Wednesday, January 27, 2010

effectual doing

Last night I started reading a book my friend Carolyn gave me for Christmas called His Chosen Bride. There was a quote in the author's note that jumped out at me- I don't have it with me right now so I can't quote it word for word, but the essense was, "No matter how together you seem to be on the outside, it's where you are with God in your heart that really counts." (It didn't sound that cheesy when the author said it, btw.)

As seemingly obvious as that concept is, it set thinking about how obsessed I've become with looking like a good Christian, and how much stock I put in a few very small things about my life that are more or less in place, especially when I compare myself to others, which is terrible. Then I stumbled upon this passage in James:

"For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks at his natural face in a mirror; for once he has looked at himself and gone away, he has immediately forgotten what kind of a person he was. But one who looks intently at the perfect law, the law of liberty, and abides by it, not having become a forgetful hearer but an effectual doer, this man will be blessed in what he does. If anyone thinks himself to be religious, and yet does not bridle his tongue but deceives his own heart, this man's religion is worthless. Pure and undefiled religion in the sight of our God and Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world." (James 1:23-27)

I just thought that was a really good reminder right in line with what I'd read in my book. It's really easy to have a lot of fancy religion in the head, without any of it actually reaching my lifestyle.

Wednesday, January 20, 2010

oh oh oh, this is a brand new day

Humm, lets see. I haven't posted in a while because I've run out of interesting/insightful things to share with you all, and I don't have much time. But now that I'm stuck at work with nothing to do, I might as well tell you all the details about my super-exciting life, because I know you're just dying to hear them. Right? Okay, moving right along...

So school this quarter is going really well. I actually like all three of my teachers. English 101 is one of the hardest classes I've ever taken at the community college, which is ridiculous. Still, it's much better than the communist-feminist-wicken teacher I had before that didn't teach us a thing about actual writing. Then there's my speech class, which is taught by my incredibly awesome advisor. I'm doing all my speeches on personality types and I'm excited to get back into that whole thing again. Last is a history class with my favorite teacher, who is from Bolivia or something like that and hates communism so much that it's pretty much the application of every single lesson, regardless of where we are on the globe or timeline.

Work, however, is not so good. It's actually looking like I may have to look for a new job soon, which would be a bummer because this job is so amazingly flexible and I pretty much love everything about it. For now I'm working about an hour a day, which of course isn't enough. The upside is I have a lot more free time to spend writing.

Now for the really exciting news- my choir may be putting on a musical Spring quarter, and if we do, I get to write it. I think it largely just depends on me getting it done in time. I can't reveal what it's about, but I can reveal that it will be an awesome colaborative effort totally worth comming to see. If it happens!

Choir this quarter is the biggest it's ever been. And I have at least four people from choir in every one of my classes. We're kind of like a cult that's taking over campus now- groups of us are everywhere you go, singing and talking and getting way too involved in one another's personal lives. Sitll, it's awesome. :-)

Irish dance is just irish dance. I'm kind of tired of it and seem to be getting worse rather than better over time. I'm sure I'll enjoy it more when we start performing again.

At church everything seems to be focused on the up-and-comming wedding. I seem to be unreasonably emotional about this whole thing. Part of it is just that someone is getting married and it's not me, part of it is loosing Christina, and part of it is just that I hate change and things certainly are changing in our little group at church. But the most important thing is Christina is really happy and two people are getting married in a beautiful, God-glorifying way. So I'm trying to just focus on that and celebrate with them.

Other than all of that, I am spending a lot of time on my new laptop. Things are much easier when you have the internet always right in front of you. And it gives me a lot more to do with my down time which makes me a much happier person. For example, I'm becomming an expert at solitaire, and I'm sure this is a great life skill to have somehow.

I think that pretty much covers me in every possible chatagory right now. This is Emily Watts, signing off...

Thursday, January 14, 2010

MLIA of the day

Since I seem to be incapable of writing anything of value anymore (well, other than the two manuscripts and the ridiculous amount of English homwork I'm working on every day) I'll just share my favorite MyLifeIsAverage.com post. Enjoy!

"A few weeks ago I was seeing New Moon with me sister. I finally witnessed proof that Twilight fans are the dumbest people alive. Some girls had painted their faces, and they had clearly been using a mirror, as one had the word "twilight" written backwards across her forehead."