A Self-Righteous Thought You Have to Deal With

I'm very glad that my faith isn't based on who I'm against.

I don't want Christianity to be about Us vs. Them, even though it's so very easy to get caught up in that. I find myself creeping (or running full-tilt) into Us vs Them with other Christians, and I have to constantly repent and correct my course.

But our command is to love God with everything in us and to love other people as much as we love ourselves. That means that we care about their feelings and opinions and that we want to protect people as much as is possible. Our needs aren't supposed to come first at all. We are supposed to be respectful and get along with people. Why are so many Christians not doing this? It really hurts my heart. A lot.

Could I be missing the boat sometimes or "soft on sin"? I'm certain that I am, but I also know that other than the moments when my head wants to explode from the hard-headed things I see Christians do (read: post on facebook), I don't live my life afraid and angry like many of them do, and I'm going to take that as a sign from the Holy Spirit.

Galatians 5:22-23 (New International Version)

22But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.

Again, I'm really afraid of being smug or self-righteous. I'm just trying to express myself and in that expression, check myself and clarify my thoughts. I want to believe what's right. It's kind of like I'm talking it out with you. Feel free to correct me in love, as long as you're willing to listen, too, and possibly be changed.

Funny Animal Things from the Weekend

These are some cute things I saw this weekend:

A deer looking both ways before crossing part of a parking lot.

An apparently polite bear that opened our car doors, gently took what it wanted, then left. (Saw the muddy evidence, not the bear.)

Another dog standing at the screen door wanting my dog to go out and play.

Those dogs acting just like two little boys- egging one another on, racing one another & cutting each other off, jumping in the river, knocking things over, and generally not listening.

A raven sneaking up on a deer & scaring it, then following it and continuing to hector it.

My little dog trying to stealthily get into the house with a big bone without the big dog seeing it, even though she can barely get the correct leverage working for her so she can walk with it.

Various deer seeming to pose for pictures for us tourists.

A squirrel got into one of the dining halls, and some foreigners who apparently don't have squirrels in their country tried to feed and pet it. "What did you do on your vacation?" "Got rabies!"

A friendly reminder about Labels

or Tags. Since I'm not a fan a labels, hardy-har-har. My tagging is far from complete. I haven't tagged all my older posts, and sometimes I'll come up with a new label for one post that probably applies to old ones, but I'm not motivated enough yet to go through them all.

As you were, & I'm as I am- looking for a good, short, streaming yoga workout to do right now. Then bed. Then YOSEMITE!! Fall colors, rushing waterfalls, granite cliffs, bears- it's great!

An Angry Article that I Didn't Write

But that I really, really like. It's on health care, it's very one-sided, opinionated, & strong.
You don't have to read it. I'm just putting the link here.
Evan Handler on Health Care.

Student Video from CHIC!!!

I mentioned in my CHIC post from August that some of our students made the winning video for the short film contest. It's very funny, and I hope you like it. The guy who plays the coach is Nunan, who helps lead youth, leads the college group that I work with, and Seth & I are in a small group with him & his wife. The other guys are Mark (the creator- tall w/red hair, interviewer), Agazy (the runner), JJ (foreign thumbs-up guy at end), and Zech (wearing a hat; runner's friend).

#vocabularyfail

I have been misusing "chagrin." Now is the proper time for its use.

–noun

1.	a feeling of vexation, marked by disappointment or humiliation.

I suppose that I do use it in the disappointment way, but not really. I thought it was more like wistful sadness or something.

I love friends!

Uh-oh. This was going to be about specific friends and bonding, but it might turn into a long-winded treatise on why I love facebook and twitter. You've been duly warned. Oh, and I just thought of another friend-themed rant. Woah. Focus, robeena. Pick one and move on.

Okay, today's topic is: we need more words in English for "friend." Alternatively, I need to grow up. The issue is that I am a fairly affectionate person who also happens to need a decent amount of affirmation herself. (It is quite natural that these things go hand-in-hand. My #2 love language is "words of affirmation," so I give that easily.) So I find myself calling this person or that "my best friend" or "one of my best friends." Then I also have to qualify that with "in California" or "in the whole, wide UNIVERSE," or some such 3rd grade nonsense.

Why do I do this? I think part of it is that, especially when introducing someone to "one of my best friends," I want to emphasize how special this person is to me. I'm trying to express that I love this person a whole lot and I'm excited for you to meet them. I just with there was a less childish way of doing it.

People mean things to me in different ways. Obviously, Seth is my best friend, period. I suppose that my sister would be next. But from there it starts to get confusing. There are long-time friends who have known me forever. There are friends who have been there through thick and thin. There are the people that I can rely on in any situation. There are the handful of people that I could talk to for days on end with no break and we'd still be having a great conversation. There are the friends that know me and I can just be near them and be completely myself with no walls. There are the few people out here in CA who I feel I have a lot in common with and with whom I can be sarcastic and watch TV. Obviously, some of these categories overlap, but all of these people are precious to me, and I want everyone to know it.

Maybe I should start collecting foreign words for "friend." There have to be words for some of these things out there. Of course, I would still have to explain the word to someone if I used it in public, but I think it would make my heart smile to have a word for just what someone means to me.

Monthly Check-In

Good golly, I haven't written here at all this month! Happy October, friends. It's my birthday month.

The month has been a bit odd. Not bad, but just off slightly. It started with Seth out of town. He went to Houston to be with his family and to see Metallica without me. sigh. At least his brother loved the concert enough that he bought tickets for the show in December out here, and I get to go!

The whole time Seth was gone, and up until today, too, I've been sick. Not any sort of horrible, flu, oh-I'm-going-to-die sick, but, possibly, one of the most annoying illnesses I've had. For over two weeks now, I've had headaches and nausea that ebb and flow. Quite frustrating. So, while I can pretty much carry on with life as usual, I'm not myself. I'm tired, and I'm in pain. I did go to the doctor to make sure I don't have a tumor or anything, and the nurse said it's some sort of viral syndrome. She also mentioned that I should go back if it kept going for 14 days, but I haven't done that. It's not quite as constant as it was before, so I figure it's slowly leaving. I'm done catering to it.

So, Seth was gone, and I lazed about and didn't eat a full meal once while he was gone. I had an excellent walk/run with some friends over two weeks ago, then my legs got very angry with me and I decided to see a massage therapist to work on them. I've seen her three times now, and I really think she's making a big difference in my shins. I'm going to give running a try today at the gym, so I'll let you know.

Seth got home the morning of Stephanie & Ken's wedding, but we thought we had plenty of time. For months now, I was certain that the wedding was at 3pm. So I picked Seth up, we stopped at a couple stores on the way home, and happily dealt with San Francisco traffic. Once home, we were very much looking forward to a quick nap before the wedding, especially because Seth had been up all night. Before said nap, I decided to look at the invitation again just to make sure I had the time right. The time was 12:52, and the wedding was at 1:30. Oof.
Thankfully, we were both able to look adorable in a timely manner. That's how we roll.

The wedding was lovely. It was much more formal than I'm used to in a high church sort of way. Though it didn't feel very personalized, it did feel holy and special in a way that most weddings do not. There was a lot of scripture and reading of things together; lots of mention of Jesus. It really presented the marriage as something sacred and serious, and that was great.

The reception was beautiful, but cold. It was a cool, windy day, and we were outside. By the time dinner was being served, I had jeans on under my dress, Katie had temporarily borrowed a coat from one of Steph's lovely co-workers, and I had also doled out sweatshirts for Sara and Jenny to put over their arms. With both Seth and I being so tired, and I wasn't feeling good anyway, we left during the groom-mom dance. Asleep o'clock was 10:30. It was fabulous.

On my birthday, we started our new small group Bible study, and it was great. Our new-ish friends made fajitas for dinner, got me a gift card to Outback (in a Twilight card with an Edward bookmark!), and an ice cream cake. They really went too far, but I felt so loved. They are really great and I look forward to getting closer with them and knowing them in the Bible study context.

And as if that wasn't enough, I had a spur of the moment girls' weekend with the friend who introduced me & Seth! She's got quite the full plate in her life right now, and needed a getaway, so she flew out from TX and requested WINE!! We had a lovely time in SF and Sonoma, and it was good to spend time together.

Other than that? Hurt my knee driving around. I'm currently babying that. Taught at the college group for the first time, and that was great. I ended up connecting with someone that I never thought I would, so that was a God thing. High school group going great, class is awesome, and we're going to Yosemite for 4 days next weekend!

Next post won't be so diary-like, I swear.