New Beginnings

Easter is a symbol of a new life—through Christ's death we are freed from death's grasp. The empty tomb was the beginning of the journey. Just as Christ rose with a new body, so we are reminded that one day we, too, will have a new body when we dwell in our permanent home.

I realized today that Easter has become a sort of symbol of newness in my own life, too. For the past few years, Easter has marked the end of something that's always existed in my life and the beginning of something new.

Easter 2008 found me in Connecticut, far away from the Easter traditions I had always known. That trip solidified friendships I had been forming my first year and a half at school, and I began to realize that while I will always look forward to visits home, God can and does provide meaningful relationships in whatever area of the world He takes me.

2008

The following year marked, in a way, the end of my childhood. Until then, when I went home I could always pick up exactly where I had left off before I left for college. Life looked remarkably unchanged. That Easter, I spent my last Sunday at FBF that felt like a Sunday from my high school years. Before I went to my next service there several weeks later, I had learned about some significant changes that would occur within my church family.

2009

By the end of that summer, those changes all hit, and I could no longer keep one hand on things at Asbury and one hand on things at home and be within easy reach of everyone I loved. I am not a huge fan of change, and bidding farewell to life as it had always been was really tough. Significant change in my life, though, showed me God's unchanging nature, and right about that time He led me to becoming more involved in my church in Kentucky. The Body of Christ is the same no matter where it is located, and my church now has become as big of a blessing in my life as the church I grew up in.

I spent Easter 2010 preparing to say goodbye to my best friend and her family. I had never spent any time away from Heather before she got married, and even after she got married she was only eight hours away (by that point everything in my life was eight hours away, so that sounded normal). Their cross-country move would make things much different from what they had always been.

2010

This Easter I find myself again preparing to say goodbye. While remarkably fewer changes have occurred in my life over the past year than a year containing a college graduation should hold, change is a constant in life. David and Tiffany have been very dear friends, and Kentucky will seem rather strange without them here.

2011

As I look back on the changes Easter has held the past few years, I can see how it's all related. Because Christ died to save me, I, through faith in Him, can be a part of His family. His family is permanent, while life on earth is fleeting. Because of Easter, I can look forward to the day where "goodbye" no longer exists.

Until that day, I am on earth for one reason: to die to myself in order to allow Christ to live in me and reach the world through me. While I am here, I will be thankful for the blessings that Christ-centered friendships bring, regardless of the physical distance that may separate us here. Life will keep changing, but He never will.

He is risen! He is risen, indeed!

Birthday Boy

My little kitty is growing up! He's a big one year old boy today. 

Well, actually, I don't really know when his birthday is, and to be honest with you, it was probably a couple of weeks ago. Since I didn't have the actual date, I decided to find one in April that would fit a cat of mine. After reading many this-day-in-history posts, I came across April 21st and all discussion of when Mosby's birthday would be ceased.

For starters, the real Mosby (Col. John S. Mosby, the Marion, or Swampfox, of the Civil War) disbanded his command in 1865 and sent all of his Rangers home. It seemed fitting that a big event in Mosby's life would fall on the same date as my Mosby's birthday.

April 21st doesn't stop there, though. It is probably most well-known for being the birthday of Rome (at least, we all celebrated it every year in college. April 21, 753 BC was a BIG deal). So, my cat gets a part of my Latin major in his life, too.

Henry VII died today, too, which means Henry VIII ascended the throne of England. And it's Queen Elizabeth II's birthday, so British History fits in here too. The Spanish-American War began, the Red Baron was shot down, Catherine II of Russia and Charlotte Bronte (not of Russia) were born. Joe McCarthy was also born (okay, I had to get a baseball connection into this somehow!)

So, as you can tell, April 21st is too perfect a day to not have my cat be born on it. So, Happy Birthday Mosby! I vote that in honor of this day, you stay in your snuggle mood all day and forget the crazy cat that comes out in you!

Plus, it's National Tree Planting Day in Kenya.

So, This is Blogging…

A few months ago my friend Heather, who will probably be my sole reader for awhile, sent me a telepathic message that had to be translated into a Facebook post before I received it, saying I should start blogging. I had thought about doing exactly that for a while, but as is usual with me, I'll think about something and decide to do it long before I actually get around to carrying through with it.

If my history with Facebook and Twitter holds in the blogging world, I'll probably write far more posts in my mind than actually make it to the screen, but I'll give it a shot. Most of my posts will probably center around either Mosby or my most recent attempt at baking bread, so it may seem like I never update this thing at all. I may shake things up every now and then and rant about the Braves (who are currently losing badly), but that would probably cause me to lose all readership I may gain with the cute cat pictures, so I'll try to keep those to a minimum.

A big thanks to my roomy and Proverbs 31 pal Sam who helped me name my blog. That was my biggest obstacle in starting this thing. I have a serious dislike of naming things, and usually wait until after I have the paper or story finished before I title it. Having to come up with a title to a blog before being able start it really threw me off. It's named, though, and now I can post whenever I like, which is one less stressor in my life. Now that I'm at this stage, I'll have to customize it and give it my personal touch. I'm excited to see just how much time I can waste on this thing in the next week! :-)