Fruit Loops

So much love in a box of Fruit Loops.
My grand parents used to always arrange for a box of Fruit Loops to be sitting in their cupboard for when our family came to visit. It was one of many highlights of our trips to Calgary. You see my mother, being the prudent soul that she is, refrained from ever purchasing said cereal unless we were camping (a twice annual occurance in our household). This made Fruit Loops a perticular treat to me and my sisters... even to this day. However, one day my grandmother made the unfortunately wise decision to put an end to the sugar cereal escapade (although I believe it has several times attempted a come-back) for the promotion of health in her grandkids.
Which brings me to my current situation where in my cbc dorm room cupboard I have sitting a Jumbo box of Kellogs Fruit Loops and a jug (yes a jug, not a bag) of milk in the fridge. This was a special gift from my loving elder sister to me and my roomie Sheldon, her "brothers". I love my sister. She is amazing. Every now and again she makes her cameo appearances on campus and comes to let me give her a big hug. It makes my day.

Shalom

Just finished my first class of Genesis. One comment stood out to me... I thought I ought to share it.

John McRae was speaking about the Holy of Holies in the ancient Jewish temple and how it was all about communication with God. Once a year, one man was allowed to enter into the Holy of Holies to have communication with God between the wings of the Cherabim. It was a big deal. A man had the opportunity to speak to God, to hear from God and to spend time in communion with God. Jesus came to break down the barrier to the Holy of Holies. He came to dwell among us so that we can seek his face all the time. We have this opportunity every day... but the superbowl is on, the car needs to be fixed, papers need to be written, reading needs to be done, people need to be entertained.

What would the Israelites think about our treatment of such a priviledged position? What does God think? Those were the questions in my head... I guess now the task is to incorperate the answers into my life.

Spend some time on your knees today in communion with the God of the Universe. I love you all.

S-dub

It's Clear We Don't Know Who We're Dealin With Here...

I am so far quite enjoying my semester... maybe that's because classes just started yesterday? No, it's been great so far.
In Old Testament Survey today, Ken Esau was talking about the average Christian's view of scripture and frankly how pathetic it is. Here we have the God-Breathed Bible in every one of our houses and we can't be bothered to pick it up, never mind love it and devote ourselves to its study and reading! I was really struck by that.
He told a story of a mormon Doctor that he had known in Alberta and, despite being a very busy doctor, how he used to teach the old testament to grade 11 kids before their school started every weekday morning! When he investigated a little more he discovered that in grade 9 they study "The Pearl of Great Price" and in Grade 10 they studied the New Testament, in grade 11 the Old Testament and in Grade 12 The book of Mormon... every day before school! How popular a program do you think that would be in your home church? Then Ken told us about the Muslim treatment of the Koran and how they refuse to even place another book or item on top of the Koran so as to prevent its disrespect. And how in order to become a "pastor" in the Muslim tradition you must have the ENTIRE Koran memorized! How do we demonstrated our love and respect and devotion to the Holy Scriptures?... I seem to remember that in highschool our bibles didn't warrant all that much respect judging by the amount of doodling and/or duct-tape that covered the majority of them... Maybe we just need to make more durable bibles? Looking back on Bible class all I can think was what a wasted opportunity that was. I mean here we were presented with the opportunity to learn and study God's word and because it was cool to care-less, that's what most (if not all) of us did.
So then Ken was talking about his kid's sunday school class and how little emphasis there was on the bible. It is all about how much fun we can let kids/teens have in a church so that they want to come back... but the thing is they are not coming back for more teaching of the Scripture, they are coming back for more entertainment! Our entire culture is built around entertainment now, it is really all we have time for, and slowly and very sadly that has been incorperated into the church as well. God taking second place to entertainment. In our Christian lives it seems that we need to have a good time with our friends or relax in front of the TV in order to complete a "good" day. But how is that Christian at all? Why are we not memorizing the bible in our spare time so that we can grow in our understanding of who God is and how he is working out his wonderful plan in our lives and to deepen the beautiful relationship that he wants with each of us if only we would give him the TIME of day!

Well, those are some of the thoughts rolling around in my head today. I hope they change my life for the better. I hope I look more like Jesus today.

Filled With Joy

I absolutely love the Creation imagery that this song uses. It verbalizes my inmost feeling when I am in nature. It almost makes me want to weep in awe of my Creator. I hope you enjoy it also. Oh yeah and someone tried to tell me that this was a Christmas song... to prevent their own embarrassment they shall remain nameless :)

Joyful, joyful, we adore Thee,
God of glory, Lord of love;
Hearts unfold like flow’rs before Thee,
Op’ning to the sun above.
Melt the clouds of sin and sadness;
Drive the dark of doubt away;
Giver of immortal gladness,
Fill us with the light of day!

All Thy works with joy surround Thee,
Earth and heav’n reflect Thy rays,
Stars and angels sing around Thee,
Center of unbroken praise.
Field and forest, vale and mountain,
Flow’ry meadow, flashing sea,
Singing bird and flowing fountain
Call us to rejoice in Thee.

Thou art giving and forgiving,
Ever blessing, ever blest,
Wellspring of the joy of living,
Ocean depth of happy rest!
Thou our Father,
Christ our Brother,
All who live in love are Thine;
Teach us how to love each other,
Lift us to the joy divine.

Mortals, join the happy chorus,
Which the morning stars began;
Father love is reigning o’er us,
Brother love binds man to man.
Ever singing, march we onward,
Victors in the midst of strife,
Joyful music leads us Sunward
In the triumph song of life.

Eager Expectation

Oh sweet glory. Well I'm back on campus and life is good... minus Carly Dyck who left us for YWAM, but I forgive her. A bunch of us went for dinner with her tonight to send her off. It was fun and sad... all at once. My room only has three guys in it this semester which is kinda nice... although Jason did provide some essential elements to our dorm... like a table and a toaster. Oh well, we'll make due. I'm pretty excited for this semester. I have a few tougher courses including Old Testament Survey which is apparently the hardest course the college offers and my dad's cousin teaches it... I think I'm in for at least a challenge. Outdoor leadership looks to be exciting too. We start the semester with our Avalanche Skills Training Level 1 course in which we are introduced to hazard management regarding avalanches. We end the course with a four day trip in the Cerise Creek area north of Pemberton which should be awesome. We also get to do a winter skills/ski traverse of Garibaldi Lake a little later in the semester. I'm pretty excited for that... I've never been on a frozen lake before! I know, pretty lame, but it ends this semester! We end off the year with our Guiding and Operating Skills Exam, affectionately called the GOOSE. It is an exam in which we plan and guide the Olympic Peninsula trip we did at the beginning of the year, with real clients and we get graded on our performance. I'm really excited for it... but pretty nervous too. I've already met several new students and hopefully given them a warm? welcome. Well friends, I miss you already. Take care of yourselves out in the mean world. Live as if Jesus was coming back tomorrow. Much love to you all.

S-dub.