Emma? Or Manuel?

Raise your hand if you love Christmas songs! Cool, I like that you all raised your hands. I love them too... but I don't love them if they are played too soon.

I feel like I notice it more and more every year that Christmas merchandise creeps into shopping malls and window displays earlier and earlier - really, do we need to be looking at men's ties with cheery ornaments on them before we've even gone trick-or-treating? The answer is NO. The same thing is true with Christmas songs on the radio - if you play them before Thanksgiving, it makes us all really sick of them by the time December 25th rolls around. It could even breed resentment in people toward "Jingle Bells" and "I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas" - which is APPALLING.



The greatest thing for me about Christmas is anticipation. Christmas day in and of itself is a wonderful thing, but I what I appreciate more are how during all the days between now and the blessed 25th, humanity oozes goodwill and peace on earth in a geyser gush that is capped and seemingly locked away in a vault for the rest of the year. Charities get a boost. Families come together for just this one day out of the 365. Tight-fisted pocketbooks spring open. Miracles happen. Lifetime movies happen. Sickening Kay Jewlers commercials happen. While the stress of the season might get some people down, the extra tinsel, Christmas trees, gifts, ice skating, mistletoe, hot cocoa, gingerbread houses, cookies, card-giving, bright-eyed children, and crooning Frank Sinatra carols floating around in the holiday atmosphere of late November-December just warms my soul. I live for the buildup of wrapping presents, cleaning the house, making Dad's Christmas candy in the kitchen, rolling out sugar cookies dough with the siblings, watching "A Christmas Story" and rejoicing yet again when Ralphie gets his Red Ryder BB-gun... I love the anticipation.

Last year in Madison I didn't have the chance to go home until the late evening of the 23rd as an ominous snow storm was creeping over Wisconsin, and there was a very real danger that I would not be home in time for Christmas Eve. Envisioning spending the "most wonderful time of the year" stuck in Room 410 of Slichter hall with not even JH to silently keep me company... it was more than I could bear. I safely made it home, but it was somewhat depressing - I had absolutely no anticipation time.

All the joy of the season for me had been sucked out by incredibly stressful Bio 101 exams and 12 page American Lit papers. Little to no Christmas spirit warmed this girl's non-anticipatory heart. BAM - Christmas Eve and Day flew by in a blur, and while time spent with family and friends devoid of homework cares that so plagued me before was refreshing, I went through the whole season with very little spiritual development. I heard cheek-chapped 2nd graders toothlessly recite Luke 2, as all good little Lutherans do: "In THOSE days, CEASAR Augustus issued a decree, that a CENSUS should be taken of the enTIRE ROman WORLD. THIS was the FIRST census that TOOK PLACE while QUIRINIUS was GOVERNOR of SYRIA. And EVERYONE went to his OWN TOWN to REGISTER. So JOSEPH..." I sang my favorite Christmas hymn "Where Shepherds Lately Knelt" (CW 54, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X06XFOSq7eM&feature=related) at good ol' classic Grace Downtown. I went over to Grandma's, I set out milk and cookies and beer and cheese for a Santa that I knew didn't exist, (as well as a banana for Rudolph... can't forget about him, poor guy!) and I opened presents. I went through the motions, and while those motions were lovely, they didn't mean very much to me last year.

I'm happy to say that this year is different - vastly different. And in many ways. If you would have told me last year that I would be taking my next winter exams in Minnesota I would have laughed until I got a stitch in my side, for one thing. But spiritually, this Advent season already means a lot more to me. In fact, Christmas has been revolutionized. Why?

'Cause Jesus was a baby.

I don't know why I never understood this before. Because I heard the joyful Christmas story proclaimed over and over again, pounded into my skull since infancy, that this incredible detail just lost it's luster?

JESUS was a BABY.

Have you ever seen a baby? Like really really seen one? A fresh one, straight from the... ? They are so very ugly. I know when I have a baby someday I will instantly dehydrate after gazing upon my child because of the tears of joy I will shed at the little bundle of joy, but we all come out as wrinkly little aliens. We can't move or eat or do anything but be scarily fragile and cry a lot. How the human race has survived this long, I will never know...

Jesus. Was. A. BABY.

Can we talk about babies for a second? BABIES. Dear Lord. Those are crazy enough in and of themselves. Those who know me know I say this all the time, but people, do you realize you hold within you the power to make a PERSON? Through your God-guided actions you play a starring role in creating a soul. A SOUL. Something that was not there before. Something out of seemingly nothing. I've always loved the image portrayed in Psalm 139:13-14 -

"For YOU created my inmost being, You knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise You because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Your works are wonderful, I know that full well."

Let's take the image of a dresser. A dresser is a lot less complex than a person, no? If I wanted to make a dresser all I would have to do is stroll over to Home Depot, buy some tools, nails, lacquer, lumber, go home, set up shop in my garage, and have at her. After some concentrated effort, boom - I have a dresser. The dresser may even last me for many years. How lovely. But I had to do a lot of work to have this dresser. Even If I had gone to Home Depot, made the same purchases, and then mixed them all together in my garage and let it sit for 9 months, when I open the door and take a peek it will all be exactly how I left it.

NOT SO WITH BABY-MAKING, folks! Not so at all. If a person wants to make a baby, they already have half the materials necessary - no need for a trip to Home Depot. And if they have a spouse, they have all the materials. Hooray. The list of items needed for a baby is far less than the items needed for a dresser - and inherently cheaper, too. (Although, now that I think about it, to get the spouse you might have to spend a little money on dates... but roll with this analogy, will you?) After a little concentrated effort, boom - you have a baby! You didn't have to sand it. You didn't have to lacquer it. You just mixed it up and let it sit for 9 months, and you have something that will last many years - like around 80 years. A mom has mysteriously cooked a creature with fingernails, eyes, a heart! A brain! Hormones and lymph nodes and a bone structure, oh my! Even as glorious and weirdly awestruck this may make you, creating a baby has made far more than incomprehensibly complex bodily systems - the man and woman two-become-one-flesh thing has crafted a soul. Something eternal, something infinite. A simple act of ultimate earthly love knit together the stuff of Heaven (or hell, I suppose) in a lowly, sin-ridden self.

Where babies come from blows my mind enough as it is. NOW, let's even amp this wonder up a notch.

JESUS WAS A BABY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

A human baby. A wrinkly smelly alien baby. And not probably a cute one at that, since the Bible says Jesus "had no beauty or majesty to attract us to Him, nothing in His appearance that we should desire Him"(Isaiah 53:2). He was not a tubby golden winged cherub, and He most certainly did not grow into the hottie that we see pictured in European art and in most of our churches. When Christ came down to earth, He came like a regular Joe instead of a Brad Pitt. Too often humans paint and mosaic Him up to be this incredible stud with rippling abs laying oh-so-handsomely on the cross, but, correct me if I'm wrong, He wasn't. He is the One who created beauty. From Him comes all attraction and even sight - He invented hormones and the sexual attraction we all have. He could have come as something far sexier than an alien baby! He could have blown our minds! I know we glorify Him in art because we want to do His glory majesty, but He was an average guy.

He walked a lot so I don't want to go so far as to surmise He was fat, but He was probably pretty unkempt - "He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering. Like one from whom men hide their faces He was despised, and we esteemed Him not"(Isaiah 53:3). He didn't have a regular shower to frequent due to His nomadic ministry - "Foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay His head"(Luke 9:58). He probably had pimples in His teenage years. And scars from popping them. He probably got roughed up in carpentry and playing with the other guys growing up, so He already had scars and the like. He was dusty. Dirty. If we passed Him in the street back then we wouldn't have cat-called or whistled at Him. He was nothing special outwardly.

By choice.

For YOU!

For me.

I just cannot wrap my head around how God - something so divine, so majestic, so far beyond any semblance of human comprehension - squashed His terrifyingly eternal majesty into a wrinkled little baby. A baby!!! How did His glory fit? Isn't the juxtaposition of the penultimate source of all manner of goodness and light in the cosmos and the lowest form of human life imaginable revoltingly mind-blowing? Doesn't it go against every physical, moral, mental law the human race has?

And not only was He born as a maggot-bound human, but He was born in a manger. A cowshed. A stable. A stall. A barn. A barn?! Not even you or I was born in a barn, despite what our mothers might yell at us when we exhibit poor table manners. We had the luxury of being born happy and healthy in a sterile hospital with trained experts standing by, blinking in the brightness of earth at around 8 pounds, 20 inches. We were instantly clean, warm, and wrapped. We had plenty to eat. We had instant vaccines. We had it good. What did He have at His birth?

Straw?

Nativity scenes are always displayed so serenely, but was the original nativity scene so pristine? BY NO MEANS. Mary, likely a 14-16 year old virgin, had to give birth IN A BARN with no epidurals, no ice chips, no local Jerusalem-area Lamaze class, and no sterile anything. Childbirth connoted a much grander fatal danger in those days, so as Mary was thrown in waves of labor pain, the thought of bleeding out on the straw in front of a man she barely knew and whom had probably never even seen her naked before constitutes a bunch of stress. And I know Mary serenely pondered all of the First Christmas events up in her heart, but if you picture it from her point of view in the heat of the moment as she's pushing out Jesus to this cold, hard world... it ain't pretty. She's experiencing childbirth for the first time, and Bethlehem was too crowded to even give Mary and Joseph a hotel room. In the words of Stephanie Tanner, "HOW RUDE!" I'm sure she was stressed about it being her first time. She's not married, so how do you think that looks to people, eh? Socially, she's in quite the unfair pickle. She's probably freaked out of her mind still at the fact that she's pregnant and her and Joseph never even did it - that doesn't seem normal - and she's little! She's a freshman in high school! And she's not even at home for all of this!

But Mary doesn't die. She succeeds in giving birth to Jesus, Savior of all. In a barn. With only Joseph to hold her hand and the oxen to oogle the orgy of blood and gross who-knows-what associated with childbirth. She's a simple woman giving birth to a simple baby boy in a simple barn. This scene could have taken place anywhere in the early Mesopotamian world. I bet 20 other babies were born that night in the area. Girls and boys, little Nicodemouses and Annas and Emmas and Madisons and Manuels. (Well, maybe not Manuels... they were Jewish after all, not Mexican. Once again, for the sake of a witty post title, roll with me here). It's simple, right?

It's simply Immanuel.

Immanuel, or "God with us". God WITH US, here! On earth! God left the popular cool kid lunch table of heaven, pulled on our weird clothes, and settled in for 30 years at the nerd table. He took Himself out of paradise - for us. With us. One of us.

This makes Jesus unlike any other idol, any other prophet, any other god. How many of those were willing to give up their glory for their subjects? Jesus' love was great enough to bring Him through a womb to our world - our world that murdered Him upon arrival. It's terrible and we all should obviously carry huge amounts of guilt for being human, being one of the same kind who killed the Lord of all, but God did this for our benefit. He did this for our good! Because Jesus, Immanuel, lived here with us,

"For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have One who has been tempted in every way, just as we are - yet was without sin" (Hebrews 4:15)

His incredible humbling is an incredible blessing for us and gives such incredible comfort. He knows how you feel when you feel like you don't belong. He understands stress, He understands betrayal and loneliness. He understands it fully, better than anyone, and the great thing is that even though Immanuel died here, He also rose 3 days later and ascended into heaven so that someday we can go spend time in His world. For forever.

And the best part? He is still our Immanuel. He is still here on earth, in every particle of everything and all around you, all the time. He promises. We can trust Him.

So start getting excited people. Start getting excited that He's coming! Start preparing your hearts to try and comprehend His indescribable love this Christmas season. Enjoy the carols and the earthly, acquaintence-y love, but please, look past that. Look past the cliche' well wishes for "joy" and "light" and "happiness" that the over-marketed world jams down your throats. Look past Santa and misteltoe, eggnog, bad sweaters, and Christmas bonuses. Dig past tradition, dig past complacency, and dig into His word to find the runty little baby in a bloody little barn that came to save your bloody rotten runty soul.

Start getting excited to comprehend His salvation and what faith in Him is all about.

Ask the Holy Spirit to help you notice Immanuel in this world and share His love with others.

And start anticipating Easter where we'll nail Him to a cross yet again, and marvel at His plans, His love, His undying truth. Marvel at Him, the humble alien baby who created all things.

Marvel at Immanuel.

Happy Advent!

Home Is... Where?

Thanksgiving countdown: 6 days!!

I cannot explain to you strongly enough HOW DARN EXCITED I am to be going home. I haven't seen my house since August. I have never been away from home so long in my life. When I went to UW-Madison I went home once a month since it was only an hour and half away... but the 7 hour drive is a little more taxing to make now that I go to MLC. I mean, it's doable. But women's soccer kept me stuck here over fall break and I just haven't made it back.

By the time I finally go home next week I'll have been away for 95 days. Since May, I've only been at home for 5 days over midsummer break+12 hours between August 19th-20th that was turnaround time between camp and college. So really, it feels like I have been away a lot longer. I have spent the last three summer at Camp Phillip, but even then I got to go home/see important people fairly regularly. This is the most anticipated home-coming for me personally of my whole life. I. CANNOT. Wait.

I just feel that when I came to MLC, everything else that I left behind in Milwaukee, Wautoma, and Madison all just stopped and would be the same, waiting for me when I return. Like everyone just froze or they're on a laptop's "sleep" mode. It's a similar feeling to how you used to feel when you were playing Barbies as a child (or last month... what? Did I say that?) You could leave Barbie and Ken in the red convertible and a week later they would still be sitting there grinningly waiting for you, lost in plastic rapture. People in my life aren't like Barbie and Ken though. They're mobile. They morph and feel and change just as frequently as I personally do. In 95-plus days a lot of the people I care the most about might have morphed in ways I wasn't around to witness - which is both an exciting, frightening, foreign feeling. Going home will certainly be interesting!

What really constitutes "home" during your college years?
"Home" used to be that place you lived as a child. The place with mom and dad, with your own backyard and your own room. It was your base. Your sanctuary. It (for the most part) didn't move. It was a recharge point, refuge, rock. As high school demands crept into your life, it became more and more of a checkpoint since you were always out and about. And once graduation hit, you hit the road and your "home" hit the fan. At least, for me it did. Now that I'm in college, I live at my childhood house for 3-4 weeks over Christmas, a weekend here and there, 2-3 weeks in May, and Thanksgiving break. That's it. I don't even go home for spring break or summer. About every 3 months I have to pack my whole life into gray tote boxes and shuffle my life down dorm halls, cram it into backseats trunks of tiny college junker cars, and move. It's worse in summer - I can only set up camp for a week and then I'm on the move again! In the beginning it was novel and exciting, but 3 years into it (wow - three years of college already?!) the luster's wearing thin. Part of me is just longing for the day I have a place where I can set up shop permanently. All I want is to be able to not have to wear flip flops in the shower and to have the ability leave my toothbrush by the sink. Is that kind of permanence too much to ask for?

What is home? Is it still your childhood house? Does it only take two-by-fours and mortar to make a house a home?

Is home just the place you lay your head at night - so home can be found anywhere, from a hotel in Argentina to hut in Moscow?

Is your office your home? Or work? That little cubicle or desk, is that the place you truly feel accepted and at ease? When you're flipping burgers, is that home for you?

Do you find "home" in your hobbies, sports, music, books, or TV?

Is "home" only found once, in one place, at one time? Or can you have many homes in a lifetime?

Is "home" now your group of friends? Is home found among your newly acquired family all living on your college dorm floor together? Is mutuality and college camaraderie enough to breed kinship?

Or is home found in your vices?

Money?

Stability?

Humor?

Or is "home" found in love?

Suddenly being thrust into a nomadic culture of semester-long leases and summer internships means many college students feel like they're reeling. All of sudden their permanence, their stability just got ripped out from underneath their feet; they're thrust into a sea of novelty and change. They have the chance for the first time in their lives to make their own choices. Do they want to keep going to church like their parents? Do they want to start voting Democratic after hearing years of Republican tirades at the dinner table? These college kids are footloose. They're nomads. They can choose! And people choose to search for solace and permanence we all desire in the arms of a live-in girlfriend or in the bottom of a bottle of Jack Daniel's. These aren't the right places to look for home.
While romance, hazy Friday nights, or even money can give people the warm fuzzy feelings of acceptance, love, and joy that "home" used to fulfill in our lives, eventually they bottom out on you. Your girlfriend could ditch you and your "love" for "Han's from Norway, the guy she met at the gym with Brad Pitt's face and Jesus' abs" (name that movie quote), the drunken nights can start feeling seedy and hollow as you inch up into your later 20's, and with the economy tanking, money is by no means something to rely on right now. Is there anything remotely solid we can hold on to in the ever-fluctuating life of a nomad?

"God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble.

Therefore, we WILL NOT fear though the earth give way, and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam and the mountains quake with their surging... God is within her, she will not fall; God will help her at break of day." -Psalm 45:1-3,5

God is our home. Even as nomads traveling through the sketchy path of life, His omnipresence in not only the daily events of our lives but in our hearts leaves no room for worry or doubt. He fills up the hole that we try and cram worthless idols into. And His love covers all our flaws.

The other day I was feeling cranky, worried, and stressed about things in my life that I can't control. I was geeking out about God's plan for my life and I was wondering if choices I made recently really were part of His plan after all, because it felt like I had made a horrible mistake. So when I was feeling down, what did I do? First I looked at Chuck Norris jokes. That was good for a laugh but it didn't help my emotional wrenching state of mind. So then I looked at Natalie Dee, and pardon the French, but I found this one that sadly resembled me:

Really, in the grand scheme of life, I have everything. I seriously may be the most privileged person in the entire world: stable family, amazing friends, the opportunity of an education, a great boyfriend, my health, talents, food on the table, a roof over my head, I get to live with my friends, I don't have to worry about money, I'm employable, I have two legs, arms, eyes, and ears... I could go on forever! And best of all, I have faith. So many people in the world don't know the saving Gospel message that Jesus became human, lived a perfect life, and died on the cross so that now everyone can go to eternal life if they just believe in Him! I'm blessed beyond belief. These little things that worry us nomads are not important - God's got it all in control.

(It's just a lot easier to say that and a lot harder to actually put that into practice, you know?)

Ultimately, God is our home. We can live as many places as we want to while we're all here on earth, but in the end, our citizenship is in heaven.

"Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God, trust also in Me. In My Father's house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am"
- John 14:1-3

Count your blessings, enjoy time with family and friends, and above all else, remember where your home truly is. God is love!

Happy Thanksgiving!

A Return

So I keep journals. You probably know this. But I really wish you could read them all. This won't happen; they're far too personal for me to probably share with anyone but my husband and kids someday. I'd be okay with the general public reading them after I'm dead and gone, but certainly not now.

I wish you could read them because nearly every entry starts in the same fashion:

12:45am. Augustana 109. 3 November 2010. Song mood: "King of Anything" by Sara Barellies.

"Well, first and foremost an apology is in order. I am sooooo sorry, I didn't finish writing about _______________. I suck. I'm sorry."


I don't know really who my journals are to, but I usually seem to address them to "you", whomever "you" may be. And they always start out apologetic because although I journal frequently, I never say what I need to say fully. I always "run out of time" or am "too tired" or something. There's always some excuse. But I need to apologize to myself in these entries, and I don't know why. Huh.


I tell you these things because I am apologizing to you know. I was really proud of my semi-weeklyish blog posts and I was excited for awhile because I believed people really read them. This made the author in me really thrilled and I loved it, but I got really caught up in life here and chucked blogging by the wayside. I used to check this for new comments on posts even before I checked Facebook (whoa, what?!) and when I logged in today this had all the attraction and warmth as a dust-blown ghost town complete with tumbleweeds rumbling down the lane. For this, I heartily apologize from the depths of my literary heart. Truly.


Apologies make people weirdly vulnerable. When you apologize to someone you're putting your emotions, heart, and pride on the chopping block; you're throwing yourself to the mercy of rejection. But have you ever been apologized to by someone who really hurt you? Or have you knocked yourself down off the totem pole of self-love and groveled for forgiveness at the feet of someone whose soul was ripped to shreds by your cutting words? I've experienced both, and can I ever tell you that afterwards in either case you just feel... clear. Clear like saran wrap. Does that make sense? I feel like saran wrap after apologies - clear, easy, clean...

It's a blow to your personal pride to admit to someone "you were right, I was wrong". It never is an easy thing to do, but sometimes to preserve relationships in your life you have humble yourself -which is something I seem to usually cowardly avoid because it's difficult. However, if we avoid the difficult things in life forever, life isn't going to be that interesting. You'll never have closure about anything and your pent up frustration just might make you blow your top like an over-shaken soda can.

Jesus, as usual, was the perfect model of humility, and gave His followers a deeply intimate look at what truly humbling yourself before men really means. It means we're supposed to wash each other's feet. We're supposed to show love to those people who deeply hurt us, asking nothing in return. It means loving people who got the label of "weird", "ugly", or "worthless" stamped on their forehead by society. We're supposed to help, respect, and forgive everyone - everyone. And it means that we too need to realize our utter sinfulness and humbly ask God for His forgiveness every single day.

How often do you ask God to forgive your sins? I know I struggle with that a great deal sometimes because I play the "compare game" - you've done it too. "I really can't be that bad, I go to a Lutheran college," "At least I'm not doing pot," "I could just be sleeping around with everyone like_________ does, but I'm not so that makes me better than ________"... and the list goes on. When I play that game I always feel like that awful Pharisee in Luke 18 -

" The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed, "God, I thank you that I am not like other people - robbers, evildoers, adulterers - or even like this tax collector"(verse 11).

How terribly, terribly prideful.

"But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, "God have mercy on me, a sinner" (verse 13)

I need to return to asking God in fear and trembling to forgive my sins like this tax collector did instead of pridefully strutting before His throne, dictating what He should do in my life. Too often we forget God could quite literally nuke us in a heartbeat - and should nuke us in a heartbeat. Who are we to yell at Him, demand things of Him, or even ask for His forgiveness - when it was us that murdered God?

"I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted" (Luke 18:14).

I'm the chief of sinners, yet He still loves me. I'll never be able to get over that. It's always the best news in the world.

So, in sum, I am apologizing to you and asking your forgiveness for not blogging in like 10 years. I'm also going to go apologize to God for all the awful crap I do everyday, and I would encourage you to do the same. Return to routine confession before God. Afterwards, you'll feel easy and clear - just like saran wrap!

"Humble thyself in the sight of the Lord
And He will lift you up
Higher and higher
And He will lift you up"
- verse 1 "Humble Thyself", Camp Phillip.

(And I might even try to return to regular blog posts?)

I'm Falling...

Hey there. I've been slacking on this whole blogging thing - sorry! I was pretty consistent for a couple weeks there, trying to post like once a week, but lately I've been distracted and there hasn't been a moment to breathe, let alone blog. However, I'm just so happy and relaxed right now that I'm in a great writing mood and I got an hour to kill, so here we go.

I just got back from art class. Today was really fun because we made pigs out of modeling clay. THIS IS WHAT I DO FOR SCHOOL, FOLKS! Modeling clay pigs. It was just so calming and happy, and after art I always have two free hours before chapel. Usually during these hours I just feel more reflective and content than any other time of the week, so that's usually when I journal and blog and have a little alone time with a cup of coffee and my thoughts. It's just a pleasant way to spend a Tuesday.

It's fall! For the longest time I have adamantly decried that summer is the best season, with it's hot dogs and swimsuits and mown grass, but I seriously might be changing my tune. Last year, fall in Madison was so blissfully delightful that I think my preferences started bending toward crisp, crunchy mornings instead of hazy humid ones. I started liking lattes instead of lemonade, scarves instead of shorts, and pumpkins over watermelons, and now I feel I can claim with distinct certainty that autumn is my new favorite season. Now it's final. I love fall!

Fall just brings too many delightful things with it to not love it the most out of all the seasons - Packer games, apple cider, apple pie, apple orchards, apple butter, apple bread, carmel apples, bobbing for apples... haunted houses, Reformation hymns, beautiful leaves, fall coats, weather that makes lounging about in a sweatshirt and jeans just perfectly lovely, pumpkin spice lattes, cornfields, the promise of Thanksgiving and Christmas drawing closer, scarves and mittens, Badger games, lately, Flandrau state park, cozy fall food like ham sandwiches and mashed potatoes and pie, clear nights full of stars...

I might have a couple other reasons why lately I've been loving fall so much. And why I've been distracted. But I digress :)

I think I will always want to live somewhere that has all four seasons - they're just all too varied and interesting to give any one of them up. The Bible doesn't talk much about fall the season, but it talks about tons of other falls - it talks about the Fall into sin, how we as humans time and time again fall out of line with what God says, a little bit about falling in love (with people and with God), and, most comfortingly, how when we fall, He is always there to pick us up.

Lately with all the joy I've felt living at MLC, starting a new school, meeting new people, and experiencing all kinds new experiences, I'm feeling pretty firm. Pretty confident. There's not much that I feel could rock me right now. However, I Corinthians 10:12 looked like a wake-up call for me

" So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don't fall!"

Last semester was the most tumultuous one of my life. So many things that I thought stood firm threw me for a loop; everything was in a constant state of stress and upheaval. The positive that came from that was my relationship with God grew much stronger in light of all the stumbling blocks, and that struggle makes me appreciate MLC all the more for what it is and the spiritual encouragement it provides. I feel firm... but I can also already feel myself growing complacent. I can already see myself starting to just depend on chapel services as the vehicle to hear God's Word instead of working on it personally - and therefore, I need to be careful. I'm probably closer to "falling" here by sheer complacency than I was when I was in Madison.

God doesn't make us go about attempting to build up our faith alone, however. He is firm and He is permanent; He doesn't change like the seasons. I love Isaiah, and one of my favorite verses in the whole thing is 40:8:

"The grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of our God stands forever"

(this is also partly quoted in I Peter 1:24-25 in case you're interested in checking that part out, too)

We all fall short of the glory of God, but His word and faithfulness stand forever. And His Word gives us hope:

"The LORD upholds all those who fall and lifts up all who are bowed down... He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds" (Psalm 145:7, 147:3)

As fall blossoms into the fullness of it's radiance through October, be careful so that you don't fall.

Now go crunch through some leaves!

P.S - This song isn't really about fall, but it's so happy it is one of the only things that comes close to describing how I joyous I feel. There's a really cute line about "picking apples in late September" and "I'll kiss you between the ears" FALL IS THE BEST!!!!!!!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGPTwkRlHzM

Come Thou Fount

I've been living at MLC for a month so I thought I would commemorate this momentous occasion with a blog post. Oop, now it's 12:01am and technically September 21st. So... month-and-one-day-versary. Whoo! 31 day-versary. I celebrated today by doing what I do everyday - classes, practice, dinner, chapel, general bliss and joy...

I'm listening to a Chris Rice Pandora radio station while a beautiful summer like breeze is blowing throughout the room as I type this, and lo and behold, my favorite hymn just came on! It's "Come Thou Fount". I've heard lots of really great versions of this hymn, and I've frequently said if anything should happen to me and I somehow die before I get a will together, this is what MUST be played at my funeral. It must. So now you know. But I digress. Here are some really great versions of "Come Thou Fount". Or at least, my favorite versions (there are tons!)

"Teach me some melodious sonnet, sung by flaming tongues above..."

1. Sufjan. Sufjan. Sufjan always seems to do it best:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8sApYYmxhWQ
This man just has a magic with hymns. I could listen to this on a loop for the rest of my life.

"Come, my Lord, no longer tarry! Take my ransomed soul away! Send Thy angels now to carry me to realms of endless day..."

2. Like I mentioned before, Chris Rice's version is lovely as well. This is the arrangement that will be played at my funeral, whether or not I die tomorrow or in 80 years: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JwFHsX6omvI

"Jesus saw me when a stranger, wandering from the fold of God, He to rescue me from danger interposed His precious blood..."

3. For choral fans out there, if you ever heard some sacred music you like, the Mormon Tabernacle choir has probably sung it. They've sung Come Thou Fount for sure: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uslytyVrWFw
I hope we sing it like this in heaven someday

"And I hope, by Thy good measure, safely to arrive at home..."

4. I keep looking for a version of Come Thou Fount that was sung at the WELS Regional Choral Fest in 2006. It was the best choral song I have ever been a part of - it concluded the most fantastic concert I have ever had the privilege to be a part of, and at that point in my life I had never felt so close to God. I wanted to just get sucked up into the clouds right then and there. If anyone can find a version of it, I would be HUGELY indebted to you if you shared it with me!

"Come thou fount of every blessing, tune my heart to sing Thy praise..."

5. The version I just heard on Pandora was lovely - it had no words and it was by Stephanie Immording, but when I searched for her on youtube there was nothing. Also on google - nothing. How mysterious. If I find it I will put it up. (I think it was listed as "Come Thou Faunt" on Pandora. Hmmm.)

"Praise the mount! I'm fixed upon it, mount of Thy redeeming love..."

6. And finally, one time, Steph and I went to go see David Crowder Band and they played this version of it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FG5ZhFN1DXk
It's far more Revolutionary-War-esque and peppy than the others

If you find or know of any other good versions, let me know!

This is apparently (according to Wikipedia) an American folk tune created in 1757 by a 22 year old pastor named Robert Robinson. I just love it. I wish I could write stuff like that.

We have "Request a Hymn" chapel tomorrow (or the 22nd... in my mind it's still the 20th, but IT'S ON WEDNESDAY. I think) but "Come Thou Fount" isn't in the WELS hymnal. How sad. Maybe I can get a petition going to change this...

Anyways. I should go to bed. I have an away soccer game tomorrow and it's starting to thunder outside - if I'm lucky there I might just get to cuddle under the covers and fall asleep to autumn raindrops on my window... have I mentioned that I love fall?
Happy month-versary!

"Oh to grace, how great a debtor daily I'm constrained to be.

Let that grace now like a fetter bind my wandering heart to Thee.

Prone to wander, LORD! I feel it!

Prone to leave the God I love!

Here's my heart, O! Take and seal it!

Seal it for Thy courts above!"

- verse 3, Come Thou Fount

You've Got So Much Love in You!

"So Much Love in You" by The Rocket Summer

"Hats need a beat like awake needs asleep.
Like a pen needs a page, to re-write you need a mistake, oh yeah.
Hearts need a mind like a clock needs the time.
Like white needs black, if you leave I hope you need to come back.

Oh, I swear, I know I believe it
Oh, I can't stop hearin' all the singin'
Oh, my soul has never had this feelin'
And it feels like gold

You got so much love in you
You got so much love in you
I'm amazed that I'm talkin' to you
You look like the songs that I've heard my whole life comin' true..."

I don't know much about The Rocket Summer - this is the only song I know of theirs, but it's catchy. This song popped up on Pandora again today and I was just reflecting on how this is how my weekend felt - I've got so much love in my life, it's overwhelming! Sometimes I get down on myself because I focus on where I lack love - namely, that I'm not in a relationship. But truly? Really and truly, I am so blessed to have people who love me as much as they do.

I didn't do anything crazy this weekend - it was pretty much laid back games and homework - but I had some free time to catch up with my PP, my mom, Ashley, Ben, etc... and it was really nice! One of MLC's few drawbacks is that it is so far away from home and I am currently car-less, as well as I'm all tangled up in soccer commitments that hold me here - so instead of going home once a month or so, I'm going home... for Thanksgiving? I spend my summers at Camp Phillip but even then I get a break to go home in the middle. It sounds babyish but I don't think I've ever been away from home for 3 solid months before, and I really love home.

Even more, I love the people at home. So I wouldn't say that I'm homesick, but I really just want to go hug my mom, catch up with Madison friends and get coffee with Steph, and I can't. Not until November. When I can't see people in the flesh I get to think about them instead. I did a lot of thinking this weekend and came to flabbergasted conclusion that I am lucky to be loved by the people who do. Seriously.

Friendships can be tricky things - people start friendships with artificial grins plastered on their faces and slippery motives clutched behind their back because they're trying to use you for some superficial reason or another. Some friendships can be highly enjoyable, but if they're built on the shaky common ground of being annoyed by the same teacher or acquaintance, what's stopping that "friend" from turning on you and being annoyed by you instead? People can befriend you because they want to date your brother, because it will look good to be in tagged photos with you on Facebook, because you're "convenient" at the time, or, more positively, they could grow out of genuine commiseration and honest commonality. There's a quote I really like about friendship by C.S Lewis:

"Friendship is born at the moment one person says to another, "What! You too? I thought I was the only one".

Writing about friendship is making my heart feel warmer and fuzzier than it already did. Here are a couple other quotes I really like about friendship:

"Truly great friends are hard to find, difficult to leave, and impossible to forget" - Author Unknown

"We are friends and I do like to spend the day with you in serious and inconsequential chatter. I wouldn't mind washing up next to you, dusting next to you, reading the back half of the paper while you read the front. We are friends and I would miss you, do miss you, and think of you very often" - Jeanette Winterson

"True friends stab you in the front" - Oscar Wilde

"The difference between love and friendship is how much you can hurt each other" - Ashleigh Brilliant

"True friendship multiplies the good in life and divides the evils. Strive to have friends, for life without friends is like life on a desert island... to find one real, good friend in life is a fortune; to keep him is a blessing" - Baltasar Gracian

The best thing about a lot of the relationships I have in my life and firmly and surely founded in common faith in God and devotion to Him. Common faith is unlike any other kind of friendship bond; it's the best kind of glue. Even if I hurt a friend, I know I can go talk to him or her and be forgiven because of our shared Savior. Friendships founded in God are not easily blown over in the storms of adversity that pummel stronger and stronger as the years go by - in fact, the exact opposite reaction happens. Faith-filled friendships grow infinitely stronger when facing challenges. Being able to be there for someone and comfort them with God's amazing gospel in tough situations is a confidence that is just harder to find in relationships where God isn't present.

The best part? Even if all of our friendships (even faith-filled ones) fail here on earth, we still have an eternal Friend who always hopes, is always there for us, is the best listener in the world, and gave a thick book full of advice on how to live our lives. He did even more than that - He died for you! You have a friend who gave up His life to save yours. We hear that all the time... but no matter how many times you hear it, it's spectacular. "Greater love has no one than this - that he lay down his life for his friends" (John 15:13).

So I just wanted to say that I love you guys! Thanks so much for putting up with all my quirks and oddities - without all of you, my friends, life would be so hollow. So empty! You bring color and life to all corners and aspects of my life. Thank you from the bottom of my heart - YOU'VE GOT SO MUCH LOVE IN YOU!! (And I have so much love in You too, Lord. Thanks)

Never forget to live like you're loved - because you are!!

When the Other Shoe Drops

Sometimes when I step back and look at the things I say I realize I say a ton of things I don't understand. Tons. I say "oofda" like 5 times a day as an expression of frustration or weariness, and I think that's a Norwegian curse word or something (Thanks, Bopa).



I usually also say a lot of colloquial, slangy phrases ways that must "make sense", but I truly don't understand what they actually mean. For example, the phrase "waiting for the other shoe to drop" - what does that really mean? We all use it as a phrase to mean that we're anticipating some kind of event (usually something inauspicious), but where did it come from? I looked up the meaning of the phrase, and Michael Quinion, who "writes on international English from a British viewpoint" had the most condensed version on the origin of this quote. Apparently in 1943 there was a cartoon published of Hitler holding a shoe, and inside the word bubble was the quote "waiting for the other shoe to drop". This indicates the phrase was well-known even then. Originally, people (or Michael Quinion) guess that the phrase came from a story/legend/vaudeville show/ or possible sitcom sketch in which a man comes home late at night, sits down on his bed, wearily takes off a shoe, and tosses it clunkily on the floor. He lives in a bunkhouse and suddenly realizes that everyone else is trying to sleep, so he takes off the other shoe a lot more carefully and gently sets it on the floor. As he crawls into bed and has just about fallen asleep, a man in the room below shouts "Well, drop the other one then! I can't sleep, waiting for you to drop the other shoe!"



Life can feel like that sometimes; life can feel like we're just waiting on the other shoe to drop. We send a letter out, and we wait for the "other shoe" to drop in the response we receive to that letter. We ask someone to be friends on Facebook and we wait for the "other shoe" to show itself in either an acceptance or a refusal. We accidentally gossip about someone and see what "other shoe" falls socially.



Sometimes it's not so cause-and-effect. Sometimes life can feel like a rain of shoes - bad things keep happening left and right, and we're just grudgingly waiting for the next shoe to clunk us in the head, hoping that it's not a soul-piercing stiletto or a 10-pound army boot. Most often when we think the "rain" of terror is over (sorry about the pun...) the "other shoe" falls when we least expect it and we're failed and flattened. Wiped out. Wan. When life is like that, it sucks.



It's not all gloom and doom though, sometimes life can be a happy rain of shoes! Sometimes positive things keep happening left and right and right and left in life, and it's like getting boxes of new shoes all day long. We get sparkling ballet flats of praise, moccasins of comfort, slippers of success. When we're waiting for the "other shoe to drop" in that kind of shiny situation, we can only rub our hands delightedly, thinking "What kind of shoes can these be?!"



Life has been a "rain of shoes" (pardon the nerdy metaphor) for me lately. It's been a little cause-and-effect. Turns out I didn't make the musical (bummer) but! A positive that came out of this was that I joined the MLC soccer team! And I love it! Not only are the girls really nice, but I also had forgotten how much I love soccer. As I keep practicing I remember more and more of my old soccer skills, and it's refreshing and exciting to get to use them again. To top it all off, what number jersey did I get last second? Number 22!! My favorite number! Ahh, it's fate. The numbers agree, I was destined to be in soccer...



The "other shoe" that fell from joining the soccer team was all the really nice people I met because of it. Meeting a whole bunch of new people here this weekend was like opening box after box of new shoes - so exciting! Fun after fun after fun. I can only smile delightedly and think "Who am I going to meet next?" Everyone here is oh-so kind. Not that people in Madison weren't; they're super nice too. It's just that a lot of acquaintances I met in discussion sections in Madison wouldn't say "hi" to you the next day in class or kind of meanly stared you down if you tried to sit by them in a lecture hall. Cripes.



(See! I'm even doing it here. What the heck does "cripes" mean?! Crepes? Are cripes bad crepes? Hey, google...)



Life throws plenty of situations at us where all that seem to fall are the bad shoes, and they pile up so high that we crumple under our worries. We're buried in grief, regret, pain, and doubt, and we feel like we'll never be able to crawl out from under that mountain of care. It's times like this passages like I Corinthians 10:13 shine like a ray of hope:

"No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; He will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, He will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it".

We feel like life has it out to get us, but really? We're no different. There's nothing new under the sun. Nothing has seized us except for the common things. There's been peer pressure, hurt feelings, relationship drama, and heartbreak since the dawn of time. From one viewpoint, we're nothing special. We're just one of billions, trillions, gazillions - a speck in a sea of mediocrity. Nameless. Faceless. We don't deserve earthly love; how much more don't we deserve heavenly love? YET, we're loved so much individually that that God knows my name - me, the speck - and He knows yours too. He knows our cares, wants, fears. He knows you have 13 freckles on your back and He knows what boy you like. He knows if it's going to work out or not. He knows. We're common, and He uncommonly loves us. What a conundrum.

His love for us makes us feel like we're just waiting for the other shoe to drop. "Sure, God loves us, yadda yadda yadda... but what next? What do I have to do?" As sinful humans, it leaves us hanging in suspense. There must be a catch. There's always a catch. "When's the other shoe going drop?"

With God, the great thing is that no other shoe falls. Ever.

God IS faithful.

So. Shoes have been falling. A few tiny bad ones in the form of twinges of missing Madison and not making the musical, a bunch of great ones in the shape of new friends and the joy of grass and soccer, and finally, a couple interesting cause-and-effect situations that require some more thought... but the shoes are falling. And they're falling into place.

I hope and pray that the shoes are falling in place for you as well.

(P.S - I looked up "cripes" - it's "an interjection used to express dismay, surprise, disgust, annoyance, etc." Guess the origin? It's a euphamism for "Christ". Guess I won't be saying "Cripes" anymore... sheesh...)

(P.P.S - I just typed "sheesh" so I looked that up too on the same website. It is also "an interjection used to express dismay, surprise, disgust, annoyance, etc." Guess this origin? Turns out it's a euphamism for "jeez" which is a euphamism for "Jesus!" AHHH I am never using these words again. Who knew I was practically swearing all this time, and the two worst words to use as swears EVER? Wow. )

(P.P.P.S - I looked up "wow". Thankfully that's not a euphamism for anything. The end).

Tryin' Out

So. Being at a new school means trying new things, right? Right. The past couple weeks have made me step out of my comfort zone and try lots of new things. New dorm. New social rules. New classes. New mentalities. New people. New city. New schedules. New priorities. New... well, new everything. I'm always one to try something new, but two weeks of total newness makes you want some things to be the same. And don't get me wrong, some things definitely ARE the same... hah but the point that I'm trying to make right now is that I have been trying new things. And mostly I like them. Mostly.

One of these new things is my recent rediscovery of TV. Holy cow. TV is great. (Actually it sucks... but just humor me for a moment). Living at Camp all summer with no TV and having a roommate that wasn't that into watching TV last year has caused my TV viewing to plummet lower than it has ever been before in my life. However - Have you ever watched MTV before? Or Bravo? Ever heard of Teen Mom? My Life as Liz? The Real Housewives of _____? 16 and Pregnant? I Didn't Know I was Pregnant? The Rachel Zoe project?!?!?! These are fantastic. Well, not really. They're fantastic in the same way the Bachelor is fantastic - it's spectacular in a soul-sucking kind of way. Regardless, this whole TV-watching-all-the-time is a completely new (and potentially AWFUL) experience for me, but it's had one positive effect - I have also discovered "The Buried Life". Have you ever heard of this show?! Literally, this show is my dream come true. 4 guys have created a list of 100 things to do before they die, and every episode they check one thing off their list as well as help someone else check something off their "bucket list". You can see more info on this show here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Buried_Life . If you really know me you know about my list and you can understand how much this show concept appeals to me. It just started; season 2 starts at 10:30pm on September 27th. Watch it!!!! I'm the biggest advocate of bucket list-making. So watch the show, but also make a list. Kay, thanks.

Something else new I tried was trying out for the musical... no callbacks but keep your fingers crossed for chorus! I'm trying to get a new job, too... I need employment. Big time. Trying to save money for a car is really hard when you have no money to save...

This summer at Camp Phillip the staff focused on Romans 12 as kind of our "mission" passages for the summer. I really like Romans in general, but I especially liked that we focused on chapter 12. The first two verses say:

"Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God - this is your spiritual act of worship. DO NOT CONFORM ANY LONGER TO THE PATTERN OF THE WORLD, but BE TRANSFORMED by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is - His good, pleasing and perfect will" -(Romans 12:1-2)

The world wants us to try out all sorts of new things - some good, some bad. Risks overall are beneficial and help you actually live your life to the fullest, but, even though they may be tempting, we shouldn't be taking sinful risks. We just plain shouldn't. Especially while we're all in college, the cliche' drinking scene is just darn tempting. Gossip, pride, and laziness haunt all the corners of our consciousness. Every day we're backed up against our closets bulging with skeletons of fear and doubt that tempt us to turn to any number of vices that wait with open, sinister arms. There are a billion and four new things we'd sinfully like to try out in the world, but instead out of love for God we should follow His command and "be transformed by the renewing of your mind". Let's not conform any longer to the rutted, asinine pattern of the world, as enticing as that may be. Let's instead see how God's "good, pleasing, and perfect will" is accomplished in our lives as we walk with Him. Try it out.

(And don't forget to watch the Buried Life!! :)

On August 30th, Normally I...

... would be moving into Madison! Or I would be there already, working at Carson's and doing all those "fun" back-to-school mixers. And I'm not moving at all; instead, I'm settling in to my second week of school already. The unfamiliar is becoming more routine, I'm figuring out the lay of the land (not that there is too much to figure out in the 3 square blocks that make up this campus...), and I have quizzes and papers due this week. It's so odd.

My first year, moving in was one of the most terrifying things I had ever contemplated up to that point in my little 18-year old life. I was moving in 3 days before my roommate Ashley was due to arrive, and my stomach bottomed out as I was walking into Slichter for the first time when the thought crossed my mind that no one in the entire city of Madison knew my name. NO ONE knew my NAME. I was about to be utterly alone, more alone than I had ever been in my life. When I get nervous I talk a lot and can't eat food, and you can believe I started chattering up a storm as I moved everything in to room 410 with the whole Strommen family in tow (this was the first time they had ever dropped a kid off at college, they didn't know better. Let's forgive them).


Then we all nervously went to Qdoba, and I wanted desperately for my family to leave and to stay at the same time. No eating happened on my part. Everything was going fast and slow at the same time. It was too hot. It was too cold. Moreover, it was frustrating. Inevitably, with bunch of send-off hugs, I was left alone in my room. In Madison. Alone. Key word? ALONE. I remember sitting down at my new desk, opening up Facebook, and then thinking "now what?"

Well, my "now what" came in the form of a calendar shoved under my door that said "Badger Buddy Dinner - 7pm" Well HALLELUJAH! The Badger Buddies were college students who helped all us awkward freshmen move in, and when I saw that on the calendar I thought "How nice! They know that we're probably all alone and they're going to eat dinner with us! Hooray!" Grinningly, I went to the Badger Buddy dinner (alone, of course. ALONE) and realized in a matter of seconds that I was grossly, grossly wrong about this Badger Buddy thing. This was not a dinner with Badger Buddies, it was a dinner for the Badger Buddies. The girl behind me in line - Allison was her name, I will never forget that - asked what I was studying. "English!" I overenthusiastically decried. "Cool," nodded Allison. "Were you a Badger Buddy last year, too?" My mouth gaped open to respond when I was cut off by the girl in charge saying, "Thanks for helping out guys! You're a great bunch of Badger Buddies. Thanks so much for helping everybody move in today, and for all your hard work. We've got plenty of pizza, so eat up!"



Oops. And if that wasn't enough to tip me off, the fact that every single person in the place was wearing a blazing red "Badger Buddy" shirt should have. It's okay, this story has a happy ending. I managed to find some other freshmen who had made the same mistake, so Drew, myself, and some guy I don't remember (but used to see all over campus) ended up walking out to picnic point, eating s'mores, catching a great view of the Capitol at night, and starting to fall in love with Madison.

Sophomore year move in was less eventful, but still involved picnic point. All the anxiety and awkwardness of freshman year was finally over and it was exciting to see all the old familiar faces, shriek about summer break, and unloft/loft/unloft the bunks a million times. It was still interesting because I had a new roommate Jennifer that I was getting to know, but it was largely comfortable. Safe. Routine.

The evening I moved in last year, some friends from Chapel had planned to have a campfire at picnic point. The sky was spattered with ominous black clouds but we were all so happy to be together again that it didn't really matter - until we almost blew off the isthmus in the deluge and near-tornado that followed. As we started running back to the car, soaked to the bone and laughing our heads off, I just thought "This is so... college. This is so great!" This was home; this was where I was supposed to be.

Now I'm in Minnesota. There were elements of freshman awkwardness moving in this year, realizing that people here didn't know me and I would be regressing, going back through a couple months of "Where are from? What's your major?"It was nice to look back and see that in two years, I went from having not a single person in Madison know my name to having a truly spectacular group of friends there. That gives me hope as I keep settling in here at MLC.

There were some elements of sophomore confidence moving in this year, too. For the first time I was living with someone I knew previously - hooray for Melissa! - and that was a great relief. Regardless, there was no picnic point involved in move-in this year, which makes my heart hurt. Literally. Madison is great and I miss it with such fervor, I can't really find accurate words for it. I miss evening strolls along Lakeshore path with the jaunty echoes of the Wisconsin band's practice melding into the cricket chirps and breeze. I miss Piccolo Pete, the Starbucks on state, the walk to Chapel, riding my bike down Charter, the 80, Vespers, the smell of the stacks, the excitement of the first day in a huge lecture hall... but most of all, I miss the people. Nothing will ever replace the people of Madison in my heart.


So normally on August 30th I would be starry-eyed at picnic point, but I guess I'll get started on my homework now...

"No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us"

- Romans 8:37

Abide With Me

Greetings from the great state of MN! Currently I'm writing from my cozy little dorm room at Martin Luther College in New Ulm. I have not been this relaxed in... probably a year? The sun is shining, and my heart kind of feels like it's shining, too.

I just transferred here from UW-Madison, and to be honest, the differences between these two places couldn't be more vast. I went from a liberal school of 44,000 students in a city of 200,000 to a majorly conservative school of around 700 HUNDRED students in a TOWN of 13,000. Light and dark cannot be more different than the differences that exist between Madison and MLC.

But do you know what? I LOVE IT!

A lot of my friends from Madison wanted to know how the culture shock of transferring to MLC would go because a couple of them are thinking of coming here, too, so this blog is mostly for them - giving them an inside look at what MLC is really like. I'm like Merriweather Lewis exploring unknown and dangerous country, mapping it out so they know what to expect if (AND WHEN!) they too make the pilgrimage. Just kidding...it's pompous of me to make that kind of metaphor.

But really. You should all come to MLC! It's unexpectedly glorious!

I should stop screaming about this. Anyways...

I mentioned in the beginning that I was more relaxed here, today, than I have been in quite possibly a year, and I wasn't lying. I think a huge part of it has to do with peace of mind - they say with relationships, "when you know, you know". I just know that this is where I am meant to be right now, and it's literally thrilling seeing how God has orchestrated the past 8 months of my life to get me to this point. The biggest thing that I learned in the past 8 months undoubtedly is that God does indeed have plans for your life, and He, in His infinite wisdom, will guide you where you need to go, no matter how hard you try and dodge His plan. No matter how you hold on to things you want, God can see the big picture. He knows when things that you selfishly want are detrimental to you, and He cares enough about YOU to shepherd you on to easier roads, greener pastures. The difficult things we all encounter isn't God vindictively messing with you; God sometimes allows daunting roadblocks to stumble us to test our faith, teach us lessons we need to learn that will help us in the future, and ultimately, to strengthen us in Him: "Many are the plans in a man's heart, but it is the LORD'S purpose that prevails"(Proverbs 19:21). Contentment and surety in Him and what He is doing in my life is a huge relaxant.

I think another huge reason why I'm so relaxed is that I just had the most enjoyable morning. I ate breakfast with my friends, drank some pretty great coffee, and had an art class where I learned about God, got to listen to soothing music, and just drew for an hour. DRAWING?! I don't think I had a truly relaxing morning at Madison... ever. Scratch that, I don't think I ever truly ate breakfast at Madison... ever. Much less with friends. And I was always scrambling to get out the door and sprint miles to a class, whereas now I can leave to go to class 5 minutes before it starts and comfortably get there. There's just less stress built into the very mentality and framework here... for me, it's a breath of fresh air.

Finally, I'm so relaxed because I got a really great chance to reflect on everything at Compline last night. Compline is an evening prayer service on Monday nights here at MLC. They dim the lights and everyone is quiet, and the atmosphere that pervades the service is akin to the attitude of a tenebre service. We just got to sing the nicest arrangement of psalms and hymns in the stately Chapel of the Christ. Everything was warm and honeyed, and when the organ dropped out on a couple verses of "Abide with Me" and all these people - my fellow classmates - were singing in beautiful harmony, it literally made me eyes kind of well up with tears to realize how much I am blessed I am to be here. He has a plan, and He's abiding with me just as He abides with you.

"I fear no foe with thee at hand to bless;

Ills have no weight and tears no bitterness.

Where is death's sting? Where, grave, thy victory?

I triumph still if thou abide with me."

- verse 7, "Abide with Me"

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