Answered Prayers

When the weather isn't verging on winter, Fall in Michigan is beautiful. Today was an absolutely gorgeous day. It was a little windy, and yet it was warm enough out that as long as you were wearing a jacket you were golden. For the first time in a couple weeks it's actually felt like it was fall and it was lovely.

It is looking to be a promising week.

This weekend was the His House Fall Retreat, and obviously since this is my first semester at MSU it was my first retreat... and it was amazing. This weekend, I mean, I'm not even sure what I thought this weekend was going to be but ultimately now I see it as an answer to some of my most recent prayers.

I have been struggling, and I've really been praying over those struggles lately. Saturday I decided to be baptized, and I didn't realize that that was the reason that God had me there until literally about an hour or so before. But now I can look at it and know that that was my reason for being there, that is why God wanted me there, why he wanted me here. I hadn't realized how much weight I was carrying around on my shoulders, until it was lifted away.

I can definitely tell that there is a difference in my general attitude over the last couple days. I just feel so much better, and it's simply amazing.

Saturday morning we split up and went to workshops, where we talked about our faith and knowing where we stood in our faith and ways to express that faith. During the first one that I attended the speaker talked about the four responses, one of which was baptism, and that first planted the idea in my head. I got to really thinking about where I was in my spiritual journey. It was a step that I hadn't taken and I started thinking about it.

The idea was there, but it was in the back of my mind rather in the forefront. The afternoon was spent initially playing frisbee golf with a group, but that quickly disintegrated into climbing trees, and just generally hanging out and walking around the woods.

Northern Michigan is gorgeous in the early fall, and the camp was right on Lake Ann. It was later in the evening after the last workshop and dinner that we were walking to Campus Time, when Felicia hesitantly brought up baptism, and I think that's when it finally clicked. I think that's when I realized that that was why God got me here, got me there. God was nudging me to solidify my commitment to him. I certainly relied on him a lot through me life, and especially the last few years.

So Saturday night, in front of five hundred people our Associate Pastor, Kevin, took my confession and my friend Felicia baptized me, and so much of the heaviness that has been weighing down on me lately melted away. I feel so fantastic right now, and I feel like that makes all the difference in the world as far as how I interact with everyone around me.

I feel more connected now, I'm not simply going through the motions, and the focus has become today rather than an eventual tomorrow. Of course there will be rough roads ahead, but today is great, and even when I struggle God will be there.

Surreal Ledes

Where did Fall go? It is seriously frigid outside at the moment, and I'm not digging it. At least it seems to have stopped raining for the moment.

Class was kind of... surreal today I guess. I mean it went well, but it was just kind of strange. In my JRN class we have started practicing lede writing, which is essentially writing introductions to news articles. They are the portion of the article that actually leads into the news. So typically the way it plays out is that at the end of a class we write practice leads, and then we spend the beginning of the next class reviewing what people in the class have written.

Essentially we end up critiquing our peers work after our teacher has posted select pieces on the class blog. There is nothing to distinguish them in anyway, so really the only person that knows who wrote the lede is the writer themselves.

This is all fine and well of course, and really it helps a lot. The strange part comes in now though. So we were going over ledes and we got to this one post, where the last one on the page was one of mine. Guess who he calls on to discuss the lede...

Bingo. I got to discuss why I felt that the lede I wrote was effective and I apparently was the only one in the room that was aware that I had written it. That was a little strange. Thankfully though my conclusions were similar to the teachers, so it all panned out.

Ah, Michigan

It’s finally stopped raining. The rain wouldn’t be quite so unwelcome, if it weren’t also so cold outside. It’s supposed to stay cold through Wednesday. In fact, on Wednesday there is some talk of a rain snow mix. Gross. I’m looking forward to Thursday when it’s supposed to get into the sixties and then the eighties on Friday. That is my kind of weather!

Ah, Michigan.

I’ve managed to get everything done for my philosophy class. At this point I’m just waiting for him to post the final exam. Seriously, I can’t wait for the day that I don’t even have to think about that class and the inane homework that comes with it. Good-bye and good riddance.

The last two days have been seriously productive though. Not only am I all caught up in philosophy, but I’m caught up in my Shakespeare class. I can finally start in on the final exam for that class as well as lend some focus to writing my final paper.

I have three more days of Abnormal Psych left and four more days of Algebra. I’m so looking forward to this summer, if only because it will mark the first time since the summer following senior year that all I’ll have to worry about is work.

Well I shouldn’t say that necessarily… once schools out that’ll free up my time more meaning that I’ll have more time to focus on the fact that I still haven’t heard anything from MSU. Seriously, what’s the deal? I’m curious, and really quite anxious to know the final verdict. I’d like to have some idea of what next fall holds.

I suppose I’ll have to wait and see, even if I am a bit tired of waiting…