Weakness

I am going to try to process some stuff that I've been thinking about here. This is mostly for my benefit, but maybe someone else will get something out of it.

There are two places that these thoughts stem from, one being Dave's sermon from last night about "stepping up" when faced with tests/temptations and the other being The Spirit of the Disciplines by Dallas Willard (chapter 3, to be more precise), which Katie and I are reading together.

Willard talks about salvation being for our life. He says it much more eloquently, but one of the main points he makes is that most of Christianity now focuses on the cross. Not that the cross is not absolutely vital to Christianity, but the fact of the matter is that the cross would not have been significant if Christ hadn't first lived. The cross was not a single event, it was the culmination of everything that Christ had taught, it was the climax of His life. Christ did not just to save us from sin and get us into heaven, he died to save us from sin in this life, to give us power to live.

The thing that Dave said last night that struck me the most was the statement that the devil doesn't mind us doing the right thing as long as we're not doing it by the grace of God. Sometimes some of the things that I may view as "temptations" are mere inclinations, something that I've disciplined myself to not give in to.

This might not sound right, but I think the majority of my life is lived by my own strength. I know that God is behind it in the sense that he made me the way I am, but most of the time, I don't really acknowledge how God is at work in my life on a daily basis. How much is God glorified by that attitude?

2 Corinthians 12:9-10 But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. That is why for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong."

I've always loved this verse, but when I read it this morning, God gave me a new understanding of what it means to delight in my weaknesses. It's kind of like school. If I had been a business major (sorry, not trying to bash anyone's major, just giving an example), my graduation would not have meant as much to me. For me, that major would have taken work, but would not have required as many sacrifices of time and energy. I wouldn't have been living up to my potential. As it was, I had to work really hard for my engineering degree and it therefore has a greater value to me. In the same way, if I just live my life in my comfort zone, where I know that I won't fail, I'm also not living up to my potential. It's not really a sacrifice to do what is easy and natural for me. If I choose to do what is unnatural to me, something that is a weakness for me, God will provide for me, and more importantly, because I have less confidence in my own abilities, I will better realize the part that God played and that I was acting through His power. And if I am more aware of what God is doing in my life and for me, that I will be better able to bring Him glory.

Not that God cannot work through our strengths as well. I Peter 4:11 says, "If anyone serves, he should do it with the strength God provides, so that in all things God may be praised through Jesus Christ." This verse is helpful to me because I really do love serving and it is something that I think God has really given me a heart to do, but it can also be easy for me to do it when it is more "convenient" or to get tired of doing it, but that it when I can better depend on Him and His strength. I want to be stretched to use my strengths as well as my weaknesses.

So, what I am thinking through right now is, what are my weaknesses? Areas that I avoid because I want to avoid "failing" and because they are areas that make me very uncomfortable. I am not trying to dwell on my weaknesses for the sake of being melancholy or depressed or self-critical, but because I want to recognize those as areas for God to be glorified. Because as I face things that I normally would avoid, I will be continually aware that my motivation to do them is not because I naturally want to do them.

I still need to think through this some more, but I am hoping to look at some of my areas of weakness and come up with some very specific things to do that could help draw me out of my comfort zone. We'll see what happens...

Hallelujah

Isn't it funny how certain things can arouse such definite memories? I rediscovered the Rufus Wainright version of "Hallelujah" tonight and it took me straight back to sophomore year. All of a sudden I'm in my room in Cate with the lights off and it's a rainy and somewhat cool night. My windows are open and I'm in a sort of mellow, sort of melancholy mood and I'm thinking about a lot of things or perhaps contemplating going on a walkies. What a crazy year. What an emotional year. I cried a lot. Over my life, over school, over friendships. So much of what I clung to that year is now gone. All of the friendships that I was so scared and troubled about losing are either broken or have faded. I think Andrea is probably the only person that I hung out with that year that I still hang out with on a regular basis. It's so weird the things that are hard and confusing and difficult to let go of, but once we are past them, we realize how much better things can be. How much we were missing out on. How much we were limiting God by finding our sufficiency in those things.

I'm so thankful for what that year was though. In community group tonight we talked a little bit about Acts 16. Verses 6 and onward go as follows: "Paul and his companions traveled throughout the region of Phrygia and Galatia, having been kept by the Holy Spirit from preaching the word in the province of Asia. When they came to the border of Mysia, they tried to enter Bithynia, but the Spirit of Jesus would not allow them to. So they passed by Mysia and went down to Troas. During the night Paul had a vision of a man of Macedonia standing and begging him, 'Come over to Macedonia and help us.' After Paul had seen the vision, we got ready at once to leave for Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them." I'd never really looked at this passage before. But what was said was that Paul kept traveling and at times the spirit kept him from going places and he may not have really known where he was going for certain. But when God finally revealed where he was supposed to go (and God did clearly let him know), Paul was already in Troas, a coastal city, very close to Macedonia. God doesn't always tell us where we're going, but he is getting us there. I believe that everything in our lives happens for a reason and that God uses everything we go through to further prepare us and refine us. There are definitely some things I regret about college. I had misplaced priorities for a long time. I made school the center of my life. I allowed my desire to please people and be loved control a lot of my choices. But God used all of those things to teach me something. And though I really wish I would have figured some things out a lot sooner, I learned from those experiences. God is faithful and God has a plan and a purpose for my life, past, present, and future. I've seen his work in my life already and I'm excited to see what he has in store for me.

All At Once

Life right now is going really well. School is pretty much amazing in that so far it has been virtually no work. I do spend the majority of my life in front of a computer, but I was expecting that. All three of my classes are very computer-based and two of them are sort of designed so that it's possible to finish your homework in class.

Beside school, I've also managed to get three jobs for this semester. I was a little worried that all this might just be "too much" for me to handle. I think I'll be okay. Since I managed to cut one physics class out of my semester, I seem to have a ton of time now, which means the house is pretty clean most of the time and sometimes I even cook.

I'm a little worried though. It seems as though the past three semesters at least have involved an emotional breakdown in the middle of the semester. I feel like I'm going to be waiting for that all semester. Hopefully I can go a semester without a two week crying spell in the middle. Ha! Now I at least have one goal for the semester. I think the best way to meet that goal is actually just to get a lot of sleep. I know what is a key factor to some of the crying is.

Actually, the key goal for the semester is discipline. I'm so bad at this. I need structure in my life, but I'm not that great and creating for myself or sticking to it. But I can change. That's the good thing, I am always being made more into God's likeness.

Why I am a packrat

So, I have this annoying habit where I never get rid of anything. I have pretty much every homework assignment and test from every class I've taken at OU, and some from high school. I'm trying to get rid of stuff, really. A couple weeks ago, I found a copy of my high school transcript and random pictures from magazines that I had cut out for a project in 10th grade and then never used. I threw away the pictures but kept the transcript. Really, it's amazing that there's not more stuff in my room than there is.

Anyway...my OU email finally got moved over to exchange. I've never used an email client program before, basically because I refused to use Outlook. However, now that I have a mac and now that I'm not on the old OU email, I decided to use Mail. Well, in the process of moving emails around and sorting them, I deleted quite a few things, including my "sent mail" folder which included 4.5 years of sent mail. This was less than a week ago and I have since wanted 2 things specifically that I normally wouldn't have deleted, but did, without thinking, in an effort to get rid of excess "stuff". I now feel completely justified for never deleting anything else, because you really never do know when you might need something from years ago.

For Andrea

Dear Andrea,
I dedicate this template to you and our mutual love of SIN.
That is all.
Sincerely,
Emily

p.s. if you'll notice the ad on the side for Traditions Square it says it's coming August 2005. I definitely started to make this template over 2 years ago. Wow. At least I finish what I start...sometimes.

A Tribute to Kitchen Comments

So, as previously stated, I've been going through old papers, stuff, etc. and I came across this gem of a Kitchen Comment. I'm pretty sure Andrea wrote this one:

Dear Dave - Do mine eyes deceive me? An under construction sign on the Cate pizza place? Oh joys! I am delighted to see that you are demolishing the abomination and returning our beloved c-store with its variety, convenience, fresh produce, convenience, cheap coffee, convenience, slushies, convenience, and ice cream! I'm glad food services realized that even the charm of the tuscan-esque fountain could not mask the essential grossness of the fare at the Crimson Crust nor the prison-like restrictiveness of the place with it's no carry-out policy. Charming though orange sponge-painted walls may be, they are no substitute for the walls of pre-packaged (and CONVENIENT!) delights at the c-store. I'm simply giddy to know that instead of pouring more money into the hopeless cause of improving that little wannabe-Italian hell hole, you've made the wise to decision to backtrack while you're still ahead and just do away with it. You're well rid of it, my good man. - Cheap coffee lover p.s. This online form is rubbish. it doesn't even give me an option to select crimson crust. Or perhaps you're erasing all traces, eh? Very wise.


I think it's time to get on with life. The Cate C-Store is no more, the Crimson Crust will remain and hopefully we can get the renovations completed so we will be able to offer you a bigger variety of pizza and pasta.

Ah, dorm life. I miss you just a smidge. Actually, I just miss my meal plan, that's all.

Semester 9

Yet another interesting semester has passed, my 9th one at OU, but my first as a grad student. The transition to grad school was a little tough, but, as with everything, it was fine once I adjusted. Not living on campus was a pretty huge change for me, but a good one. Here are some of my memories from this semester.

• Andrea DenHoed, Rhodes Scholar (my reaction: "are you serious? no, really?")
  
• Having a degree!
  
• Having a house!
• Having a car!
• The desk project (you guys should really visit university surplus)
  
• Trying to decorate my house
  
• Another Thanksgiving in Norman with Matt + Die Hard (when I really should have been writing a paper instead)
  
• River Church
  
• Community Group
  
• Happy Hour and Slushies at Classic 50s
  
• Bugging Holly almost every day
  
• Nickel Creek concert in Dallas (+ walking around with St. Francis)
  
• Tuesday lunch at the 2:8 House
  
• Not losing power during the ice storm
  
• Having Tuesday lunch at our house on Monday of finals week and a "study party" there too
  
• More Tootsie Rolls
  
• Candy Canes + power series
  
• Mooching my first meals at the caf from freshmen and RAs
  
• Really trying research for the first time
  
• Still hating research for the 3rd time
  
• The customary two weeks of crying that seem to come in the middle of every semester
  
• Physics....
  
• Not getting a "C" in physics this semester
  
• Pretending like I didn't have semester-long research papers to do for the first two-thirds of the semester and not doing homework every night of the week
  
• Having people from Project visit
  
• Having friends that aren't college students!
  
• Lots of procrastination by cleaning
  
• Rearranging the kitchen cabinets for Katie
  
• Emails from Dr. Morrison at weird times in the morning
  
• Having a life that didn't just involve school
  
• Roadtrip to Boulder, CO
• Watching shows like "America's Next Top Model" and "Beauty and the Geek" with Holly, Rita, and Cindy
  
• Studying at the honors dorm...and then getting to leave because I don't live there
  
• Watching The Office...and then a movie with Jon and Mike every Thursday
  
• The occasional walkies
• Giving people advice for grad school
  
• Playing Bang!
  

As always, additions to the list are welcome.

National Merit Essay

So, I'm going through old files on my computer to clean stuff up and I found this gem. This is the closing paragraph of my National Merit Essay, last revised September 16, 2002. I had a really great plan for my life:

Next year I plan to study the Classics and Business Management at college. Hopefully my high school experiences with clerical and organizational responsibilities will have prepared me for my course of study. During my undergraduate years I hope to spend a semester or two abroad in Australia. After graduating, I plan to go to law school and eventually practice in the area of estate planning.

Funny, I didn't do a single thing I wanted to do, nor do I really plan on it...

Die Hard

"It seemed like a good idea at the time"
-Bruce Willis, Live Free or Die Hard

What a great response to what happened.

papers

Rule of Thumb: if you have a paper to write, never, NEVER, start watching the first movie in a trilogy that you haven't seen during the weekend before your paper is due.

blog-o-sphere

I endorse this blog: http://www.naomi-lynn.blogspot.com/

Yay!

Physics

Physics made me cry today. Stink.

Be With You

You know, I've discovered a lot of music in the past few years that I really love, but somehow, I always come back to Rich Mullins. I keep rediscovering the music I loved as a child, but now I understand it a lot more than I used to.

Be With You

Everybody each and all
We're gonna die eventually
It's no more or less our faults
Than it is our destiny
So now Lord I come to you
Asking only for Your grace
You know what I've put myself through
All those empty dreams I chased

And when my body lies in the ruins
Of the lies that nearly ruined me
Will You pick up the pieces
That were pure and true
And breathe Your life into them
And set them free?

And when You start this world over
Again from scratch
Will You make me anew
Out of the stuff that lasts?
Stuff that's purer than gold is
And clearer than glass could ever be
Can I be with You?
Can I be with You?

And everybody all and each
From the day that we are born
We have to learn to walk beneath
Those mercies by which we're drawn
And now we wrestle in the dark
With these angels that we can't see
We will move on although with scars
Oh Lord, move inside of me

And when my body lies in the ruins
Of the lies that nearly runied me
Will You pick up the pieces
That were pure and true
And breathe Your life into them
And set them free?

And when You blast this cosmos
To kingdom come
When those jagged-edged mountains
I love are gone
When the sky is crossed with the tears
Of a thousand falling suns
As they crash into the sea
Can I be with you?
Can I be with you?

faith

Remember when I used to write in this blog? Yeah, me too.

I'm not going to write much because I need to study, but let's just say that this semester has been really, really rough so far. It's going to get better, I know, but right now I just don't want to deal with this. So much change. I kind of feel like my foundations have been shaken and I'm searching for some solid ground. I'm going to keep walking by faith and trusting in His goodness.

Isaiah 55:8-9
"For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
neither are your ways my ways,"
declares the LORD.

"As the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are my ways higher than your ways
and my thoughts than your thoughts.

That's something I need to meditate on some more.

Gifts and Curses

I think blogs have gone out of style. Oh well, that means it's okay if I never update mine.

I think I watched about 4 hours of the office today with my whole family. Sweet!

I will be returning to Norman in less than one week. I will have a house, a car, and I will be in grad school. Things will be the same, but different.

Semester 8

Wow, what a great year. I can't believe I've graduated already. Here's what I'll remember about my last semester.

• 2nd Annual 80s French toast at Fenway. The side ponytails were awesome.
• Tootsie Rolls. And Tootsie Roll wrappers. A lot of both. Probably well over 3000.
  
• Andrea's Day of Beauty, aka the Miss OU pageant. An enlightening experience.
• Spandex!
• Discovering the duck pond
• Valentine's MT
  
• Quantum...
• The general grad school crisis
  
• The month long cry-a-thon in February/March due to Vanderbilt calling me about a potential fellowship
• The 48-hour visit to Nashville complete with delayed flight.
• Vanderbilt rejecting me
• Naomi's visit: snowcones, the duck pond, and getting soaked in the rain on the way to Andrea's
  
• Purdue visit with my mom
• The great flood of '07 in Norman
• Glorieta
• The Game
• The most excellent Chris Valentine's prank (Just Married...)
• Amy Grosser visiting
  
• Easter in Mustang
• The awesome electronic waterguns from Danny's mom and the attacks that promptly followed on all those studying in the classroom and Chris and Mike and Chris...and Chris
• Passing the waterguns on to other people to squirt Chris.
• The most boring semester of classes ever.
• Getting mistaken for an RA again.
  
• Watching The Office. A lot.
• Study Party Bingo.
• Rain just about every day for the last two or three weeks of school.
• The Wasielewski family randomly sitting behind the Weisbrook family at commencement.
• Dr. Fagan bossing us around (loudly) at graduation.

There may be more, but not tonight. I'm going to sleep and then I'm going to Chicago tomorrow.

another lame post

For anyone who cares, here is a picture of my new (used) car:




Also, I would really like to read this book. In case you were wondering.

on being home...

Church cookbooks are the best. Period. I think everyone needs a standard Betty Crocker or the Joy of Cooking cookbook to get the full gamut of recipes. But after that, church ladies make the best food and therefore, the best recipes and, collected, the best cookbooks.

I also have acquired a car. It is neat. I'm happy. It's a Honda. That means it shouldn't die on me. :)

I'm basically doing a whole lot of nothing while I'm home. This is good. This is also bad. Now that car shopping is over, I'll be doing even more nothing. Unless I actually start cleaning up my room. Motivation is sadly lacking...

My sister is bored a lot recently too. So we hang out sometimes.

Also, my quantum grade was not very nice to me this semester. Oh well. I'm a grad school student now, so it doesn't matter.

That is all. Except that The Office is awesome.

Cali

I want to go to California. Seriously.

Wrapping things up...

I graduate in one week. That's absolutely crazy. My four years of college here are kind of a fuzzy blur, but I have many dear, amazing memories from this place. God knew what He was doing when He brought me here. And I'm pretty sure He knows what He's doing by keeping me here, even if it occasionally seems like the dumbest idea in the world.

So, I can't sleep. I'm terribly sleep-deprived, but I laid in bed for an hour and a half to know avail. So, I got up and read for a bit. I'm going to make another attempt after I finish writing this. These past two weeks have been crazy. I spent 40 hours two weeks ago working on my capstone project/report. Our presentation was last Monday though, so that's completely over. Thank goodness. As is my extra credit paper for numerical methods. I think I overcomplicated that paper a bit. Oh well, that tends to be my typical approach.

This summer is sneaking up on me. People keep asking if I'm excited about Chicago. The answer is "yes", except that I haven't really thought about it much. I'm just trying to survive the next week. Then I can graduate in peace and go home and start thinking about summer.

There's a few unknowns for the fall too. I still don't quite have a place to live. Neither does Katie though. There are two or three potential houses, so that's a step at least. A car for the summer/fall would also be nice too. Hopefully that will work out. Again, something that will hit the radar after graduation.

Life is going well, though, in all honesty. It's been a rough couple of weeks, but I'm getting through. God is faithful . I will make it.

May the Lord bless you and keep you.

-Emily