It has only recently come to my attention all the things that God has taught me this year. I guess this has to do with how the semester is coming to a close in the next two weeks. And how this also marks the close of my first year of college. What a journey it has been. It sped by.
1. I am blessed. Beyond anything I can fathom.
This is something I never want to forget. I take my whole life for granted everyday. I'm so entirely selfish. Yet God still loves me. Crazy.
2. Sometimes, even if you pray for something, if you don't truly desire for that thing to come about, it won't.
I guess this is something I should have known. Maybe everyone knew this but me. What you have to pray for is desire, so you can honestly want that thing and pray for that thing to come about. When praying in supplication to God, if your heart doesn't match your words God won't care about your words. It sucks. Sometimes it'd be nice to be able to fool God like we fool everyone else in our lives. But then He wouldn't be God.
3. Sometimes, just cause you feel a certain way, that doesn't mean that the person you feel that way about feels the same way about you.
Excuse me while I try and remain vague on this point. I guess in this, I just learned that God can have bigger plans than what I see. His will outweighs my wishes. So sometimes He hardens people's hearts to accomplish His will. Even if the result has to break my heart for a little while. And by little while I mean two semesters.
4. Friendships are powerful things.
They will make or break your entire existence. A desire for fellowship and community is something God put inside all of us. Without it you can suffocate spiritually and emotionally.
5. Friendships are way more important than idle talk and gossip.
This is fairly self explanatory. But I've had to face this issue a lot this year. It's aggravating to say the least. Because no one wants anyone to talk about them, but they talk about others relentlessly. Why are we all hypocrites.
6. God can even work through our downfalls to make His will come about. Even in our pride.
Let's just say God used my friends and I to bless a fellow student last night. And I didn't even want to do it, because I was prideful and selfish for about 10 seconds. In hindsight, I hate myself for ever thinking that. The only reason we were able to bless him was because of God's orchestration. Not of my own ability at all. To God be the glory. Always.
7. You may think you want something. But sometimes that can be settling, and it's not until you see what you really want that you realize how much you didn't want the first thing.
Again, this is self explanatory. So I won't go into detail. But this has to do with God's divine providence and my small view of the world and life. And how God knows what He's doing.
8. Patience and humility are hard things to learn. And they have to be relearned daily.
9. Loving others is easy with God. But it also is a discipline that has to be relearned daily.
God has been teaching me how to love His children in a way I never have before. With a sort of reckless disregard for my own feelings or desires. When you view people as God's, it's so much easier to love them and care for them in a way that begs urgency, that begs for me to pray them into eternity with Christ whether they like it or not.
10. I lean not on my own understanding, my life is in the hands of the maker of heaven.
I guess this is the overarching theme of everything I've learned this year. How God is so powerful, glorious, all-knowing, all-sufficient. And how, for this reason, I shouldn't worry about tomorrow. Or the next day. Or the day after. Or all the days ever after. He's got it under control. Even when I have no idea what my major should be or what kind of a job I'll have or who on earth I am going to marry.
--Oh, and I love United Pursuit Band. Their songs are straight up prayers. They speak all the prayers I didn't know how to voice previously.
Saturday, April 14, 2012
Saturday, March 24, 2012
An Ode to Peeta Mellark (My reflections on The Hunger Games)
Perhaps it's cliched for me to be blogging about The Hunger Games right now, on the weekend of the movie's birth. I'm sure that nearly everyone and their mom has also done so. But I need an outlet for my musings. Otherwise I will continue to exclaim "Why does Peeta not exist!" at the top of my lungs for the next 6 weeks.
Rest assured, I enjoyed the books for more reasons than the character of Peeta. And, to be hipster, I read them before everyone else found out about them from the movie release. I also liked Peeta before he was Josh Hutcherson. But that's beside the point.
I really enjoyed the movie. It was perhaps the best book-to-movie adaptation that I have ever seen (the second half of the 7th Harry Potter being second place). Maybe this was because I read the book over a year ago. I probably forgot a number of details. But I think it's best to have some separation between the time of reading a book and seeing the movie. Then they can stand independent of one another. I realize that certain things were changed, and the movie moved quickly, but it was a lot of story to tell in such a short amount of time. So I accept these changes with open arms.
The Hunger Games is a very interesting, artistic portrayal of mankind. It seems to be a sort of commentary on the human condition, man's corrupted nature, but also his potential for good. The scary thing is that this is something our culture could eventually turn into. Maybe we're already here. People have become so desensitized to violence, through movies and video games, that this modern form of gladiator battles isn't too far from reality.
It's the idea of people being entertained by death that is so vile. The Capitol is full of people who revel in violence, who have no respect for human dignity or life. Much like the people who used to watch hangings for entertainment during Renaissance times, or people who gloried in gladiator matches. The only real, good people that exist in Panem are those in the poor districts, who can't afford to "fix" their imperfections. Those who have to fight to survive. The overlooked.
One scene from the movie that seems imprinted on my mind is set in the capitol. The camera focuses on a small boy receiving a present from his parents, a short sword. He proceeds to chase his sister, brandishing it at her. Young children being apart of this twisted society goes very much against God's intention for mankind. It's even more disturbing than the adults like Seneca Crane who create the games.
Career Tributes are potentially the most disgusting of all the characters in these stories, though. They are children bred simply for the killing of others, should they be put in the Hunger Games. This fact is emphasized in the last scene of the games. Cato, a career tribute and the last person standing between Katniss, Peeta and victory, strangles Peeta as Katniss aims her bow at him. He says, defeatedly, that he doesn't know how to do anything but kill.
I guess when I read the books I never imagined the story to be so life-like. It was pure fantasy to me. The movie made it realistic. The violence was so real. I found myself close to becoming physically ill at the site of it (I most definitely do not recommend taking children under the age of 15 to this film).
While this may sound like I'm bashing on the film, I'm really not. I loved it. And I'm hoping to see it again sometime this weekend. I loved it for its honesty. I also loved it for its good characters.
Let's take a while to reflect on Peeta Mellark, aka The Boy With the Bread. Peeta defies all previously set standards for leading male characters in fiction writing. He is humble and kind, self-sacrificing and loving. Peeta is the utter opposite of his counterpart, Gale. Some people would compare the love triangle presented here to that of Twilight (Gale-Katniss-Peeta = Jacob-Bella-Edward), but the literary merit of this book is so beyond that of Twilight that this comparison is unfair.
I was never a fan of Gale. He's the arrogant jock type. Someone who would survive the Hunger Games had he been picked. Peeta's the humble, strong, and loving type. He was never expected to survive. Even he knew that.
Peeta always looked out for Katniss above himself. He was never self-serving. Somehow this is a fault, according to a friend of mine, with whom I debate the issue of Peeta vs. Gale quite often. Peeta is not the kind of man that society puts as the leader. This is why I respect him. He's not cliched. And I realize that he's not completely realistic either. But I think, deep down, this is the type of man every girl wants. He loved Katniss long before she loved him. (not to mention that Josh Hutcherson can make a brilliantly bright blue suit look classy)
Katniss is also more than the stereotypical teenage heroine. She is selfless - volunteering as tribute when her sister is chosen. Before this she has spent her whole life working to provide for her family. And she leads the rebellion against The Capitol. She is flawed, too. Sometimes to the point of the reader becoming disgusted with her. But I don't think she deserves to be put on the same level as Bella Swan.
The Hunger Games is a story that seems to revolve around death and destruction, but I hope people see it for much more than that. If it's read critically this book can be very constructive. Right now I'm a bit obsessed, but this will probably wear off just in time for the second movie to come out (November 22, 2013!) so that I can become re-obsessed again.
Rest assured, I enjoyed the books for more reasons than the character of Peeta. And, to be hipster, I read them before everyone else found out about them from the movie release. I also liked Peeta before he was Josh Hutcherson. But that's beside the point.
I really enjoyed the movie. It was perhaps the best book-to-movie adaptation that I have ever seen (the second half of the 7th Harry Potter being second place). Maybe this was because I read the book over a year ago. I probably forgot a number of details. But I think it's best to have some separation between the time of reading a book and seeing the movie. Then they can stand independent of one another. I realize that certain things were changed, and the movie moved quickly, but it was a lot of story to tell in such a short amount of time. So I accept these changes with open arms.
The Hunger Games is a very interesting, artistic portrayal of mankind. It seems to be a sort of commentary on the human condition, man's corrupted nature, but also his potential for good. The scary thing is that this is something our culture could eventually turn into. Maybe we're already here. People have become so desensitized to violence, through movies and video games, that this modern form of gladiator battles isn't too far from reality.
It's the idea of people being entertained by death that is so vile. The Capitol is full of people who revel in violence, who have no respect for human dignity or life. Much like the people who used to watch hangings for entertainment during Renaissance times, or people who gloried in gladiator matches. The only real, good people that exist in Panem are those in the poor districts, who can't afford to "fix" their imperfections. Those who have to fight to survive. The overlooked.
One scene from the movie that seems imprinted on my mind is set in the capitol. The camera focuses on a small boy receiving a present from his parents, a short sword. He proceeds to chase his sister, brandishing it at her. Young children being apart of this twisted society goes very much against God's intention for mankind. It's even more disturbing than the adults like Seneca Crane who create the games.
Career Tributes are potentially the most disgusting of all the characters in these stories, though. They are children bred simply for the killing of others, should they be put in the Hunger Games. This fact is emphasized in the last scene of the games. Cato, a career tribute and the last person standing between Katniss, Peeta and victory, strangles Peeta as Katniss aims her bow at him. He says, defeatedly, that he doesn't know how to do anything but kill.
I guess when I read the books I never imagined the story to be so life-like. It was pure fantasy to me. The movie made it realistic. The violence was so real. I found myself close to becoming physically ill at the site of it (I most definitely do not recommend taking children under the age of 15 to this film).
While this may sound like I'm bashing on the film, I'm really not. I loved it. And I'm hoping to see it again sometime this weekend. I loved it for its honesty. I also loved it for its good characters.
Let's take a while to reflect on Peeta Mellark, aka The Boy With the Bread. Peeta defies all previously set standards for leading male characters in fiction writing. He is humble and kind, self-sacrificing and loving. Peeta is the utter opposite of his counterpart, Gale. Some people would compare the love triangle presented here to that of Twilight (Gale-Katniss-Peeta = Jacob-Bella-Edward), but the literary merit of this book is so beyond that of Twilight that this comparison is unfair.
I was never a fan of Gale. He's the arrogant jock type. Someone who would survive the Hunger Games had he been picked. Peeta's the humble, strong, and loving type. He was never expected to survive. Even he knew that.
Peeta always looked out for Katniss above himself. He was never self-serving. Somehow this is a fault, according to a friend of mine, with whom I debate the issue of Peeta vs. Gale quite often. Peeta is not the kind of man that society puts as the leader. This is why I respect him. He's not cliched. And I realize that he's not completely realistic either. But I think, deep down, this is the type of man every girl wants. He loved Katniss long before she loved him. (not to mention that Josh Hutcherson can make a brilliantly bright blue suit look classy)
Katniss is also more than the stereotypical teenage heroine. She is selfless - volunteering as tribute when her sister is chosen. Before this she has spent her whole life working to provide for her family. And she leads the rebellion against The Capitol. She is flawed, too. Sometimes to the point of the reader becoming disgusted with her. But I don't think she deserves to be put on the same level as Bella Swan.
The Hunger Games is a story that seems to revolve around death and destruction, but I hope people see it for much more than that. If it's read critically this book can be very constructive. Right now I'm a bit obsessed, but this will probably wear off just in time for the second movie to come out (November 22, 2013!) so that I can become re-obsessed again.
Monday, January 30, 2012
Sometimes... God answers prayers
Well, God always answers prayers. But some of His answers are more obvious than others.
Recently, I have been praying for patience and humility. These are two things everyone always warns against praying for. Because God will answer these requests in a BIG way. And He has.
Patience doesn't come easy for me. Especially when it involves waiting for God's will to be revealed in my life. I struggle with relying on Him to guide my steps in everyday life. I struggle with giving over the worries I have about my future to Him. I have no idea what His plan is for me after college. But that's where the patience and faith come in. He is giving me patience through opportunities to exercise patience.
Even though patience is difficult, humility is worse. Yesterday in church my pastor gave a sermon on sin. One of the points He made is that demons can see fraudulent faith in 'christians', even when humans can't. This is terrifying. And if it doesn't convict the most spiritually confident, then I don't know what will. We took communion at the end of service and I felt like God was using this to knock me down. To help me realize how small I really am. He was telling me that my confidence in my faith was ill placed. I should boast only in Christ and what He has done for me. Not what grand spiritual gesture I have made recently. The only person I am helping in learning more about God and drawing close to Him is me. God doesn't need me for His kingdom.
There are two really tangible events in my life recently that have given me an opportunity to exercise patience and humility. It's difficult to wrestle through these now, but I hope to let them refine me.
Another way that God has answered my prayers is through the hymn Jesus Paid it All. It seems that everywhere I go now I hear this song. I take this to mean that God is using this song to help me through my struggles with patience and humility. The first verse goes 'I hear the Savior say, "Thy strength indeed is small. Child of weakness watch and pray, find in me thine all in all."
Find in me thine all in all. This is all God ever wants from us. This is what I'm working on.
Recently, I have been praying for patience and humility. These are two things everyone always warns against praying for. Because God will answer these requests in a BIG way. And He has.
Patience doesn't come easy for me. Especially when it involves waiting for God's will to be revealed in my life. I struggle with relying on Him to guide my steps in everyday life. I struggle with giving over the worries I have about my future to Him. I have no idea what His plan is for me after college. But that's where the patience and faith come in. He is giving me patience through opportunities to exercise patience.
Even though patience is difficult, humility is worse. Yesterday in church my pastor gave a sermon on sin. One of the points He made is that demons can see fraudulent faith in 'christians', even when humans can't. This is terrifying. And if it doesn't convict the most spiritually confident, then I don't know what will. We took communion at the end of service and I felt like God was using this to knock me down. To help me realize how small I really am. He was telling me that my confidence in my faith was ill placed. I should boast only in Christ and what He has done for me. Not what grand spiritual gesture I have made recently. The only person I am helping in learning more about God and drawing close to Him is me. God doesn't need me for His kingdom.
There are two really tangible events in my life recently that have given me an opportunity to exercise patience and humility. It's difficult to wrestle through these now, but I hope to let them refine me.
Another way that God has answered my prayers is through the hymn Jesus Paid it All. It seems that everywhere I go now I hear this song. I take this to mean that God is using this song to help me through my struggles with patience and humility. The first verse goes 'I hear the Savior say, "Thy strength indeed is small. Child of weakness watch and pray, find in me thine all in all."
Find in me thine all in all. This is all God ever wants from us. This is what I'm working on.
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