So today, I basically wasted my 80% of my day doing what I hate most... shopping. Oddly, it was both for other people and for myself. I needed some new clothes, so that was going to be my mom's gift to me. After we left the overly crowded woodland mall at around 9... I felt this deep disgust stirring inside of me for this season. This is not common, for Christmas is easily my favorite holiday. For some reason, I can't stand the crazy amounts of unwarranted spending and thoughtless buying that takes place on this holiday. There is NO NEED to buy all this crap. Why does everyone automatically do it, like its completely normal and even supposed to happen. If anyone dared to not buy everyone in their family and their closest friends presents, then they would feel like complete assholes... and for what? I left the mall partly frustrated because they make guys jeans too tight and uncomfortable, and because of how crazy consumerism is taking over. It makes me so mad.

I want to just be a complete rebel. This year, no presents from Matt. Sorry. Now I just have to deal with feeling like an asshole, and having the guilt hover in my brain all season... but seriously people. Give to those who need, not to those who expect, or already have plenty. Where is the joy and love in that? The only love is love of approval and acceptance... temporal and fleeting.

What if during Christmas, the naked were clothed, and the hungry were fed, and the sick cared for, and the homeless given a place to stay, and the thirsty a drink, and the lonely a friend? Why do we have to give more to people that already have? Purely because that is what capitalist consumerist American Christmas tells us.

There, that is my rant.
May we find a new song to sing this Christmas...
Merry Christmas,
Matt

It's been one of those weekends that has been a ton of fun, but the whole weekend there has been that lingering worry in the back of my mind cause of a future event that is coming... for some reason its not that I am not looking forward to it, but I just have that gut feeling like oh man here it comes. Its because my comfort zone is being pushed to a limit that is often scary to go near. I try to think of the best way to avoid the situation just to avoid being uncomfortable and I scare myself into wondering if it is really worth it. Then there comes a point like right now, the night before it happens, that I realize most risks in life are worth it. Even if they turn out terrible, and I were to regret every minute of it... the fact that I was willing to risk it is great in itself. It says that I'm unwilling to be complacent. I'm unwilling to be nominal or average, but will risk in order to live greatly. Comfort zone's I feel are meant to be constantly expanded... but most of the time we don't expand them not cause we don't want to but because we don't realize our situation.

The times when I don't worry like I am now, are not the times I am comfortable, but rather the times when I am. For my liberated times are when my mind is not concerned with myself... but rather when I have learned selflessness... when my comfort zone is of little significance because I am too concerned not with myself but more with the interests of others.

Sometimes, the times I am not comfortable are more the times I feel liberated (not tonight)... perhaps because vulnerability and risk are most always worth it. Its so easy to get caught up in the comforts of my life and forget what its like to risk and to really live. I pray that my zeal would not die not as I am still in college, but that it would learn to become enflamed instead.

I basically knew that this was going to happen. I knew that when I quit soccer, I was going to have time. What I also knew, is that I would fill that time. Well know I am to the point, where there are so many little things that I am doing, that its hard to keep a fresh mind. My joy is unable to remain in one thing, because I have to worry about something else when that thing is over. Shoot. Is it shere laziness, to get ahead in things. Am I searching for joy in the wrong things? If I am doing my homework, I feel temporarily joyful because  I am being productive and I am learning... but then when I'm done, I remember that I still have 10:07 work to take care of... then when the amazingness of 1007 is over, I realize I have TAPP work to do and think about, then there's SIFE and Neighbors, and RA responsibilities, and all along my business is on the back burners and I get to the end of the day totally forgetting it. I haven't even mentioned the fact that I would love to pursue some kind of social life, including Bible Study of some sort... but if I were to look at all that I have to do, and ask myself which of those do I want to get rid of... the answer is a clear "none of them".

When I start to worry about things and feel anxiety, I've always gone back to the verse in Philippians that says, "Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God which transcends all understanding will guard your heart and mind in Christ Jesus." Its easy to forget where I need to go for peace. To whom I need to seek for joy. To where I need to run for protection. For there is always hope in the salvation of Christ. Hosanna! Come save us! and not just from our sins and from all iniquity, but also from worry, from anxiety, from loneliness, from fear, from distrust, from doubt, from worldly pleasures, from all that separates us from experiencing the radiance and Glory of the one who saves. Amen.