Drivin' With The Windows Down

Ya know what I love?  I love summer days when I drive around with the window down and feel the breeze while I have something playing in the stereo that just makes feel like summer is a good time and I should just enjoy this car ride.  

...

Driving around in the summer with Goo Goo Dolls playing and the window down... oh man it doesn't get any better.

The Four Loves

I'm a big quote guy.  I love quotes.  Whenever I read a book, I try to get a lot of quotes to walk away from it with.

...

I just read a book by C.S. Lewis called The Four Loves.  It was good.  Here are some quotes from the book.

...

"Those who cannot conceive Friendship as a substantive love but only as a disguise or elaboration of Eros betray the fact that they have never had a Friend."

---

"Nothing so enriches an erotic love as the discovery that the Beloved can deeply, truly and spontaneously enter into Friendship with the Friends you already had: to feel that not only are we two united by erotic love but we three or four or five are all travelers on the same quest, have all a common vision."

---

"The little knots of Friends who turn their backs on the 'World' are those who really transform it."

---

"The mark of perfect Friendship is not that help will be given when the pinch comes (of course it will) but that, having been given, it makes no difference at all."

---

"In a perfect Friendship this Appreciative love is, I think, often so great and so firmly based that each member of the circle feels, in his secret heart, humbled before all the rest.  Sometimes he wonders what he is doing there among his betters.  He is lucky beyond desert to be in such company.  Especially when the whole group is together, each bringing out all that is best, wisest, or funnies in all the others."

---

"For we all wish to be judged by our peers, by the men 'after our own heart.'  Only they really know our mind and judge it by standards we fully acknowledge.  Theirs is the praise we really covet and the blame we really dread."

---

"The gnat-like cloud of petty anxieties and decisions about the conduct of the next hour have interfered with my prayers more often than any passion or appetite whatever."

---

"For it is the very mark of Eros that when he is in us we had rather share unhappiness with the Beloved than be happy on any other terms."

---

"It is as if Christ said to us through Eros, 'Thus—just like this—with this prodigality—not counting the cost—you are to love me and the least of my brethren'"

---

"The only place outside Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers and perturbations of love is Hell."

---

"Christ did not teach and suffer that we might become, even in the natural loves, more careful of our own happiness."

---

"We shall draw nearer to God, not by trying to avoid the sufferings inherent in all loves, but by accepting them and offering them to Him; throwing away all defensive armour.  If our hearts need to be broken, and if He chooses this as the way in which they should break, so be it."

---

"It is probably impossible to love any human being simply 'too much.'  We may love him too much in proportion to our love for God; but it is the smallness of our love for God, not the greatness of our love for the man, that constitutes inordinacy…But the question whether we are loving God or the earthly Beloved 'more' is not, so far as concerns our Christian duty, a question about the comparative intensity of two feelings.  The real question is, which (when the alternative comes) do you serve, or choose, or put first?  To which claim does your will, in the last resort yield?"

---

"We were made for God.  Only by being in some respect like Him, only by being a manifestation of His beauty, loving-kindness, wisdom or goodness, has any earthly Beloved excited our love."

---

Ahh, good ol' Clive Staples.

Peace.

Time Numbs

I've heard people say, "Time heals all wounds."  I don't think that is true.

...

I have been through my fair share of painful and tough times.  I don't think time has ever helped me heal over the things that have happened, it had just numbed me from feeling the same fresh and familiar pain. Time has made me apathetic.  

...

I don't think time heals; I think it just numbs us.  I don't feel like I am healing.  I am just becoming numb.

Summer, Summer

So that bittersweet summer I was talking about is here. It certainly does have its ups and downs.

...

I have been pretty busy with my internship at Rivertree and working in the theater at Malone. Sunday was the day I moved in to Gram's here back at Canton. I really enjoy living here at Gram's and it feels good to be back in Canton. Something about western PA just didn't feel like it was as much home as Canton is to me now. It's hard to explain. It is almost like outside of my family and a small handful of friends and people from high school, there isn't anything (or anyone) for me out there. Back here is another family and whole lot of friends. This is becoming home more and more as time passes. Its a somewhat difficult transition but I do like it.

...

Monday I went down to the theater and got my timecard. Jim (my boss at the theater) gave me the summary of everything that needs to be done once the summer is over. The best thing about that gig is that I can go down there whenever it is convenient to me. I have keys to get in and I know what needs to be done... just gotta do it.

...

I started at Rivertree on tuesday. Tuesday and wednesday were consumed by time spent with Toby (the guy I work with at Rivertree) and time spent at the church in general. It was all really awesome. I got the tour of the building and did some brainstorming with Toby about what all I am going to be involved in this summer. I got to meet a ton of people on staff, about 1/6 of whose names I remember. Everyone has been really awesome. Then I had a brainstorming meeting with some others on staff, which was a cool experience. Me and Toby ended the first day by going to the batting cages and just talking some more about my assignments this summer.

...

Wednesday me and Toby went to a seminar in Hartville about small groups and how they should look in churches if they are going to change lives. I was able to take some cool things away from the 7 hours I was there. Later that night I went to a leadership meeting about how to have conversations with people about Jesus and faith if the other person doesn't have any particular religious interest. I hate to talk about evangelism sometimes because there is almost this inherent judgment that comes with the word "evangelism" that I really try to avoid. But I suppose if you have the right kind of established relationship with the person that you are talking to then everything would be okay. That's kinda what the meeting was about. It was good.

...

Yesterday I just went to Malone and worked at the theater for most of the day. Gonna try to do the same today. Yesterday did have an awesomely pleasant surprise. Nikki came to visit Tim and me and her got to just hang out for a couple hours here at Gram's. Really cool. Good times.

...

I am reading The Four Loves by C.S. Lewis. I like it a lot so far. Once I get more into it I might blog more about it. There are a small handful of books I want to read this summer:

The Four Loves by C.S. Lewis,

Soul Cravings by Erwin McManus,

Mere Christianity (rereading it) by C.S. Lewis,

Sex God by Rob Bell,

Starving Jesus by Craig Gross,

The Secret Message of Jesus by Brian McLaren

...

Well this is just a boring update. Maybe I'll have something more to say soon. Keep in touch and God Bless

-Nick