Not Even Sure What To Call This One

WARNING: I am going to write this as nicely as I can muster... no promises though.

If any of you guys are my Facebook readers then you probably think this particular blogpost is going to be about an ignorant student who told my speech class that America is corrupt. You however are wrong because believe it or not, I ran into even more idiotic people. No idea where this is going to go but I assume it will probably be a rant so brace yourselves:

For the past 2 weeks on Tuesday, a crazy psychopath comes to my College and stands on the main patio of our campus and twists Bible verses around while screaming at students. We all know the Gospel (for these purposes I will be condensing this like a ton and also will be using the short version that most of the people 2 generations above my own would use): We are sinners, we deserve hell, Christ took our sins. If you are my age you would realize how... unappealing, I suppose, this sounds, and you would revise it to look more like the truth: we are sinners, God is love beyond our understanding, he can help us out as people as well as help us out with our eternity, yadda yadda yadda. My generation prefers this second approach for multiple reasons that I will not delve into now. Once we mature as Christians, it is a lot easier to swallow the whole "we deserve hell" thing. I'm like completely okay with hearing this, I understand it completely, and this fact actually makes my relationship with God better. Nevertheless, my generation generally takes a different approach to the Gospel.

With that being said, this crazy preacher literally stands on a pillar and screams in essence "YOU'RE GOING TO HELL!!" in this face of students as they walk to class.... very encouraging right before an exam I must say.  My purpose is not to necessarily talk about this crazy man, however I will include some vital information: The man believes a variety of incredibly not true things. The one under discussion today was that people could lose their salvation just because they sinned. Here is what he meant: He believes in Jesus therefore he is a christian therefore he no longer sins.  He believes that if you are a christian and sin you lose your salvation. One of my good friends was pulling out verses left and right disproving this and the guy would not have it. Ultimately the guy said "Are you a Christian?" and when my friend replied yes he said "Well then I'm not really here for you. I'm moving on." SO, what Im trying to get to is that this guy claimed he was here for non believers.

Well, I was standing in the back listening to all of the nonsense comments being made while the crazy psycho was talking to individuals. A series of events that completely disturbed me occurred as follows:

1. A Giant dude and scrawny little dude were talking. I couldn't tell if they were honestly stupid or a little drunk or both. I'm leaning towards both. Anyway, the big, giant, dumber one said something along the lines of:
"DUDE *obnoxious drunk/stupid laughter* What if.... what if like.... like everyone just was doing shrooms out in the desert and like... wrote the Bible man *more obnoxious drunk/stupid laughter*"

Being as this comment was made after a slew of other ignorant ones, I couldn't take it no longer and politely informed them that that indeed would be absolutely crazy being as like 90% of religions use the same Old Testament so like how crazy would it be if they had all been on shrooms and written the exact same thing??
The idiots thought I was agreeing with them.
They then talked about how maybe they all just Plagiarized after one another. This, of course, was after the big one announced "I ate beer for lunch man *obnoxious hick laughter*"
Moving on.

2. My friend came to talk to me about when Jesus talked about how a fig tree bearing no fruit needs to be cut off. Not going to teach on this, if you want clarity google it please. If you understand the passage, move on.

A pink haired girl with her head half shaved came up, randomly in the middle of my conversation, and said in a very hippy-esce tone "Yeah, I mean by fruit don't you mean like peace and love man?"

No, hippy girl. No, that is not what fruit is.

She then said "Cause, I mean, this dude is hate. He ain't love, man. He's hate. He's worse than Satan."

WORSE THAN SATAN. I don't think this point even needs to be addressed. If THIS is her version of Satan, the vision of hell that she has in her head is paradise man.

3. A long haired freaky man ran up behind crazy preacher dude and yelled "Hale Satan!!!" to which the pink haired hippy said "Yeah, man!" and then went and hugged a random dude like pink-haired hippies would do.


Not really sure where to go with this. There is no lesson here. Just a lot of sadness. My heart is deeply pained by these people and their beliefs. They have honestly put no thought into it at all, not even a little. And anything we say they will be turned off by because being a Christian in that crowd right now is sooooo "not cool".

My bad though, I thought we were in college. Not middle school.

Pomp and Circumstance (Almost)

Today at a certain school on top of a hill, the bells rang one last time, locker doors slammed shut a final time, and a school parking lot drained out all too quickly. The same sounds were made, the same laughs were heard, and the same names were called today as they were when we first walked into that same school on August 1st, 2010. Today was my last real day of high school.

It doesn't feel happy or excited or even sad. There is only one word to describe the feeling that every senior is inevitably feeling at the moment and that word is "weird". I don't know what to feel. I'm excited for the future but then again it's uncomfortable. It's like we're mourning the loss of all the friendships we've ever known, the ones we've shared since we started Kindergarten in 2001. But at the same exact time we're fantasizing over the new friendships we'll create. The only thing I can connect this feeling to is my experience when reading Harry Potter (I'm a nerd, I know). You read a chapter where so much action happened and some losses occurred and all the sudden you find yourself at the end of that chapter feeling more emotionally confused than ever. You are excited and eager to move on to the next chapter to find out what happens next and to become enveloped in that story line, but you still find yourself lingering, fully reflecting on what you're leaving behind. That's exactly how I am today.

I know the next page of life will be full of more words and relationships and happiness. I have known for a while that the page I just finished would be coming to an end soon. But I'm in that weird in-between stage, that awkward blank chunk of paper between the ending and starting chapters. So the question now is, what do I do with that white space?

I think, for the moment at least, I will choose to use the white space to reflect. I've been a cheerleader and president of clubs and in AP classes. I've learned what I do and I don't like. I found Christ and real friendships and some not so good ones too. I've had an absolute ball as well as the most frustrating time of my life. It IS weird, a weird I won't feel again, but it's a good weird.

Hats off to you, class of 2014. You've been great and I wouldn't have wanted to go through this journey with anyone else. But now it's time for someone else to take our place. We left our mark, we made waves in our little pool. Let's not let the ripples stop here. Love each and every one of you. Your future will be as bright as you choose to let it be. God bless you all.


      Freshman year                   Sophomore Year                                       Junior Year                              

SENIOR YEAR!!

There's a Time to Weep and a Time to Laugh...

Tonight I celebrate my graduation from my "baby christian" stage. Tonight was the graduation that my Sunday school class set up for the seniors. I can not begin to describe how incredibly blessed I have been through this group of people. I have truly witnessed the hand of God reach down to touch the kids in this group. I have seen almost every one of them break down in worship and weep because they couldn't possibly comprehend how great, how loving, how gracious our Jesus is. And through witnessing that, I have truly came to appreciate the beauty behind such actions. Being with this group of teens has blessed me in ways I will never again be blessed. Teenagers seem to more easily be able to swallow their pride and get on their knees (or sometimes even literally lay face-down to the ground) and cry out to God. They put hands on each other and they pray wholeheartedly. They put their hands out and they scream and sing  and cry because that is the kind of worship that our God deserves. They become Jesus and they rake yards and they make soup and they brush kids hair and they sweep floors and they carry tables and they do what needs to be done in the church and in the mission world. Adults have problems with these things. They don't want to go in front of a congregation and admit that they have flaws or that they haven't appreciated Jesus the way that he deserves. They pray in extravagant words because they think that's the way to go. They mumble worship music in hopes that no one will be able to hear the words that they sing because they are ashamed of their voice when they sing. They have work and a family and they cant go to Africa or the other side of the country or across the state or even up the road because that's somebody else's job and they have a life. It seems like the teen Jesus and the adult Jesus are 2 different people. However, I believe wholeheartedly that my group of teens, my sunday school class, my brothers and sisters will help to change this stereotype. I have watched them change lives and churches and communities. I have seen God use them. I can't wait to see how God will continue to guide them.

It has been my pleasure and privilege to be a member of such a wonderful group of people. It's a bittersweet moment, but I know that God will continue to bless the next phase of my life. It will be a different experience but a good one. This is a moment in time, however. Never again will I see such blessings as these. Praise the Good Lord.