On Saturday, May 21st stuff got done. I graduated college. Maybe not in the traditional sense by walking up and getting a diploma from Danny Reneau, but from walking to the graduation office in the back of the registrars office and asking Sheila for it. I finished my first Ironman. In a time of 13:19. That was the hardest 13 hours of my life. And I realized I needed Him again. So let's go through these monumental moments and discuss them.
Throughout the past two weeks I have been struggling with this boring streak going on in my life right now. Mainly through my ministry of Christ. I have been so caught up in the school and training aspects of my life that I have almost forgotten the Word, His grace, Him. I mean I think about Him daily, and pray, but I haven't been constantly spending quality time with the Father lately. And that within itself has been killing me. David describes it pretty well in Psalms.
"You do not delight in sacrifice, but in a broken and contrite heart." Psalms 51. I was brining Christ my "sacrifices" but He has always wanted my heart. I was trying to bring Him the correct actions and lifestyle that a supposed "Christian" has but it was just leading to a non-fulfilling life because He was not at the center of my focus. My actions were. Well yesterday, I realized what needed to change. My focus and my desire. He must be my desire and my focus. Again David with the awesome quote.
"My desire...that I may behold Your beauty." Psalms 14. David had the heart of the matter correct. That the focus of my life, my desire, must be on Him and His beauty. If I can get this then everything else falls into to place. However, this is no easy task. As John Piper says, "Make war." Make war with my body, my mind, my desires and turn them to Him. No where in the Psalms does David ever say that it would be easy, he just said that he would do it. I am no different, war must ensue in order for Christ to be glorified.
Graduation. Three hours of the most boring activity in the world only to have your name called for three seconds and to walk across the stage and be given an empty certificate holder. That was not for me. Like I said before, I simply walked to the Graduation Office and asked for mine. Sheila, the secretary, got up walked to the counter, found my degree and holder, and then handed it to me. It was a beautiful thing. No pictures. No yelling friends or family (not that I am saying I don't like that). No tears from Sheila. Just me and my diploma. It felt good. To hold my college career in my hand and know that all four years of my life at Tech have been completed just for this piece of paper was an interesting feeling. And let us not look the past the fact again that it felt good as hell to know that I was done with college. Done with those dumb tests and homework. Just plain done.
Ironman. If anyone does not know what an Ironman is, it is a type of triathlon. The longest to be exact. Meaning I swim for a while, then bike for a while, then run a little ways. The exact distances are a 2.4 mile swim, a 112 mile bike, and a 26.2 mile run (a marathon). Needless to say, this was one long day. On graduation day while everyone was walking across the stage and receiving their diplomas I was on some mile of the marathon running until I couldn't feel my legs. Now don't let this sound like it was an all together bad idea to do this. I really enjoyed it. Hearing the guy at the finish line yell, "Ruffus Darden you are an Ironman." Was amazing. And it felt good to not have to run anymore. But to me this was definitely the way to finish college because at the end of the day I wasn't just a college graduate. I was an Ironman college graduate. And triggas that sounds awesome.
Tuesday, May 24, 2011
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
Thoughts About the Past Week
Whenever I heard that Bin Laden had been killed by American forces the other night I immediately began to think of funny tweets I could write about it that would have plenty of whit and be quite hilarious. Here are those thoughts:
So Bin Laden is dead, now we can focus of the growing bison populations in the Dakotas.
Bin Laden is gone, now America can work on more important things.......personal spacecrafts.
So apparently Fox found Bin Laden's driver license and his actual name is Usama.....Suprise! And he is also a donor....so he does have a heart.
A black girl told me in class today, "Osama be dead!"
A girl also looked at me and said, "Wait who Osama!"
So Bin Laden is dead, apparently he accidentally turned on the tracking on his twitter.
I had many more thoughts but I am not going to list them all now. If you have any good ones, please tell me. I would love to hear them.
Second thing I would like to discuss today is that I just finished my last test of my college career. I am done. Finished. Finito. No more. On my way for the long haul. At the end of my rope. About to jump off the cliff. Digging my grave. Wait...I'm not about to die. That really got out of hand fast.
I am not sure what I will do with all of this freedom now. I mean I still have to student teach for another couple of weeks but besides that I am doing nothing in relation to school. No more classes. No more homework. No more tests. No more idiotic teachers telling me to do meaningless and pointless work. No more standing in line at Chick-fil-a for almost 30 minutes after my 12:15 class when everyone and half of China is in the student center. No more idiotic freshman not knowing what they want whenever they order or to say "Chic wit cheese" instead of taking a million years to say "I want a number one with cheese and no pickles please."
Gah I disdain idiotic freshman.
No more midnight to two a.m. study sessions in Tolliver or at Crescent City. No more trying to find a parking spot in the parking from hell that is Louisiana Tech parking. No more getting dumb parking tickets in the Hutchison dorm parking lot at 4:15 in the afternoon. No more terrible bands for the Spring Concert. No more of those stupid women Nike workout shorts that every girl in the world seems to have. No more $300 dollar textbooks that the professor says to buy that I use once to answer one question but can now not return for full price because he said that I would use it the whole quarter but didn't until the last week. The liar. No more ALEKS. No more Moodle. No more Tech internet that takes more time to load than most iPhones. No more $12 dollar pasta bowls and three dollar small coffees.
If you didn't notice: Tech is raping you with its prices for food. Just food for thought.
The last thing I would like to discuss is something I saw the other day on a girl that really bothered me.
Promise rings
Firstly, I would like to say that the overall premise and idea of a promise ring is a noble one. Keeping oneself until marriage is awesome and completely biblical. I am doing to same thing (except without that dumb ring). However, by wearing a promise ring you are not only doing a dumb thing of having a physical show of something that is a matter of the heart but you are also turning away many good guys who may want to talk to you. If in the morning you don't notice what finger you are putting your promise ring on, it is the same finger your hopefully future wedding ring goes on.
Well let us just think about something for a second....if you put a ring on your wedding finger that is not a wedding band than how the heck is any guy out there supposed to know that you are not engaged! And in turn not talk to you because they think that you are already taken. That is just ridiculous to think that some guy, that isn't totally worthless, will disrespect the ring on your finger in such a way and just talk to you even with a ring on your finger. If a guy is respectable then he will respect that ring and not try to just chat with you...
Sometimes I feel like what I say is such common knowledge that no one seems to care about.
Anyway these are just a few things that were on my mind this week. If there is anything else you would like my opinion on just tell me and I will write about it.
So Bin Laden is dead, now we can focus of the growing bison populations in the Dakotas.
Bin Laden is gone, now America can work on more important things.......personal spacecrafts.
So apparently Fox found Bin Laden's driver license and his actual name is Usama.....Suprise! And he is also a donor....so he does have a heart.
A black girl told me in class today, "Osama be dead!"
A girl also looked at me and said, "Wait who Osama!"
So Bin Laden is dead, apparently he accidentally turned on the tracking on his twitter.
I had many more thoughts but I am not going to list them all now. If you have any good ones, please tell me. I would love to hear them.
Second thing I would like to discuss today is that I just finished my last test of my college career. I am done. Finished. Finito. No more. On my way for the long haul. At the end of my rope. About to jump off the cliff. Digging my grave. Wait...I'm not about to die. That really got out of hand fast.
I am not sure what I will do with all of this freedom now. I mean I still have to student teach for another couple of weeks but besides that I am doing nothing in relation to school. No more classes. No more homework. No more tests. No more idiotic teachers telling me to do meaningless and pointless work. No more standing in line at Chick-fil-a for almost 30 minutes after my 12:15 class when everyone and half of China is in the student center. No more idiotic freshman not knowing what they want whenever they order or to say "Chic wit cheese" instead of taking a million years to say "I want a number one with cheese and no pickles please."
Gah I disdain idiotic freshman.
No more midnight to two a.m. study sessions in Tolliver or at Crescent City. No more trying to find a parking spot in the parking from hell that is Louisiana Tech parking. No more getting dumb parking tickets in the Hutchison dorm parking lot at 4:15 in the afternoon. No more terrible bands for the Spring Concert. No more of those stupid women Nike workout shorts that every girl in the world seems to have. No more $300 dollar textbooks that the professor says to buy that I use once to answer one question but can now not return for full price because he said that I would use it the whole quarter but didn't until the last week. The liar. No more ALEKS. No more Moodle. No more Tech internet that takes more time to load than most iPhones. No more $12 dollar pasta bowls and three dollar small coffees.
If you didn't notice: Tech is raping you with its prices for food. Just food for thought.
The last thing I would like to discuss is something I saw the other day on a girl that really bothered me.
Promise rings
Firstly, I would like to say that the overall premise and idea of a promise ring is a noble one. Keeping oneself until marriage is awesome and completely biblical. I am doing to same thing (except without that dumb ring). However, by wearing a promise ring you are not only doing a dumb thing of having a physical show of something that is a matter of the heart but you are also turning away many good guys who may want to talk to you. If in the morning you don't notice what finger you are putting your promise ring on, it is the same finger your hopefully future wedding ring goes on.
Well let us just think about something for a second....if you put a ring on your wedding finger that is not a wedding band than how the heck is any guy out there supposed to know that you are not engaged! And in turn not talk to you because they think that you are already taken. That is just ridiculous to think that some guy, that isn't totally worthless, will disrespect the ring on your finger in such a way and just talk to you even with a ring on your finger. If a guy is respectable then he will respect that ring and not try to just chat with you...
Sometimes I feel like what I say is such common knowledge that no one seems to care about.
Anyway these are just a few things that were on my mind this week. If there is anything else you would like my opinion on just tell me and I will write about it.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)