Okay

Okay, my apologies for yesterday's post. Like I said, I was in a bad mood....not the best time to be saying things!

Anyways, we went to church this morning, minus my dad because he's down in Colorado Springs on vacation.......just kidding, it's for work. Well, for the first half I really didn't see the point in being there. Singing the same old songs in the ridiculously high key ranges, listening to yet another message. So I just sat there during worship, barely singing, and going off into my own little world. I was tired of doing the same old motions and not really connecting with God, so I figured why am I going to just "pretend" I was into the worship and "feeling" God when I'm not? My thinking is it's not about the motions, it's not about looking spiritual or just putting on an act. It's about relationship and if I'm not at a great place, I'm not going to pretend I am because I'm in church. Church is supposed to help you grow in your faith, not sugar coat it.

But my attitude changed during the sermon. Pastor Greg is still doing his series on faith. The first couple weeks I don't feel helped me a whole lot because I'm passed the basic belief in whether God is real or not. But this week he talked about actually applying it to your life and beginning an actual relationship with God. This is more what I was looking for. He referred to the two Greek words for the English word "word" which are logos and rhema (I think that's what it is.....going by memory here). Logos means the actual word....so the Bible is the Word of God....it's what God said, whereas rhema is the application of the word, so taking the logos of God, and applying it as the rhema. Does this make sense? I'm hoping I'm explaining it right!

So yeah, that really stood out to me because right now I'm searching to find out how to not just go through the "motions" but to actually mean them and get to that place where it's no longer in my head, but in my heart. It's really hard I must say! I had a conversation with my b/f the other day about how it's easy to look spiritual by raising your hands, closing your eyes, waving flags, etc. and thinking that by doing this, you're connecting with God. Being able to list the things you do that are spiritual and thinking that, because of them, you have some deep relationship with God. But I think that it's not about looking like anything. It's about the heart, and I don't want to get caught up in the outward appearance in church, or anywhere for that matter, of being spiritual. Look at Jesus, he didn't care what anyone said about the things he did because he knew that they were all done in obedience to God, not because he wanted people to think he was holy.

Anyways, those are my thoughts for the day. I'm off to the train station to get an ISIC card....sweet discounts for my travels! hehe have a good day everyone! :)

Stupid Blog

I've decided I hate blogging. Why? I don't know, I just do. I can't come up with anything important to say and I hate writing. I always have all these thoughts going on but can never figure out how to arrange them in a clear and concise manner. Which brings me to my next point of how much I hate essays. Right now I am working on part of an essay for a group. That has to be the worst thing ever because there's so much pressure and I am no writer at all! I'm more sciency. At least, I get better grades in sciences than anything else. But anyways, you don't want to put wrong information in for the essay or screw it all up for the rest of the group. Bah, I hate it.

Well, I don't really have anything positive to say right now, but for some reason I just felt I had to write something. Maybe I should end this entire blog. I never really write. I've learned something....many many times to say the least....I learned that you should never make decisions when you're mad. The other day I went to roll the car window down to chuck my discman out it because it wouldn't stop skipping, but luckily I stopped myself because I would have regretted that decision for sure! But anyways, I shall leave you now. I'm having one of those horribly bad days, but for no real reason at all. It kinda sucks.

P.S. Don't forget to set your clocks back an hour.....mmmmm sleep.

P.P.S. For all you who keep criticizing me on my whole music thing, you can stop. I still have my CDs. Why? Because I'm terrible and I don't really care anymore and I've gotten some comments from friends who say I'm turning into "that" Christian. Wanna criticize me for letting peoples opinions stop me? Go right ahead.

Quit hammering nails in my head!

Muahaha that is me playing Nothing Else Matters by Metallica....good song.

So anyways, ever since Monday I have had this horrible headache, hence the title of this blog. They weren't even migraine headaches, just horrible pressure where you feel like your head is going to explode. Yeah, fun stuff, eh. No, not really. Everyone kept telling me I had a brain tumour....it's good to have friends....*note sarcasm. So I went to the doctor yesterday and she got me to do all these funny things like jump and down and touch my nose with my eyes closed and stuff. I think she was checking for vertigo. So now I'm on sweet medication! Yah!!

I don't really have much to say these days. School is ridiculously busy, but I still love it. I find it hard to balance school, work, socializing and sleep. Oh right, the doctor also told me to take naps during the day....hahaha I don't have time for that! Who's she kidding. So yeah, I find second year is a HUGE change from first. I feel like I have more time, but then again, like I have eight times as much work.

I've decided I don't like my Minority Groups class. The text book is horrible. I find it's hard to understand what they are talking about because I think they just used about the biggest words they could find to describe things and I'm not very good at English in the first place, so that's a challenge. Also, they just ramble on about crap that I really don't care about. Like, "we can't look at racism on the surface, we have to dig deeper and find out how it is constructed, and then once we figure that out, we must learn when this occured, and then why it happens and how it links to everything else in the world..." Okay, so that's not what they actually said, but it might as well be. This is what I hate about University, you can spend all your time learning about issues in the world, but no time trying to fix it. Yes, I understand you have to know the root of the problem to fix it, but really, do we care about a million different theories that some dead people constructed that never worked? Not really. So what's the point of learning about it? Bah, whatever.

Before I end this, here's some good Christian music I've discovered:
- Spoken - they just released a new CD
- P.O.D. - yes I know they're not new, but I never really listened to them before
- Blindside - I've listened to them for awhile and they're still good
- Falling Up - I just got into them
- Kutless worship CD - is good
- 12 Stones - are alright, not as heavy as I like sometimes though
- Skillet - I don't own their stuff right now, but I listened to them at a friend's and they're good

I Can't Believe I'm Doing This

Okay.

I cannot believe that I'm doing this. No no, it's nothing really big, well, to me it is, but for you, probably not so much. I've decided to get rid of some of my music. I was talking to a, um, friend last night and we were talking about music and such and how he only owns Christian music. I had thought about my music collection before and I realized that I don't have all that much Christian music. So last night was like a huge revelation for me. I thought about it all day and I came to the conclusion that some of it really has to go. This is especially hard for me because I LOVE my music and not necessarily the lyrics of everything, but certain songs I think are just magnificently done and I'm not sure I can do this and part with it.

I sorted through my music binder today and created four seperate categories:

1. Christian
2. In Between (stuff that cannot be classified under either, such as Creed, LotR soundtrack, etc.)
3. Non-Christian (3DD, Linkin Park, Pilate, Audioslave, etc.)
4. Bad (stuff that includes swearing pretty much)

I have 70 CDs in total, and here's how the categories break up:

1. Christian: 18 CDs
2. In Between: 10 CDs
3. Non-Christian: 31 CDs
4. Bad: 11 CDs

Right now I am focusing on those 11 CDs categorized as "bad". For the most part, I'm okay with parting with those except for a couple CDs which are just killing me because I REALLY do NOT want to get rid of them. Here's how that group breaks down even further:

1. Green Day - American Idiot
2. Matthew Good Band - Beautiful Midnight
3. A mixed burned CD with some bad stuff (such as Missy Elliot....ewww)
4. Another mixed burned one with various swearing songs
5. Breaking Benjamin - We Are Not Alone
6. A Perfect Circle - 13th Step
7. A Perfect Circle - Emotive
8. Pearl Jam - Ten
9. Incubus - Make Yourself
10. Alicia Keys - Songs in A Minor
11. Our Lady Peace - Clumsy

Now, the reason for this selection is simple. CDs that inlcude swearing in them in more than one song pretty much (for example, I am not including Audioslave because there is only one song on their first CD with swearing and I don't listen to that song anyways, so it's all good...in a sense). I'm alright with getting rid of all of them except for A Perfect Circle and Incubus. I don't know why, but those two have such a huge hold on me. I really like their music and I am really unsure if I can actually do this. I feel like God is calling me to, but I, in my weak human state, don't feel as if I can.

It's funny, 'cause I was talking to my parents about it and I came upstairs to do some Bible reading and I read Hebrews 4:13, which says, "...Everything is clear and lies open before him, and to him we must explain the way we have lived." That really struck me because last night I was trying so hard to justify the music I was listening to, but it just was not measuring up. And this verse made me realize that God knows all and if I can't justify it to my friend, then how can I justify it to God? I can't.

Another verse I read was Hebrews 4:15-16, "For our high priest (talking about Jesus) is able to understand our weaknesses. When he lived on earth, he was tempted in every way that we are, but he did not sin. Let us, then, feel very sure that we can come before God's throne where there is grace. There we can receive mercy and grace to help us when we need it." Oh boy, I sure need it! This was also a comfort to me and somewhat of a confirmation that this is something I need to do. So yes, this was just all a bit of an epiphany last night....so I thought I would share it. Pray that I don't go back on my decision and that I obey God!

Baby Shower Part III

Well, these are the last of 'em. I hope you enjoyed and I wishI could put all the other ones on, but some of them are really fuzzy and everything. Anyways, have a great day guys! :)



Note the football in the air that Mr. T just threw
Nice catch Ariel!
A little chattin', botchy ball (sp?) and football
Read above
Praying
More praying
Boy we like praying. Sweet!!
Three beautiful women! Laura, Alma and my mama

Baby Shower Part II

Well, here's some more for you guys to look at. I'm glad you enjoy them!


I absolutely love this one of Seth!!
Awwww!!! :)
People....you can figure it out!
Mr. and Mrs. Terry with little Benny (as my mom calls him)
Awwwww! Mrs. T and Elyse and of course, the baby!
The whole lot of us
Nice backpack Abe. It suits ya!
Not sure what's going on there (there's you Jamie...are ya happy??!!) :)
Awww fast asleep! Man, I wish I was like that right now!

Well, sorry it took so long, but as I said before, I went away this weekend and it was amazing!! I got to sit at the head table of the wedding and everything :) I also got to drive a Mustang!! No....I didn't kill anyone. But it was pretty sweet. I wanted to test to see how fast it got up to 80km/h so we were driving in the country and I stopped the car and we counted 1.....2.....3.....GO! And I took off and it took about 6 seconds to get to 80km/h, but I don't think I was flooring it because I was a little scared since it was a rental car for the wedding and Nathan's dad wouldn't be too happy if crashed it or something! Anyways, yeah, that was great! More pics to come!