I hate asking for help. Seriously! It is one of the most difficult things for me to do in life, ESPECIALLY when it comes to finances. Maybe this sounds a bit Ridiculous to some of you but then again maybe you can relate.
I was raised with a very independent upbringing. I had to learn to take care of myself and others. I was taught that one needs to work and provide for themselves and not rely on anyone else to look out for them. Being the oldest meant lots of responsibilities that tended to squash out my childhood and bring me into an early adulthood, of course I have digressed back towards a more childlike nature now. Both of my grandparents and even my dad are very independent people and do not like to rely on other people to help them out and even my grandma has been struggling with getting older because she has to rely on others more for help. Now I am sure this is all a pride issue. Right? Or, maybe it has to do with the fact that I really have a hard time trusting people? Honestly I think it is both. It has only been in recent years that I have realized how little I actually trust others and even God. I keep every person at an arms length because I don't want to get hurt. I let others in a little and then shut them out when they get too close. And, when it comes to needing help I instantly think that nobody will actually help (ok well i do know a couple who would do anything if they could). But here I am in this place where I am needing God and needing others trusting that He will provide financially for me to do the thing that I believe that He has called me to do and that I haven't just made up out of an emotional response. It is an extremely humbling feeling handing someone a support letter or mailing it out knowing that they probably will read it. They will know that I need help and maybe even think that I am going to become one of those "k-love" type begging for support persons. When I start to think about stupid things like that i have to remember that I am simply doing what I believe God has called me to do and I am only sending people letters who I believe are suppose to get them and praying that they will do whatever God wants them to do and think no less of me for sending them the letter. (I also have to remind myself that I am not doing what I am doing because of what others might think of me because that is fear of man and I don't live to please others I live to follow Christ and Him alone.)
Being humbled sucks. It is like this feeling where the protective layers or your heart have been pulled away and your left open and vulnerable but still trying to keep up your last defenses in case someone says or does something that could hurt you. God wants to pull away every layer that we have placed up around us and He wants us to lean on Him as our defense. He is our hope, our love, and our faith. But He has also called us in to community with others. God could very well just drop a billion, a million, or a hundred thousand dollars in my lap randomly, (thats what I'm praying for) but I don't think He will because I believe that He has called me to humble myself and ask others to pray and partner with me in what God wants to do in Shasta Lake. So, I am learning more in trusting God and in trusting others.
Seriously why does it have to be so Ridiculously hard?
B
Wednesday, December 30, 2009
Monday, December 28, 2009
The end of a 4 year blessing and the beginning of a new Adventure.
Life is a Seriously Ridiculous rollercoaster. Imagine all the ups and downs and backs and forths and times you said, "I will never do this" or "I am done with that" and still you find yourself coming back to that very same thing. This has happened to me in a couple of areas. First off after working at Dairy Queen for a year I said I would never do it again. It wasn't that I wasn't blessed by the job or that I wasn't thankful but I really did not like it all that much and had no desire to go back. And still, over and over God called me back there. He provided for me through the work that I did at Dairy Queen and blessed me with great employers who welcomed be back with open arms and who were sad every time I left for a short time. Now, God called me to quit that job and take a leap of faith and go back to another thing that I said I would never return to.
So second, I was a youth pastor at a little church in Shasta Lake City for over 2 years. It was the most difficult thing that I have ever done in my life. I struggled with more with church, faith, and following christ during and after my venture. I came out a lot more educated but extremely exhausted and burnt out. After talking with the head pastor on a Sunday morning he was telling me that I had to do whatever God called me to do and that might even include coming back out to Shasta Lake again and screaming in my mind was this one thought, "I will never come back out here." Well never say never. God gave me a vision for the youth of Shasta Lake City 4 years ago and during my time away from being a Youth Pastor He only enlarged it. I also have struggled a lot in my faith and my walk with the Lord in really deciding how I want to live my life. And, when God had divinely orchestrated everything together to bring forth the opportunity for me to step back in to a Youth Pastor role alongside a team of people I love and respect very much I decided to follow Jesus. So now I am leaving a job that I said I would never return to that I came back to time after to time to trust God and follow Him to do Youth Ministry in a community and at a church that I said I would never go back to.
Sometimes the way God works is Seriously Ridiculous.
I have no idea how my bills will be paid but I know this, God has always provided for me whether it be through a part time job, random checks in the mail, or other people listening to the voice of God and supporting me financially as he has lead, my bills have always been paid.
So here I go. I'm taking this leap. I am excited and terrified and at the same time full of hope and peace knowing and believing that I serve the one who fills us until we are full and provides beyond what we think that we need.
Pastor B
haha pastor thats funny...
So second, I was a youth pastor at a little church in Shasta Lake City for over 2 years. It was the most difficult thing that I have ever done in my life. I struggled with more with church, faith, and following christ during and after my venture. I came out a lot more educated but extremely exhausted and burnt out. After talking with the head pastor on a Sunday morning he was telling me that I had to do whatever God called me to do and that might even include coming back out to Shasta Lake again and screaming in my mind was this one thought, "I will never come back out here." Well never say never. God gave me a vision for the youth of Shasta Lake City 4 years ago and during my time away from being a Youth Pastor He only enlarged it. I also have struggled a lot in my faith and my walk with the Lord in really deciding how I want to live my life. And, when God had divinely orchestrated everything together to bring forth the opportunity for me to step back in to a Youth Pastor role alongside a team of people I love and respect very much I decided to follow Jesus. So now I am leaving a job that I said I would never return to that I came back to time after to time to trust God and follow Him to do Youth Ministry in a community and at a church that I said I would never go back to.
Sometimes the way God works is Seriously Ridiculous.
I have no idea how my bills will be paid but I know this, God has always provided for me whether it be through a part time job, random checks in the mail, or other people listening to the voice of God and supporting me financially as he has lead, my bills have always been paid.
So here I go. I'm taking this leap. I am excited and terrified and at the same time full of hope and peace knowing and believing that I serve the one who fills us until we are full and provides beyond what we think that we need.
Pastor B
haha pastor thats funny...
Saturday, December 5, 2009
To The End of The Earth and Back Again... A Blessed Journey
When I started college over 4 years ago I also became a Youth Pastor at a small church in Shasta Lake City called Calvary Chapel and after over 2 years of great experiences and difficult lessons and amazing blessings I stepped down. Now 2 years after stepping out I find myself back at the same place ministering to the same students in a much larger capacity. Now that is SERIOUSLY RIDICULOUS!
Have you ever said to yourself, I'm never doing that again? Well be careful because God may call you back to the very thing you said no towards.
2 years ago I left a position at Calvary Chapel in Shasta Lake as Youth Pastor because God had been leading me towards a different area. Upon leaving I was lonely, burnt out, tired, blessed, and yet I never wanted to work at a church again, most definitely not as a Youth Pastor. And again here I am back at the same church working with a different group of people, under different leadership, carrying an even larger vision than before, and thankful for every thing I have gone through in the past 2 years to get me ready to come back to this position.
Shortly after leaving the church I wound up back at little country church helping out in the High School minstry again. It was much different during that time then in the past when I was just a small group leader and an intercessor. I was teaching a couple of times a month and meeting with students every week and working at DQ. My time back at Little Country became a time of healing for me. I needed some real healing and refreshing from all that I had gone through and I was able to find a portion of that while working in the high school ministry and attending Simpson. Then I co-lead a team with one of my closest friends to Australia. What a life changing trip showing me how God has called me to not only be a youth leader here in my own country but that He has called me to be a world youth leader, to impact the youth of the world and not just of the nation (which is still pretty huge). I also was able to attend a National Youth Workers Convention where i was given so many tools and felt like I was really being ministered to and God gave me so much confidence in Him and help me be secure in who I am in Him. So much happened in me that year it was crazy and yet in 2009 as I got closer and closer to graduating it was like everything was falling apart again.
It is a difficult feeling to describe when you get to a point in your relationship with God after doing some amazing things and seeing Him move in such amazing ways and yet you just want to stop living for Him and start living for the self. I stopped saying God what is your will and started saying "God what about me." I became lost and confused. I reached a point in my life again where it seemed absolutely pointless to keep doing what I was doing in terms of ministry because I couldn't give up the life I living in secret and the things that I was longing for. So I stepped out of ministry, took out all venues for accountability, and become completely obsorbed with self. I spent a lot of time being angry. I was angry at myself and angry at God. I tried isolating myself from others and just doing whatever I felt like doing but I remember saying one morning to God before I taught a group of High School students at Little Country, "God no matter what happens don't let me go." The funny thing is, He actually listened. The more I tried to run from Him the more I felt Him pulling me back in to Himself. It is hard to run very far when He is calling your name.
So in the midst of all of this and feeling like I didn't have any purpose I began to remember the one vision that God had given me for the city of Shasta Lake and from that point I began to feel God stirring me and pulling me towards something I couldn't explain but I knew it was bigger than myself. I held on to that vision and went for walks in Shasta Lake city and began to dream new ideas and visions for the city and what I wanted to see happen with the youth. I only told a couple of people the vision that God had given me for the city. I had no idea how the vision I had would work out but God had told me that I couldn't do it by myself and that I needed a team to go out in Shasta Lake in order for it to work. Little did I know that God was working on a lot of hearts of other people for the same city. Later I told a couple of people the vision I had for Shasta Lake and starting a Youth Center and all that it encompassed and how I knew it had to be a team of people and that it was what I was going to do. I told them I didn't know how I was going to do it or how it was all going to work out but that it was what I was called to do.
Maybe a month later I recieved a call from an excited person telling me that he was going to be stepping in as Pastor for 7 weeks and teaching and that it might become a permanet thing and he wanted me to pray about becoming youth pastor. It was a very short prayer for me. Then about 4 weeks later I was actually announced as the churches youth pastor because the guy who had been doing it stepped down. The very next week I called all of my old students in Shasta Lake and had a group of 11 students show up and it has been a very consistent and growing group of students and I am absolutely thankful and blessed by each and every one of them. 4 years ago when I started a youth ministry at this same church there were 3 kids and now restarting another youth ministry from scratch there is a much larger group.
God has blessed me so much and soon I will be quitting my job and asking everyone I know for support to do this full time as I start working on an after school program where kids can come get food and help on homework for free at the church building. But that is a whole other blog, and a support letter. ; )
There is no end to the goodness and faithfulness of God. Even with a member of our family dealing with cancer we have faith in Him who is greater and lives within us than he who is in the world. Our God is Seriously Ridiculous.
-B
Have you ever said to yourself, I'm never doing that again? Well be careful because God may call you back to the very thing you said no towards.
2 years ago I left a position at Calvary Chapel in Shasta Lake as Youth Pastor because God had been leading me towards a different area. Upon leaving I was lonely, burnt out, tired, blessed, and yet I never wanted to work at a church again, most definitely not as a Youth Pastor. And again here I am back at the same church working with a different group of people, under different leadership, carrying an even larger vision than before, and thankful for every thing I have gone through in the past 2 years to get me ready to come back to this position.
Shortly after leaving the church I wound up back at little country church helping out in the High School minstry again. It was much different during that time then in the past when I was just a small group leader and an intercessor. I was teaching a couple of times a month and meeting with students every week and working at DQ. My time back at Little Country became a time of healing for me. I needed some real healing and refreshing from all that I had gone through and I was able to find a portion of that while working in the high school ministry and attending Simpson. Then I co-lead a team with one of my closest friends to Australia. What a life changing trip showing me how God has called me to not only be a youth leader here in my own country but that He has called me to be a world youth leader, to impact the youth of the world and not just of the nation (which is still pretty huge). I also was able to attend a National Youth Workers Convention where i was given so many tools and felt like I was really being ministered to and God gave me so much confidence in Him and help me be secure in who I am in Him. So much happened in me that year it was crazy and yet in 2009 as I got closer and closer to graduating it was like everything was falling apart again.
It is a difficult feeling to describe when you get to a point in your relationship with God after doing some amazing things and seeing Him move in such amazing ways and yet you just want to stop living for Him and start living for the self. I stopped saying God what is your will and started saying "God what about me." I became lost and confused. I reached a point in my life again where it seemed absolutely pointless to keep doing what I was doing in terms of ministry because I couldn't give up the life I living in secret and the things that I was longing for. So I stepped out of ministry, took out all venues for accountability, and become completely obsorbed with self. I spent a lot of time being angry. I was angry at myself and angry at God. I tried isolating myself from others and just doing whatever I felt like doing but I remember saying one morning to God before I taught a group of High School students at Little Country, "God no matter what happens don't let me go." The funny thing is, He actually listened. The more I tried to run from Him the more I felt Him pulling me back in to Himself. It is hard to run very far when He is calling your name.
So in the midst of all of this and feeling like I didn't have any purpose I began to remember the one vision that God had given me for the city of Shasta Lake and from that point I began to feel God stirring me and pulling me towards something I couldn't explain but I knew it was bigger than myself. I held on to that vision and went for walks in Shasta Lake city and began to dream new ideas and visions for the city and what I wanted to see happen with the youth. I only told a couple of people the vision that God had given me for the city. I had no idea how the vision I had would work out but God had told me that I couldn't do it by myself and that I needed a team to go out in Shasta Lake in order for it to work. Little did I know that God was working on a lot of hearts of other people for the same city. Later I told a couple of people the vision I had for Shasta Lake and starting a Youth Center and all that it encompassed and how I knew it had to be a team of people and that it was what I was going to do. I told them I didn't know how I was going to do it or how it was all going to work out but that it was what I was called to do.
Maybe a month later I recieved a call from an excited person telling me that he was going to be stepping in as Pastor for 7 weeks and teaching and that it might become a permanet thing and he wanted me to pray about becoming youth pastor. It was a very short prayer for me. Then about 4 weeks later I was actually announced as the churches youth pastor because the guy who had been doing it stepped down. The very next week I called all of my old students in Shasta Lake and had a group of 11 students show up and it has been a very consistent and growing group of students and I am absolutely thankful and blessed by each and every one of them. 4 years ago when I started a youth ministry at this same church there were 3 kids and now restarting another youth ministry from scratch there is a much larger group.
God has blessed me so much and soon I will be quitting my job and asking everyone I know for support to do this full time as I start working on an after school program where kids can come get food and help on homework for free at the church building. But that is a whole other blog, and a support letter. ; )
There is no end to the goodness and faithfulness of God. Even with a member of our family dealing with cancer we have faith in Him who is greater and lives within us than he who is in the world. Our God is Seriously Ridiculous.
-B
Friday, November 27, 2009
Slave to Sin... Slave to Righteousness... What if I don't want to be a slave?
How can you find freedom in being a slave?
In Romans 6 Paul uses the illustration of a person being a slave to either sin or righteousness and the idea is that freedom is found in submission to being a slave to righteousness (or maybe I'm just paraphrasing too much at any rate you should read it for yourself). This is Seriously Ridiculous. I don't want to be a slave at all. I mean think about it, everything that you know about slavery, nothing about being a slave is good. And yet, this is an extremely important illustration for us to try and understand within our culture. (Maybe there was something about slavery in that culture that was good or honorable that I don't really understand)
So the whole time I was reading this Matthew 11:28-30 was swimming around in my head:
"Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light."
Somehow taking on the "Yoke" and "Burden" of Christ leads to freedom and rest that we can't find in being a slave to sin. (Gosh I honestly hate the word slave, probably because I hate losing the right to make the decisions in my life and giving up control. hmm...) In Christ there is a freedom that allows us to carry and yoke and a burden that is light and easy and find a rest for our souls. This rest is a type of rest that is a "blessed tranquility of the soul." So in midst of work, carrying a yoke, there is a peaceful, fulfilling, and rejuvenating rest.
I believe this is where the difference between being a slave to sin and being a slave to righteousness is. Not only that but I think this is where our idea of what a slave is has to be broadened into something different, something new, something redeemed. Being a "slave" to righteousness brings us something that being a "slave" to sin can not offer. There is no peace, rest, hope, eternal life, or true love in sin. There is no fulfillment or satisfaction. Being a slave to sin always leaves you wanting more. Being a slave to righteousness brings satisfaction. This is the Psalm 23 filling where we have all that we need and are led to that place of rest, peace, and joy. (You should really read it too. Just read all the verses. Romans 6, Matthew 11:28-30 and Psalm 23).
What is really interesting is that the world sees being a "slave to sin" as freedom over being a "slave to righteousness." I honestly believe that this is the fault of way too many Christians pretending that they are living righteous lives when in fact they are cursing, condemning, judging, and living lives under the "law" just as the religious pharisees. This is probably where our misconception of what it means to be a righteous person comes in. We forget things like what Paul says in Galatians 2:16 "...a man is not justified by the works of the law but by faith in Jesus Christ...for by the works of the law no flesh shall be justified."
Still, I don't think i want to be a called a slave to anything but rather a friend like Jesus calls His disciples. Friend works. Maybe in being friends of Christ we can live a righteous life that shows the world that we are not in "bondage" to our "religion" (wow so many quotation marks in this blog) but that we are able to live in holy freedom.
Seriously Ridiculous.
-B
In Romans 6 Paul uses the illustration of a person being a slave to either sin or righteousness and the idea is that freedom is found in submission to being a slave to righteousness (or maybe I'm just paraphrasing too much at any rate you should read it for yourself). This is Seriously Ridiculous. I don't want to be a slave at all. I mean think about it, everything that you know about slavery, nothing about being a slave is good. And yet, this is an extremely important illustration for us to try and understand within our culture. (Maybe there was something about slavery in that culture that was good or honorable that I don't really understand)
So the whole time I was reading this Matthew 11:28-30 was swimming around in my head:
"Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light."
Somehow taking on the "Yoke" and "Burden" of Christ leads to freedom and rest that we can't find in being a slave to sin. (Gosh I honestly hate the word slave, probably because I hate losing the right to make the decisions in my life and giving up control. hmm...) In Christ there is a freedom that allows us to carry and yoke and a burden that is light and easy and find a rest for our souls. This rest is a type of rest that is a "blessed tranquility of the soul." So in midst of work, carrying a yoke, there is a peaceful, fulfilling, and rejuvenating rest.
I believe this is where the difference between being a slave to sin and being a slave to righteousness is. Not only that but I think this is where our idea of what a slave is has to be broadened into something different, something new, something redeemed. Being a "slave" to righteousness brings us something that being a "slave" to sin can not offer. There is no peace, rest, hope, eternal life, or true love in sin. There is no fulfillment or satisfaction. Being a slave to sin always leaves you wanting more. Being a slave to righteousness brings satisfaction. This is the Psalm 23 filling where we have all that we need and are led to that place of rest, peace, and joy. (You should really read it too. Just read all the verses. Romans 6, Matthew 11:28-30 and Psalm 23).
What is really interesting is that the world sees being a "slave to sin" as freedom over being a "slave to righteousness." I honestly believe that this is the fault of way too many Christians pretending that they are living righteous lives when in fact they are cursing, condemning, judging, and living lives under the "law" just as the religious pharisees. This is probably where our misconception of what it means to be a righteous person comes in. We forget things like what Paul says in Galatians 2:16 "...a man is not justified by the works of the law but by faith in Jesus Christ...for by the works of the law no flesh shall be justified."
Still, I don't think i want to be a called a slave to anything but rather a friend like Jesus calls His disciples. Friend works. Maybe in being friends of Christ we can live a righteous life that shows the world that we are not in "bondage" to our "religion" (wow so many quotation marks in this blog) but that we are able to live in holy freedom.
Seriously Ridiculous.
-B
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
A Loaf of Bread, A Roll of Toilet Paper, What do You Need?
I understand that you are in need of something but I barely have enough money for myself. So what should I do should I still help you out and just trust in God for some money to supernaturally appear or should I be "wise" with my finances and believe that there is some other way you will get what you need even though I could help?
It is a bit ironic that my last blog was about how selfish and a horrible person that I think that I am and now I am blogging about sharing all of our resources with others. I am a strong believer in the idea that what resources I have I am to share with others (unless it is my PS2 or my clothes with my little brother, that's a totally different thing). The problem I have, besides having random days of selfishness, is that we live in a society that is all about protecting one's own resources rather than sharing them. Even in different church settings your are given the example of hording what you have and just giving very little to support those around you who are in genuine need.
I think the problem we have is when we start to believe that what we have really belongs to us as individuals rather than to support a community or one another. We are a people created by God for community and as a community we are called to share our resources however large or small they are.
Tonight someone I know asked me for a roll of toilet paper because they were out and couldn't afford to buy any at the moment. My instant response was sure I'll get you a roll but then I began to think to myself: "What good would one roll do for someone who is taking care of an apartment full of 6 others? I know I don't even have enough money to make my car payment right now but what matters is this person needs some toilet paper. OK I'll take this person and buy them some." So I took this person to the store bought them like 24 rolls of the soft kind of toilet paper which was a bit more expensive but when it comes to wiping I prefer not using construction paper.
Side note: Honestly what is the deal with toilet paper? We wipe our noses and faces with the softest tissues that have all sorts of things made out of them to help keep our faces feeling nice and yet we wipe our asses with construction paper. Seriously don't you think your butt is just as sensitive as your nose?
Anyway. So what if it cost me a little bit of money and I am even more short from being able to pay my car payment this person was in need of something essential. How could I not help and buy this person what they needed? This person was humble enough to admit they needed help what could I do just ignore them? That would have been crazy.
But, I wonder how often other people around me are in need of little things like toilet paper, bread, water, a ride to work, or maybe even a place to sleep. And I wonder how many people like me would be unwilling to admit they are in need of help and ask for something because of fear of what others might think.
God has created us to be a community and I think it is time we stopped worrying about how much we own to give ourselves a better life and start caring about others having what they need to live.
Okay, granted you don't need toilet paper to live: but honestly, you get the point.
B
It is a bit ironic that my last blog was about how selfish and a horrible person that I think that I am and now I am blogging about sharing all of our resources with others. I am a strong believer in the idea that what resources I have I am to share with others (unless it is my PS2 or my clothes with my little brother, that's a totally different thing). The problem I have, besides having random days of selfishness, is that we live in a society that is all about protecting one's own resources rather than sharing them. Even in different church settings your are given the example of hording what you have and just giving very little to support those around you who are in genuine need.
I think the problem we have is when we start to believe that what we have really belongs to us as individuals rather than to support a community or one another. We are a people created by God for community and as a community we are called to share our resources however large or small they are.
Tonight someone I know asked me for a roll of toilet paper because they were out and couldn't afford to buy any at the moment. My instant response was sure I'll get you a roll but then I began to think to myself: "What good would one roll do for someone who is taking care of an apartment full of 6 others? I know I don't even have enough money to make my car payment right now but what matters is this person needs some toilet paper. OK I'll take this person and buy them some." So I took this person to the store bought them like 24 rolls of the soft kind of toilet paper which was a bit more expensive but when it comes to wiping I prefer not using construction paper.
Side note: Honestly what is the deal with toilet paper? We wipe our noses and faces with the softest tissues that have all sorts of things made out of them to help keep our faces feeling nice and yet we wipe our asses with construction paper. Seriously don't you think your butt is just as sensitive as your nose?
Anyway. So what if it cost me a little bit of money and I am even more short from being able to pay my car payment this person was in need of something essential. How could I not help and buy this person what they needed? This person was humble enough to admit they needed help what could I do just ignore them? That would have been crazy.
But, I wonder how often other people around me are in need of little things like toilet paper, bread, water, a ride to work, or maybe even a place to sleep. And I wonder how many people like me would be unwilling to admit they are in need of help and ask for something because of fear of what others might think.
God has created us to be a community and I think it is time we stopped worrying about how much we own to give ourselves a better life and start caring about others having what they need to live.
Okay, granted you don't need toilet paper to live: but honestly, you get the point.
B
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Oh Selfish, Prideful, Judgmental, Hypocritical, Messy, Ridiculous me...
If your life was like a box of chocolates what types of chocolates would be in the box? Would they be savory or sweet; bitter or sour; crunchy or chewy; good or bad?
Personally I feel like if my life was like a box of chocolates the box would probably be filled with a couple of really good ones but then the majority would be gross and disgusting. Like, not just the kind of gross chocolate that you take a bite out of then put it back after spitting the piece in your mouth out but the type of gross where as soon as it hits your tongue (if you are able to get it to your mouth before gagging on the stench) you immediately have to throw up. Pretty gross huh? My life has this nice little packaging on the outside that looks all good and inviting and then you open the box and begin to doubt whether or not the chocolates are really as good as they had said to be and just to test it out you take a bite of one and you know for sure something is seriously wrong with the chocolate as you make a b-line for the bathroom.
I am a selfish, prideful, judgmental, hypocritical, fearful, arrogant, ridiculous mess. Now maybe your reading this and your thinking, "no way your not like this at all you help people and stuff." Let me burst your bubble: I am like this. There are times now and again where I help people and walk in love and compassion but too often they are overcrowded by the candy coating of selfishness and pride. I spend too much time thinking about my position and my own glory and not enough time thinking about truly sacrificing for others. Without realizing it I judge others based on their appearance, or smell, and feel on some level that I am better than them. I am probably one of the biggest hypocrites I know. I speak big words of Gods love and how He has commanded us to love one another as He has loved us and yet here I am living selfishly and having no clue how to really love others. I am a Seriously Ridiculous Mess.
And yet... Jesus Loves me.
This is even harder for me to understand because I know how big of a mess I am and how often i fail, and choose to fail, and still He loves me. It is an absolutely Ridiculous love that no human being can ever comprehend and I won't try to explain it because I don't even understand it other than that God loves me. This love drives me to want to be different it urges me to seek some type of change in the consistency of the chocolates within the box of my life; that rather than being overpowered by the gross and disguising the sweet and delicious chocolates would be the majority. But again I go back to my mess. I read passages in 1 John and I realize I have no idea how to really love others and I study Ephesians 5 and recognize that I have no idea how to or even what to do to imitate God. Maybe I don't have to do anything. Maybe all I have to do is to submit to His Will but even then what does that look like? I don't know.
All I know is this, God loves me and I need grace, love, and the Spirit in order for the Seriously Ridiculous Mess of the box of chocolates to be transformed into something amazing.
-B
Personally I feel like if my life was like a box of chocolates the box would probably be filled with a couple of really good ones but then the majority would be gross and disgusting. Like, not just the kind of gross chocolate that you take a bite out of then put it back after spitting the piece in your mouth out but the type of gross where as soon as it hits your tongue (if you are able to get it to your mouth before gagging on the stench) you immediately have to throw up. Pretty gross huh? My life has this nice little packaging on the outside that looks all good and inviting and then you open the box and begin to doubt whether or not the chocolates are really as good as they had said to be and just to test it out you take a bite of one and you know for sure something is seriously wrong with the chocolate as you make a b-line for the bathroom.
I am a selfish, prideful, judgmental, hypocritical, fearful, arrogant, ridiculous mess. Now maybe your reading this and your thinking, "no way your not like this at all you help people and stuff." Let me burst your bubble: I am like this. There are times now and again where I help people and walk in love and compassion but too often they are overcrowded by the candy coating of selfishness and pride. I spend too much time thinking about my position and my own glory and not enough time thinking about truly sacrificing for others. Without realizing it I judge others based on their appearance, or smell, and feel on some level that I am better than them. I am probably one of the biggest hypocrites I know. I speak big words of Gods love and how He has commanded us to love one another as He has loved us and yet here I am living selfishly and having no clue how to really love others. I am a Seriously Ridiculous Mess.
And yet... Jesus Loves me.
This is even harder for me to understand because I know how big of a mess I am and how often i fail, and choose to fail, and still He loves me. It is an absolutely Ridiculous love that no human being can ever comprehend and I won't try to explain it because I don't even understand it other than that God loves me. This love drives me to want to be different it urges me to seek some type of change in the consistency of the chocolates within the box of my life; that rather than being overpowered by the gross and disguising the sweet and delicious chocolates would be the majority. But again I go back to my mess. I read passages in 1 John and I realize I have no idea how to really love others and I study Ephesians 5 and recognize that I have no idea how to or even what to do to imitate God. Maybe I don't have to do anything. Maybe all I have to do is to submit to His Will but even then what does that look like? I don't know.
All I know is this, God loves me and I need grace, love, and the Spirit in order for the Seriously Ridiculous Mess of the box of chocolates to be transformed into something amazing.
-B
Saturday, October 17, 2009
This was a Seriously Ridiculous dream I had and not sure what to do about yet.
The rules: no stealing, no drinking alcohol, no smoking, you have to eat what we eat and together, sleep when we all sleep. If you mess up we may show you grace once but afterwards we have to let you go. You are only here if you want to be here if you don’t want to be here then you must leave because you will not change unless you want to change.
There was a place I went to in my dream. I believed it was somewhere in Asia or something like Thailand but the people were not all Asian they had dark skin most of them as if they were black but a couple had lighter skin. At any rate in my dream I went to this place to help out where they brought in kids from off the streets or kids from families who were addicted to drugs and alcohol and they helped provide for all of these kids. They had a very large garden and a cook who cooked everything. The facilities were very large as they had lots of rooms for kids to stay in with beds in them. Also there were facilities for people who came in and helped out as well. The amount of property that this placed had for their entire location was like 30,000 or 3,000 acres I think it was 30,000 (that just seems like so much though). In this location they would care and provide for the kids like and orphanage. These kids would have classes and things of that nature where they would learn normal school things and the woman who ran the place would go out in to the market every week to buy vegetables and spices and always wind up bringing back a kid with them who was living on the street. I think that we would also sell some of the vegetables and stuff from the garden in the market to help provide for the centers general needs.
In my dream the lady who ran the location wanted to get some extra spices but didn’t have any money to get them from the market so she decided to ask the neighbor whose house, a very large house too, was directly across from where the kitchen faced. When she asked the lady for the spices the lady replied that she didn’t have any to spare. The neighbor lady was standing on the balcony of the 2nd story of her house and had a friend with her as well. Both were a bit older and quite stuck up but they were curious about how we constantly kept bringing in new children as they believed that buy doing this center, or whatever it was, it gave us a right to ask people for things and expect it in return. So, the next day the neighbor lady and her friend went out to market and brought a few kids back with them and I was shocked because I knew these women were not doing this to help the children but rather they were doing this to make themselves look good and possibly have people give them things. I became so mad that I went over to the house and confronted them about what they were doing and asked them where they took the kids from. At that point the women began defending themselves saying that they had every right to help kids as we were doing at the center but the problem was they weren’t really helping the kids they just wanted it to be about themselves looking good.
After spending only a short time arguing I decided to leave. It was like arguing with a brick wall and trying to convince it that it really isn’t made of brick but of sand. I kept looking out of the front door of the center and over at the house where the neighbor lived to keep an eye on the kids and think of a way to bring them to the center where they could actually receive help and care from people who genuinely cared for them. I even made an attempt once to bring the kids over to the center but they wanted to stay where they were at so I left them but I kept an eye on the place because I wanted to know how the woman got the children there. At one point a woman showed up to the door of the neighbors house with a child with her and dropped off the child as the two women gave her money. I was enraged and went over to the two women who now had the child and went off on them about how they had been giving women money to take their children off of their hands. When the two women wouldn’t listen to reason I ran after the mother who sold her child to the neighbor. By the time I caught up with her we were in the city area again and people were following me as I was asking this woman how she could sell her child. The woman was obviously someone who had struggled with drugs but she seemed sane enough to tell me that she couldn’t take care of the kid properly and that the kid didn’t really want to be with her. So I told her how the child loved her and would wait for her and didn’t care what she was like because he wanted to be with his mother. The mother just responded that she couldn’t take care of him. She said that she loved him but she just couldn’t do it. I responded with something that sounds cheesy now but I asked her “isn’t love enough.” By now she was getting in to a taxi and an African American guy and another Caucasian man were following me and the Caucasian guy had a camera but I was left just broken for the child, the woman and all the families in the area.
As I walked back to the center with the two men still following me while I talked to myself out loud about not being able to understand why love isn’t enough I began to realize that what we were doing at the center wasn’t enough. My heart was so heavy that I realized that it wasn’t just enough to take the kids out of the streets and give them opportunities and care for them but it had to be done for the whole families. Women and their children needed a place to go where they could change their lives and people could minister to them and help them change their lives. I don’t think I realized this but I was still saying all of this out-loud and woman began to gather with their children and I began to encourage them to come to the center too where they could change their lives and not have to live on the streets anymore.
When I returned to the center I called out for the lady who oversaw the ministry and she wanted to know what was going on and I began to tell her how what we were doing wasn’t enough. We couldn’t just provide a place just for kids anymore it had to be for the whole family if we were going to make any real difference in people’s lives. She began to ask how we would be able to do this or make this happen and what kind of rules we would have. One thing she wasn’t concerned about was the facilities. We owned so much property that we could spread the center out enough so we could have buildings for everything we needed to help these people. So, as I was saying to the overseer that I didn’t know how it would work but it had to happen because what we were doing wasn’t enough anymore the doors for the whole building were surrounded by women with children, women without children, and a couple of men some just looking for a place to get some free food while others were looking for a real life change. We decided to just let them in and they went everywhere looking through everything and so my boss again asked me how we would do this and I said we could have rules and so I then explained the rules to her and then she shouted. She began to explain to the women and men that were there that it would be a place where people who wanted to change their lives could come and find a safe place where they would receive help and provision but that there were rules to be followed. She then explained the rules. When she began to start telling the few rules we had a woman began to put something in her pocket so we decided to add on No Stealing to one of the rules because everything we had was shared.
The whole time this was going on I felt like I would burst out in tears for these people because my heart was so broken but after the rules were said some people left but many stayed. I went into one room and found a couple women with their children sitting on a bed and they told me they had nowhere else to go and they didn’t want me to kick them out so I told them the rules if they wanted to stay and so they stayed. But again the whole time I just felt like crying. And then, I could see people that I had worked in other ministries with coming to this location to help out and the place growing and things happening that we had set out to do in a short time. The whole time I felt like my heart would burst because it was so heavy and full of joy.
And then… I woke up.
There was a place I went to in my dream. I believed it was somewhere in Asia or something like Thailand but the people were not all Asian they had dark skin most of them as if they were black but a couple had lighter skin. At any rate in my dream I went to this place to help out where they brought in kids from off the streets or kids from families who were addicted to drugs and alcohol and they helped provide for all of these kids. They had a very large garden and a cook who cooked everything. The facilities were very large as they had lots of rooms for kids to stay in with beds in them. Also there were facilities for people who came in and helped out as well. The amount of property that this placed had for their entire location was like 30,000 or 3,000 acres I think it was 30,000 (that just seems like so much though). In this location they would care and provide for the kids like and orphanage. These kids would have classes and things of that nature where they would learn normal school things and the woman who ran the place would go out in to the market every week to buy vegetables and spices and always wind up bringing back a kid with them who was living on the street. I think that we would also sell some of the vegetables and stuff from the garden in the market to help provide for the centers general needs.
In my dream the lady who ran the location wanted to get some extra spices but didn’t have any money to get them from the market so she decided to ask the neighbor whose house, a very large house too, was directly across from where the kitchen faced. When she asked the lady for the spices the lady replied that she didn’t have any to spare. The neighbor lady was standing on the balcony of the 2nd story of her house and had a friend with her as well. Both were a bit older and quite stuck up but they were curious about how we constantly kept bringing in new children as they believed that buy doing this center, or whatever it was, it gave us a right to ask people for things and expect it in return. So, the next day the neighbor lady and her friend went out to market and brought a few kids back with them and I was shocked because I knew these women were not doing this to help the children but rather they were doing this to make themselves look good and possibly have people give them things. I became so mad that I went over to the house and confronted them about what they were doing and asked them where they took the kids from. At that point the women began defending themselves saying that they had every right to help kids as we were doing at the center but the problem was they weren’t really helping the kids they just wanted it to be about themselves looking good.
After spending only a short time arguing I decided to leave. It was like arguing with a brick wall and trying to convince it that it really isn’t made of brick but of sand. I kept looking out of the front door of the center and over at the house where the neighbor lived to keep an eye on the kids and think of a way to bring them to the center where they could actually receive help and care from people who genuinely cared for them. I even made an attempt once to bring the kids over to the center but they wanted to stay where they were at so I left them but I kept an eye on the place because I wanted to know how the woman got the children there. At one point a woman showed up to the door of the neighbors house with a child with her and dropped off the child as the two women gave her money. I was enraged and went over to the two women who now had the child and went off on them about how they had been giving women money to take their children off of their hands. When the two women wouldn’t listen to reason I ran after the mother who sold her child to the neighbor. By the time I caught up with her we were in the city area again and people were following me as I was asking this woman how she could sell her child. The woman was obviously someone who had struggled with drugs but she seemed sane enough to tell me that she couldn’t take care of the kid properly and that the kid didn’t really want to be with her. So I told her how the child loved her and would wait for her and didn’t care what she was like because he wanted to be with his mother. The mother just responded that she couldn’t take care of him. She said that she loved him but she just couldn’t do it. I responded with something that sounds cheesy now but I asked her “isn’t love enough.” By now she was getting in to a taxi and an African American guy and another Caucasian man were following me and the Caucasian guy had a camera but I was left just broken for the child, the woman and all the families in the area.
As I walked back to the center with the two men still following me while I talked to myself out loud about not being able to understand why love isn’t enough I began to realize that what we were doing at the center wasn’t enough. My heart was so heavy that I realized that it wasn’t just enough to take the kids out of the streets and give them opportunities and care for them but it had to be done for the whole families. Women and their children needed a place to go where they could change their lives and people could minister to them and help them change their lives. I don’t think I realized this but I was still saying all of this out-loud and woman began to gather with their children and I began to encourage them to come to the center too where they could change their lives and not have to live on the streets anymore.
When I returned to the center I called out for the lady who oversaw the ministry and she wanted to know what was going on and I began to tell her how what we were doing wasn’t enough. We couldn’t just provide a place just for kids anymore it had to be for the whole family if we were going to make any real difference in people’s lives. She began to ask how we would be able to do this or make this happen and what kind of rules we would have. One thing she wasn’t concerned about was the facilities. We owned so much property that we could spread the center out enough so we could have buildings for everything we needed to help these people. So, as I was saying to the overseer that I didn’t know how it would work but it had to happen because what we were doing wasn’t enough anymore the doors for the whole building were surrounded by women with children, women without children, and a couple of men some just looking for a place to get some free food while others were looking for a real life change. We decided to just let them in and they went everywhere looking through everything and so my boss again asked me how we would do this and I said we could have rules and so I then explained the rules to her and then she shouted. She began to explain to the women and men that were there that it would be a place where people who wanted to change their lives could come and find a safe place where they would receive help and provision but that there were rules to be followed. She then explained the rules. When she began to start telling the few rules we had a woman began to put something in her pocket so we decided to add on No Stealing to one of the rules because everything we had was shared.
The whole time this was going on I felt like I would burst out in tears for these people because my heart was so broken but after the rules were said some people left but many stayed. I went into one room and found a couple women with their children sitting on a bed and they told me they had nowhere else to go and they didn’t want me to kick them out so I told them the rules if they wanted to stay and so they stayed. But again the whole time I just felt like crying. And then, I could see people that I had worked in other ministries with coming to this location to help out and the place growing and things happening that we had set out to do in a short time. The whole time I felt like my heart would burst because it was so heavy and full of joy.
And then… I woke up.
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Down with "Random" Acts of Kindness Up with "Intentional" Acts of Kindness
Why is it that acts of kindness are so random?
It is as if being kind to others or receiving kindness from others is done so little in our world that we can only understand it as "Random." I don't understand why it is so random. Like, why is it such a bad thing to show kindness to someone? Or, how come when were being kind to someone without expecting anything in return it is counter-cultural? Rather than experiencing or being a part of "random" acts of kindness I think we should seek to live lives filled with days where we are intentionally kind to others.
What would happen if everyday we were intentionally kind to others even when we didn't feel like it? It is possible that nothing might happen at all. Or, in some cases, certain people might just see those who have shown them kindness as people that can be taken advantage of. At the same time it is also possible that simply by being kind a person's life might be changed. (Ok maybe not their entire life but at least their day) hmmm... I wonder what a person behind me in a line at starbucks would think if I told them I wanted to buy them their cup of coffee? The person might get all stubborn and say that they didn't need anyone to buy them anything, or they could just say no thanks, at which point I would insist and tell them I really wanted to. Maybe I should try that sometime. Honestly the worst that could happen is they let me buy them a coffee and then spend a little extra money. (Just to let you know if you ever see me behind you in a line feel free to offer to pay for my coffee I won't mind)
It's a bit ridiculous thinking about randomly trying to be intentionally kind to people every day. I can only imagine how hard this would be and yet how extremely rewarding it may be as well. But, I think in general it starts with realizing that the world is not all about "ME" but that it is about all of "US."
well here is just another random thought
B
It is as if being kind to others or receiving kindness from others is done so little in our world that we can only understand it as "Random." I don't understand why it is so random. Like, why is it such a bad thing to show kindness to someone? Or, how come when were being kind to someone without expecting anything in return it is counter-cultural? Rather than experiencing or being a part of "random" acts of kindness I think we should seek to live lives filled with days where we are intentionally kind to others.
What would happen if everyday we were intentionally kind to others even when we didn't feel like it? It is possible that nothing might happen at all. Or, in some cases, certain people might just see those who have shown them kindness as people that can be taken advantage of. At the same time it is also possible that simply by being kind a person's life might be changed. (Ok maybe not their entire life but at least their day) hmmm... I wonder what a person behind me in a line at starbucks would think if I told them I wanted to buy them their cup of coffee? The person might get all stubborn and say that they didn't need anyone to buy them anything, or they could just say no thanks, at which point I would insist and tell them I really wanted to. Maybe I should try that sometime. Honestly the worst that could happen is they let me buy them a coffee and then spend a little extra money. (Just to let you know if you ever see me behind you in a line feel free to offer to pay for my coffee I won't mind)
It's a bit ridiculous thinking about randomly trying to be intentionally kind to people every day. I can only imagine how hard this would be and yet how extremely rewarding it may be as well. But, I think in general it starts with realizing that the world is not all about "ME" but that it is about all of "US."
well here is just another random thought
B
Monday, October 5, 2009
The Man Who Could Change In To Any Color... Including Plaid
What if you could change the color of your entire body to any color you wanted? And, what if you could change colors of your body parts? Like, say I wanted my hair (yes I'm including that as a body part its my blog I can say what i want) to be red for Halloween so I could look like gaara from Naruto, I could just think about it and presto my hair would be red.
Honestly I think it would be one of the most fun things to be able to just change to whatever color you wanted to simply by thinking about it. There are seriously days where I think to myself I wish I could be blue, or green, or red. Imagine how easy it would be to start conversations with new people. I think the first conversation would go something like this:
Random Person: "Dude your green"
Me: "I know right"
Random Person: "Dude! No! Seriously your green! Like your face and everything."
Me: "Yea I know I got this sweet ability where i can change in to any color I want or just specific body parts. Look at my ears." (At that point I would change the color of my ears to yellow)
Random person: "Woah, thats crazy"
Me: "I know but its so cool cause I can be whatever color I want at any time I want."
Okay so maybe that is just an example of a nice person. I think some people would be scared and run away and some moms might grab their children and walk faster as their son/daughter points and says, "hey mom look at the man with a yellow nose and red ears."
The downside to changing colors, other than having moms freak out and run away with their children who have the bad habit of pointing at people who look different, would be that people would probably want to just test your ability all the time with different requests: "hey can you turn periwinkle?" "How about chartreuse?" (Yes I did look up how to spell that) A new form of prejudice would probably be created as people might start saying hating others who were turquoise or had arms that were different colors. Or, maybe your friends wouldn't want to be around you anymore cause your favorite color to change to was their least favorite color in the world. (Would you still be my friend if I was your least favorite color?)
But you know what I say to all those naysayers; if I want to walk around with an orange and purple arm then I will walk around with an orange and purple arm.
I think the only thing better than being able to change colors would probably be to have a tale like a monkey tale that could lift things or you could hang upsidown from. Maybe even better than a tale would be a sweet set of wings that you could use to actually fly with... Hmm not sure what I would want more wings or a tale. Whatever, thats a whole other thing to blog about at another time.
-B
Honestly I think it would be one of the most fun things to be able to just change to whatever color you wanted to simply by thinking about it. There are seriously days where I think to myself I wish I could be blue, or green, or red. Imagine how easy it would be to start conversations with new people. I think the first conversation would go something like this:
Random Person: "Dude your green"
Me: "I know right"
Random Person: "Dude! No! Seriously your green! Like your face and everything."
Me: "Yea I know I got this sweet ability where i can change in to any color I want or just specific body parts. Look at my ears." (At that point I would change the color of my ears to yellow)
Random person: "Woah, thats crazy"
Me: "I know but its so cool cause I can be whatever color I want at any time I want."
Okay so maybe that is just an example of a nice person. I think some people would be scared and run away and some moms might grab their children and walk faster as their son/daughter points and says, "hey mom look at the man with a yellow nose and red ears."
The downside to changing colors, other than having moms freak out and run away with their children who have the bad habit of pointing at people who look different, would be that people would probably want to just test your ability all the time with different requests: "hey can you turn periwinkle?" "How about chartreuse?" (Yes I did look up how to spell that) A new form of prejudice would probably be created as people might start saying hating others who were turquoise or had arms that were different colors. Or, maybe your friends wouldn't want to be around you anymore cause your favorite color to change to was their least favorite color in the world. (Would you still be my friend if I was your least favorite color?)
But you know what I say to all those naysayers; if I want to walk around with an orange and purple arm then I will walk around with an orange and purple arm.
I think the only thing better than being able to change colors would probably be to have a tale like a monkey tale that could lift things or you could hang upsidown from. Maybe even better than a tale would be a sweet set of wings that you could use to actually fly with... Hmm not sure what I would want more wings or a tale. Whatever, thats a whole other thing to blog about at another time.
-B
Thursday, October 1, 2009
How in the world do you talk to Adults???
This is not a rhetorical question, or at least I don't think it is. This is something I keep asking myself over and over and... ummmm... over?
I have a bachelors in Youth Ministry and I have worked with youth and kids from babies to high school seniors (anyone else ever wonder if they are spelling the word senior right?) and talking to kids and meeting them seems to come really easy almost natural. But, when it comes to adults such as parents or teachers or other random older people I feel like I'm a terrible communicator. People keep telling me that I am just as good at working with adults as I am with youth but honestly I find that very hard to believe. When meeting anyone there is normally this point where conversation is generally surface level and a bit awkward but then you start asking each other questions and things go a bit deeper and you establish a relationship beyond the casual acquaintance. With students it takes only a short time to get past that awkward banter where you say things like "tut tut it looks like rain" or "have a good one," whatever the heck that means, and begin getting a bit more deep and talking about favorite types of cereal and what have been the most drastic life changes you have experienced (I don't care what you say, someones favorite cereal tells a lot about their personality).
Maybe there is a book about this that I could read that would help me out in being more confident in my interaction with other adults, and friends don't count as adults because they are as silly as I am, if not more. If I was to write a book about this subject I would title it "Help I Don't Know How to Speak Adult Talk!" Who knows, maybe if I wrote the book I would be more likely to get past the first couple of pages without wanting to take a nap.
At any rate, I think that part of my problem is that I see myself and youth and adults as extremely different. Don't get me wrong they are very different but honestly look at kids and adults. Adults are all kids just older ones. I mean they are someones kid right? Somebody is their parent or was their parent. So what is to say that they are very different on the inside then the youth I work with and find so easily able to connect with? Hmmm... I think I will try this. Rather than placing adults in a whole other category from kids I will try to see all adults as kids too. I wonder how some teachers and staff and administration at the High School I help out at will respond when I ask them what their favorite cereal is. I can just see the shock on the nurses face when the first question that comes out of my mouth when I go to meet her is, "whats your favorite kind of cereal," lol...
Hopefully by the end of the school year I will have a list of all the teachers and staff's favorite cereal at Central Valley High School. I will definitely have to post it in a blog. Now I just have to pray for boldness to actually do it and not just talk about it. OK Here We Go....
I'm Seriously Ridiculous sometimes.
B
I have a bachelors in Youth Ministry and I have worked with youth and kids from babies to high school seniors (anyone else ever wonder if they are spelling the word senior right?) and talking to kids and meeting them seems to come really easy almost natural. But, when it comes to adults such as parents or teachers or other random older people I feel like I'm a terrible communicator. People keep telling me that I am just as good at working with adults as I am with youth but honestly I find that very hard to believe. When meeting anyone there is normally this point where conversation is generally surface level and a bit awkward but then you start asking each other questions and things go a bit deeper and you establish a relationship beyond the casual acquaintance. With students it takes only a short time to get past that awkward banter where you say things like "tut tut it looks like rain" or "have a good one," whatever the heck that means, and begin getting a bit more deep and talking about favorite types of cereal and what have been the most drastic life changes you have experienced (I don't care what you say, someones favorite cereal tells a lot about their personality).
Maybe there is a book about this that I could read that would help me out in being more confident in my interaction with other adults, and friends don't count as adults because they are as silly as I am, if not more. If I was to write a book about this subject I would title it "Help I Don't Know How to Speak Adult Talk!" Who knows, maybe if I wrote the book I would be more likely to get past the first couple of pages without wanting to take a nap.
At any rate, I think that part of my problem is that I see myself and youth and adults as extremely different. Don't get me wrong they are very different but honestly look at kids and adults. Adults are all kids just older ones. I mean they are someones kid right? Somebody is their parent or was their parent. So what is to say that they are very different on the inside then the youth I work with and find so easily able to connect with? Hmmm... I think I will try this. Rather than placing adults in a whole other category from kids I will try to see all adults as kids too. I wonder how some teachers and staff and administration at the High School I help out at will respond when I ask them what their favorite cereal is. I can just see the shock on the nurses face when the first question that comes out of my mouth when I go to meet her is, "whats your favorite kind of cereal," lol...
Hopefully by the end of the school year I will have a list of all the teachers and staff's favorite cereal at Central Valley High School. I will definitely have to post it in a blog. Now I just have to pray for boldness to actually do it and not just talk about it. OK Here We Go....
I'm Seriously Ridiculous sometimes.
B
Thursday, September 24, 2009
Seriously Ridiculous
If you were a pickle how would you taste? Would you be sweet, sour, or just plane gross? Or, how about this question; if you could eat one type of breakfast cereal everyday what type of cereal would you eat?
These are the random things I think about sometimes. The way I think about my life and myself can be described in one word "Ridiculous," which I honestly forget how to spell it every time I go to type it up. Life is a crazy roller coaster. There are amazing times when I feel like it is impossible to get any better than this and then there are times when i feel like it couldn't get any worse than this, and yes it both has been better and worse. Life for me is an up and down ride where everyday could be considered an adventure if I decide to get out of bed that day. And, what I love about the word Ridiculous is how it can be used in so many different ways to describe so many different situations. The dictionary definition of ridiclous is something obsurd, proposterous, nonsensicle, ludicrous, and funny but my favorite is the slang meaning for the term, amazing, crazy stupid (which also means really good), awesome, really cool, and beyond the ordinary. In general I believe that I have had all of these moments take place in my life where I can say that was sick (in a good sense) and also say that was the worst time of my life. What is great and even important about all of these moments is that in everything there is something that can be learned. The crappy ridiulous moments will always remain crappy unless I become willing to look at them from a different light and learn from what took place and even the good ridiculous moments require me to take time to evaluate and look back on things so that I can learn even more from the situation. But, for right now in my life I would say I am at the point on the roller coaster where it just keeps going up and down up and down like it is going over some hills or something...
At any rate back to the real important matter: If you were a superhero what would be your name?
These are the random things I think about sometimes. The way I think about my life and myself can be described in one word "Ridiculous," which I honestly forget how to spell it every time I go to type it up. Life is a crazy roller coaster. There are amazing times when I feel like it is impossible to get any better than this and then there are times when i feel like it couldn't get any worse than this, and yes it both has been better and worse. Life for me is an up and down ride where everyday could be considered an adventure if I decide to get out of bed that day. And, what I love about the word Ridiculous is how it can be used in so many different ways to describe so many different situations. The dictionary definition of ridiclous is something obsurd, proposterous, nonsensicle, ludicrous, and funny but my favorite is the slang meaning for the term, amazing, crazy stupid (which also means really good), awesome, really cool, and beyond the ordinary. In general I believe that I have had all of these moments take place in my life where I can say that was sick (in a good sense) and also say that was the worst time of my life. What is great and even important about all of these moments is that in everything there is something that can be learned. The crappy ridiulous moments will always remain crappy unless I become willing to look at them from a different light and learn from what took place and even the good ridiculous moments require me to take time to evaluate and look back on things so that I can learn even more from the situation. But, for right now in my life I would say I am at the point on the roller coaster where it just keeps going up and down up and down like it is going over some hills or something...
At any rate back to the real important matter: If you were a superhero what would be your name?
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