This day did not quite turn out as originally planned. The plan for today was to wake up, get a few things done, pick the Faber’s up at the airport, bring them back to the Mather’s place, have supper, and then off to bed.
Well, to start off, Steve realized how little time we all actually had left at camp to finish things up before the kids came so he ended up going back up to camp that morning. Then, Cami called that morning and filled me in on the changing events such as the Faber’s were not going to come in until midnight (which meant we could have actually stayed at the camp one more day unfortunately) and that I would have a day to myself. In the beginning it seemed like things were not going to work out so well, but God always knows what He is doing even when it seems messed up. Yet a day to myself seemed great! There was a lot that I wanted to do.
One of the first things I did was to see if Pratt had any movies that I could watch in Romanian to catch some of the language. I definitely felt like I needed to learn more and more about the language to be more effective. But after talking to him I learned something quite interesting. Apparently DVD’s over in Europe and DVD’s over in America are different. American DVD’s are what is called Region 1 DVD’s and European DVD’s, and practically everywhere else, are what is called Region 2 DVD’s. This means that you cannot watch Region 2 DVD’s and Region 1 DVD players, which is definitely what I have, without messing up the formatting. So Pratt offered to let me use his but he didn’t have any good movies so that plan was shot down, but I knew there was plenty more that I could do.
So I decided to catch up with people who I had been recently falling behind with. For this reason I spent a couple hours just replying to facebook messages and e-mails and such. While doing this I ran across an e-mail from a person back in the State’s that I used to work beside and it said that he had just finished writing a book that you could read for free if you downloaded it.
At first I was a bit hesitant, but I had nothing else to do that day so I gave it a try. Little did I know how much it would change me and have an impact on me for so long of time. As I cannot remember the name of the book at the moment, the first chapter was called Good People and how we all see ourselves in a better light then what we actually should. We see ourselves as being nice and doing good things for others and for this reason we just can’t be bad people. Then, the next chapter was titled Bad People. In this chapter it talked about how we may judge how “good” we are because of how “bad” others are. We see the people doing and selling drugs and we know that they have to be bad people, but when we occasionally tell a white lie or make some inappropriate jokes we are still good people. This is only the case because we justify our actions by comparing those to the other’s actions.
Now the third chapter came at the perfect time. After explaining how we tend to think (or at least how I tend to think) the third chapter was about desperately needing Jesus. The way we view ourselves by our own standards and not God’s, we tend to feel as if Jesus is just the cherry on top of our lives. We don’t technically need Jesus because we view ourselves as okay people. It brought to light how I at least truly view myself and made me question if I desperately need Jesus or seek Him the way I need too.
After reading these three chapters I decided my poor little brain needed a break and time to soak in everything that I had just read. It was a lot to deal with and a lot to comprehend. Even though I yearned for more, I knew that this book needed time to make more of an impact on my life. So I went out for a walk where I was able to explore more and more of the city. I definitely passed a sign that said Kaufman and another sign that said Domo. Domo!!!!! That really made me happy because it reminded me of a good friend back home.
When I returned from the walk I decided that I would take a break and play a game that I could turn my brain off during. So I played the game for a couple of hours and then life returned to me, even while I was playing. I started to re-evaluate life and relationships with others. I evaluated things such as which friendships need to change and which friendships need to stay permanently throughout my life. What started out as a very relaxing day turned into a very impactful life altering day.
I came to many conclusions that day. Some were good, some meant change and others led me to question. No matter what the conclusions, God was able to come and make me realize things that at times I just refuse to even think about. The day had a specific plan, which none of it happened, but yet still turned out good. After such a long, exhausting day I was very glad to go to bed to start another wonderful day.
No comments:
Post a Comment