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| Two Roads Less TraveledRobert Frost says "i took the one less traveled by,/and that has made all the difference."
What happens when both paths are less traveled? I have two opportunities that are proving to have conflicting schedules. Whichever one i choose one, i risk crippling my connection with the other. Opportunities are great and it's an encouragement that i have so many chances to use my giftings...but now which way do i go?
Better yet...which way is narrower? Which way is straighter? Cliche, i know...but it's all that i have to hold to.
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| EventuallyOne day i'll grow up. One day i'll mature. One day i'll stop making the same stupid mistakes that i regret every time and work to avoid them ever again, and then meander right back at them sooner rather than later. According to who was is...Einstein?...i'm insane. I attempt the same feat without approaching the situation any differently, and expect different results. They aren't coming. Somehow a lesson learned is not necessarily a lesson learned. I see the problem, i feel the pain, i know the errors, i know the situation, but yet i don't avoid the sequel. And it's a crummy sequel at that. I learned my lesson as to what happened, but haven't learned my lesson of how to change and prevent a redundancy. Normally i write on here to try to get something out and feel better. To share and hopefully help someone else through what i have to say, some message of new revelation i've gained. Right now, maybe i don't want to feel better. Maybe if the pressure in my chest stays longer, it will serve as a better reminder why i should avoid buying into the next sequel. The beginning is sweet, but the end...the end isn't sour, but rather revealing. But not revealing enough. I'm not entirely sure why i feel so torn, so wilted. A Paradox: 1) What the enemy intended for evil God has turned for good. 2) The good things God originally designed, the Devil corrupts into weapons of his own. | | |
| What are we made of?And what will people remember? Liviu Librescu, 76, an engineering science and mathematics lecturer. He was born in Romania, immigrated to Israel in 1978 and moved to Virginia in 1985. An Israeli citizen, he had taught at Virginia Tech for 20 years and was internationally known for his work in aeronautical engineering. "His research has enabled better aircraft, superior composite materials, and more robust aerospace structures," said Ishwar Puri, the head of the engineering science and mechanics department. Librescu's son, Joe, said his father's students sent e-mails detailing how the professor saved their lives by blocking the doorway of his classroom from the approaching gunman before he was fatally shot. “My father blocked the doorway with his body and asked the students to flee,” his son Joe Librescu said in a telephone interview from his home outside of Tel Aviv. “Students started opening windows and jumping out.” (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18143312/?GT1=9246) | | |
| Corporate Worship ExperiencesORU chapel rolls around roughly twice a week, give or take 1%, and i'm there for every one, partially because ORU has something called a mandatory attendance policy, but mostly because i choose to be there. Interesting speakers (most of the time) see everyone on my floor and sister wing. However, the worship (my favorite and most dear part of any service) has only struck me in a great and mighty way in chapel once...out of what 50 times now? I've continually wondered what the cause of this rarefication of corporate worship and adoration has been. The answer came last night. Not at chapel, but at Campus Worship. Same building, same band, same sound system, same me, yet there was a distinct and tangible difference between the spiritual atmosphere in chapel and the spiritual atmosphere at Campus Worship last night. I have not felt the passion i felt last night sense August 2006 at the Southwest Believer's Convention. It is a passion i know not how to express in movement or word, or any natural means. And i asked myself what was so different about that service as opposed to the Chapel services. The answer struck me almost immediately. It was not me, or my heart. It was not the band, or the sound system, or the friends i was sitting with. But rather, it was the heart of the entirety of the "congregation." Chapel services are mandatory. This means that everyone has to be there, even the students that want nothing to do with God. The ones that sit in their chairs during worship and listen to their iPods, somehow drowning out the massive levels of volume coming from the live worship. The ones that are there to some how show off the rest of the campus by yelling and cheering louder than anyone else. The ones that legitimately understand the concept of Christianity, but are only at Chapel because there are no excuses for getting out of chapel. There are plenty of other things they would rather do. However, the smaller crowd at campus worship was not there because it was mandatory, or because they wanted to impress others (well, there is a likelihood that in every service of any large size that there is at least one guy going to the service just to impress the girl sitting next to him--or vice versa.) They were at Campus Worship because they legitimately wanted to spend time with their Father and Lord and Creator in corporate setting of worship. And when the atmosphere has a strong polarity of hearts truly seeking the same cause, the effect will be something akin to their desire. Likewise, when chapel is half-filled of people halfheartedly attending, the tangible presence of God is only halfway released, which really isn't a release at all. This is not the whole truth of experiencing God, for that i need more than a xanga post, but it is a truth about this aspect of worship. | | |
| Warning--Not as Deep or Well-Thought Through As Other Spiritual Posts"The blessing of the Lord brings wealth, and he adds no trouble to it." Prov 10:22 "The integrity of the upright guides them, but the unfaithful are destroyed by their duplicity." Prov 11:3 So i couldn't sleep last night, maybe it was the Pepsi i had just finish 20 minutes before i tried to go to bed, or maybe it was all the thoughts running through my mind. The caffeine was likely accelerating the speed of the thoughts. So i decided to try to resolve some of these questions and this bewilderment. I have found only two ways to do such a thing: 1) Read the Bible or 2) Write a Song about it after 1:30 in the morning. It was after 1:30, but there is no private place where i can work out the melodies, and besides i needed answers not therapy, so i read my little black bible. I plopped down on a chair in my floor's alcove and opened to a random page in Proverbs. Wisdom is something i seem to be short on despite all the knowledge i am gaining here at college. The page turned out to be not so random. Normally i start at the beginning of a chapter, so i can get the full drift of it, but this time, i felt that i should just start at the top of a page (which happened to be verse 9 of chapter 10.) On a quick sidenote, i've interceded and fasted and sought God's voice in many things throughout my life, but i've never had to go a whole day or search very long for the answer. Generally it comes almost immediately, or He tells me that now is not the time to find the answer, that it still has to grow within me. Last night was no exception. Within 12 verses, and not even one column of the page, i had found a verse that struck me as a eternal measurement of every aspect of my life. (Prov 10:22) Everything in life has a rough spot, but the question is what kind of rough spot is it? Is it tearing you up or sharpening your edges? If it's the latter, than the trouble and the thing (whether it be a belonging, job, hobby, or friend) is not what you need in your life. But if the rough spot is good, than it is not trouble at all, but rather a good stress like the stress of a flame purifying ore. I found examples of each in my life yesterday. Trouble is simply an attack on your calling, in one form or another. It may be simple and seem innocent enough, but so can an apple. What is fine for one person may throw another one off their path. Hopefully you can differentiate between the two before the wrong ones mess things up, or someone can help you find the way back before you can't see the path from the dense shrubbery. The other verse (still on the first page that i started reading from) showed me that i have to have a few more things figured out in my life. I have to draw my own conclusions and realizations. I need to stay up late reading the Bible in absolute silence more often. | | |
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