Home Sweet Home

I really hate sleeping away from home. I love my bed. This weekend I was at UMW School of Missions with my mom, Linda Moore, Carla Whitmire, Arvilla, and Gretchen and Dan Miller. It was not nearly as boring as I thought it would be. It was pretty interesting. Mostly, it was nice hanging out with some ladies from the church. And just kind of affirming the idea that we should be accepting of all people, especially in church. Surprisingly, the part I liked most was reading my bible. It has been a long time since I have actually opened my bible and read it. It's actually quite pathetic. But this weekend, I remembered what it's like to read a passage and really study it. To try to understand where the writers are coming from, and what the significance of this passage is, and what Jesus was trying to say, and how it applies to my life now. It actually makes a lot of sense. I mean I love to study for school, why is the bible any different? I think that's why I like hearing Chris speak. Just like me, he takes a very intellectual perspective on the bible. He looks at the history and culture behind it. I always learned new things about bible times when we used to have bible studies in high school. Well, I was inspired this weekend and I really want to study the bible more. I am going to see if I can find a good devotional book that takes the same appraoch to bible study that I do. Maybe I will find one that Daniel and I can do together. We complement each other in a very good way for bible study. He's emotional, and I'm practical. He's a feeler and I'm a thinker. So it would be nice for us to study the bible together.

Part of this came out of a book I just finished reading called The Red Tent. It was about the story of Joseph (and the coat of many colors) but from the perspective of his sister Dinah. In the bible, there is just a short passage about Dinah being raped (Genesis 37 or something like that). So this author took what was given in the bible, and expanded it into a full story. So after reading that book, I wanted to read the bible and see what it had to say about the same story. It's remarkable how reading a fictional book can make the bible so much more understandable. Because of that novel, I can now probably recite the generations from Abraham and Sarah all the way down to Dinah. I know who married who and who had what sons and daughters just from the way the story was told.

Today I went out to lunch with some of the YAMS from church. When I agreed to go, I didn't know that certain people were going to be there. And when I found out they were, I was not thrilled to say the least. Part of me thinks I shouldn't judge them and I should just be nice and whatever. But then the other part of me says that I decided a long time ago that my life was much better without these people. And I just always left angry and upset when I was around them. I mean, there's a point that you just decide that a relationship is toxic and it needs to be cut out of your life to save everything else. Anyways, I successfully got through lunch without saying one word to them. So it turned out fine. I enjoyed everyone else there. It was so nice to see Kendra again! Daniel's coming over for dinner :-) It will be a good night.