Atrophy

And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years. She had suffered a great deal under the care of many doctors and had spent all she had, yet instead of getting better she grew worse. When she heard about Jesus, she came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak,because she thought, “If I just touch his clothes, I will be healed.” Immediately her bleeding stopped and she felt in her body that she was freed from her suffering.

At once Jesus realized that power had gone out from him. He turned around in the crowd and asked,“Who touched my clothes?”

“You see the people crowding against you,” his disciples answered, “and yet you can ask, ‘Who touched me?’ ”

But Jesus kept looking around to see who had done it. Then the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came and fell at his feet and, trembling with fear, told him the whole truth. He said to her,“Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering.”
~ Mark 5:25-34

Some people try to get by with the bare minimum, and that carries them, as Ryan shared with us tonight. But I am very different, and that can be both a blessing and a curse. I compulsively try by hardest to do well, and that carried me up until college. But then Mines comes and slaps (nearly) everyone in the face, saying, “You have to give your whole self up in order to do well in this class, and even if you do, you might end up failing.” Thus, the curse. My life is exercised in an imbalanced way. My slight OCD will force me into wee hours of the night. I try to fix that by adding other stuff to my life. But if you exercise parts of your body completely unevenly, you’re gonna have a bad time. Exercise might be bad.  (This might not be true, but this is why I don’t ever physically exercise.) But God is watching wondering when I’m going to find the time to spend with Him. What does everything else matter? I’m killing myself physically and emotionally without God. When that part lacks, life deteriorates.

Not a Maybe

When one of those at the table with him heard this, he said to Jesus, “Blessed is the one who will eat at the feast in the kingdom of God.” Jesus replied: “A certain man was preparing a great banquet and invited many guests. At the time of the banquet he sent his servant to tell those who had been invited, ‘Come, for everything is now ready.’ “But they all alike began to make excuses. The first said, ‘I have just bought a field, and I must go and see it. Please excuse me.’ “Another said, ‘I have just bought five yoke of oxen, and I’m on my way to try them out. Please excuse me.’

“Still another said, ‘I just got married, so I can’t come.’ “The servant came back and reported this to his master. Then the owner of the house became angry and ordered his servant, ‘Go out quickly into the streets and alleys of the town and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind and the lame.’

“‘Sir,’ the servant said, ‘what you ordered has been done, but there is still room.’ “Then the master told his servant, ‘Go out to the roads and country lanes and compel them to come in, so that my house will be full. I tell you, not one of those who were invited will get a taste of my banquet.’”

Urbana: An Unexpected Journey

One CSM InterVarsity student's experiences at Urbana 12,

 December 27-January 1, St. Louis, MO. 

I don’t really know why I came to Urbana. I remember saying it’d be the chance of a lifetime as Urbana 15 will (hopefully) take place after I’m done with my undergraduate degree. I know it would be an adventure, road tripping across three states, and that intrigued me. But most importantly was the feeling that God said “Go”. And in the journey of my life I felt Urbana was the place I was to go to next. So after watching commercials for it freshman year and not considering it, on the last week of October I decided to go.