sheesh...

school was intense this morning...

if asked to describe the feeling i have right now, i probably would say its something along the lines of heavy or thoughtful or maybe just intense. perhaps this is what it feels like to fear God, to be in awe of Him; apologies, i'm not too sure of how to categorize what i'm thinking and feeling.
i've questioned before why the israelites wanted a mediator instead of a direct connection with God, but i'm thinking that i understand, a piece of it anyways. honestly, i wonder if i would respond differently. it seems easy for me to question their response, but on days like today i'm not so sure i would be doing anything different. not to say that all my earings would go into a pot and come out a golden calf, but today i felt the presence of God a few times and it has come close to wrecking me.

Beginnings

I was reminded yesterday of a day almost a year ago when I was talking with a friend of mine, telling him that the books I was reading weren't making me want to dig deeper into the Word, but were actually discouraging me from searching for answers in the Bible and causing me to question things that I should've known as truth. I didn't see what obviously needed to happen... for me to stop reading them and instead focus on Scripture.
Now I'm at Bible College! Who would've thought? This place is amazing, the community incredible. I've never had or heard of Christian leaders (in the place of honor like my teachers here) who take the time to get to know each individual personally and care so much about the details of my life. I've been here almost 11 weeks already and I'm blown away by the Jesus I see at school.
Thank you Lord for bringing me here.
Tomorrow we leave for camp! I hear its the Disney Land of camp grounds... we'll see!

Letters to my former self

I'm just wrapping up a book called Here's to Hindsight (Letters to My former Self), written by one young lady, a musician named Tara Leigh Cobble. I've heard mixed reviews from people around me as I've been reading it, people who've read at least a part of it, but I think I really it. I appreciate Cobble's honesty and I enjoy her writing style.
My favorite line is in the middle when she's relating how she feels so at home in a bookstore, and says she likes the religion section but says its so bipolar, so much good and yet so much crap.
I don't know if I would purchase the book, but if you can borrow it then do it.
(Ashley Harpham has a copy and I'm almost done with it.)

Just because...

There are so many new faces around campus! Registration is next week and students have begun to trickle in. I can't wait to meet them all... perhaps we could all wear name tags or lanyards for the first two weeks to help the memory? It makes me thankful again that it worked out for me to move early; I feel like I've been here a while and have figured out the over-the-summer people a little bit.
Last night Freedom and I held a paint throwing party for Ashley Harpham's birthday. By night's end the three of us were covered from head to toe in a collage of 10 colors. Hopefully the pictures we took on a couple disposables will turn out so I can share them. :)

random activities in the last couple of days....

So I took Lisa's bike to visit some kids from my City Kids route and when I got back to the dorm Lisa needed it to go to SafeWay. We decided to ride tandem even though it wasn't meant to be used that way. It was about a mile and a half to two miles and we were laughing the whole way...

This was actually like two weeks ago. I went with Mary Anne, Sam and Mandy to play in the water at Moulten Falls. Fun times.

Last night about 10 or so of us went out for Mary Anne's birthday to celebrate after Jason and Ellie's wedding. This is one photo from when we were at the riverfront.

Same story except at Mio Gelato. Gelato, yum.

Funny comment heard this week (at Bible study): "Judas was that guy who sold Jesus to the Romanians."

4.30AM

This morning I walked up to the Butte to watch the sunrise and in the dark I saw this, minus the police car, about half way up. The picture is really dark so I don't know if you can tell what has happened but the truck evidently buried itself into the side of the Butte. It wasn't running when I walked past but I was way to freaked out to approach it so I called 911. Once the cop showed up and made sure no one was in the truck I left and walked the rest of the way up.

I really felt creeped out while waiting for the sun to fully rise so I left after taking a couple shots.

Here's a picture of the moon when I was back on campus and it was almost fully light out.

Lesson learned: Listen to the Holy Spirit and others who tell you you probably shouldn't be alone up there.
Never again.

random

I found it, or rather, it was found and someone put it on my desk!
This morning I ran into Nathan Cole whom I met in Thailand and was living in another Asian country... I was picking up a key from Tom and saying a final goodbye when a guy came walking up the stairs with a little girl in his arms. I recognized him right away but he couldn't remember where he knew me from. Hopefully in the next few months I can visit some with Nate and his wife!