Ugh... complicated

So the white Civic is out. Get this - it's too cheap.. haha. So now I'm test driving an adorable red
'03! It's too cute. I'm getting more excited. Just thought I'd let you know!

Wait [Did I already post this one?]

by Russell Kelfer

Desperately, helplessly, longingly, I cried;
Quietly, patiently, lovingly, God replied.
I pled and I wept for a clue to my fate...
and the Master so gently said,"Wait."

"Wait? you say wait?" my indignant reply.
"Lord, I need answers, I need to know why!
Is your hand shortened? Or have you not heard?
By faith I have asked, and I'm claiming your Word.

My future and all to which I relate
hangs in the balance and you tell me to Wait?
I'm needing a 'yes', a go-ahead sign.
Or even a 'no,' to which I'll resign.

You promised, dear Lord, that if we believe,
We need but to ask, and we shall receive.
Lord, I've been asking, and this is my cry:
I'm weary of asking! I need a reply."

Then quietly, softly, I learned of my fate
as my Master replied again, "Wait."
So I slumped in my chair, defeated and taut,
and grumbled to God, "So, I'm waiting...for what?"

He seemed then to kneel, and His eyes met with mine...
and He tenderly said, "I could give you a sign.
I could shake the heavens and darken the sun.
I could raise the dead and cause mountains to run.

I could give all you seek and pleased you would be.
You'd have what you want, but you wouldn't know Me.
You'd not know the depth of My love for each saint.
You'd not know the power that I give to the faint.

You'd not learn to see through clouds of despair;
you'd not learn to trust just by knowing I'm there.
You'd not know the joy of resting in Me
when darkness and silence are all you can see.

You'd never experience the fullness of love
when the peace of My spirit descends like a dove.
You would know that I give, and I save, for a start,
But you'd not know the depth of the beat of My heart.

The glow of My comfort late into the night,
the faith that I give when you walk without sight.
The depth that's beyond getting just what you ask
From an infinite God who makes what you have last.

You'd never know should your pain quickly flee,
what it means that My grace is sufficient for thee.
Yes, your dearest dreams overnight would come true,
but oh, the loss if I lost what I'm doing in you.

So, be silent, my child, and in time you will see
that the greatest of gifts is to truly know me.
And though oft My answers seem terribly late,
My most precious answer of all is still "Wait"

---

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If nothing goes wrong

Then I'm going to have this -

By no later than next weekend!!! Pops' old Toyota wagon finally bit the dust, never to return. And so they posed to me the idea of buying my own car.. and it's actually a lot more feasable than I thought it would be. We drove around an Acura that Bro. Scott had, and thought we were just gonna buy that one, but when we checked out Consumer Report, the Civic actually has much better safety ratings. It's about the same price for the '01 model we looked at.. but mine would be white with a little spoiler. I'm gonna talk to the credit union tomorrow. I'm so excited!!! It has tan interior with black accents, and it's just so cute. Yay!

It's so shiny and pretty!

I know, I know I haven't blogged. I have a whole litany of valid excuses to give. Like the fact that my dad chopped the cable cord last weekend with the shovel.. multiple times. Apparently it was right in the way of all the places he wanted to plant trees. Buuuuut... he made up for it by finally getting our new phones for us. We've been eligible for the upgrade for over a month now. It couldn't have happened at a better time. I was leaving Target to go meet Pop at the Cingular store and he called me. But it didn't show up on the screen of my phone that he was calling, it was just ringing and vibrating and wouldn't stop. After pressing every button I finally got it to stop ringing but it vibrated the whole way to the store. The cingular guy couldn't even figure out how to make it stop. He just took the battery out.

I was going to get the iTunes slvr after seeing Laurens. But then I've tried to talk to Lauren while she's on her phone and we don't go one phone call without her cutting out unless she's outside. I saw a chick in Target with the black version of my dads' slide phone and decided at the last minute that I reeeaally wanted that one. Suprisingly it cost over $50 more than the slvr we got for Jordan, and that's only after the rebate. And then it's another $40 for the chip you need for the Mp3 player, and another $25 for the cord to hook it up to your computer to transfer the files. I guess we'll see if it's worth it! It would still be cheaper than an iPod.

But for right now I have a pretty, new phone that takes pictures with about 8 different effects (black and white, sepia, sketch, negative, etc.). I'm resisting the temptation to set it up on my desk so I can look at it.. I can't 'cause we're not even supposed to have them turned on on this floor. Oh well. It's enough just knowing how pretty it is, even if I can't see it.

I have a sudden craving for club soda. Or really good ginger ale.

---

Mortgage refinance is hot 1) Rates near 30-yr lows 2) Good credit get intro-rate 4.625%*

Pathetic attempt

I know it's been well over a week since I've written anything here. My apologies to all you avid bloggers. I'm attempting to email this to my blog from work but I don't remember if I have the right address or not. If any of you've read your email lately you'll know a little bit of what's going on with our family. It's been tiring to say the least. My mother is overly laid back about everything and my dad is overly anxious. It's a wonderful combination that makes living with them amusing.. at times. When I'm not annoyed I step back and have a good giggle with Jordan over it all.

I almost burned the house down yesterday - Well not really. I don't even think I told my parents this yet. After I got home Jordan and I were watching TV and we started to smell something burning. One of my biggest nightmares is that my house will burn down. I'm telling you, I can't stand to even think of it. So when I smelled smoke I got scared. Jordan and I jumped up to investigate. We didn't see any smoke or feel heat. Jordan went outside to check the roof while I climbed into the attic, all the while running around the house sniffing like dogs. Nothing.. Except when you stood right in front of the TV. We gave up after a few minutes, but the smell remained. Just when I was leaving to go babysit, Jordan asked me to turn off the lamp next to the TV. Instead of touching the switch, I accidentally touched the hot bulb which caused me to peer under the shade to carefully turn it off. Then I discovered the source of the problem. We'd been drying some flowers upside-down, hung on the switch. I guess when I turned the lamp on I shifted the stems because they were flat against the bulb, now a nice charred, ashy black.

Agggggh… I just found out I have to work tomorrow. At 6AM.. Doing something I've never done before.. My gosh, I could just cry.

 

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THIS is emo.

I just spent over three hours waiting around the set of a local cable show (NO, I am NOT telling you which one!). It was "Motivational Monday". A family friends' makeup model cancelled at the last minute. She was desperate and I was "available". She's a costmetologist who's trying to come back on the scene and got the opportunity to do this showcase on a ladys' cable show. It was one of those "before" and "after" things. I assure you that the difference was very dramatic! It doesn't look like me. At all.

For those of you who've heard us use the word "emo" and wondered what it meant.. well this is a perfect example. Heavy eye makeup (I've never worn that much in my life) and dark lips and pictures taken from that angle.. egh. It's the first and (hopefully) the last time you will ever see me with this much makeup on! So I figured I should take a picture since it'll never happen again. It's hard to believe some girls get up and do that to themselves every day. If the eyes really are the windows to the soul, then they try to pull the curtains shut.

So needless to say, I had a very eventful evening. I was preached at about prosperity and faith for blessing. Apparently we are supposed to be the Head and not the tail to be able to earn our way to 6 figure success in Gods' will. And that was only the beginning. This guy coined a new word - no longer is it the principle of reciprocity, but "rich-i-prosity".. Maybe he just stumbled his words but I thought it ironic that he mixed "rich" and "properity". I was asked after it was over, "So what are you getting out of this?? Aren't you feeling inspired??" I was like "Yeah.. uh.. I am!" - to throw up all over that guys pretty suit.

Sigh. I'm going to bed. I've got another long day of online training courses ahead of me tomorrow.

Speaking of blasphemy...

Anybody wanna take a wild guess at what this says....? Please, Take a guess.....

Okay, Okay.. I'll tell you. It's tongues. The site where I found this suggests that you roll the "r"s to make it sound more realistic. This shirt is printed in Got Good Religion Gold. They offer many other phrases that you can get printed in any color. For example: Pentecostal Plum, Souly Ghost Green, Fresh Anointing Fuchsia, Lord Have Mercy Lime and the list goes on. Go to www.holyghosttees.com to check it out. I honestly can't decide if they're really serious or not. Initially it's rather comical. But I think it's blasphemy, which is not a word I throw around lightly. For our younger readers, blasphemy is defined "to speak impiously or irreverently of (God or sacred things). To speak evil of; slander; abuse. " I don't think it would be an exaggeration to label that as blasphemy.

On another note, Jordan just informed me of a new teenage revolution called The Blasphemy Challenge. I googled it. Apparently this has been floating around in the media for more than two months. Newsweek published an article on Jan. 8th. You can read the whole thing here. To sum it up for those of you who've heard nothing about it yet, it's a challenge from a couple of prominent atheists to publicly blaspheme the Holy Spirit - which many know as the unforgivable sin. The question they ask is "Do you have a soul you're not using? We want it."[paraphrased] They ask you to make a video condemning yourself to hell, then post it on YouTube. Your reward - at least for the first 1001 who take the challenge - is a free DVD - The God Who Wasn't There. I went to the site, but I can't bring myself to watch any of the videos. It's painful to even think about someone doing such a thing. It grieves my soul. Here's a snippet of what NewsWeek Journalist Jerry Adler reported

...another self-described blasphemer, whose real name is Michael Lawson,replies that he knows exactly what he's doing: he's daring God to send him to hell. "We want to show the world that we really mean it when we say we don't believe a word in this book," he says. He means the Bible.
God could not be reached for comment.

I ask myself, what drives someone to atheism? What drives them to take it to this level? Ironically, I believe it can be the same thing that drives me to forsake my flesh and cling to the cross. Religion. Pure religion. How many times have you heard an atheist rail against Christianity because of hypocrisy and other reasons? I've known many young people who grew up in religious homes only to convert to atheism out of bitter disillusionment. It's upsetting to think that religion played a big role in that. It motivates me to do something about the mediocrity that is running rampant in this generation of "Christian" young people.

There is another side to the spectrum. Some enthusiastic people have created http://www.challengeblasphemy.com/ . I haven't been able to look at any of their videos yet. But we shall see.. we shall see.. More on this tomorrow.