How to be a Child

It's back to business in IV. I say that but most people would gladly come to this place, the beach and the people and all, even if it means getting back to business. Personally, I had a great break, caught to catch up with people not seen in many moons, but boy is it good to be back. I cannot explain all of the emotions that I experience the first week of any quarter-my mind races back and forth, shuffling through the classrooms in an attempt to find mine, I see faces, one after another after another of people my heart leaps for. I get to spend time individually and divide my time in my own mind of how to see and properly experience all of the wonder that these people bring me, each in their own way. All of that, while trying to sift out what God is telling me and trying to take time to stop and listen to my savior whilst catching up on basketball and crashing classes left and right. I need those times to just sit with my Father, listening and talking. Otherwise, I so easily feel overwhelmed with the magnitude of it all. Yeah, it is overwhelming, a dashing start to a quarter with only moments to stop and catch my breath.
The one thing that God has been showing me in all of this is how to be a child. I think last year I developed a strong desire to become a man, a MAN. This is a good thing, however I think that I, like many people, got so caught up with being an adult and trying to effectively be a man of God that I lost sight of what it really means to be a child of God. I have been thinking a lot about childhood this week and how a child wholeheartedly depends on his father, assuming he has a father and that the father is indeed a true man. The child will not cross the street without holding his father's hand, he will not stay up late without first informing his father, when he is in a conundrum and needs advice, he goes to his father, he trusts his father to provide for him without trying to constantly second-guess if there is a better way to act. All of this is very applicable to how my relationship with my heavenly father should be. I need to rely on Him, to provide, to make everything better, to watch me as I cross the street, to stop me from making dire mistakes while letting me make the ones that teach me greater lessons. I literally need to emulate the attitude of a child towards his father in order to learn more fully how to act towards mine, my Heavenly Father. It's only in this that I will learn more fully what a child of God is.
Treats of the week: Oreo-pudding cookies. Absolutely divine.
IV Peep of the week: Goes to the girl I met at traitor joe's who told me she had class the next day and then did not remember me when she sat right in front of me.
~Good Luck and Good Eats
Cody

Another Year Gone By

Well, it's official-the year is 2012. It feels weird even typing those words. The point of a new year is not simply to celebrate, to drunkenly enjoy the turning of another day, the point of a new year is to first be thankful. We must not forget to be utterly, humbly thankful for the way that God's grace has shaped our lives in the past year. God's grace has been everywhere in the past year, and has made a definite, tangible impact on my life. Secondly, the point of new years is an introspective one, an opportunity to take a look at past events and try to become a better, more cohesive person.
For me 2011 was an interesting year, to say the least. The beginning of it was winter quarter last year and the beginning of OLF. Ever since the start of 2011, I've allowed God to work within me more than at any other time, I have cared more about God's opinion than anybody else's opinion. I was more broke in 2011 than in any years recently prior to it, but also cared less than ever before. I declared a major, philosophy, and bogged down my schedule accordingly. I led three seperate bible studies, with three different people, all amazing in their own right. In 2011 I learned how to bake, and then I learned how to bake better. June of 2011 saw me galabanting off to Santa Monica to tell people about the greatest gift ever given and in the process watched the Dallas Mavericks decimate the Lakers and then dispatched the Heat in the NBA finals. I met one of my best friend Chris Radford and many people I got to know much better, a trend I most definitely hope continues in the next 365 days. I'll list some of the names of people whom I feeel have made an impact in my life that I did not know in 2010 or prior. Conner, Lindsey, Kenny, Angie, Jessica, Andrea, Keila, T-Crown, Andrew, and many otherr, I do not have close to enough time to name everyone, those are just the names currently in my head. Ultimately, 2011 was such a joyous year for me, and that can only be on account of me allowing God's Love to seep into more parts of my life. I definitely have more exciting times ahead in 2012, but I nonetheless will not readily forget the people or events that allowed me to have so much Joy and divine communtiy this past year. The older I get the more I love people, the more I love people, the more I love being alive and where I am. I am so thankful for Who God has made me into and how he continues to shape me, and use me to shape others. As well, I started this blog this past year, and I hope that you have enjoyed it as well, it will continue this year, undoutbedly.
Restaurant of the week: Fonda Don Chon's. A delicious mexican buffet. Probably the best type of buffet.
~Good Luck and Good Eats