Well I am a bit late on this but last week on July 18-20 I went to the Xenos Summer Institute in C-bus, Ohio. I gotta say that it was pretty much a blast all in all. It’s just a really cool thing to be able to have an opportunity for some real spiritual insight from very well-known Christians. It was draining, no doubt, because of all the teachings I had to sit through, but it was all worth it, every second. I also got to hang out with the few buddies I knew from C-bus Xenos, Kate and Alex. I actually made some a few new friends too, Rachel and Zoe. I’m slowing becoming more aware to the peeps down in C-bus so that was cool… Though now its getting harder to leave!
I think the coolest thing about Xenos is just how its like no other church around. It just shows how cool it is to be able to know Jesus Christ. When I was growing up, I always thought church was the most uncool thing you could be doing. I never really made any relationships with anyone. I felt like a nobody, someone who was easily disposed of. I felt more important at school! It was so hard to deal with; it was the worst day of the week! Then God gave me to Xenos, and man has nothing been more exciting, partying, and truly fulfilling. I was with my friends from school, so I knew them all (well most of them when I joined). We did stuff that was so fun too. I remember all those nights of getting home around 1 am every friday. So many good times, all backed up by real love, by God, though that took me longer to realize. These people love me, and I love them. Slowly I am becoming a mature christian too. Though instead of becoming some religious fanatic, I’m more cool-minded, easier to get along with, more caring and loving of others. Instead of a proud, narrow-minded, condescending person, I’m humbled and trying to edify my brothers and sisters in Christ.
Alright well my take on this year’s XSI was that it was pretty cool. It’s only my second time so I only have one other XSI to compare it too. The teachers there were pretty cool though. I was glad the topic was about building a spiritual community because now I sort of have an idea of what to expect from my HC and myself. I’ve heard a lot about spiritual gifts lately, at XSI and in our own CT’s. I am still not sure what my gift is, though I’d really like to know. The concept of gifts is very interesting. I’ve really never been able to identify gifts, because I’ve never really been exposed to a church that uses all their gifts. Overall all the XSI teachings were cool, but I had a hard time grasping some of the material, so much to take in. I took as many notes as I could but it was still a lot to absorb. It actually weakens my mind trying to take in so much info at once. However, I managed to take some notes so I hope to be able to recount these teachings in the future.
I had some cool experiences during the partying stages of XSI. I actually sat in the same room with Dennis McCallum for more then 10 minutes!!! It was actually scary, I only sat down because I got to talk to Kate. I’m still pretty shy around the Xenoids down in C-bus. Another sweet scene was that Dennis actually told me something to me! He’s just as intimidating as Keith when I first met him! I hung out/slept over at Martha McCallum’s too! Martha and John are really cool too. All the McCallums are a blast! Sometimes I wish I was born as a McCallum; it would have been interesting to see how I turned out. Well anyways, I think I’m close with a wonderous emphasis on my feelings!
So I would just like to thank everyone in Xenos for helping me in my walk with Christ, and you Christ for taking your perfect and all powerful self and dying for my sake. Your love for me is everlasting, and I am so thankful for your sacrifice!
Well today I had just finished reading the fifth Harry Potter book, The Order of the Phoenix, in order to know what happened in the book before I would see the movie. Firstly, I’d just like to say this was the first book for me to actually sit down hours a day and finish reading it in six days, which for those of you who know me well could possibly find this surprising. The Harry Potter books are undoubtedly helping me get more into reading, and I hope to start becoming a regular reader sometime within this next school year. With reading this book in six days, I still have a very good idea of what happened throughout the entire story and thought I’d give it a little review while it’s contents are still fresh within my mind.
Firstly the one thing I disliked about the whole story more then anything else was Professor Umbridge. I am not saying that she should have never been introduced into the story; I just found her to be very annoying. Every time she came up in the story, things became more complicated then they were even when it was thought impossible that the situation couldn’t get any where worse. Her described appearance gives me a picture of this plainly hideous woman that is not bright or delightful in any way. Every time it came to parts with her I just wanted to move on to the next part and hope that she didn’t make things even more fucked up. If her arrogant and complete absent-mindedness were never introduced to the story and was instead more reasonable (not reasonable to the point where she didn’t make things complicated at all, but rather more of just a very strict teacher, like McGonagall) with Harry, I thought the parts with her included would be a lot more pleasant to read.
Next throughout the entire story, I thought Harry would act very child-like and arrogantly. Even after Ron and Hermione had fully explained themselves for why they couldn’t write to him and that they were deeply sorry (even though they didn’t need to be sorry) Harry still grudgingly held it against them like they meant to not write to him. At this first part, I really was thinking is this the forgiving and heroic Harry that I had read about in the first four books? I thought he was being a ‘little bitch’ and really could have used a nice punch in the face. Though he continued to be a little bitch throughout the school year, some of it is a little more thanks to the straining homework and Professor Umbridge. Harry’s attitude changes a lot in this book from the last one, though some of it can be attributed with the return of Voldemort. It’s just I thought that the return of Voldemort would have had an opposite-effect on Harry. Instead of becoming more angry and bitter at his friends, I thought he’d be more loving and comforting (at least to the ones who weren’t talking about him behind his back) in order to sort of differentiate himself with the way Voldemort acted. Though with all the stress that is put on him in the fifth book, a lot of his anger and bitterness could be attributed to this stress. However at several moments of the book, I felt that Harry really would just put an arrogant foot down and no one else’s advice, even Dumbledore’s, would be allowed into his mind, especially with the death of Sirius Black. I didn’t think that Harry would ever come back to his senses when Sirius died, thankfully the events of the last chapter gave me hope that Harry was not going to remain the arrogant, little bitch he had become.
A part of the book I really enjoyed was the more involved work of Albus Dumbledore and the introduction of the Order of the Phoenix, Dumbledore’s secret army to stand against Voldemort. I was very glad when I got to see Professor Lupin return to the storyline as a member of the Order of the Phoenix. He was my favorite Defense Against the Dark Arts, as I’m sure is the favorite of a lot other Potter fans. The idea of a counter army against Voldemort and signs of a war really had me excited.
I always enjoy reading about action happening within a story. It always gives me the chance to imagine just how the fight went, really letting my imagination getting the best of me. The fifth book, in my opinion, has the most ’serious’ action then any of the others (though Goblet of Fire had the Triwizard Tournament, it didn’t involve life-threatening parts until the end of the story) and included Dumbledore himself a part of the action. He even fought Voldemort himself! The battle between the students and the Death-Eaters was also very enjoyable to read as well. The battles had vivid detail (especially since they were fighting in such an interesting building) and full of plenty of action and suspense.
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix in my overall opinion is a very good book and deserves to be a part of the amazing Harry Potter series. However, the course of Harry’s attitude is slowly changing within the series and in a direction I was hoping he wouldn’t go. The books are becoming more dark as to keep with the age group that started with it. My only hope is that when I get the chance to read the sixth book that I hopefully Harry will not become overly depressed and arrogant because even though he is dealing with more stress then anyone I have ever seen, becoming depressed just makes the reader depressed and the stress just becomes that more worse. It’s better to be an optimist rather then a pessimist because believe me I know what it’s like to be a pessimist and its nothing to rave about, it only makes the people around you sad and it just makes the pessimist that the more unwise. Harry’s biggest struggle I believe is his battle with his deceitful feelings. If he can learn to not rely entirely on his feelings and more on wisdom, he is going to be much better off against Voldemort and his own sanity.