Ganamos

That is all.

Debrief, for lack of a better title

The sky taunts me with thoughts of yesterday
When everyone's away
I'm here alone facing you
The colors in the air are crying
You know my heart is torn
You know I'm here before you
Still, the laughter is slow to come
And I'm standing here so cold
The colors ripple in the trees
Saying "Welcome, but you don't belong
You have to find it once again"
Remember the sound of the smiles, the tears
The long nights that turn into years
The memories of times I've turned my back
And thoughts of the things that I still lack
So you know, and you've known, me better than most
Which gives me relief when all else is lost
So with all that I am and all that I do
At the end of it all, I'm still found in you

You know it

There were four things I wanted during my time at Bethany. Well, more than that, but four stand out. And I didn't get any of them. At the end of my third year, I was disappointed for these four reasons, but I said I guess that is how it is, and for whatever reason I guess God saw that it was better that I did not have them. So I gave these desires back to Him.
Then I went to Mexico.
Everything I had wanted at Bethany and gave up, God answered in my fourth year, when I was technically but not physically there. And what I learned, and want to share with you, is that God answers forgotten prayers. He remembers. And He cares. And His timing is exponentially better than ours. Things are more beautiful when done His way.
The four things are:
1) A great roommate who I am good friends with.
2) A good friend who is a boy.
3) Road trips with friends.
4) The Boston Bruins winning the Stanley Cup. (And for everyone who ever made fun of me for cheering for them, now is your opportunity to eat it.)

Quiero ganar

Fan of the season.

The colors in the stars, they dance

The colors you choose
The reds, greens, and blues
They are reflected in your voice
You know I had no choice
I listened to your words, your cries
And saw the same reflected in my eyes
My colors, purple, blue, and black
From who we are, there's no going back
The blue runs through it all
Reflected in summer and fall
When the world wants to, starts to, cry
The rain is reflected in the blue of your eyes
It's the dark I am drawn to, again and again
The color reflected in the cry of the rain
The colors of fire, of water, of blood
And the brown in the blue, the color of mud
To let go again, fall into this flood

If I said you were dead, would you kill me?

Instead of teaching us how to defend the Gospel, teach us how to live it.

Growing up, I never liked going to church. I basically only went because my parents made me. I mean, why would you want to waste three hours of your day going to a large but unexciting building, sitting in a class where you learn nothing except how to goof off, go upstairs, sing three generally boring songs, and then sit for half an hour on hard benches and listen to someone talk about something completely uninteresting, if not seemingly irrelevant, to your life, and then wait for your mother to finally finish talking to all the other ladies so you can go home, change, and watch TV? Welcome to my old view of church. I usually read a book through it.
Recently, I have learned that church can actually be good. It can feel alive. And you can get stuff out of it to encourage and support your daily walk with Christ. Not to mention that Christian community is really really important.
But I have one complaint. Why did I have to leave the country to learn this? One church service from last year stands out in my mind. It happened at my parents' church in Saskatchewan, the same church I grew up in. Maybe I'm jaded, I don't know. But the person who was preaching that day preached on creation. How creation was right and evolution was wrong. He had examples and everything. Proofs. Details. Complicated intricacies of the animal world, proving that we are created beings. And my problem is this: I don't care. People have decided their stance on creation versus evolution a long time ago. I didn't come to church to hear another argument about it, when you're saying the exact same thing everyone has already said. Again. I came to learn about how to live my faith in the world. I want advice on how to love people who are hard to love. I want to know how to live my faith in the workplace. I want to know how to not be distracted by boys. I want community that encourages me, where I feel that after these few hours with other Christians, I can go out into my extremely secular culture and live for another week or few days confidently, strongly, differently. I want to learn how to share my faith with strangers who confront me in the street. I want to know what following Jesus is. And I'm sorry, but I didn't come to hear how the mosquito proves that we are created. I don't give a damn. Teach me how to live so radically different from the world that they will notice, and then teach me how to love those who are persecuting me. That is what I want to know. And then shove me out the door so I go do it.
So my final question is this. How do you bring to life a dying church? Because I can't get over the fact that I feel like the church I grew up in is dying. It's not growing. It's cold. And at the risk of being called an upstart young girl who went to Bible school and now thinks she knows everything, I think something drastic has to change.

Dangerous

So I don't really know what to write... I'm pretty bad at this updating thing. Sometimes I just prefer to live my life, and not tell people about it. Though I know I ought to. That, and I'm lazy sometimes. Maybe more of that. So what do you want to know about my life? Lately it's been eventful in small ways, such that they matter to me and probably not to you, the reader. What are some of these things? I like drinking London Fogs. I have become a follower of three different television shows via the internet this month. I am being challenged to live differently than the world. What will that look like? I have no idea. But I fully expect things to be different. Unexpected. Risky. Dangerous. If we call ourselves Christians, we ought to look different than the world. I'm starting to think that if we don't, we also don't have the right to call ourselves Christians. Because if you can't tell that someone is a Christian by the way they act, they're not doing a very good job of being Christ to the world. And this means that some things have to change in my life. I read a book. It changed my views on some stuff. It is called "Radical" by David Platt. And it made me think. And I think that some things are going to change. Because I want to be different. I want you to see Christ in me. And to live so that you want what I have. Because it is the one thing that is worth giving up everything else for. And it's not easy and it's not safe and it's scary. But it's worth it. If it doesn't change your life, it's not Christianity.

And on a different note, here we are at Teotihuacan:

Reasons why today is exceptional

1) We have started watching a new television show that looks really good. But there are only three episodes out so far. We watched the first one.
2) It is raining for the first time this year. And hard. And we danced in the street in the rain.
3) Lady Gaga has now played four songs in a row that I know...
4) We went to the tianguis this morning.
5) We stayed up really late laughing really hard last night.

Homesick at home

"All the optimism of the age had been false and disheartening for this reason, that it had always been trying to prove that we fit in to the world. The Christian optimism is based on the fact that we do not fit in to the world... The optimist's pleasure was prosaic, for it dwelt on the naturalness of everything; the Christian pleasure was poetic, for it dwelt on the unnaturalness of everything in light of the supernatural. The modern philosopher had told me again and again that I was in the right place, and I had still felt depressed even in acquiescence. But I had heard that I was in the wrong place, and my soul sang for joy, like a bird in spring... I knew now why grass had always seemed to me as queer as the green beard of a giant, and why I could feel homesick at home."
-G.K. Chesterson

Follow

I would first like to say that I dislike "steps to salvation" and I don't know why these came out in steps. But it seemed the way it wanted to be done. We are talking lately about evangelism, discipleship, and things like that, and today during an exercise I came up with these 10 "steps for telling someone about God", focused in one girl I know. I doubt it would speak to many other people, but I thought it was interesting what came, and so here they are.
1) You are loved. You are beloved. And you will never, never be abandoned by this lover.
2) You were created with purpose, and that has not been forgotten.
3) It isn't promised that your problems will go away, but rather that with God's strength you will be able to deal with them. For in your weakness He is strong.
4) The difference between being dirty and clean is accepting the washing. And sometimes being scrubbed clean hurts like heck, but it is worth it. There is no other way to truly live.
5) You have to choose to follow without knowing where you are going, or how to get there. You have to trust.
6) It is hard. You will be mocked, tested, persecuted. Why pretend that it is easy? You have to die to yourself every single day. It is only in this dying that you are able to live.
7) You have been covered by the ultimate sacrifice- Jesus Christ. As repugnant as the image might be, it is true. It is his blood that makes you whole again.
8) It is easy to forget. Don't. Remind yourself every day that you have been made new, that you have surrendered yourself and now live for Christ.
9) Jesus Christ, a sinless man who was and is the Son of God, was killed but rose from the dead, and doing so conquered death. It is in his life that we have our hope and our example. And they may be able to kill and torture our bodies, but the cannot touch our faith and our spirit. For we belong to the One who has already won, and the Spirit of God is within us. It sounds crazy, but it changes everything.
10) It is not enough to know. You must also live. Start by doing justice, loving mercy, and walking humbly with God. And you will fail, and God will pick you up and still love you, and despite every time everything goes wrong, keep following and loving Him, because He will never let go of you. And that is a promise.