Happy Surprises

I love it when God unexpectedly plops little happys (happies? It's not a real word, but it's the one I want to use. I just don't know which wrong way to spell it is the right wrong way.) into my lap.

Last week in church we were talking about not just sitting around but actively doing something for our faith, so I got to thinking about how I'm not involved in any ministries at home. This is mainly because during the school year I'm never there. However, I'll be home for June and July which is a whole two months that shouldn't be used for idleness but for doing something productive. I was just starting to contemplate what I could do when a friend leaned over and said she needed to talk to me about something after the service. She wants to start a program for girls in the church, a kind of mentor/Bible study/sleepover-fun kind of thing, and she wants me to help. It was like all I had to do was actually think the words "What can I do?" and God was right on top of it with a "Here--do this!"

I am currently sitting in a hotel room in Odessa, TX as part of a group of 8 students and 2 professors from my school on a storm chase. We're driving around the Great Plains for 2 weeks looking for storms. The most I really expected to get out of this trip was some cool pictures of clouds, hopefully some tornadoes, but yesterday I got a lot more. I was sitting in the room with two of the other girls, one of whom was reading her Bible. She read something that she thought was cool out loud to us and it sparked this whole deep conversation about finding God's will.

I didn't expect God to immediately give me a ministry I could be involved with the second I asked for one or for Him to speak to me about His will through my fellow storm chasers while sitting in a Texas hotel room, but He did both of those things. And when I think about it, why did I not expect Him to do those things? He's an all powerful God. He can do anything. Just imagine what He could do with me if I was asking for and expecting great things rather than just being surprised (although pleasantly so) by them when they're dropped into my lap.

Yee Haw

I associate summer with country music. I have for a while, and I have no idea why. I rarely, if ever, listen to country during the school year, but all summer I listen to it almost exclusively. I used to think that it was just a Lucedale thing. Something about driving down back roads at home just needs country in the background to feel right. However, here I am, still sitting in Starkville and the least excited about summer that I've probably ever been, but what am I doing? Listening to the Josh Turner Pandora station. I guess my mind is trying to tell me subliminally through my music choice that summer is here and there is nothing I can do about it, so I might as well suck it up and make it worthwhile. I'll see what I can do.

And so that this isn't a complete downer of a blog post, here's a happy story. Last semester I was in a class called Physical Meteorology that was probably the most ridiculous class I've ever taken (Actually that's not entirely true because I'm pretty sure Physics II was an even bigger bane of my existence, but that was last year. New year, new bane.). Not that the subject was ridiculous, but the teaching method was. It was unorganized and way above everyone's head. The first test was mostly quantitative (plugging stuff into equations and whatnot) and I made 100 (with a curve of course). Since the curve was necessary, the teacher decided that for the next test, it should be all qualitative (explaining of processes rather than proving them with equations). I made a 77. The class average overall was a lot higher though, so for the final, it was decided that this new format would be kept. I just knew that there was no way I'd get an A if this was the case. I dreaded the test all week. When the day came, I was convinced it would take me at least 2 hours to finish, judging by how his previous tests had gone. Instead, I was out of there in 45 minutes, and this was after working through the test three times because I didn't want to be the first one to leave. Finally, I gave up and turned it in. The next day, I checked my grades, not expecting that one to be posted yet, but saw that it was...and I had an A!! I screamed. Out loud. My roommate came running into my room because she was sure something had attacked me.