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.