List of Good Things

1.  I gave up TV from post-Senegal to January, as a kind of "I love You more than TV" sort of thing.  And of course, on January 1st, I watched five episodes.  Luckily! I talked to Stephanie, and we agreed to keep each other accountable to only two episodes per day, so we will not waste our lives as couch potatoes.

2.  Also Stephanie and I are memorizing James!  Which is great, because James is great.  Steph has a butt load of it memorized already, so I need to get my game on.

3.  David showed me a commercial with Brett Erlich, and then in Bible study I said something and both Daniel and Troy said I sounded like him.  Life is complete.

4.  Bible study was awesome!  We went through the whole book of Joel (we're powering through the Minor Prophets because when we went slowly people got bored), and it was actually really awesome to do the whole book at once.  Makes it more cohesive and understandable.  I want to do more reading whole books at a time.

And anyway, I love teaching the Minor Prophets, because it makes me study them and read extra resources, and I get a whole lot more out of it than I would if I just read them through on my own time.

And plus!  I just do so much love my church friends.  Next week's service project is really coming together, and even though there are still some arguments about the college kids' exact place in the church, hopefully all that is dying down.  It is so encouraging to be surrounded by people who are passionate about helping people in need.  I love that our idea of hanging out can totally be passing out clothes or visiting nursing homes.

5.  I love the junior high Sunday School girls.  Now that we've divided up girls/boys, the girls are really opening up and talking.  It's weird, because we never talked about sex when I was in junior high, but we totally did today.  So much of the world has changed in just ten short years.  Best part:

Junior High Girl:  If I got pregnant at 16, I would be so mad at God.
Me:  Um, that would be entirely your fault, because you had sex with a boy.
Junior High Girl:  But that's gross!
Me:  ...That's how you have babies.
Junior High Girl:  But that's gross!
Me:  Then don't do it.

It's almost eerie how much I notice myself acting like Wendy.  I can only hope that I will have as positive and as big of an impact on their lives as she did on me.

6.  I really need to stop being pissy about living in Peoria.  I used to worry that I wouldn't be able to live a life of missions in Peoria, because no one else wanted to, and blah blah pity party etc.  BUT.  God has given me a chance to talk to kids about missionaries.  He's given me two classes to teach, where I can lead discussions about God and life.  And He's given me a group of friends who are missions minded in Peoria, which is exactly what I wanted but never expected.

What I'm saying is, I'm glad I'm in Peoria.  This might be the most I've served God yet, including when I lived in Senegal.  Yay for glorifying God anywhere, anytime.