Whoopeee!

I am going skiing at Mt. Baker tomorrow! That is right! It is Superbowl Sunday and I am going to totally avoid it all while skiing on the deserted slopes of Baker.

Winter Camp

How do you describe with words an experience of the heart?

This past weekend has been…amazing, wonderful, difficult, enlightening, emotional, draining, uplifting and glorious. I know, you must be thinking how lame and undiscriptive is that Levi! Well, all I have to say to that is…it was!

Okay so some background to begin with,

Friday evening, we pack and leave WWU at 4:00pm. It takes about 4 hours to get to camp even though it is only a 2.5 hour drive. This incongruity in time was do to some serious misunderstandings in directions which led to many side tracks and tours of neighboring roads. After finally arriving at camp, we settled in for the night and had our first session. It was very powerful, discussing how we as Christians need to draw our identity from God not others.

The next morning, we were rudely awakened by our Core Leader Sean singing a song on his guitar about how it was morning and breakfast was in 3 minutes. After grumbling we made it to breakfast in time to miss the instructions. This led to us sitting in the wrong area and as such food service was slow.
The second session was one of the most captivating and insightful sermons I have ever heard. It was discussing intimacy with God through prayer.
After lunch we had free time and so being tough manly guys we decided to go play Tackle ultimate Frisbee.

Okay, so I need to clear up some things before I go on. Tackle Ultimate Frisbee (TUF) is just like ordinary UF but it is full contact. This means that…well you get the idea. It is rather dangerous when you jump up to grad a Frisbee and you get bowled over by a 200lb dude. There are of course rules to this game but they are not necessary to the story. To be fair, there are girls that play to and (most) people are considerate of how rough they are depending on the person.
SO we went to play TUF during the free time. Oh, did I tell you it was raining out and the temp was about 37 F. Oh, also I was sick. That’s right, stuffy nose, headache, sore and achy. I know, I know, it was a poor decision but how do you learn except the hard way?

So I was out playing this game, shiver and sweating at the same time, soaking wet and trying to avoid being taking down onto the muddy ground. About 15 minutes into the game, it began to snow. That’s right, white stuff, which means the temp was below 32 F. Anyway, after about 15 more minutes everybody was ready to quit and we all went back and took hot showers and then I went and took a 3 hour nap in the cabin.













This camp is a little different than the fall camp in that schools from all over Washington and North Idaho come together for the weekend.
The evening service was amazing and afterward there was over an hour of prayer time. We were all praying for each others needs but it was not like a normal group prayer time. This was amazing! Laying hands on each other dozens of groups each prayer for different things. People were mercilessly healed and you could feel the Holy Spirit at times. I had a prayer answered. Ben (a guy from my Core) who had prayed for me and then about 8 minutes later, a guy went to the front to say something that was on his heart and what he said was a direct answer to my prayer. It was amazing and incredibly powerful.

Today, we had our last session and then left for home. My car stopped at a Jesse’s house on the way back and his mom cooked us some amazing teriyaki chicken and rice. Delicious!

Over all it was a great time and very empowering. I would love to talk more but for two things. First off, some people will probably have already stopped reading this is so long and second, I have a chemistry test tomorrow that I have not studied for yet so I really have to do that.

Rain and computers

Note: some of you may have noticed this before, but I, ocelot61, use cool colors and fonts for my posts, to distinguish them from Levi's. I am not Levi, just so you know.

It has been raining for about five days straight. What with walking to classes and walking to the caf and walking to computer services and walking to the practice room..... I've given up being dry. Even though I enjoy getting rained on, it starts to feel a little tedious being soggy. :) Oh well, the rain is really fun to run in.

And my computer broke this morning. As in, I now have a loaner from computer services and my computer is being sent into Gateway to get fixed. Why do the computer services people assume that since I'm a girl I know nothing about computers and talk down to me making the questions about was was wrong more confusing than if they'd just asked it using the right terms? Anyways...

On a more positive note, chapel this morning was really good - talking about integrity, and being honest with ourselves and repenting of when we aren't truly cultivating love for Christ in our hearts. And that one way to cultivate that love is to meditate on how repulsive and helpless your sin is, but Christ saved you anyway. A convicting message to think on. :)

Busy, busy, busy! (Or maybe just not interested in leaving posts [Maybe due to no responses] hmmm?)

This week has been beautiful. The sky is bright blue and there is no wind. It is still really cold though. Without the clouds to insulate, the heat just vanishes. It has been around 28-34 degrees this past week and there are frozen puddles just sitting around being frozen while sitting in full sunlight. (I don’t think they realize that they are supposed to melt when sun hits them, very disobedient.)

Lets see, what interesting things have been happening lately. Oh, I know, last weekend Jordan and Dad were up here so that was stupendous! So far, it is the best weekend this year. Other than that, I have my first math test in about 30 minutes and I probably should be studying but I find the material pretty straight forward so it is tough studying stuff I feel I know. I guess I will see very soon. The last thing is that I woke up today with a terrible sore throat and it hasn’t gone away after I got going on the day.
It hit me very quickly and has made my day very uncomfortable. I skipped my weight lifting class this morning so I could sleep some more in the hopes of getting better.
Also, I almost overdosed on vitamins this morning so I am now peeing yellow.

My Psychology class is turning out to be strange. I feel like it is more of a history of the differences between male and female and so far I haven’t learned much new stuff except that there are a lot of people who did “significant” studies in this field and that I need to know there names for a test next Tuesday.

Tomorrow evening I am leaving with my CORE to go to winter camp south of Seattle. It should be a great time and I was really looking forward to it until I got sick this morning. Please pray for my health.


Ian and I are getting along quite well and I have very few qualms with my life up here at Western. God has blessed me so much; I can’t even begin to describe it with words. I have this incredible desire to be a blessing to others and to help people. At times I feel like bursting with this desire. I want the love of Christ to flow out of me and touch others. But it is not always like that, there are many times where I feel drained but over all I am loving life up here. My friends are multiplying and growing stronger and I am very happy. (Most of the time) So far there haven’t been any big tests or projects due and that could be part of my light spirit.

Well, I have to get to the test now, so “chow”!

I'm so bad at making post titles

The conference is over... 'twas amazingly wonderful; I think the most powerful message was from Hebrews 12:12-17, focusing on our response to God's discipline; how rejecting it leads progressively to discouragement, dislocation, bitterness, profane living, and disqualification for the prize. It was a very convicting message that really made me think about how I respond when God disciplines me - do I seek with joy what it is He's teaching me? Or do I harden my heart and just try to get through it on my own? I'd like to say the first, but it's not always true of me...

I really really really want classes to start, but I suppose Monday will come quickly enough. Just for the record, reading my econ textbook so far, it looks like this will be pretty easy considering what I already learned in my high school econ class with mom and Mr. G. Yay for easy classes!!!

**end of post proper, the following is for those who would like to read my response to a very good comment brought up on my last post**

Perspicacious onlooker - Thank you for discussing thoughtfully this idea. When you say that Christians are not slaves of Christ, that we have nothing but choices and that our relationship is more characterized by a parent-child relationship, there are a few problems with that. First of all, in Romans 10, one aspect of saving faith is to proclaim that Christ is Lord. The greek for Lord there is kurios, and it means one who has power, ownership, and right to command. It is similar to the word despotes - absolute ruler. Both are used of Jesus in the New Testament many times. Now, no one can be kurios of nothing - a ruler implies there is one ruled over, an owner implies that there is one owned. If Christ is called Lord more than He is called Savior, it implies that He rules over something abosultely - and that would be us. Secondly, used almost 150 times in the New Testament is the word doulos - slave. Now, the speaker who was talking last night pointed out that even though almost all translations translate this word as servant or bond-servant when talking about our relationship to God, when talking about inanimate things (like being slaves of righteousness or slaves of sin) or about specific people who were slaves, they translate it as slave. No Greek scholar will contest that this word means anything but slave; an authoritative dictionary on the greek language says that the word is so unequivically slave that it is unnecessary to even trace the usage. It means slave and nothign else. So lots of the places where we get the idea we're God's servants - the Greek literally says we're His slaves. When Christ says in John 15:15 "No longer do I call you slaves, for the slave does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I have heard from My Father I have made known to you," the context indicates that He's not releasing them from slavery - the assumption is that they are slaves, and that doesn't change, but they are made special slaves, companion slaves, who knwo the bigger picture. Romans 6:22 includes a part "Now that you have been freed from sin and enslaved to God..." No matter how we try to get around it, we are the slaves of Christ.

Yes, we have choices, but we don't have options - a slave can choose whether to obey or disobey his master, but the choice is between doign his master's will and being a slave in rebellion. Yes, we are children of God, but we are slaves who have been called friends who have been adopted as sons. It's a progression starting on the foundation of being Christ's slave, and the privilege God gives us in Christ of relationship with Him builds from there. We may be encouraged to obey God because we know He has our eternal good at heart, but we MUST obey because He is Lord, true surrender to the Lord of all has no true choices besides obedience vs. rebellion, faithfulness vs. idolatry, and because at the bottom line of Christianity is the fact that, redeemed and enabled by grace, we exist to do the will of the Father. If you don't agree with that, take a look at Matthew 7:21, John 14:23, John 14:12 and John 8:28, John 15:10, and Romans chapter 6.
All right, a friend jsut called and needs me, so I suppose this post is over...

Hmmm?

Well most of these posts are long and kind of boring so I am going to try and spice it up by making some short and sweet.

Also, sorry that photos are not up, I always forget to take photos when I am out.

So the tid-bit of humor for now...(drum role please)...

I don't really know.

Ahhh...? Its cold up here and this weekend is a three day weekend because of Martin Luther King Jr. Day on Monday.

Okay, so don't mix orange juice and yogurt and vitamins and then go to the gym early in the morning. It does not benefit your system. Also, don't go running in the early morning with only a sweat shirt on. Have at least a windbreaker and hat.

La-de-dah

I'm back at school now. Classes don't start 'til Monday, but I've gotten all my books and started my Econ homework, since that looks like a hard class - a quiz and a paper due every week! Since on top of that I'm sharing the textbook with someone... I figured I'd better get going. :) Right now, we're doing a conference thingy where various speakers come in to talk. This year's theme is discipleship, and the talks have been really good - last night's was about the fact that Christ is Lord means that Christians are His slaves, not saved to fulfill their dreams, but to live His will. One convicting question that I've started to think about since is this: How would the way I share the Gospel be different if I was clear in my own heart and in what I say that I am preaching a call to slavery? Ouch.... Anyways, I'm kinda ready for classes to start, but life is good.... and books are expensive.

So?

So what defines happiness? Where do the beginnings flow from?

I was thinking about this recently. (Well, to be honest, I have only been thinking about it since I began typing this blog. No! That is not true, I have been thinking along the same lines since yesterday’s church service.)

On Sunday, the pastor of this church I went to gave a sermon on loving the Lord with all your heart, all your soul and with all your mind. I was convicted during it and realized that even though I loved the Lord, there were things in my life that I was holding on to and not letting the Lord be apart of entirely. (Whoa! This is deep you might say. I would agree. Also, I don’t think I really want my whole spiritual life on the web for all to see. Who knows, one day I might be famous and write a book about it but if it were all on the web already then who would buy my book? Then I would starve and die and it would be the end.)

So, I had my first Chemistry lab today. I enjoyed it and it turns out I have a pretty good lab partner. He is a super senior (5th year student) and is double majoring in Psychology and Neuroscience. Compared to the chemistry class I had in high school with Mrs. K and Mr. G (no full names for security reasons) this course is not only easy but a very sad substitute. For the first week and a half, we have been discussing the factor label method. He is teaching us what were are doing, just how to plug and chug the numbers. Quite sad really. I just hope that the tests aren’t to difficult. This is more of a HS chem. class and I would definitely say that the one I took in HS was more like an upper division class here.

Psychology is not very enjoyable because the teacher just reads off a power point and it is boring. Also, right now all we are talking about is how gender has affected the history of psychology.

In calculus, we have begun to do derivatives. It is difficult but so much more interesting! All my math life has been learning the building blocks to higher math and now, we are doing something interesting. Finding slopes at exact points or the derivative of a graph, it is challenging but rewarding.

Oh! Dinner is calling. I missed lunch today because of classes so I am starving.
TTFN (Ta Ta For Now)