People

I love community. Love talking to people, listening to people, praying together, laughing together, singing together. I love the whole package. But even with all the beautifulness of Christian community, it sure can get annoying. In my opinion, if you aren't building up the people around you, if you're not helping the people around you become better people, then I think whatever you're doing besides that is pointless. Maybe sometimes among my group of pals I come across as the "mom" and i get way too defensive when it comes to my friends and the decisions that they do or don't make. I have to be careful because through that sometimes I seek my own self-righteousness and the feeling of proving to the world that my point is right. I really think that in Christian community, you not only have the responsibility of helping your pals grow and be better, but also you must listen to what other people say, people that you trust. It's not always about dishing out the advice or calling out the wrong actions. It's also about learning from each other and listening to each other. We Christians are pro's at sitting and hearing preaching from the preacher dude or listening to Godly wisdom but then walking right out the door like we never heard anything. Change and growth needs to happen to follow Christ. Following is an action. When you're following someone, you don't just stop halfway through and say "screw it, I'm gonna still do my own thing." Why? Because you'll get left. This annoyance isn't just something I thought about on the ride home. It's in fact the peak of my frustrations at the current moment. I get frustrated with community when I see us not acting according to the gospel. And I'm not Jesus in this story. If anything I'm a selfish pharisee who gets told what to do by Jesus but calls it whack and continues down my own road sometimes. Talking about these things within the given community helps. The good word tells us to seek out our pals and chat about what's up (not exactly in those words, but you get it) But I don't know what happens when the person won't listen. I haven't figured out that part yet, readers. Most of the people I roll with these days are younger than I am, and me and Jesus have had our own set of battles with solely that sentence. But what i feel called to be lately is not the 23 year-old know it all, but someone who builds other people up. No matter what the age. We are called to love our neighbor and unfortunately we dont get to pick who that is. So younger or older, God wants me to help my friends be better people if I can, and hopefully we'll all mature in the way that God defines maturity. And I pray really hard that that is the the goal for others so that they can build me up and tell me when i'm wrong when i screw up. Community that is worth anything does not function without Jesus. It simply can't and won't. And I'm a firm beleiver that He would call us to build up and listen to each other and love each other deeply, and help to change each other. Just a thought.

The Bronx be ballin!

For those of you who don't know or don't care, the Yankees are going to the World Series! I was telling my mom the other day how it just doesn't pay off to live around here and be a sports fan sometimes. Carolina Panthers, Carolina Gamecocks, Clemson (admit it orange fans, yall don't win championships) and Atlanta Braves. They all for the most part suck from year to year and that's ok with me, I'm a faithful fan. But the baseball t-shirt that I rock on a warm day reaches far beyond this region, for I am a New York Yankees fan. Calm down, I know the yankees spend more money in one day than you or I will ever see in a lifetime, but hey, you gotta spend money to make money. And don't you dare tell me that the Red Sox don't spend just as much money on their players because I've looked it up, they're almost equal. That goes for all of the big market teams in America. Los Angles, Boston, New York. Those cities are rolling, so it makes sense that their sports teams would cash in too. No matter what the managing strategies may be, the Yankees are a legendary team with some crazy winning records. Derek Jeter is my favorite player of all time and he has been ever since I started playing shortstop in coach pitch softball as a youngster. Those were some good days. I reckon he's the only reason I became a fan, but now I hate the Red Sox so much that I could never go back. Be happy for me, because no team of mine ever wins games much less goes to any sort of game that means something.

And now for the quote of the day, and the reason why I love working in the physical education department...
Student: "Did the Jets win yesterday?"
Dr. S: "Yea 38-0. We played the Raiders, so we were basically playing a high school team. But we won."

quote of the day

Me: "why do all of taylor swift's songs talk about kissing in the rain?"
Brittany: "text me through the phone!"
Grace: "why can't we just kiss inside where the weather doesn't matter and we won't have to call long distance?"

quote of the day

You had to be there...

Erica: "I caught a cricket in this bag."

I just dont know what's so appealing about a jacket. I mean fall is colorful and chilly and crisp air and whatever, but I don't want it if it's going to rain like this. I think it's been raining like 13 out of the 14 days in October. I'm probably offending all 1% of you who read this, but pumpkins and crunchy leaves just aren't cool enough for me to give up my allegiance to summer. I might change my mind if south carolina wasn't so weather challenged, and seasons actually existed. Oh but we try to make them exist when it turns 65 and we bust out our flip-flops in march and our jackets in september. But that's enough about the weather. Have a good fall break, peeps. Don't drown.

These are my people

It is far too late for me to be awake and putting thought into anything, but I just want to say how much I love people. Sometimes I get in this mood where I feel like I'm too "mature" (whatever the heck that means) to hang out past 11:00 with freshman and be completely silly and walk around campus meeting new faces, but that thinking is wrong. I'm not cool. And speaking of cool, Brittany S. and Rebecca (2 newish friends) came over to our house tonight for pancakes and straight up did the dishes that were piled up in the sink! Just walked in, had a pancake, and started doing the dishes for no reason. Doesn't that make you want to thank Jesus for life and be in a musical while wearing yellow? It makes me want to do all those things, man. I looked around our front porch tonight and realized (not that this is anything new to me) that I hang out with some truly beautiful people. Adorable people. People who have some good good hearts inside of them. Flawed people. A type of community that I know I just can't go without. We weren't created to go without it I don't think. Yes lord, tear it up.

Don't Stop Believin'

True story: Almost every night since I started grad school, I've had trouble going to sleep becuase im excited about something that the next day is about to bring. I know that's completely cheesey, but it's the truth. I've been having a great time and every single day of this semester so far has been fantastic. And then this week happened. I knew it was going to come. The week where everything about the world sucks and I want to just pull my hair out. I'm really not trying to be dramatic here. I talked to an atheist last night. Well, it was more like an atheist talked to me last night. He asked all the questions that I should be able to answer as a Christian, and I'm pretty sure my responses sounded like I'd never read the Bible in my life. I had no idea what I was talking about really. To give me an ounce of credibility, he was a bit on the rude side and just wasn't open to anything I said. So that made life tough. But after leaving that conversation, I immediately started feeling like I have my entire life whenever I lost a soccer game. In soccer I was constantly frustrated with myself for not playing well, not scoring a goal, for letting my team down. I had that exact feeling and I HATE it, I've always hated it. Evangelism isn't some competition where I'm the team captain. Unlike soccer, it shouldn't be based on how I perform. It should push me to be convinced of what I believe. To understand more than the feel-good parts of the Bible. To learn a bit about how to talk to an atheist because I have to know. The grace that He gives is so good. To know that the Kingdom doesn't start or stop with me is good.

In other news, I'm completely in love with the new tv show, Glee. There's singin and dancin and loser high school kids and everything I could want in a new tv show. Like I have any time left to devote to watching more trash tv. Oh well.