Lyrical Study

I chose to do a lyrical study on "Just the Way You Are" by Bruno Mars.  I like this song.  I like it because of the singing, the music, and I think that it is cute.  I think it is cool that this song is not inappropriate.  I think that in this time, and in that style of music, it is cool to be inappropriate and suggestive.  But it isn't.  All they are doing is exposing young kids and teenagers to things that aren't right. They are teaching them that it is cool to go to bad stuff.  I like this song because all he does is compliments his girlfriend.  He is telling her she doesn't need to change anything about her, and that she is perfect just the way she is.  Of course she isn't perfect, none of us are.  I think girls should hear this more often. Not always from a boy, but even from media.  This is not what the media is telling us at all. The media is telling us that we need to look a certain way, dress a certain way, be a certain weight, and height. This really causes problems in teens.  Many people get discouraged about themselves. Even going too extreme.  I like this song because it is taking a different stand to the music industry.  It is also probably successful because of all the teenage girls who listen to this song, and want a boy to say that to them.  Which gets me onto a different subject of where someone's fulfillment comes from.  But from a buisiness stand point, the words really do reach the teenage age and girls. 

Come on Down!

Many evangelists use a technique called the altar-call.  This technique is used to get sinners to come to the front of the church to confess their sins and repent.  It also is used to show the preachers how their sermon turned out and how the crowd received it. The more people to the front, the better the sermon. This method has not always been around.  Many great evangelists, such as George Whitefield and Jonathan Edwards did not believe in this method. They didn't even know what it was. They believed that private inner change was how it should be done. The question is, which method works?  I think that both methods can work. God can work through anything. I also think that it depends on the person and how they feel lead. Some people are turned off by getting in front of people. Many people have definitely been saved by the altar-call method.  I think some people view going to the front as getting saved, instead of believing in Jesus and confessing their sins.  Of course there are people who are actually saved during altar-calls as well.  We also have to think about how people think by getting baptized they are saved, and in the old times people thought by sacrificing, and getting circumcised saved them.  Any method in evangelizing can be taken in a wrong way. I don't think this method is bad. I just think the pastor should make sure the people understand how they are really saved. God can use any situation to bring people to Him. We just need to listen to Him and determine what way He wants us to do things.

Salt and Light

In Matthew 5:13-16, Jesus is giving the Sermon on the Mount.  In this sermon He talks about many topics.  One of the topics was "Salt and Light".  This topic is very convicting to me.  Jesus talks about how Christians are the salt of the earth, and if we lose our saltiness how can we become salty again.  He also said, what good does unsalted salt do? NOTHING! Jesus said that unsalted salt should be thrown on the ground and trampled on. "You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot."  (verse 13) This is very convicting. It makes me think about what I am like. Am I "salty" or not? I really need to work on spreading God's word to people. "You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven." (verses 14-16) I need to stop thinking selfishly and all about myself. I need to go out of my comfort zone and share the gospel with people. We as Christians need to get out from under the "bowl" and let our light shine. I think that my "bowl" is, I am too scared about what people will think about me, which is ridiculous. I do NOT want to be unsalty salt to where the only good I am is to be thrown on the ground and trampled on. I want to be used to further the Kingdom and be a tool God can use to show people about Him. I think a way that I can do this is set a good example for younger people. I know that when I was little I would look up to the older kids. I should build relationships with younger kids that others aren't reaching out to. This can be a very humbling thing. It will help me get out of my comfort zone and it will make me stop worrying what other people think about me.

Halloween

I do not think Halloween is a bad thing.  I think it is just fine to dress up in fun outfits and go Trick-or-Treating.  There are many people who view Halloween as a devil holiday, and that there is more demonic activity on Halloween, and that by participating in its activities they are participating in devil worship.  However it was really a Celtic holiday to celebrate the end of summer and the beginning of the harvest season.  During the same time, they would celebrate the "festival of the dead" this is when they believed that the evil spirits came out.  they would wear scary masks and outfits to ward off the spirits.  They would also carve faces in turnips and put candles in them, which is where we get the idea of jack-o-lanterns.  The Celtic children would go from door to door entertaining their neighbors with songs, in exchange for candy or money.  This is where we got trick-or-treating.  If Christian's are going to boycott Halloween because it is a pagan holiday, we need to rethink our other holidays, such as Christmas and Easter.  These holidays were both originally pagan holidays that Christians put a spin on to make it okay to celebrate them.  It is kind of hypocritical to boycott one holiday, and not the other.  Some people really do participate in devil worship on Halloween, and I obviously think this is very wrong, and that people should NOT participate in those activities.  But I still do not think that it is wrong to trick-or-treat. 

Special Olympics Bowling

Today our sophomore class went to volunteer with Special Olympics bowling.  It was a great experience.  At first I was very nervous because they were all adults. Which is a little bit intimidating. I learned that you really just have to talk to them and encourage them and they love it.  I had one of the guys say to me "I just came to have fun;  it doesn't matter what my score is."  This is a great attitude to have.  I watched and a lot of them would do really good, and they wouldn't even care. They seemed to have a great perspective on what was really important, not the score, but meeting new people and having fun. I never have really had the desire to go help with special needs people, but this experience has given me a desire to help more.  Most of the time when people see a person with special needs, they tend to try to avoid them, and not talk to them.  But they are people just like us. We need to reach out to these people more and stop migrating away from them. I really admired the coaches that came with the adults.  They were very patient and helpful. One of the guys that was in my group didn't talk. I don't know if he couldn't or he just didn't like to. He finally said "hi" one time after his coach was trying to make him say it.  It was very hard to get any response from him. I wasn't for sure if he understood what I was saying.  It was hard to communicate with him.  He finally began to smile and show emotion. I feel like this is sometimes what I am like with God. He is talking to me but I don't clue in to what He is saying. This was a great experience and it really opened my eyes to the needs of these people, and all the things that I can do to help.

Spiritual Emphasis Week

How do you know the sky is blue? How do you know you are alive? How do you know there is a God? These were a few questions that Andy Braner, our speaker for Spiritual Emphasis week, asked us at the beginning of the week. We all want to answer "I just do", "because", "I have grown up with it", or "my parents told me". But we really need to think about why we believe what we believe. I was gone two of the days for chapel, but the days that I was there, Andy discussed "Believe", and "Behave".
One of the days he talked about the topic "Believe". "Why do I believe what I believe?" was a question he asked. We really need to think about this because when we go into the real world without our parents being there, we need to be able to rely on our beliefs not theirs. There will probably be times when our faith is tried be others and if we don't know why we believe what we believe how are we going to stand strong in our faith. If we don't know why we believe what we believe, we can easily be waivered in our faith. He also talked about objective and subjective truths. If we believed in subjective truth as many people do, we would do whatever we wanted and be fine with it. If there is not a certain truth than what is truth? It would be different for every person. One person may think it is right to punch a guy in the nose, but the guy who got punched would not think it was a right thing for him to do.
Another day he talked about "Behavior". He said that all ideas have consequences. (based on Romans 12:2). A good idea has good consequences, while a bad idea has a bad consequence. He also said that the ideas of the world are in direct conflict with the ideas of God. We need to be in the world, not of it. I really don't want to be in direct conflict with God. We need to work on our ideas and actions and make sure they are not of the world. We need to make sure they are not in direct contact with God. A way we can do this is look into our lives and see what is vile and then to completely take that out of our lives. He gave us a few examples of different things of the world that can influence our dating. Such things are Facebook, different commercials, and secular music. He did not say that we should totally get rid of those things, but that we need to be careful with what we are constantly putting into our minds. Facebook is not a bad thing, but we need to be careful, with what we talk about on there. Not all commercials are bad, but there are many that make us want to change what we look like, our bodies, or what we wear. The give us a false image of what beauty is. In our Bible calss, we watched a dove commercial where they took a picture of this normal lady, not a model by any means, and took a photoshoot of her, and put make up on her to cover all her blemmishes, then they move bones in her face and and cut off her soldiers, redid her hair, and made her eyes better. After this they show a billboard with her face on it. She was gorgeous!!! Now all these women walk by and think I should look like that, I should be that skinny, I should have my face look like that, and they will do anything to achieve that, even if it hurts them alot worse, than it helping them. Also men will walk by and think oh thats what my girlfriend should look like and will try to get a girl that looks like that even if she is not good. He also did not say that all secular songs are bad, in fact he said not all of them are. He showed us examples of sonds thaat could be ok, and then songs that are not good. He showed us a progression of love songs, starting with a "friendly" love, and ending with "obsession". He also said that listening to these types of songs once didn't hurt us but when these seeds are planted and watered, it can grow into something bad.We need to clean the vile out of our lives. We need to find what glorifies God and do it.

Friends!

"Let's be friends like Jonathan and David, they show us how friendly friends can be. They share everything, and talk about everything, and promise to be, they knew that they'd be friends forever..." When I think of friends and their personalities, this song that I learned in elementary school comes into my mind. I think it gives a lot of characteristics of what a friendship should be like. The story of Jonathan and David is a great example that God gave us as what friends should be like. The story is found in 1 Samuel 18. The story is about a King Saul wanting to David because he is more popular than him. Jonathan is the son of King Saul and the best friend of the David. This would be a very hard position to be in. Would you be on your dad's side or on your best friends? It would be very difficult to choose. Even if your father is VERY wrong, it would still be very hard to go against him. Yet Jonathan chose his best friend, he helped him get away from his father. Jonathan put himself in a very bad position for the safety of his best friend. I think this is an important thing to do. We as friends should risk getting hurt, not particularly physically, but we should stand up for our friends even if it could embarrass us. Samuel 18:1 says that Jonathan loved his friend's soul as much as his own. This is crazy to think about. You may like your friend but I think it would be very hard to love their soul just as much as your own. I think I really need to work on treating my friends exactly how I would want to be treated. I say things some times that I would probably be hurt by. I need to think about if I would want them to say that to me. I have a lot of friends that don't go to OBA that I know from youth group, volleyball, basketball, and church camp. One of my good friends that don't go to OBA is KayDee Stafford. I met her at church camp a few years ago. She is very fun to talk to, and to see at different sporting events. I am so glad that we have kept in touch through the years and I hope is continues.

Racism

Racism is a big problem in the church. The basis of racism is evolution. Charles Darwin has made a huge impact in the Church. If we believe what the Bible says, we should believe that there is only one race in the world. There are not multiple races. Only one. The only difference is the amount of melinen in our skin. It is very sad that people would rather their child to marry a non Christian of the same color, than a great Christian of another color. It is also awful that people do ethnical cleansing through the name of Christianity. There beliefs are so scewed and it is sad that they are hiding behind the name Christianity. Think about what people will think of us Christians. Im sure they think that we believe that the Bible teaches us that there are many races. I am sure that there are people who have turned away from the faith because of the people who misuse the name of Christianity. The Ku Klux Klan leader was the son of a preacher. Who in the name of Christianity murdered a ton of people just because of their color of skin. Hitler murdered thousands of people because of their "race", in the name of Christianity. Another really sad thing is, is that these people thought that they were doing the right thing. They thought that they were making the world a better place by making their "race" better than the others. The Church really needs to work on this as a whole. We are not very good at accepting people of different color into the church. If we are Christians we need to act like it.

Slow Dancing in a Burning Room

I think this song is all about a relationship that is falling apart. The whole time he talks about how they just keep getting worse, and how their relationship used to be a lot better but it is dying. I think that it is so sad that people's love can die. I think the song is depressing. He says something like this isn't the storm before the calm. This makes me think that he isn't even trying to make it work. It makes me feel as though he has given up. Which I think many people do in relationships, even marriages. It should not be like that. I think that divorce is wrong in almost every situation, especially if they don't try to make it better. I know of people who have done both, try to make it work and those who don't try. And sometimes, it just doesn't work out. But this song, it makes me think that he doesn't even want to try to make it work. He has given up. When he says "we're slow dancing in a burning room" it makes me think that he knows it going to end but maybe they want to play it off that they are doing fine but really it going aweful, and they know it will end soon. John Mayer makes it sound like it is her fault, but we only see one side of the story, so we don't know fully what is going on. I don't think this song is bad, but I don't think that we should constantly be listening to sad music like this all the time.
I am so thankful that God does not give up on us. He is always there for us and will always want a relationship with us no matter what we do. All we have to do is seek to know Him better.

My Future Spouse

A quality that I want in my future husband, other than being a Christian, is faithfulness. To have a good relationship one thing that both of you need is to be faithful to eachother and to your relationship with Christ. My future husband needs to be faithful to God, our family, and myself. If spouses are not faithful to eachother, a lot of times it ends up in divorce. I also think that if you are not faithful parents, your children will not be able to trust you and grow up in a way that is not right. Children need parents who they can trust so that when they grow up they will also be parents that their children can trust. In conclusion, I think that faithfulness is very important in your relationship with your spouse.  

Gendercide

I chose to write about gendercide because it is a topic that I found very disturbing and something that needs to be prayed for. I can't even imagine any parent doing what these people do to their children. The parents in many nations throughout the world kill there baby girls because they want sons. There is an estimated 100 million baby girls missing in the world. This happens a lot in China and Northern India where having a daughter is a bad thing to have happened to you. There is a Hindu saying "Raising a daughter is like watering your neighbor's garden." In China a baby girl was born and the father said "useless thing" and next thing you know, you see a babies foot sticking out of a slop pail. This is DISGUSTING! It is very hard to even think about! It is interesting to realize that if I were born into a family in China that could have been me! I am so blessed to be born into the family I have and where I am. We often take advantage of where we are and the blessings God has given us. We need to think and pray about the purposes for our lives and be open to what God has planned for us.