Truth is stranger than fiction
I'm typing from Josh's PC right now. Josh and I stayed up till 3:30 last night talking about theology issues. It was very refreshing. I wish I had him at CCCB (or vise-versa for me at Ozark). He will be graduating this December. This makes me think about a lot of things…
There are a lot of things that I chew on about Christianity. You can say that I am a healthy skeptic. I question a lot of what I read in the Bible, but this only makes my faith even stronger than when I started questioning. I come to Josh with some of these things that I question, and he tells me how he has ALREADY dealt with these things. I look up to his opinion because his train of logic is similar to mine. Like I said, it’s very refreshing to hear his opinion.
There are only a handful of people here that were here when I was. It’s a little difficult to think about, but it’s also a little comforting to know that the core group of people that I looked up to have remained steadfast in their education. This gives me hope that some of the serious people here at CCCB should remain with me in my walk towards the finish line.
One of the major issues that I’ve been struggling with of late is what I’ve done with the last three years of my life. Some of you reading this know that I wasn’t in college (at least full time) for three years, so I’ll give you a quick run down of my situation:
I graduated a semester early (January 2000) and went immediately to Ozark Christian College (in Joplin, MO) for the spring semester. I went to Ozark for a full year (spring and fall 2000). I ran out of money, and felt that I wasn’t being called to do anything in ministry at the time. So I went home to Des Moines, Iowa and lived with my folks for three years. A lot of stuff happened during this time. I applied for two major art schools (I got accepted to both); my girlfriend dumped me shortly before our three-year anniversary; I got involved with the youth ministry in my local church; I got addicted to comic books; and a lot of other things happened to me.
What’s really been plaguing my thoughts for the last four to five months is whether of not these three years was a waste of time. Was I supposed to stay at OCC and graduate with my friends? Am I on a level of maturity that’s different from these friends at Ozark? Am I not as smart as these friends?
This weekend answered most, if not all, of these questions. I believe that God needed me to go home, and live a little while, and find my nitch (how do you spell “nitch”? MS Word isn’t helping). Am I on the same theological level that my friends are? Nope, but that’s not a bad thing because I have a lot of practical life experiences to relate them to. Am I dumber (dumber is a word) than these friends? Nope, as my Dad would say, “he’s just a little slow.”
Here are some people that we (Josh and I) spent some time with:
1. At lunch on Saturday (in the campus cafeteria) we ran into Aanna Lang. Aanna is from Grinnell, Iowa and has been a friend for quite some time. But, I haven’t seen her in about four years so this was a time for catch up. She wrote a book! She gave me a copy on disc, and said that it was okay to review, and tell her how I feel about it. She’s currently looking for a publisher, so it’s top secret!
2. We went to Joe Muggs for some coffee with Jason Fry and Matt Hodges. Jason used to be my RA at Ozark, and I always look up to him for advice. He’s a good kid. Matt Hodges is a nice guy, but I don’t really have much in common with him.
3. Then we hung out with the infamous Jeff Byrnes. Jeff is THE PRANK MASTER. I write this without hesitation. Jeff is a legend in his own right. He gave me some great pranks that I will execute soon.
4. Then we went to Applebee’s with Michael Parman. We always called him by his last name. Parman is a really nice guy. He’s one of those quiet types, that is really smart, you just have to talk to them.
5. We went back to the dorms and I talked to my Godfather: Ryan McSwain. McSwain got me back into comic books. He’s the guy I always go to for good advise on comics. He knows what is good, and what is bad, so we talk comics most of the time I see him.
6. Sunday went by and I got to spend more time with Jeff Byrnes. It’s a long story, but he gave to me a red police light that is operated via cigarette outlet. Then we went to Wal*Mart and attached an on/off switch to this thing and it works fantastically. Jeff is like the McGuyver of pranks.
7. Then I got to see Parish McDarris (not sure if I’m spelling his name right). Parish got married to an awesome girl last summer. I wanted to go to it, but I had already purchased tickets to the Chicago Comic Convention, which was on the same weekend. I got to see pics of their wedding which was really cool because the person that they had do it was very creative. Parish and I caught up, and he gave me some good books. Then we talked theology for a while, and then he “told” me how his brother demolished the building that Saddam Hussein’s brothers were hiding in, in Iraq. That was pretty neat news.
So, everything about the trip was pretty cool, except the girl who drove us down there. I don’t want to get into what is wrong with her… it was just really bad.
I have more that I want to write, but this is all for now.