A Scent I Need Bottled!

The smell of orange blossoms! My store has dwarf orang trees on sale and they smell divine! They remind me of when I was in Cali and the orange & cherry trees were in blossom. Ooooh sooo good. You must take a wiff my friend! For a moment you'll think your in heaven!

Theology, Signs & Wonders, and Evangelism

These are things I have been contemplating lately.
I have been contemplating whether their is one way of evangelism aka sharing Christ's story with others. Some people believe it is an emotional break through, others believe it is through philosophy and science, some believe in a ritualistic verbal confession and still others believe it is through signs and wonders. So confusing! Is their a right way or wrong way to tell the redemptive story of Christ sacrifice and mastry over death?(I tried to exclude Christianese words)

See I am beginning to believe that there is not a bad way. In fact with all of my schooling in post-modernism of how to relate to the post-modern culture it could be great but that doesn't mean that it is the only way of doing things. At the drop-in I work at I work with very modern thinking people and the kids love them! Want to know why!?! Because the workers show them Christ's love and acceptance! Yes, one particular worker is very old school in his continual 'gospel' message but the kids see his character....his sincere interest in them not his akward presentation of the gospel. As much as it frustrates me that he is stuck in his ways and is resistant to change I still go because of the love for the kids have. This is the common ground that I share with him. Love!.....besides I'm probably just as backwards as him at times.

Also mom and I have butted heads recently about a specific church in our town that is having a revival. Mom is very enamoured with the emotionalism and signs and wonders that happen at it. I on the other hand have been their done that and want to move onto something more itellectually stimulating. I want balance cuz I believe that God's power comes in miraculous ways but I want to know how to think! Why do I believe in what I believe in!?! We had the whole end times talk and I refuted it with the new broadcasting technology magnifying events. I then compared today to being any worse than turn of the century England, Rome, Sodom and Gomorah. Then I moved onto how time does not exist outside of God. Then I spoke about Lewis's conversion due to science's undeniable proof through creation.

Mom drives me bonkers sometimes! She is very passionate but gets as spiritual as a new ager when she starts talking about the end times and spirits of darkness.....yet God has used her! She is so kind and generous and despite her passion people have seen her compassion and she has led them into righteousness in their relationship with Christ. She is very thoughtful and kind. Almost too much sometimes.
Its cool how God can use us even though we are backwards and narrow minded at times. Despite how much we screw up and even screw up his representation he still chooses to use us. Even our misdirected good intentions that get misconstrude and may cause more damage than good.
Oh how we serve a gracious God!

Guilty Pleasures Revisited

1. The Philosopher Kings
2. Whitney Houston (I wanna dance with someBODY, Yaahhhh I wanna dance with someBody.....with somebody tonight)
3. Straightening Iron

Kill the Canada Geese!!!!

I ride my bike to work sometimes (this week everyday because the weather is glorious!) and on my way to work I ride through Sdot's wetlands. The wetlands use to be owned by ducks unlimited....crazy organization that had a conservation for ducks so that they could shoot them! Yah people are so wacky! 'Lets make a conservation so that we can shoot ducks'. They were never blatant about this fact of course.
So anyway the conservation area that I ride through has farm land on either side of it and a stream/large ditch and a couple ponds/something suspicious that I don't think is ponds (the other day something was splashing in the water, it looked like fish but how to fish get into ponds in the middle of nowhere?). Now from the simple mans view everything would look fine. In fact it would look picturesque, birds flock to this little sanctuary, their is a man made grove of trees with paths in it and the sun dances on the water like stars. Yet if one is to look closer they would see the tube that runs through the water that periodically belches a cloud into the water, the trees are planted in the grove in perfect lines, the two ponds are in perfect circular shapes. The grounds are littered with disgusting huge mounds of geese poop, the water ways are greenish brown from farm run-off and geese fieces.
It is a nesting ground for Canada geese. Again for the simple man this would be quite sweet to look at the little gosselings and coo and awww. In reality it is a disaster they are all just going to grow into little poop shooters that will polute our bodies of water. I look at the serene, languid, sophisticated blue herron who lazily lounges in the creek/ditch and think 'poor creature has to bathe in the poluted waterway that the mangy geese poop in' 'I feel sorry for the offspring he will help bear, will they be mutated because of the chemicals and toxins he bathes in?' 'Or will nature just continue to adapt to its surrounding.....it is amazing how nature continues to adapt to man's interference....this can be a good thing or a bad thing ie: Killer bees have adapted to Florida's climate....this means they will most likely migrate upwards'.
Anyway so back to the geese. When my parent's and I use to vacation in Virginia our trigger happy Virginian friends would complain how they hated the geese and wished that they could shoot them but because the geese are Canada's national bird they weren't aloud. One time when my uncle was younge and reckless he and his friends tried to catch a goose....this ended up in one of his buddies having two brocken ribs. One year when I was a younge adolescent our church went camping and the water at the camp ground was filled with goose fecies. We didn't find this out until one of the families who came up with us got rashes from the water. At first we only thought that the water was full of algie....think again....it was geese cacka!
So anyway I think that geese need to be turned into mantle ornaments. They are over populated and litter our grounds. Somewhere along the food chain they're predators got pushed out or over hunted. Now they litter our golf course and parks. When I ride my bike in the wet-lands I have to be careful or else shit will fly up off my tires or I'll run into some over protective geese that hiss at me. How annoying!
I should start a campaign called Kill the Canada Geese!
Ya, thats my rant on dirty geese.

What part of 'I'm busy' do you not understand?

Okay so duder from work just isn't getting the picture that I don't want to hang out with him! Yesterday he found out I rode my bike to work and that we were both getting off at the same time so he decided we should ride home together. Ugggghhhh I didn't want to so finally I let some of my co-workers know my dilemma(sp?). I had been keeping this from them because I didn't want it to become a big issue but I was cornered and needed a way out. So one of my co-workers decided a good excuse to get out of it was to tell him I had to cover for her while she went on her dinner break.
5 o'clock comes around and he anxiously walks up to me and tells me its five. I reply back (not looking him in the face) "Oh I have to cover for Sierra until she gets back from her break" he says "How long is her break?" "Just until 5:30". He contemplates this for a moment and then responds in a disappointed voice "Oh thats 15 minutes" another slight pause and I say "ya its not that long, I'll see ya later though okay" he replys back dejectedly "alright see ya later". I avoided looking him in the face the whole time. I felt so bad for lying to him but I just don't want to hang out with him! I mean I know kids who are around his age that I use to baby-sit! Gah
I can totally tell when he is working up the nerve to talk to me at work because his mouth twitches every time I see him and he has this serious look on his face. I don't understand! How much more obvious do I have to be! Does he not get it that I just want to keep our friendship on a work friendship level? I mean what part of 'I'm busy' doesn't he understand? Do I have to say 'I'm washing my hair tonight' or "No I don't want to hang out with you because I went to school to learn how to minister to your age group".
I am flattered really I am but......you know.