It occurs to me that one of my consistent mental exercises is the one where I try to take all the current changes in my life and extrapolate future events. I should say possible future events. This is a close cousin to rehearsing a conversation you are going to have repeatedly before the actual person you plan on talking to is involved. It is kind of like emotional planning. If I can think of all the worst possibilities then I can lessen the sting of surprise, I can better “handle” disappointment if I can expect it fist. I had a student once that was worried about visiting their parents. They spoke about the past of their relationship and just vented about how it all made them feel. While writing this I remember what I told her and am slightly embarrassed because I so often fail to keep my own counsel or heed my own advice. I told her to feel her feelings to pick them up and then put them down and to leave space for her parents to surprise her. Maybe it will all happen as you expec...
I am 18 years old, just graduated high school and I am in my hometown of Big Spring, Texas or as many locals affectionately and bitterly call it “the whirlpool.” Why you ask? Because no matter how far you get it sucks you back in. That desperate feeling that young people often feel in small towns is very real. It seems like you will never break out into the big world and when you do it’s only a matter of time before you get sucked back in. In example of this, I had a college friend that made it all the way to New York, NY and after a few years of working and striving settled back home. You can only really understand the feeling if you have had it. During this summer I had a serious decision to make. I could launch my adulthood and move to a college town somewhere(anywhere) and take the risk of being sucked back home with less options than I started with or cope with the feelings and get two years of free college. In retrospect, such an ea...
In 1906 there began a movement in America which saw the bringing together of both black and white Christians in the Holy Spirit filled worship of God. The movement began in a small house on Bonnie Brae Street in Los Angeles, California. The small congregation soon moved to Azusa Street where it grew and began the Pentecostal movement. This movement crossed racial divides and denominational lines at first, but when it too became a denomination, it reestablished the racial divides were so entrenched at the time. The Azusa Street revival was birthed out of the holiness tradition began by John Wesley. The link between the Azusa Street Revival and Methodists is a focus on the Holy Spirit and focus on a personal experience with God. In my study at Seminary the Azusa Street Revival seemed to be a lynch pin in my study of church history. You almost can’t understand Christianity in America or the Evangelical movement without knowing what happened there. The Holy Spirit moved, and He cha...
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