remembering

i've been remembering lately. i guess because i've been thinking about the future, which makes me consider the past.

(by the way, i just got a part-time job!)

anyway, i've been thinking about how i want dreadlocks, but now more than ever i can't get them because i have to be a professional in school. but in the future, in my dream, in czech, i'll be able to do whatever i want with my hair.

i do honestly believe that my future lies in czech. i'm yearning to be there. but i know that my future there won't be for a time, and i don't know how long that time will be.

so in considering this, in considering moving there sooner rather than later - and i've decided to give it time, i'm still young - i realize how much i'd matured each consecutive time i've been there. even since i was there in october, especially since the internship in 2008, and most definitely since my first time in 2004.

i have a specific memory, and i've really been thinking about this one lately. i think because i've been re-reading "blue like jazz" and it really hits on this stuff.

at the point of this memory i was 19. i was leading a class and discussion group. i had known most of the students for at least a year, but the main character of this memory i had known for two years; he had attended my first english camp, though i don't remember if that had been his first. he was very much against christianity - not christians, because he had christian friends, and he kept coming back to english camp which was very obviously christian. but he wanted nothing to do with christianity. in my group he started naming off all the horrible actions that had been done and said in the name of Christ, like the Crusades, and anti-homosexuality. and i could do nothing but shake my head partly because a) i didn't know how to answer him, and b) i was that christian.

i understand very well how i would talk to that student now. i would defend the name of Christ, because ultimately as humans, us Christians mess up who Christ really is. He didn't want thousands of people to be murdered by people claiming to be doing his work, He wasn't anti-gay - he ate with the worst sinners!

but more important than how i would defend Christ, i am moving away from being that person. if i claim to be a christian, i need to be loving people no matter what. i sin...ugh...i can't tell you how much i sin and how i make Christ appear to be unloving. i hurt people, and then i say i'm a christian. no wonder we have a bad rap...it's because of people like me. and it's such a struggle to love people and not to judge them. but in judging i am disobeying Christ. i'm sorry, Lord.

harry potter

to anyone who knows me, it's no strange fact that i like my fantasy. i just love the imperfect metaphors relating to the real world about love and life. i've read all the harry potter books each summer for the last couple years. i just finished re-reading them again, and now i'm attempting to watch all the movies through as well. i just watched the second movie (hp and the chamber of secrets) with my friend becky, and throughout the movie we attempted to figure out what we would be like if we lived in this fantasy world. for example, we wondered what our polyjuice potions would taste like (an enemy of harry potter's tasted like bogie), and we wondered what our patronuses would be (an animal that is formed to ward away creatures that suck the happiness out of you).

the most important question, however, was which house we would be placed in. the hogwarts school of witchcraft and wizardry where harry attends is split into four houses. here are how they are described by the sorting hat:

You might belong in Gryffindor,
Where dwell the brave at heart,
Their daring, nerve and chivalry
Set Gryffindors apart;
You might belong in Hufflepuff,
Where they are just and loyal,
Those patient Hufflepuffs are true
And unafraid of toil;
Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw,
If you've a steady mind,
Where those of wit and learning,
Will always find their kind;
Or perhaps in Slytherin
You'll make your real friends,
Those cunning folk use any means
To achieve their ends.

By Gryffindor, the bravest were
Prized far beyond the rest;
For Ravenclaw, the cleverest
Would always be the best;
For Hufflepuff, hard workers were
Most worthy of admission;
And power-hungry Slytherin
Loved those of great ambition.

For instance, Slytherin
Took only pure-blood wizards
Of great cunning, just like him,
And only those of sharpest mind
Were taught by Ravenclaw
While the bravest and the boldest
Went to daring Gryffindor,
Good Hufflepuff, she took the rest,
And taught them all she knew

harry belongs in gryffindor, and obviously all harry potter fans also wish that they would belong in gryffindor as well.

the truth is that i know i would belong in hufflepuff: "she took the rest." hufflepuffs unfortunately get a bad rap because they're really not good at anything.

so i was trying to make a case for myself as to why i should be in gryffindor, but i couldn't come up with anything. the biggest reason being that i'm not bold and brave for what i believe/the core of who i am. i hate discord. i want people to like me. but that is not taking a bold stand for Christ.

in november i was put in a position where i could easily have shared my faith, but instead i listened passively to my God being mocked. it ended with me going up to my room and crying. not quite worthy of a gryffindor.

the good thing is that people can change. the headmaster of Hogwarts, Dumbledore, told a member of his staff, Snape, that he believed they sorted too soon. Snape had been in slytherin when he had attended hogwarts, but as an adult he performed wonderful feats of courage out of love for another.

i pray now that when another chance comes to share my faith (and it already has), that i will be bold and brave, and i will tell about the love of the one who created me.

june playlist

1-2-3-4: feist

it's a great day to be alive: travis tritt

my moon, my man: feist

ten gun salute: madi diaz

we will worship you: carlos whittaker

hosanna: hillsong united

sail away: david gray

everybody's changing: keane

healing hands: citizen cope

if i die young: the band perry

flipside

over the years i've had uncertainties about my home church, lcbc (lives changed by Christ). but since i've returned in the past couple months, i've found the sermons and community to be challenging in the way that they should be. we recently finished a series called "flipside," and our human view of certain elements as opposed to God's view. i suggest you download the podcasts. one sermon was on the parable of the prodigal son, and it focused on the older brother and his selfishness and inability to forgive. another was about forgiveness, and how God flips our views of those who we don't love: He tells us to love our enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, and pray for those who have hurt you. Jesus the radical. if only i could love like that.

the last sermon in the series focused on yes/no, and the calls for different disciples in Luke 9 who all put conditions on what they would do for God. here's a snippet out of my journal on what i've been thinking about and about my conditional love for God:

LCBC's last sermon was called Flipside. God's pulled some flipsides on me. I'd been doing fine, but right now I just feel like a loser. I have my master's degree, and I can't get a job. So there's one flip: everyone says it's better to have a higher education, but right now people who didn't go to college aren't living in Manheim with their parents, unemployed. I am; I who have the high and mighty master's degree all before the age of 23. what garbage.

But moving away from the bitterness...When I was twelve and flying over the ocean to make a new home with my family, I told myself I would never go into missions and put my family through that hurt. Here's another flip: over the years God has changed my heart's desire so that my only vision of the future is doing his work in some other culture.

I came to terms with that and said alright to God. "I am ok with going where you want me, but I don't feel called to Africa, and I definitely have no desire to ever go to Russia. But I'd go to Czech because I love those people!" And that was good, right? I was willing to go to Czech. But no - God doesn't want me saying where I will and will not go. Didn't Jonah say no to going to Ninevah?

Growing up, some families from our church would go to the only Christian music festival and conference in England. In the kids' group, we sang a song about Jonah, and to this day those lyrics resound with me: "When God says go, you don't say no." Subsequently, I think the words can be inverted to say "when God says no, you don't go."

Last September I was visiting a friend in Czech. He prayed that if I was being called to Czech that I would just feel it in all of me, even in my bones. I don't. But thanks to Rich Stearns (president of World Vision), my heart has been broken for the poor in Africa, and suddenly I'm not so opposed to going there. "Flipside," God says! "You will have a passion for all of my people, not just the ones you want. I made YOU, and MY son died for you. You don't have the right to choose who to love."

And as if that wasn't enough, my "plan" all along has been to pay off loans and THEN go into missions. Of course my plan since moving home has changed every other week: volunteer with city year, teach abroad, teach in another state, stay home for free and teach, stay home for free and get a job with benefits. All of them my plans, and none involving taking the risk of swallowing my pride and asking people to support me in paying off my loans so I can go into missions.

Jesus tells several men in Luke 9 that they cannot follow him and be his disciples if they are putting conditions on what they will do for him. See, I view it as a decent if not good thing to tell God that as soon as my loans are paid off I'm his and I will literally go anywhere to spread his good news. But God flips it and tells me that I am not his true servant if I am making such conditions and excuses.

Andrea, when God says go, don't respond by saying no-that it will hurt my family to leave their friends and home. Don't respond by saying I'll go to Czech, but not Africa. Don't even respond by saying I'll go ANYWHERE as soon as my loans are paid off. Say yes Lord and Master. I will go where you want me, even if that means Manheim (though I pray it doesn't).

weddings galore

in the past four weekends i've attended three weddings, a bridal shower, and a bachelorette party. i've loved each wedding, but this past weekend one of my high school friends got married to another high school friend, and i was really anticipating this one (though i'm sure they had been more than me - they were together for 5 years!).

i met janelle in 9th grade and took to her right away knowing that she would be a good christian friend. i met chris probably at some point in middle school where i had a crush on him like every other girl in 7th and 8th grade (who can resist such boyband-ish looks?). the two began dating at the end of our senior year of high school. i went to college with chris and so got to know him better AND got to see more of janelle.

five years after prom, i got to see janelle in a white dress, and she looked as beautiful as ever. congratulations, you two!

about 8 years of difference here. we're not as dramatically changed as i should have hoped...

dad

this man is funny. friday morning he did a funeral, and when he came home he left his nice pants on, changed into a t-shirt and flip-flops, and got the laundry in...we keep our clips in what looks like a purse. and the best part was that he let me take a picture of him (not that he had a choice)

boy on a string

The marionetter has your number
Pulling your arms and legs till you can't stand on your own
Dragging your conscience on the stage
And your heart gets rearranged
And you cannot tell your mentor from your Maker
Look at the crowds bleeding with laughter
Over the way you entertain at beckon call
They don't see behind the lights, or the painted backgrounds
They just like to see you fall

But you don't really mind
Cause you're just wasting time
You can't feel anything
You're a boy on a string

I feel a sadness like Gapetto
Watching the life that he created run away
Seeing the puppeteer's intrusion,
And holding the remains of puppets that had rotted away
One day the curtain will not open
And all of the crowds will go away
Sometimes those strings will choke you, but until that day

And you don't really mind
Cause you're just wasting time
You can't feel anything
You're a boy on a string