Like a child...

As I am 26 years old, I figured I was finished experiencing most new things in my life.  But since moving out here to California, I frequently have moments where I feel like a child excited about seeing something for the first time.  I'm continuously in awe of the landscape or palm trees and This weekend, I had the opportunity to experience two other things that I've never seen live before: Surfing and Fire

1) Surfing... I was apparently way unprepared for the amount of people in southern California that surf.  Even though Pasadena is about an hour from any beach, people make it a point to maintain this hobby.  Surfing just isn't something people do in DC, or Pittsburgh for that matter, and this makes it all very intriguing to me.  This weekend, we went to the beach and instead of reading the book I have due for class on Monday, I was so enthralled with the surfers in the water.  They all paddle out there and just sit and wait for a wave to come in.  Only one or two people can ride a wave at a time, so I guess there's some sort of unspoken (or maybe spoken, since I wasn't out there to hear them) way to tell whose turn it is on the wave, but it seemed that one could wait a long time in order to ride a wave for a few seconds.  I've observed people of a wonderful spectrum of ages out there.  I think the youngest looked about 7 and the oldest was in his 60s.  I think that Surfing might also be one of the most humbling activities out there.  You can not pick up a board and be good at it.  It takes lots and lots of practice and your movements are entirely dictated by God's creation.  If you ever need to find yourself some humility...try surfing. 

2) Fires.  On the east coast, the roads are closed for an accident or flooding or ice, but out here, they will close because of fire.  May I just repeat...FIRE.  I do not intend to address the major destruction caused by these fires every year, but to highlight how, aside from the destruction of property and livelihood, these fires affect life.  My friends literally drove through the most recent fire in Orange County where there were flames on either side of the freeway.  From the house we were staying at, it appeared as if we were looking at Mordor on the horizon.  In order to get home tonight, I needed to look up road closures because of fire.  This just isn't something that happens on the east coast.  Again, I do not intend to downplay the horrific destruction of this or to complain about the inconvenience I was caused, but to share another unexpected first.  

Ears to hear...

Sorry for the delay in posting, It's been a busy few weeks with midterms and my computer died but was resuscitated back to life.
This weekend I had to opportunity to see two of my favorite musicians Denison Witmer and David Bazan (two separate shows.) Both shows were excellent and performed in pretty intimate settings. One of the reasons I love both of these musicians is because they are musicians who love Christ, but not making Christian music. This has been an ongoing conversation in my Theology and Pop Culture class. One of the main passages we've been referancing back to is Jesus saying "He who has ears, let him hear" (Matthew 13:9). This verse is used in referance to Jesus teaching in parables and encourages the listener to hear/see God in the everyday. I think these two men are living out this pretty well.
We got a chance to chat with Denison Witmer after his show for a bit and ended up talking about our favorite C.S. Lewis books. He told us this story that I thought was funny, so I'll share it with you all... He recently purchased some Joy dish soap and noticed on the back of the packaging there is a list of warnings and one of them said "If you get Joy in your eyes..." He (I as well) thought it was pretty funny to think about what you should do if you ever for joy in your eyes. Just think about it.