So there has definitely been a lot going on lately. I don't know where to begin, how to say it, or if some of it is even appropriate to mention.
I feel a lot of tension, like I'm walking on eggshells.
I feel disconnected, like nobody ever tells me anything.
I feel like my identity has been severely attacked. I've been to the point of hating myself because I feel like people think I'm too silly. I have this internal conflict, this struggle in myself because I feel like this silly person is just how God made me to be, but at the same time I feel like it's not okay. I feel like people don't believe that I can be an effective minister and still have an element of silliness in me. I've talked to people who say they don't think that about me, and I've talked to people, who deny it, but their faces and the way that act toward me confirm it. I don't think people realize that there is more to me than just my face value. I think they see me being silly and just dont appreciate the fact that sometimes you just have to laugh at life to keep from crying. Life is hard. I mean seriously. Life is really, really hard. I feel things very deeply. I struggle with a lot of things that few people know about, and a lot of things I've told no one at all, things that are out of my control, and most people don't care. I am complex, I'm not looking for a hero and I am not something to pitied, but I also cannot be 'that girl who is too goofy to take God or life seriously enough to make an impact.' That tears me apart because I don't think it's just students that see me that way.
I read something in my devotions this morning that made me feel better though.

"For consider your calling.... .... God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise..."

This is from 1 Corinthians 1. Ofcourse there are more to those verse, and they are equally important, but I wanted to focus in on this because I don't want you to miss why this passage was important to me. In the worlds eyes, I am foolish. I am terribly foolish, but God chose me for what He has chosen me for anyway, and He will serve His purpose for me because when He created me to be a "silly person", He had my calling in mind.
hmm. This was a good release. Perhaps next time I'll talk about a 'weighty' issue.

That is all,
Amanda

A Humbling Experience

All week I've been anticipating going on a fieldtrip with my classmates for our class Leadership and Administration in Youth Ministry. Today was the day. None of us knew where we were going, because our professor refused to tell us. We all loaded up into vans, speculating where is was that we could possibly be going. Imagine our surprise this afternoon when we pulled into a graveyard.
We unloaded from the vans and Professor Brandt talked with us for a moment and told us to spend about 20 minutes just walking around and looking at the graves, what they said, what they looked like, the dates on them, the surroundings.
I looked at the area that had the babies first. The first stone I looked at said "Lost but not forgotten." I didn't think much about it, until I was further down the line of the baby graves and saw places where there was a stone, or a marker of some sort, signifying that a baby lay there, but time had faded away the name. Have these children been forgotten?
After I looked at a long line of childrens graves, many of which the stones said "our bright eyed child", "or beloved child" and other variations of those two, I visited some other graves. One of the ones I saw had a stone for two people, and the date of thier marriage was on it. The date was in 1996. The date of the death of the wife was in 2000. Someone else said they found one that had the same thing, except the date of the death of the wife was the day after the wedding. I saw a lot of war veteran graves. But they were forlorn, by themselves, and out of place with the rest of the graves. Alone.
A lot of the stones had poems, or epitaphs on them. Beloved Mother. Beloved Father. Beloved (fill in the blank). It was interesting to realize that people want others to look at their family members graves and know that they were loved.
The last grave I looked at had passages from the Koran on them, but there was something remarkably different about these graves than the rest of them. All the foliage around these graves were dead, or dying, and covered in spider webs. I'm sure it was just a coincidence, well... I'm not sure I believe in coincidence, but it just made me think. As a Christian, I know that death is not the end for me, for there is life after death, an eternity in heaven with Christ. I can't say that I know for sure that these islamic graves held people who's names aren't written in the book of life, but I can make an educated guess. It just dawned on me that these graves symbolized life without the saving grace of Jesus. It's death. Spiritual death.
It was a pretty intense experience. Life is short.

Psalm 23

Christine sent this to me in a forward, I thought it was so neat. I wish you could see the pictures that go with it.

Psalm 23
This is an eye opener... Some probably never thought nor looked at this Psalm in this way...


The Lord is my Shepherd-- That's Relationship!
I shall not want-- That's Supply!
He maketh me to lie down in green pastures.--That's Rest!
He leadeth me beside the still waters.--That's Refreshment!
He restoreth my soul--That's Healing!
He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness.--That's guidance!
For His name sake--That's Purpose!
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death.--That's Testing!
I will fear no evil.--That's Protection!
For Thou art with me--That's Faithfulness
Thy rod and Thy staff they comfort me,--That's Discipline!
Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of my enemies.-- That's Hope!
Thou anointest my head with oil,--That's Concecration!
My cup runneth over.--That's Abundance!
Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life.--That's Blessing!
And I will dwell in the house of the Lord.--That's Security!
Forever.--That's Eternity!

Face it, the Lord and I think you are special.
Send this to the people you think are special.
I thought this was pretty special, just like YOU!!!
What is most valuable, is not what we have in our lives;
but WHO we have in our lives.

College life makes me emotional because I lack the discipline to get adequate rest, eat healthy, and exercise enough... That among other things. I don't like being that way. I like to be a pleasant person to be around, and I don't want to cause trouble for anyone else.
So, I'm definitely doing laundry right now. That's right. It's after midnight. I should be in bed, sleeping.. getting rest. I don't have a class until 11am, but I would like to go to the computer lab and get my assignment done for Effective Teaching in Youth Ministry. I have to study a passage where Jesus is interacting with people, not like he's teaching large crowds, but like one on one interaction or something like it. I have to study it inductively, then I have to make a powerpoint presentation out of it and get it emailed to Brandt like 2 hours before class. AHHHH.
I'm just slightly overwhelmed. You know what? When I was going to bed early and getting up early, I accomplished so much more that I have been lately. What happened???

You know what. I'm tired of complaining. Let me tell you about all the good things in life. I got the opportunity to talk to my grandma for a little while the other day. She called me and we had a nice conversation and I told her about school and everything that's going on. It was nice. I love my grandma. I also talked with my mom on the phone. My family isn't doing too bad... well, nothing is too terribly different from what's normal, if that means anything to anyone, so life is definitely not worse. And to me, that's really good.
Also, I'm a part of a website; www.writing.com and I have the free membership and I logged on yesterday to add another poem to be reviewed and I found that someone had anonymously bought me a three month upgraded membership. Yay! How cool is that?
I've also had some opportunities to bond with my roommates. which is always nice.
Well,that's about all for tonight. I'm going to work on my assignment while I wait for my laundry to finish.

Amanda

Life is Interesting

Well, Bethel just went through our Spiritual Emphasis Week. It's strange because it seems like it just came so early this year. For the first time in my college career... I skipped night chapel during Spiritual Emphasis Week. I am such a heathen. :-) I went through several emotions doing this. First, I went on Monday night and was quite honestly... bored. So I had no desire to go the next night so Christine, Naomi and I went to the Dollar Theatre Tuesday night and saw Evan Almighty, which is a wonderful movie, I highly recommend it. But it has a lot of religion based inside jokes, so if you're not familiar with that the movie will probably just be stupid to you and in that case I don't recommend it. It was a little strange, it felt wrong, and liberating to skip that chapel (by the way, no, I'm not required to attend evening Chapels). So Wednesday night, I didn't go again but instead hung out with Christine, and the same for Thursday Night, and there is no evening Chapel on Friday after Spiritual Emphasis Week. It felt great all week not to go to Chapel, to not do something out of duty. However, on Friday I kept feeling like I had missed some great things and wished I had gone. But this was a good experience because going to night sessions had become a legalistic thing for me that I really needed to break. Besides, I can always download the chapel sessions from Bethels website. Anyway, I feel good about not going because it broke down a part of me that had become legalistic, but also because now I feel that when we have other evening chapel sessions for our special weeks, I will be going because I want to hear what God has to say and not out of a sense of duty. It's those little things that make life interesting. By the way, I also didn't go to Prayer Watch, I stayed in my room and studied the book of Romans.

I've had my share of ups and downs this week; no better or worse than anyone else. It's just life. My interest has a girlfriend. He's really happy about her, and I would hate to interfere with that, not that I would, but I don't want to do anything accidentally, so I'm going to back off. It's probably better that I back off anyway. A guy should have to fight for my heart, and if one actually does (in my condition) then I know that he just might be worthy of me. Right?
In other news, Ive had some annoyances with some people here... but those thoughts are reserved for me to work out in my private, handwritten journal. It's nothing terrible anyway.
Did I mention that my phone broke? Well, it finished breaking to the point that I can't really use it. The sound went out for some reason. Bummer. Im ready for a new cell phone that I can actually use, but I need a hefty paycheck before that will happen. I have a lot of expenses to take care of with my first few paychecks.

Well, That's going to have to be all for an update because I have a few things I would like to do. Hopefully I'll be able to update this thing a few times a week instead of once a week.

Amanda

My Spirit is heavy.

Okay, so I am just not having the best day today. It started out fine, but it's just becoming a pain. I went to bed at midnight last night and I slept until about 10:30 today. I must have been exhausted. Naomi called me on my phone and I couldn't hear a thing, so she called on the house phone. She and I, and Naomi J and Katie all went and worked out today. It was a good work out and I felt really good afterwards. We relaxed for a few minutes, then went to the DC for Brunch. After Brunch I went to work for a few hours to do Student Calling. I have 10 hours of work this week, so hopefully that, alongside Chapel Attendance will put a few dollars into my pocket when I get paid. I could really use the money.
Okay, so up to this point, everything is going pretty good, nothing really horrible. Actually, nothing really horrible today has really happened at all, I'm just unhappy. I'm unhappy because my phone is broken beyond use now. And also because money is always an issue for me. I never have it. And I could really use it. I won't go so far as to say I need it because technically, I don't really need a cellphone at all, let alone a new one that will actually work for me. There are lots of things that I don't need. There are a lot of things I should just rely on God for.
*sigh* I wonder why some people are blessed with riches, others are blessed with comfortable, though meager, living, and my family, well... I suppose we have just enough for the day, which is more than the majority of the people on earth have, so I know I'm not bad off. Just wishing for something better. I didn't have a job all summer and I could've really used one.
I had a bad dream last night. I dreamt that I was in the backseat of a car and my parents were in the front seat driving, all of our stuff was packed up to move. I don't know where my brothers were. My parents were in the front seat and they were really depressed, so depressed infact, that they talked about driving into the lake and just ending it, everything. I was in the back seat crying and telling them not to do it, but they drove into the lake anyway. It was strange though because we didn't sink to the bottom of the lake. We floated on the top to the other side and drove out of the water. This dream repeated a few times before I actually woke up. I was sobbing, and I guess my heart has been a little heavy all day. I want to talk to my mom, but I have no way of contacting her at the moment. Well, I'm going to shower so I can go to prayer watch withouth stinking.

Amanda

Give it all to Jesus

Well, today seemed like it was just an incredibly busy day for me. I dont know how it seemed so busy when I didn't have anything to do until 11am. Oh wait! That's right, Christine called me at 7am and asked me if I wanted to go to breakfast. I said yeah and I got up and showered, went to the DC, ate, came back here, spent some times reading my Bible, praying, and thinking about all the wonders of theology and God's universe. Then Christine called me again saying that she locked her keys in her car and she wanted to know if she could come hang out at my house for a little while, so she did, and we talked about some of the things I was thinking about, then some things she was thinking about. Then I had to go to my Bowling class. My Bowling class was a blast, even though all we really did was take roll. The Bowling professor is hilarious! Let's just say this, he was so fun that calling roll took half an hour by itself. So we got to leave early and I went to find Christine and met up with her in the bookstore. I bought a few more supplies, some Bethel pens, and the book Wild At Heart. Then the two of us went to lunch at Sufficient Grounds, then I waited for Christine's Dad to show up with her spare set of keys since Christine was supposed to be in a class when he would get here. But she showed up right when he was about to leave so I just gave her the keys then and she took her dad to her house so he could see it. Then I came back to my room and finalized some homework I had to get done, went to the computer lab... saw Justin. I was planning to give Justin a copy of Wild At Heart as a kind of surprise gift, and it was supposed to be anonymous, but seeing that he is off campus this year, and not knowing how to get it to him, I just gave him the book in the computer lab. I told him that it was supposed to be anonymous, but I didn't know how to get it to him, and he was like, "Oh, you could just leave it somewhere around campus and it would get to me." Somehow I doubt that, but yeah... I really wish I could have given it to him without him knowing it was me. Anyway... We are also thinking that we may want to have lunch instead of dinner so we can share about our summers. So then I finally got my paper printed off (there was a problem with the printers, I'm glad I showed up at 15 till) and I went to my class 'Effective Teaching in Youth Ministry.' Of all the classes I take this fall, I am sure that this class is going to be one of the most essential... perhaps also even in my college career. After that class I visited my advisor, Brother Tim, I got the drop/add form, he signed it, then I went and visited Dr. Beals. We talked and he wrote up a letter to get me into his NT Lit class even though it was full. So that was accomplished. I came back to my room. I did something on my computer. I'm not sure what it was, but I'm sure it was important. By this time it was about 5pm I went to our Student Caller meeting, worked until about 6pm, came back to the House, had dinner with my SLE Family, went back to work at 7pm, made a bunch of calls. I had some really good calls too, some of thepeople were really friendly and we were having some good 5 and 10 minute conversations, some were probably more like 15 or 20 minutes. I worked 3 1/2 hours and made a total of 25 calls. I'm a little nervous about that. I didn't space off or anything, I just made calls, and I was trying to make them quickly, but I still didn't make more than 25. I did spend a lot of time with several long calls, so I hope that they notice that, because 25 calls in 3 hours is just not good. Anyway, I did have 8 completed calls though, probably more because I talked to some parents, but I didn't put them down as parent calls. After work I went straight to my audition for Pride and Prejudice. I was so nervous, I calmed myself down a little with breathing and went in and auditioned. Overall, it wasn't a bad audition, I think, but I did forget my lines a few times. Auhhhggg. But it's okay, they gave me some good comments. They liked my inflection and pauses. Then they asked me to do it without an accent and to put more energy into it. I tried... not sure how I did, but I forgot the words again. Well, we'll see what happens. I hope to have at least a call back. That would be nice. It would be a 100 percent total blessing from God if I get the part of Mrs. Bennet. I hope I do, but God's will be done. I trust Him, even if it means this is not the time for me to be in a musical. But I still hope it is. So I came back to the house, changed into my pj's because I was really super sweaty. I had to cool off. And well.... here I am.
Wow, I had a really busy day today. I didn't even realize how busy it was. Too add to everything, I totally just added another class for MWF... Perhaps I should have just gone with 13.5credit hours because I added more homework. I'm a little nervous about my Saturday Seminar because there is so much more to it that I expected. I'm sure that I will be able to get it all done (God willing, yay). And it's spread out over time, so it's not bad, it's just overwhelming to look at it all at once. So I've decided not to try to get a job on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. If I'm going to try to be in the play it would just be better for me to leave that open to do stuff I need to get done. Well, that is my update, I'm sure it's pretty long.
Okay... breathe.... life is good.

Amanda

Thank God for 3 day weekends!

I am so glad that we have a three day weekend this week. I don't know how I would survive if I had to be ready to start classes again tomorrow. But I suppose this coming week will shove me back into the college routine.
Speaking of routine, I've been going to bed between 11 and 12 and getting up between 7 and 8. It's so weird considering the sleeping patterns I had this summer. I tried to have good sleeping patterns, but I guess it just didn't want to kick in until now. The great thing, though, is that I have had the chance to get up each morning and have a devotional study and pray. Pretty soon I will probably add homework to that.
I've decided not to try to get a job on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Those will be good days to get my homework done. Especially if I get a part in the play. That's right. I'm trying out for Bethel's production of Pride and Prejudice. They had monologues for us to prepare with and I'm practicing the monologue for the part of Mrs. Bennet. At first I didn't know which one I wanted to try for, but Naomi and Sonia think that will be the best part for me. Then they instructed me on how I can do the voice of Mrs. Bennet and got a really good laugh at me. Tonight Naomi helped me to own the character a little bit and also to memorize the monologue. It's not perfect, but it's getting there. My audition is Tuesday at 9:45 pm. I can't wait. Well, I can, but I kind of want to get it done because if I can do this, it will be my first time acting in a Bethel production and I really want to do it. Pray for me. Pray that I will do my best. Pray that God's will be done even if it means I won't have a part at all. I've been wanting to be in a Bethel production since I came here. Maybe this is the year for it. I hope so. I would love to be able to call my mom and surprise her with this. Then her and dad could come watch the performance.
So anyway... My homework load isn't terrible, but my World Civ homework is really getting to me. It's those danged maps. Thank God I don't have to turn it in until Wednesday. I still need to get some colored pencils. Tonight I will do it in high lighter like Nora suggested and hopefully that will be acceptable to him.
Well, I'd like to try to get all my homework done tonight, and maybe get a little extra done, so this is goodnight.

Amanda