Too much to be thankful for!

Well in the spirit of Thanksgiving (although it's a few days late) I wanted to share a few things I'm truly thankful for. My brother and sister were in Charlottesville for a few days and we all got a chance to share five things that we're thankful for this year, here are mine:

1. My roommates. La Nida is the BEST place to live in all of Charlottesville, I'm convinced. Abby is probably the sweetest person you will ever meet, without a doubt. Hope, the funnest person you will ever meet, by far. Ashleigh, pretty dang inspirational if you ask me.

 We were soooo tan! What happened?!?!

2. My parents. I'm pretty sure that more supportive, loving, caring, awesome people do not exist. The Lord has blessed me with parents who love the Lord with such fervor and who cared to show that to me. Thank you Mom and Dad for teaching me who God is and how much he loves me. 

Oh and my sister is kind of the bomb too!!

3. My education. What a blessing it is that I get to go to such an amazing school like UVA. I take it for granted pretty much everyday but it really is a blessing. I hope that in this coming year I can be a little more grateful for this incredible place. 

Yeah, I'm blessed.

4. My small group. I'm not going to lie, I was pretty nervous about leading a small group. When school started I was convinced that it was a total fluke that I was chosen to be a leader. I had all these fears and worries that were totally ridiculous because God has it totally under control. He has blessed me in ways that I couldn't ever have dreamed. 

Granted, this is plus or minus a few. 

5. My job. It can be difficult and frustrating at times, that's for sure. But the girls are sweet and I am learning soo much from it. I'm thankful that I have another way to show love to God's creation. I hope that he shows me how to love them well and with new patience every single day. 

When I think about the blessings that the Lord has lavished on me all I can think of is that verse in Colossians that says, "Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights who  does not change like shifting shadows." He has given me gifts that I never could have asked for. I serve a good God. Thank you. 

You know it's a Monday. . .

Well once again it's been ages since I posted but an idea came to me and I thought I'd run with it.

Today is a Monday. 

Last year I tried to change the negative stigma that comes with the word Monday and the whole day itself. I would pretend it was a Friday or leave little funny/inspirational quotes in my planner and backpack. I would make a conscious effort to smile the whole day. Let's just say it's hard to change the stigma when pretty much everybody hates Mondays. So this year I am embracing it.

Therefore, you know it's a Monday when:

1. It's a two cup of coffee kind of morning.

2. You ran in to at least one dorm frame or wall after waking up.

3. You have a whole to-do list from the weekend with pretty much nothing crossed off.

4. You are doing your homework for your 10 am class at. . . 9 am.

5. You are already dreaming about Friday/making plans for the weekend.

Happy Monday everyone!
I say embrace it for what it is and know that there will never be another Monday October 17, 2011. So why not cherish it? Even those things that stink about Mondays :)

It's never too late. . .

Well it's been ages since I've posted anything. . . woops. At the same time, there is no time like the present! A lot has happened since I was headed to New York, who knows how many months ago. Here are a few of the incredible things in my life:

This is my nephew Richard. He is hands down the cutest baby I have ever seen. 

Now as some of you may know, there are a lot of Richards in the Leary family. So it starts to get really confusing really quick. When Richard was about 2 weeks old I was on the phone with my family and Rebekah tells me that Richard has jaundice and had to go to the hospital. The whole time she is talking I'm thinking about my brother having jaundice and how weird that must look. About 10 minutes into the conversation I realized she was talking about the baby. We'll call that Richard mix-up #1. Just a little picture of what we've got in store for us. . . forever. I guess I'll have to get used to calling my brother Dick or my nephew, as Russell suggested, little Dick. 

Let's just say I really can't wait to get to know this kid. 

They are The Civil Wars and they make great music. 

I stole this picture from a friend of mine who attended this concert, unfortunately I only found out about them after it happened.

 Let's just say I am anxiously awaiting the next time they come to Charlottesville. 

Check it out. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-6EwdDiopQ 

These are my friends and we jumped off a really big rock quarry this past weekend. 

I LOVE stuff like this. I love playing outside and doing crazy stuff, it's so much fun. Needless to say I was really excited about finally going to the quarry. But when we got there I realized the jump in real life is a lot higher than I thought it would be. So instead of letting myself get scared by hanging out on the edge for too long I decided I would just go for it and jump. (In retrospect, I probably should asked for a little direction from the pros in our group. . .  but I didn't.) You are in the air for a lot longer than you think you will be. That feeling of falling was way better than any other roller coaster or weird trapeze thing than I have been on.  It was really awesome, until I hit the water, and then it was not so awesome. Actually to be more accurate, it was horrible when I hit the water. Upon impact my butt took a real beating. 

Let's just say I am still sitting in really awkward positions. 

This is my roommate Kathryne and I cannot imagine life without her. 

This picture is documentation of the second Sunday in a row that we matched for church, completely unintentionally. In fact, we got dressed two hours apart from each other on this particular Sunday. Kathryne put it well when she said, "I guess this is what happens when you've lived with someone for over 7 months." This incredible girl has loved me and encouraged me in ways that I could never possibly thank her for. God blessed me with an amazing first year roommate. As our final week together progresses it makes me so sad to think that we aren't going to be together for 3 whole months. 

Let's just say I'm going to miss her like crazy. 

New York or bust.

The big apple gets better ever time- this time will be no exception. 

Can't wait. 

He is beautiful.

God created this earth to be magnificently beautiful, to reflect His majesty. Know that and cherish that. 

  

Oh Lord, you're beautiful

Your face is all I see

For when your eyes are on this child

Your grace abounds to me

The Unlikely Candidate

This semester I am taking a class titled the Hebrew Bible which is an academic study of the Old Testament. It fascinates me to really attempt to view the Bible in a totally different perspective. At first, the class was extremely challenging to me in that I felt attacked and discouraged by what I was learning in the lecture. Over the past few weeks, however, I have been gaining understanding on how to learn what I'm being taught without changing what I know to be true. I really feel like God can speak through the class and use it for good in my life this semester. I also think that the class is meant to challenge me a little bit and make me think about beliefs that are fundamental to my faith.

One of the things that has been the most interesting to me in the course has been our discussion of characters. The Old Testament is all about God's interaction, directly and indirectly, with his creation. He is intricately involved in the lives of those who he has chosen to be His people and in some cases even those who are not his chosen people. With almost every character that we study the class is puzzled by why God would ever choose the person that he did? Most of the time we can't come up with a definitive response. But that's really what's fascinating to me about the whole story; God chose the most unlikely people. It reminds me a quote that I read from a book recently: 

'The next time you think you have an excuse why God can't use you, consider the following:

Noah was a drunkard, Abraham was too old, Isaac was a daydreamer, Jacob was a liar, Leah was ugly, Joseph was abused, Moses was a murderer, Gideon was afraid, Samson had long hair, Rahab was a prostitute, Timothy was too young, David had an illicit affair, Elijah was suicidal, Isaiah preached naked, Job was bankrupt, John the Baptist ran around in a loin-cloth and ate locusts, Peter was hot-tempered, John was a self-righteous. The disciples fell asleep while praying, Martha fretted about everything, Mary Magdalene was demon-possessed, the boy with the fish and five rolls of bread was too obscure, the Samaritan woman was divorced more than once, Zacchaeus was too small, Paul was too religious, and Lazarus was dead. . . No more excuses!"

God didn't pick the people that we would think. He chose people that were broken, in pain, sinful, dirty and not put together in the least. What is even cooler than that was that there was only one condition for all those people. God didn't ask them to clean up their acts, get their lives together and try to become perfect people, the only thing He asked was that they follow Him. That's all that God is asking on any of us. Sometimes I have the tendency to think that I have to do all these things to "better" myself before I can truly go to the Lord and be useful for Him but that's false. The Lord wants us as is and that's it. In reality we are all the least likely candidates because we all fall short. That is what is so beautiful about who Christ is. He can take me, dirty rotten sinner Ruth, and work through me to further His kingdom. So stop saying I'm not the right person for the job. Stop asking why me? Just start following. 

Happiness

Don't worry be happy; a phrase made popular by Bobby McFerrin's hit song released in the 80s. It seems that this simple phrase encompasses one of  the things that we are most obsessed with. Is it not the thing that we are all searching for, that motivates our actions and our thoughts? When you don't have it all you can do is want it and when you do have it all you can do is pray you don't loose it. But when did happiness become the ideal and the goal? It seems that there came a point when the desire for happiness surpassed our desire for truth and thus became an idol. I think that just like anything else happiness can be an idol and a dangerous one at that. It's like this mysterious ether that travels around touching some people and missing others. The reason why it's so dangerous is because there is no definite source. It's random and untraceable. Things that once made you happy can stop bringing you happiness. One of my favorite TV shows said it well:

"People get lost when then think of happiness. We're always thinking that someday we'll be happy; that we'll get that car or that job or that person in our lives who will fix everything. But happiness is a mood. And it's a condition not a destination. It's like being tired or hungry, it's not permanent it comes and goes and that's okay. If people thought of it that way they would find happiness more often."

I just love the part where he says it's a condition not a destination. The moment that we make happiness what we are working toward is the moment that we are let down. And that's why we have to have an outside source that is constant and 100% intentional. This reminds me of my 11th grade pre-calculus class with Mrs. Welk. Being that she taught in a Christian school Mrs.Welk liked to give Biblical integration for the math that we were learning. Although some chapters were difficult to integrate others had very interesting applications to our lives as students and as believers. She once described a sine curve as being our feelings and the x-axis as being the truth that God provides for our lives. Our feelings are always going to fluctuate up and down no matter what we do. We let our happiness be based on the situations that we experience in life and not definite truth. When we make the choice to be governed by the consistency and ultimate truth of God it gives us the ability to be freed from the never ending and unsatisfying search for happiness.

There is always going to be stuff in my life that causes my feelings to fluctuate, especially in this new environment but I can't be controlled by them. I have to fix my heart on the the true promises that the Lord has for me.