A Secret Prayer: Please Let Lunch Be Good Today

Currently Listening To: Floating World by Anathallo

Let's just say this...
Sometimes one gets tired of eating peanut butter sandwiches for breakfast and lunch...
Anyways...
I am praying that the cafeteria hooks me up today...

This past weekend was nice...
We got a 3-day weekend because of Children's Day, a Korean holiday...
So, we got to see some festivals (Lantern Festival) and a cool parade...
It was awesome...
It really makes me feel a part of the country I live in...
A nice change from just walking in clothing stores, for sure...


Well, I am starting a Korean Conversation class tonight, I think...
All I have to say it, finally...
I have been wanting a way to learn a little Korean, and now I have my chance...
I think it is going to be offered twice a week...
I just wish it could have gotten started up a long time ago...
I only have a couple months left...
Hopefully I can absorb as much as possible before I leave for the summer...
I think we only have something like 5 weeks of teaching left or so...
Which is, honestly, kind of a relief and kind of frightening...
I still feel like I have a lot of stuff to get through before finals...
Well, I guess you just gotta do the best you can...

Anwyays, I have to do some planning for my World History class before lunch...
XOXO

My Students Always Come Back With Haircuts After Vacation...

Currently Reading: Love in the Time of Cholera
Currently Listening To: Happy Music for Happy People by Mogwai

I have nothing groundbreaking to say in this entry, I just sort of want to write...
I really am striving to be a more honest person...
Honest with myself, honest with others...
Lately, every time I think about what it means to be a Christian, I just think how I want so badly to be like Jesus...
I really feel that the Lord has been so faithful to me...
I went with some of my friends to a great English ministry in Seoul on Sunday...
I think we are going to try and make it out there as much as we can, given the distance and all...
I really just want to feel and be alive, and I think God is responding to my desire by drawing me in to God's nature and being, and I am trying to focus on becoming as much like Christ as I can...
I am trying to rejoice both in the freedom and yoke that comes with Christianity, and just strive for greatness (which, as I was reminded on Sunday, comes when we become servants of all)

Like I said, I don't have anything to say, which makes my life feel somewhat monotonous and lacking in reflection...
That's a different story...

XOXO

Korean 7Up and Peanut Butter Crackers

I Miss My Best Friends

Currently Reading: Blood and Guts in High School by Kathy Acker (I don't recommend it - it has become an teeth pulling endeavor)
Currently Listening To: Relationship of Command by At the Drive-In

Well...
Apparently God doesn't want me to enter my students grades into the school gradebook system, because both times I have tried to do it in the past two days, something has gone wrong...
So, now I am sitting and drinking Korean 7Up and debating whether or not to make myself something to eat (I really want cookies, but I just don't have any)...
Um...
What has happened lately?

I saw Hillsong in Seoul (absolutely amazing - I needed it in my life)
I bought a candle from the store that produces no smell but claims to be apple-scented (and to think, it smelled so strong before I lit it - this is a pet peeve that I can't even start on, sort of like trying to wash your hands when the faucet is too close to the wash basin in the sink)
I just bought some candy for a kid in my homeroom (it is her birthday tomorrow)

Korean Boys Love to Sit in Each Other's Laps...

Currently Reading: Blood and Guts in High School by Kathy Acker
Currently Listening To: Little Wars by Unwed Sailor

This is a cultural phenomenon that I do not understand...
I have sort of gotten used to it (and let's face it, I am not a super-macho dude anyways)...

Well...
For those of you who read this, I am basically just asking for your continued prayer as I try to walk out the steps that God would have me to take...
Coming back to Korea still seems like the most "lucrative" option in my life (I mean, I have never been one to base my life around money)...
I guess what I mean by lucrative is like a holistic sort of lucrative-ness...
I get to live in another awesome part of the world and see amazing places (I mean, who gets to go to Thailand for Spring Break and backpack across Asia in the summer?)

However, I am not at all opposed to pursuing another option if God would have me to do so...
The whole "Don't do it because it is safe, do it because it will be worth it" concept...
So, just keep praying that I will be led and sensitive and open to the doors God opens...
Thanks!

The Song for April Is...

Currently Reading: The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner
Currently Listening To: Legends of Rodeo

Well...
I have got some updating that I am going to do...
I just got back from Thailand, which was great...
In Bangkok, we got to experience the Thai New Year, which is basically a 3-day-long water fight where everyone's goal is to soak you and rub clay all over your face...
Needless to say, it was amazing...
Then, we went to Phuket, where I was able to lay by a swimming pool for hours on end and get hit on by gangs of cross-dressing male prostitutes (this was both frightening and saddening)...
Now, we are back and teaching again...
All good things come to an end, yeah?

Now, on to the serious stuff I have been thinking about...
(You knew it was coming)
Basically, I just want to make sure that I "do" life right, at this point...
What I mean by this is that I just want to live life the way it is meant to be lived starting now, rather than putting it off until I know what I am supposed to be "doing" with my life...
Does this make sense to anyone else but me?
This doesn't mean I am living in sin or sowing wild oats or doing whatever I please until God snaps me out it...
Rather, I am just trying to walk into my destiny...
It is just tough to know what to do sometimes when you don't see the "end" result on the horizon...
I know nobody knows the future, but at least some people have an idea of their callings and what they ultimately want to do...
For me, this has never been the case...

However, God has been super-faithful to me lately...
For instance, last night, I felt God tell me not to do something because it is safe, but to do it because it is worth it...
So many times, this is so hard...
Even when I go on "crazy" adventures, I somehow do them with a level of comfort...
Basically, I am just wanting to live the life that is tailor-made for me by the Great Designer...
And, I love how God is wanting to reveal that life to me slowly but surely...
I have been re-exposed to some really encouraging and challenging words from God and they are stirring in my spirit...
As I often say in times like this - I am feelin' it...

If I Make It To Heaven, I May Be As Bloody As Hell...

Currently Reading: Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
Currently Listening To: Seven Swans by Sufjan Stevens

Well...
Here I am, sitting here, and I just sort of feel like writing...
Some days it seems like I am on the right track, doing a pretty good job, pretty close to God, all that jazz...
Then other days, I feel like I have so far to go, and that I and so spiritually immature and anemic...
(NOTE: This is not a "boo-hoo" blog or me complaining - it's really kind of positive, so don't read this and hear me agonizing with a sense of desperation)

I woke up this morning and decided to walk to the store in our apartment complex to buy some candy for my homeroom, and I just started singing "Center" by Charlie Hall...
I was just kind of making it my prayer, altering the lyrics to make it personal...
"Christ, be the center of my life, be the place I fix my eyes"
Then I started wondering the reason why I pray, the reason why I talk to God, the reason I want to be close to God, the reason why I try and communicate with Jesus...
I couldn't help but wonder if I do it because I feel like it is something I need to do to be a good person/Christian, or if I am doing because I truly want to be close to the One who gave up their life for me, so that I could have the ability and freedom to be in a relationship with them...
Donald Miller talks about how (and I am paraphrasing) grace is an invitation to relationship, and the rejection of grace is pretty much like a slap in God's face...
Also, John Ortberg speaks of grace as being viewed as a way of life...
Everything we are given every day can be seen as an outpouring of the mystery that is God's grace...

Hopefully, with God's grace (haha), I can somehow better understand that mysterious gift that I have been given, and operate joyfully and freely in this gift rather than being bogged down by the rules and laws I place on myself...

Things Just Keep Getting Better...

Currently Reading: Middlesex: A Novel by Jeffrey Eugenides

Ok, so despite the daily stresses of having a serious job, things really aren't that bad...
I am with great friends and I am getting to live a pretty awesome life right now...
In other words, right now I feel blessed...

I have been thinking about a verse that I read a week or so ago a lot the past couple of days...
"Unless the Lord builds the house, its builders labor in vain. Unless the Lord watches over the city, the watchmen stand guard in vain." - Psalms 127:1

When I read this, it really reminded me that if God/my relationship with Jesus Christ is not the focal point of the overarching scheme of my life (as well as all the detailed happenings), then I am basically wasting my time...