May in Massachusetts

Hello!

A quick explanation of the title (as if it really needed one...) but basically I am in Massachusetts only for the month of May. Which means that there's only a month for me to enjoy all the Kimballs ice cream I can get my hands on, take the T into Boston as many times as I load my Charlie card, and spend as much time with the people I love as their schedules would allow. The downside of being in Massachusetts for a whole month is that there is a LOT more free time than I hoped for/would ever want. I've probably logged more hours on facebook and pinterest in these past 2 weeks than I have during the academic year.... and I have definitely been spending way too much time and money on Groupon. (But, I have found some pretty sweet deals!) All this empty time and pointless web browsing has got me wishing I was back in West Lafayette working at Greyhouse or something. At least then I would have the convenience of living closer to friends and having more activities to do within walking distance. But gradually I am coming to terms with the fact that God has me in Massachusetts for a reason.

Perhaps that reason is so that I can sit for hours on end in the Java Room reading and reflecting. A book I read last week was Heaven is Real by Todd Burpo cover to cover. I honestly can't remember the last time I had the time to read a book cover to cover and so being able to do it this time was awesome. It was such a good book too! Basically it was about a little boy who goes to heaven during a near-death experience and comes back with an incredible account of heaven. And the craziest part was that his experience lined up with the Bible. I won't ruin the book for you, but the rest of the book is about how his experience in heaven impacted his family. It was a really great reminder to his family (and now to his readers) that heaven really is real and that we have a real hope and a real place that we are going for eternity.

Another book that I've been reading through is Pursuit of God by A.W. Tozer, a book that Sally gave me but was recommended to me first by Adam. I'm only in chapter 3, but it's been so good so far! One of my favorite parts of chapter 3 was 

We can exaggerate about many things; but we can never exaggerate our obligation to Jesus or the compassionate abundance of the love of Jesus to us.

I just loved this so much! First, because it really helped me to put our devotion to God and Jesus's love for us in perspective. Two, it's so so so humbling to think about because we are so awfully weak and we exaggerate about the pettiest things (okay, maybe I can't speak for everyone.... I exaggerate about the stupidest pettiest things). This just reminds me of how limited our minds and bodies are. That we could even think of the littlest thing as a really big deal. And so it's mindblowing to even try to begin to grasp the fact that we could never ever ever exaggerate God's love for us. No matter how bad we screw up or how bad we think we screw up, there's nothing that Jesus's blood doesn't wash clean. And then to think that we could never exaggerate our devotion to Him! We owe God our blood, sweat, tears, and our very lives and that is just so humbling because that is not an exaggeration.  It's crazy to think that the gruesome deaths the saints had to endure in the Bible is not an extreme. Along with those that choose to give everything up to cross the world and risk their lives to preach the gospel is not an extreme because that is the unadulterated devotion that God requires of us. Our lives, our love, and our devotion to God can never be an exaggeration.

Anyway, there are a lot more thoughts I have on this book, but it's all in the moleskin and if I continue to type it all up, it'll be a ridiculously long summary of the book and I honestly don't know if I would do Tozer any justice. So you should all just read the book :D

Okay this is the end of this post because it's time for dinner. Fun fact: I used the 'shift' key when typing this up. Annnnd...that fact will only be significant to those who know my shameful keyboarding secret.... >.<

Later!

There's a Chipotle in town!

How exciting! Four Corners looks so much less dreary with a Chipotle rather than a Burger King. Anyway, it's good to be home. I'm not quite sure where I'm going with this post... kind of posting for the sake of it.

Since I've been home, I've been to Boston quite a few times. My favorite trips to Boston have actually been when I was alone. Walked around Downtown Crossing, Park street, and discovered some really neat places, two of them being coffee shops. Ever since college, I've turned into a real coffee junkie. It's seriously burning a hole in my wallet... but anyway, there's a cute little coffee shop across from Ufood in between Downtown Crossing and the Commons named 'Common Coffee'. I've only had their chai latte and it was pretty good. Tasted exactly like how I would imagine a chai latte to taste (as you can probably tell, I'm not a very good judge of these things...) So sometimes I use my Purdue debit card in hopes of striking up a conversation with the cashier at various stores/restaurants and so this one time at Common Coffee, it actually worked! Turns out the barista has a friend who went to Purdue, which led to a 5 minute conversation between us and my friend Christina about where we're from, where we go to school, etc. Then, we find out that Barista girl is from Savannah, Georgia! And without thinking about it, I blurted out, "Heyyyy! We're going to Georgia!" Which then led to a conversation about the Passion Conference :) I really didn't find out much about Barista girl, but being able to tell her about Passion was super neat and definitely not an interaction I would have expected to happen with a stranger in Boston

The other coffee place was called 'The Thinking Cup' that Vernon and I randomly decided to go to just because we were 20 minutes early to the Muppets (which, by the way, is an excellent movie). Don't really have much to say about it except that when you walk in, the first and only thing you see is a huge tan curtain so we were thoroughly confused. My immediate thought was that they wanted us to leave. But, turns out they have some direct trade coffee with some countries in Africa. I supported that.

But my favorite place that I have discovered on my solo adventures thus far, would definitely have to be this book shop that I have always walked past but never had the opportunity to actually look at because none of my friends (ie Sarah and Charles..) actually enjoy reading. But oh boy, it was the COOLEST thing ever! Outside in this alleyway, they had brick walls and along the brick walls were shelves and shelves of super cheap books. There were Bibles, maps, encyclopedias, novels, poem anthologies, Chinese/Japanese  novels, and more. And the craziest part-- some of these books dated back to the 1800s! Inside, they had 3 floors. The first two were about the same as the books outside, but probably more expensive. And on the third floor, they had a 'rare books section', and when I walked upstairs to see and touch books that were at least 200 to 300 years old, that literally took my breath away. I don't even know why, I'm not THAT much of a reader, but I guess I do love history. I also found my way to the math/science section and saw books on thermodynamics, analytical mechanics, E/M physics, linear algebra, differential equations from the late 1800s/early 1900s, which I thought was really neat! There were also old newspaper cut outs, posters, hymnals, and huuuuuge Bibles. So I guess it's not so much my love for reading, but my love for history. I love thinking about the endless possibilities of where these books have been, whose hands they've been in, what kind of shelves they've been on. I love imagining what kind of lives these authors lived, the places they've been, what the world looked like from their eyes. And the Bibles! What they meant to the people of the 1700s and the 1800s. Was it more sacred to people then, than it is to people now?

Anyway, aside from my solo adventures in the streets of Boston, I've been spending a decent amount of time at home. Mostly with my dad, since he has these 2 weeks off as well. Recently, I've been reading Radical by David Platt, and I'm only halfway through it, but I'm loving it so far. It's certainly been giving me a lot to think about and it's been very convicting. One thing that stood out to me was that we ask people to 'accept Jesus into their hearts' as if Jesus needs our acceptance... aren't we the ones that need Him? Platt also talks about how we as Americans have turned the command to 'go into the world' into a calling. There's a very big difference between command and calling. Just as we are commanded to love each other as ourselves, we are also commanded to go into the world and proclaim the good news. Man, we need to read this for scaffolding or something (along with Desiring God). :D

I think this post is long enough. I'm at the point where I'm getting distracted by everything and everyone around me. And, I don't even know if I would have the motivation to reread this for myself. But, only a few more days until Passion! Super excited, especially now that logistics are all worked out! (Now I feel ridiculously silly for stressing about all that. People are so incredibly generous :D) I'm really looking forward to what God has in store for us there :) He is good. He is good.

Later!

"Glory's waiting outside your window..."

Lessons to be learned...

1. You are NOT in control of your life.
2. When you don't let your brothers and sisters in Christ help you out, you are robbing them of a chance to demonstrate Christ's love.
3. There are bigger and better things in life than your grades.
4. It's not about the circumstances, it's about your attitude.
5. Jesus loves us so much that he went through pain we could never fathom.

Apparently it took a broken collarbone to realize this. SOML :)

Basketball and Middle Schoolers

So this morning, I had a really humbling experience. Okay, it's not that big of a deal, but reflecting back on what happened, I can't help but smile.

Basically, before camp starts, we let some of the kids just hang around outside or inside. The kids outside were playing basketball and they were all really big 8th graders who are just really good at basketball. There was a decent amount of people outside too. I just happened to be standing off to the side when a kid named Denny says, "Ms. Wong! Take a shot!" (kids call their senior counselors by Ms. or Mr. here). And because I am HORRIBLE at basketball, I said, "Yeah ok.. only if everyone outside closes their eyes" Of course, Denny's friend Shihua overheard and he wanted me to take a shot as well. Soon enough, Macklin joins in and he says, "Everyone freeze! Ms. Wong is going to shoot a basketball!" And of course, Charles joins in and next thing I know, EVERYONE is standing there watching me nervously hold a basketball. (Story of my life?) Tammy even offered to compete against me, but really I think she was trying to encourage me. And, because I have zero confidence, I miss the first two shots and then Tammy shoves me under the hoop pretty much and tells me that there's no way I can miss from there. And she was right, I finally got it in! Everyone was clapping and laughing (with or at me, I couldn't tell). Then, I facepalmed my way out of the basketball court. Haha I couldn't believe that happened, but then I thought about it further. Why was I so bothered by it? I think it was because I went into camp today thinking "I'm the counselor. I have something to offer to these kids." Which, I mean I guess I do. But I never really thought that they could teach me anything or force me to really step outside of my comfort zone. Looking back, it was really cool and encouraging to me that these kids would cheer me on and believe in me! It took something so simple yet so .. uncomfortable to make me feel vulnerable. And it was so humbling! I think from that I learned that my identity shouldn't be in how well I can shoot hoops or what people think of me when I miss. I also learned that middle schoolers can be just as encouraging, if not more than their counselors! Mostly, I realized that we all have something to learn from each other.

Anyway, gotta go. Last day of camp tomorrow!