Saturday, 1 August 2015

Red

All I can do is play cheery indie music
it reminds me of red popsicles
they’re sweet as sugar, tinted red like blood
leaving your mouth with an acrid taste

Sunday, 4 November 2012

Who's your Jesus?

Everyone has a different interpretation or translation of Jesus based on their needs. The basic message of Jesus though, doesn't change. In the Bible, Jesus is the same. So how can he be interpreted so differently for each person? Here are a couple different versions of Jesus, which people see.
Spooky Jesus
This is the Jesus that you are scared of. Literally. Look at that freaky halo around his head. It just makes me want to go and cry. He is looking straight into my soul, and judging me. He can see all my inner sins, and everything I've ever done. He is so creepy looking. I sure wouldn't want to make this Jesus mad.
Buddy Jesus
This is the "hey, wanna hit up the town and watch a movie" Jesus. He is your best friend, the guy you always want to be with. He's a fun loving guy. You share your secrets with him, and hang out. You can just chill with him, and chillax. He's a pretty cool dude.
Sunday School Jesus
This is the "Jesus loves me, this I know" Jesus. He is really simple and easy to understand, even for little kids. Especially little kids. He lives in your Sunday School Bible, and does miracles like making food out of nothing for 5000 people, turning wine into water, and breaking down the walls of Jericho. He loves everyone, and promotes peace in an easy to read sort of way.
Jesus is My Boyfriend
This is the Jesus who you are in love with. You have a relationship that feels almost crazy. You love eachother, so much, and you just can't wait to spend your life with him. You are on fire for Jesus. He's the best thing that ever happened to you. You talk to him for hours every day, and read about him, and learn about him. You want to tell all of your friends about how amazing he is, and how much you love him.
Bearded Jesus
This Jesus is found in churches. Its the most realistic as found in the Bible depiction of Jesus. He is the Jesus found on crucifixes everywhere. Guaranteed, there is a picture like this somewhere in your church (except not mine, since I go to church in a movie theatre... love the Meeting House!). He has wicked flow, and is the most traditional looking Jesus.
Middle Class Jesus
I really like this picture a lot. This is the Jesus that is an everyday, hardworking, tax paying citizen. He shops at Ikea (obviously, who doesn't), pays his taxes on time, and is a good neighbour. He is just like you, and so easy to relate to. He has a 9-5 job, a nice family, and loves God. This is the down to earth Jesus, no fluff, no false religion. Just Jesus. He's plain jane.

So, which Jesus do you follow?

Which one do I follow, you ask?
Well. I follow all of them!

Huh?

Yea. All of them! My Jesus is a little spooky, my best friend, a guy I follow with childlike faith, my perfect husband, a traditional person, and my neighbour across the road. He is scary sometimes; Its hard to follow someone you can't see, and believe in something non tangible. He is my buddy; I love to chill with him, and just talk to him through prayer and reading my bible. He is my Sunday School teacher; somebody I follow with a faith like a child, and with unfathomable hopes and dreams. He is my boyfriend; someone I love like my best friend, and can tell anything too. Someone who I have a run-away-lets-get-married relationship with. He's the perfect guy, and someone I can always talk to. He is the bearded Jesus; the guy they talk about in church, who looks like a homeless man, but has a sick beard. He is the Jesus on a cross, the guy who was chill enough to die for our sins. He's also my neighbour; the guy next door, who is just like me.

Jesus is lots of things... but he can't be restricted to just one. He is an all around guy, the perfect friend, husband, and God. He is more than we can ever dream of, and is so graceful. He loves us even with our sins, and helps us even when we don't deserve it. He's perfect.

-Peace and Love
C

Monday, 13 August 2012

Running from the Future

As summer speeds by us and winds to a close, I look forward. I look into the future, trying to see what is written and what will happen. So much lies ahead of me, so much potential. But as I look harder, I see that my vision is blurred. I can't see what lies ahead, there is so much uncertainty. If you asked me a year ago today what lies ahead in my future, I would've been able to give you a play by play of my whole life. Now, I hardly know what I am going to have for breakfast in the morning, not to mention where I am going to go for university. These choices I make in the next 2 years will affect my ENTIRE LIFE. 

Yea, I know. Stressful right?

My whole life, summed up in these next few years. These decisions will affect everything. My job. Where I live. Who I marry. Who my friends are. My relationship with my family. Even my personality will be affected. 

So, now you see my dilemma. I was so sure, I knew what I was going to do. I was convinced of the life that I would lead. Now I'm not so sure.  My future is muddled from my view, like trying to look through dirty water to see what lies beneath. I want to be able to see what lies under me before I plunge into the icy water. What if there are sharks or eels under the water, just waiting for me to jump in? What if there is seaweed that will tangle my vision and spoil my mind. I want to see ahead. 

In short, I want to see the future.

But, we all know I can't do that. Nobody can. We all reach a point in our lives where we have to make these kind of choices, the big choices in life. I just hope I make the right one.

I believe that God will lead me to the right decision. The future is coming, whether I'm ready or not. I feel like I'm running from the future. I'm letting fear get in the way of my dreams. It's my fears vs. dreams. What I need to do is help my dreams succeed.

I have so many dreams. I want to do so many things with my life. I believe in my dreams and I will fight for my dreams. But, there is the nagging thought in my mind, what if I'm not good enough? What if I can't do it? What if I don't get into Med school? What if something goes wrong? I don't know what's going to go on in the future. I hope my dreams come true. I hope I can make a change in my life. I hope I am called to something greater than myself. 

I do more than just hope. I know.

“The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.” 
― Eleanor Roosevelt


Peace and Love
-C


Thursday, 2 August 2012

Perspective.

      I walk along the sidewalk of a busy street, walking by hundreds of people. It's mind boggling to think that these people all have a life, a story, a beginning and an end. That lady that just bumped into me rudely could be a single mother, struggling to feed her 3 children and just barely scraping by. That angry man with the road rage might have a wife that is fighting for her life in a cancer ward. Everyone has a different situation, and you don't know their story. I grew up in a loving family, but not everybody is as blessed as I am. So many kids grow up in households full of hate, struggle, anger, pain, and fighting. You can't judge someone before you know them, that would be completely unfair. That homeless man could have been thrown into debt after making a bad move on the stock market, worked hard to recover it all, but just couldn't. That prostitute could have fallen into a drug addiction after watching her parents die in a tragic car accident, using drugs to cope with her mounting pain. So much goes on that we don't know about or see. It's all about perspective.

      I flick on the tv to watch an episode of my favorite show, Rookie Blue. As I'm changing channels, I stop on the news for a minute or two. The news story is about Kim Kardashians failing marriage to Chris Humphries. How could something this stupid be newsworthy?! We fill our days obsessing about the lives of our favorite stars while children in 3rd world countries are starving. How could our world be so so upside down, so perverted? The media focuses on our celebrities, and spends its time chasing them when so many of our own kind are dying of HIV and AIDS every day. It's fully preventable, so why are so many dying? Why can't we find a solution to this ever growing problem? We need to shift our focus, and help our fellow man. We live excessively, waste our money on flashy cars, on chasing the proverbial "American Dream". Is it really a dream though? How can we live like this when so many of the worlds population live on less than a dollar a day. Seems kind of unfair to me. We can make a change in these peoples lives so easily. It would take barely any effort on our part, but make a world of a difference on their part. It's all about perspective.

      After spending a week away on a mission trip, my eyes are completely open to the incredible world around me. It's incredible to see how some people can give up their entire life to helping others. They are making a sacrifice on a grand scale, living selflessly. It's so inspiring to see others living this way.
It inspires me to do more with my life and to use the skills and passions God has given me for a greater purpose. Spending a week working with the UrbanPromise team was one of the most amazing weeks of my life. It's great to see how you can impact little lives so much. I urge you to break out of today's culture and bondage, and to open your eyes to this impact. There is so much out there, so much to be done, so much to be discovered. It's easy to live for ourselves and to stick to the status quo, but I urge you, go out and help. Find a local charity, and give your time. It doesn't have to be much. If everyone gave an hour a week, imagine what a change we could make! Lives would change, and with that the world would change. For the better. It's all about perspective.

Peace and Love
-C

Wednesday, 20 June 2012

Yea, I'm a Jesus Freak

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=unbdMFgDEiM
What will people think when they hear that I'm a Jesus freak?
What will people do when they find that its true?
I don't really care if they label me a Jesus freak- there ain't no disguising the truth.
There ain't no disguising the truth.
I ain't into hiding the Truth
-"Jesus Freak", Newsboys

Now, you all may be wondering, what is this? What's a Jesus Freak? Well let me tell you!

Jesus Freak- someone who is crazy about Jesus, and loves Him with all of their heart

I'm proud to say that I'm a Jesus freak. Jesus is my King and Saviour, and he is the best thing that ever happened to me. I am proud that he calls me his daughter, and that I can call him my father. He is always there for me, and is unconditionally loving. Even when I mess up (which happens WAY too often) and even when I sin (same with this, I sin every single day). That kind of love can't be expressed on this earth, except for by Jesus. I have messed up too many times to count, yet God doesn't keep track. He's not like your little brother, who will remember the one time you threw chilli at him forever and never let it go. He forgives you when you ask for it, and BAM, sins are forgiven. There is no keeping tabs of your sins with Jesus.

Sounds like a sweet deal, right? Why wouldn't you love and trust such a loving father?

Well. There is much more to Christianity than just saying, "hey, you seem like a cool guy. I like you, I believe in you. Now, can ya love me? Thanks bro." No, Christianity is believing, but also acting on those beliefs! The point is to live your faith, like Jesus did when he was on our Earth. This may be hard, with all those haters out there. They are gonna try to get you down, try to pressure you into caving to society's norms. But, the great part about loving Jesus is that he gives you strength to overcome these pressures. He gives you power over these people, the power to move on, and not let those haters get to you. Haters gonna hate, yo.

Don't let em get ya down, just keep pushing through. Keep being a Jesus freak, and keep living your life. 

One more thing: This unconditional love, this forgiving and loving nature that Jesus has towards us, its great. It doesn't occur with humans on earth. Even in marriage, this kind of 0 resentment, doesn't happen. There is always some kind of fighting, some kind of trouble. Jesus ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS loves. Jesus is my prince, and I'm his princess. Its the perfect love story. So, I guess you could say that I do believe in a fairy tale.

"People say I'm strange, does that make me a stranger?
My best friend was born in a manger"

Keep It Real
Peace and Love
-C

Wednesday, 13 June 2012

Another hour wasted...

Hello there! How are you, its been a while! I'm sorry I've been AWOL the past few weeks, its been a crazy while. With exams, friends, youth group, my boyfriend, and sports, its been insanely busy. For this post, I think I am going to do a blog post on exams and the many reasons why I hate them.

1. You have to study your butt off
I absolutley hate studying. For exams, you have to study (or at least I do, I guess you dont have to) for a couple hours a night. It is ridiculous. I get so annoyed while I study as well. I am a perfectionist, so I feel that I need to know every little detail when I study. I go way to in-depth in my studying. It is insanely annoying.

2. Some exams are pointless
Its so pointless, especially when you have to study for a subject like grade 10 math. Like honestly, when am I ever gonna need to calculate the parabola, or figure out the equation of a line? It is completely useless, and has no use in my life. Why must we memorise this? Why can't we learn some math that we will honestly use! Someone said to me the other day, "why don't we have a math course that is devoted to calculating daily math, such as tips?" I think that would be so useful, we would actually use that math!

3. Its a waste of time
You will not remember what you studied on your exam a few months after the course is finished. You will, however, remember the projects and what you learned from applying your learning. I think teachers should just give a series of culminating projects, and we do those as our "exam mark".

4. All that extra stress
I don't know about you, but I get extremely stressed out about exams. I feel that I need to be the best at every thing, as I said earlier. And exams are huge tests on everything that you have learned. So, you can imagine how I study for hours, and get so stressed that I'm going to fail, how this one exam will lower my average, and how I'm not going to get into Med school because of it.

5. Teachers cram during quiet week
So, this isn't directly exam related, but in the final week of school before exams, teachers always cram and try to get all the learning that we should have been taught earlier in the year into one week. They realize, oh dang, I didnt teach this! And the students have to go through an entire unit in one week. Its crazy.

So there you go! Sorry to be a negative Nelly about exams, but I am extremely stressed right now, and needed to vent about my hatred of exams. Have a nice life!

-Peace and Love
C

Sunday, 27 May 2012

What's the deal with the language?

Walking down the hall at school. What's the number one word you hear? I'm sure you can guess, it's a four letter word, starts with an f. Every other word, you can hear this one. I have a question for those of you who swear, what's the purpose? What's the deal with swearing? It's detrimental to you in many ways! Here's a list of  reasons why swearing is a terrible idea.

1. It makes you sound stupid
When you swear, it makes you look immature and stupid. If you have to rely on a swear word to express yourself, then you aren't using the English language properly. There are so many other, non-swear words that you can use to express your anger at your English teacher, or use to describe that person you hate. When you swear, it makes you look like a stupid teenager, the stereotypical teenager that grandmas and little children hate. Don't you want to prove this stereotype wrong by using proper language, grammar, and using more intelligent words?

2. It can give a wrong impression
If you swear all the time, it will become a force of habit to swear in all situations. What if you are going in for a job interview? You don't want to be sitting there, going through the interview, and then let out the f-bomb. That will make you look unprofessional, unsophisticated, and unqualified for the job. I'm sure they won't hire you if you do that. This will give the impression that you just don't care, and that you are that stereotypical teenager.

3. It is inconsiderate
What if those around you are offended by your swearing? They don't deserve to be around someone who is constantly swearing. Its rude.

4. It can get you in trouble
There is always that one stickler teacher that doesn't allow any swearing. You don't want to be spending every lunch in her room writing lines of "I will not swear in class", do you? Don't do it.

There are some reasons against swearing, and those, along with a couple more, are the reasons why I don't swear. Just my opinion on swearing.

Peace and Love
-C