it's worth it.

How many religions in the world depict God actually coming down to the humans to make life possible for them? None. How many of them show such love and sacrifice as Jesus did for us? None. Christianity is completely unique in the fact that GOD showed us such love and mercy. Our religion is one of mercy and grace. Most other religions require fear or works. Our religion requires commitment and love. Jesus actually allowed himself to be fully exposed to ALL of God's wrath towards sin. Let's put it like David Platt does. Imagine yourself looking at a huge dam from the bottom of it. Suddenly, the dam breaks and all the water starts pouring out at you, like a huge hurricane ready to suck you to your doom. But then the ground opens up and swallows the entirety of the water. All of that raging death has been taken by something else. Jesus swallowed all of God's wrath for us. He took that punishment because he loved us so much. Agonizing torture was the least of his worries that night. That really hit me. I could've been the one to endure that. Living in the darkness, never feeling God's love and guidance. But Jesus took that for me. He was willing even though he knew how much it would hurt. It makes me wonder if I would do the same. Until the answer is, "yes", I need to keep becoming more like Jesus. I will never be perfect but I must be willing to lay down my life for his cause. Only then can I truly become a radical Christian.

"And he said to all, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me."" ~Luke 9:23

Complications

"Make it complicated. I like complications." - Jamie from The Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler.

Whenever I think of my life, I always think of that quote. No matter what, it always seems like my life just gets so complicated! Nothing is simple and straightforward...no, that would be too easy. If there's one thing I know how to do, it's how to make things complicated. For example, I can't take a normal essay and just write it. Nope, I have to create a thesis, think about the implications of the thesis, write down all the points that support that thesis (with subpoints of course) and then extrapolate all of those points and subpoints to ensure I'm not saying something wrong. And that's just to write my outline! Fortunately, this only takes maybe 10-20 minutes but still. How many steps does writing an outline really need?

I make my relationships complicated too. I can't simply enjoy a day with my family. I have to create conflict somewhere at sometime. Don't ask me why! I have no idea why I need conflict. I seem to feed off of it or something. o.O yes, I know that's weird. But I do! I think because it puts me in control of the situation or something. Oh yeah, that's another thing that's complicated. I always need control. I'm also very nosy and when you put those two together....well let's just say I'm often right in the center of drama. I don't often start it and it's almost never my fault. I'm just always mixed up in it somehow! I have no idea how/why. It just happens. Everywhere I go, things seem to get more complicated. I don't know if that's normal but it's how my life has always worked. It would be fine if I knew HOW TO DEAL WITH IT. But I don't. I'm a simple person. I like lists and I like instructions. I like knowing what to do and how to do it and when to do it. Unfortunately, when things get complicated, instructions get complicated. The way things work gets complicated. I don't like it and I'm not quite sure how to deal with it.

So anyway. On a more enjoyable note, I have officially become obsessed with Doctor Who. I always liked it but I never really watched it in earnest until now. I have completed Seasons 1, 4-6. :D (I haven't watched Seasons 2 and 3 because I don't like Rose and I don't like Martha.) I would just like to take a moment and say that David Tennant happens to be one of the most amazing people on this planet and he was the best Doctor. Ever. No question. I love Amy and I love Rory but I'm not so sure about the Matt Smith version of the Doctor. He's growing on me though. Anyway, that's my little geeky moment. :)

Secrets

Well today I thought I would just post 20 things about myself that not very many people know. :) They'll just be kinda random things about me. I didn't feel like trying to sort through graduation and all that stuff right now. Maybe next week....

1. I can only draw swords. I can't draw faces or trees or anything else.
2. Words of affirmation and touch are my love languages.
3. I am INCREDIBLY controlling.
4. I'm self conscious.
5. Well okay there are parts of me that I adore but then again there are parts that I'm not so sure about. :/
6. I do actually like the occasional chick flick (SHHH!! DONT TELL ANYONE!!!). I hate most of them because they have little plotline and no common sense but there are a few that I appreciate.
7. I'm a fraidy cat. :P
8. I love reading. But not just reading lame modern books, I love reading stuff like the Scarlet Pimpernel and the Count of Monte Cristo.
9. I'm actually kinda violent.
10. I'm scared to death that I'm not as brilliant as all the professionals tell me.
11. I've always wanted to either learn Irish or Native American dancing.
12. I adore public speaking. So.much.
13. I would love to learn some form of martial arts.
14. My lifelong dream has been to be an actress but that's not going to happen.
15. I'm really self conscious about my voice.
16. I love playing the piano and singing throughout my house.
17. I'm really trusting.
18. I've been hurt a lot because of number 18.
19. I often feel very lonely.
20. I don't submit to any kind of authority well at all....

So that's just a couple of things about me! :) After this weekend maybe I can go a little deeper and check out some of the things God's been teaching me lately. (NOTE: these are not fun lessons :/)

"Incline your ear, and hear the words of the wise, and apply your heart to my knowledge, for it will be pleasant if you keep them within you, if all of them are ready on your lips. That your trust may be in the Lord, I have made them known to you today, even to you." ~Proverbs 22:17-19

News

Well for this post, I'm going to talk about something a little bit different. I'm going to address the recent death of Osama Bin Laden. But before I do that, I want to quickly say that my college trip to Liberty University when fatastically and I have felt God leading me to go there. So I will be attending Liberty University next fall. :) Now that that's been taken care of, let's talk about Osama.

First off, I am ecstatic he is dead. I've seen a lot of my friends talking about how we should never be happy someone is dead and that as Christians, we should have mercy on him. I completely disagree. How many more people should have been allowed to die through his hand? He was not an innocent man and he did deserve death. If someone attacks our country and threatens thousands of lives, we should not stand back in the name of mercy! Our country must be preserved in order to save those innocent lives. Its a hard decision, yes, and we definitely should pity him as he faces Judgment now. However, his death is welcome and necessary. It is not a death; it is a triumph of good over evil. Saying that this is not a good thing is like saying Hiroshima was not a necessary action. Now I understand that that too is controversial, but again, it was necessary to protect more lives from being taken! Sometimes you have to choose between death and more death in policy. When those choices are presented, you have to choose the one that preserves the most life. That is the choice America made in both instances and it is the right choice. We are not celebrating a death, we are celebrating the conservation of more life. Those who say we should not be proud of America are wrong and quite frankly, make my blood boil. We triumphed over the Bin Laden. We triumphed over Al Qaeda. We triumphed over evil.

Moving onto another topic that is very near and dear to my heart, General Petraeus' appointment to the CIA. Most people look at it as completely political and scoff at Obama and blah, blah, blah. I find it quite amazing. Why? Well in case you didn't know, I want to work for the CIA after grad school. And Petraeus is one of my personal heroes. He is a military genius and rather conservative. I've never met him personally, mind you, but I look up to him quite a bit. So, working under him in the CIA would be a dream.come.true. :) I honestly don't care about the political reasoning behind it (which is probably bad...but whatever!).

so anyway. That's just my personal take on two news stories right now. :) Sorry if you were expecting something deep today. ;)