I don't always make time for them though. I was re-inspired when I found Shauna Niequist's list of 20 favorite books. I found a few titles that I couldn't wait to get including, "Where'd You Go, Bernadette" by Maria Semple.
This story is told through a collection of letters, emails, notes, voice mails and newsletters so you have to piece things together as you go. Bernadette, wife of Elgie and mother of Bee, is a bit peculiar and quirky but I immediately fell in love with her character. A bit of recluse, renowned architect and genius, this woman's life becomes a hilarious and mysterious story. I came home from school today and had to keep reading for a couple hours until I finished it.
Junior High is never predictable...
An 8th grade boy in our school is selling a used lighter on ebay that became famous last night in a reddit post because he broke a pen on it. This used lighter already has a bid for $11,100. Are you kidding me. Overnight he has made at least $11,100 and the bidding doesn't end till Nov 7th. Update: As of Tuesday morning the bidding is up to $100,000. This kid is in 8th grade.
A new student in our school that I'm getting to know through Wyld Life is a Mormon. I don't know many Mormons. After asking her questions about her faith last week, because I was really curious, she brought in a copy of the Book of Mormon for me. I love that she's excited to share and explain what she believes. It's also so eye-opening for me to realize what it must be like for people to flip through a Bible for the first time. Have you ever heard of the book of Alma? Do you know where to find Helaman or 3 Nephi?
Young Life is the best part of Mondays...
Tonight I got to go to dinner with Genna, Anne, Kaitlyn and Brooke before Campaigners. I made the girls all eat with chop sticks because sometimes you just need to do weird things. We played the game of Truth and yelled Taylor Swift in the car and played on the playground for half a second. I just have so much fun with these kids.
We met up with the rest of the Young Life family at the Devoe's gym at 7:32. Friends sit in clumps and circles on the floor, we jump up to hug leaders or friends we haven't seen in awhile, the guys play basketball and we try to not get hit. Ryan came right from the airport and got there in time to lead us in singing. Back in the day, aka last Fall, we would sing along with an iPod every week. This is so much better.
In our small groups tonight we talked about entitlement and the role God gets to play in our lives.
We had such good conversation about this story from Matthew 20, "God’s kingdom is like an estate manager who went out early in the morning to hire workers for his vineyard. They agreed on a wage of a dollar a day, and went to work. Later, about nine o’clock, the manager saw some other men hanging around the town square unemployed. He told them to go to work in his vineyard and he would pay them a fair wage. They went.
He did the same thing at noon, and again at three o’clock. At five o’clock he went back and found still others standing around. He said, ‘Why are you standing around all day doing nothing?’ They said, ‘Because no one hired us.’ He told them to go to work in his vineyard.
When the day’s work was over, the owner of the vineyard instructed his foreman, ‘Call the workers in and pay them their wages. Start with the last hired and go on to the first.’
Those hired at five o’clock came up and were each given a dollar. When those who were hired first saw that, they assumed they would get far more. But they got the same, each of them one dollar. Taking the dollar, they groused angrily to the manager, ‘These last workers put in only one easy hour, and you just made them equal to us, who slaved all day under a scorching sun.’
He replied to the one speaking for the rest, ‘Friend, I haven’t been unfair. We agreed on the wage of a dollar, didn’t we? So take it and go. I decided to give to the one who came last the same as you. Can’t I do what I want with my own money? Are you going to get stingy because I am generous?’
“Here it is again, the Great Reversal: many of the first ending up last, and the last first.”
A few years ago I read a book called the Shack and this image has stuck with me, "I don't want to be first among a list of values; I want to be at the center of everything. When I live in you, then together we can live through everything that happens to you. Rather than a pyramid, I want to be the center of a mobile, where everything in your life-your friends, family, occupation, thoughts, activities- is connected to me but moves with the wind, in and out and back and forth, in an incredible dance of being."
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