My perspective.
I completely understand youth groups and their purpose. When I went to a youth group, I admit that it was nice having a group of like-minded Christians who had the same religious perspective as myself and who would support me in my faith. However, while I was in that youth group, I sort of think that my faith began to stagnate. I felt growth in my faith at first from being surrounded by fellow Christians, but later on I sort of felt that I had hit an impasse...nothing challenged my faith and no one brought new perspectives into light about it, which I suppose is comfortable but not exactly stimulating or conducive to growth in my opinion.
Fast forward a few years, and I'm in college downtown at VCU. The set of friends I've made are certainly a different crowd than those in my youth group; of about the 15 people I hang out with most, only myself and maybe three others are Christian. As for the others, it's a mix of (mostly) atheists and agnostics. In the beginning, constantly being around those who truly believe that there is no God (for personal reasons; these aren't just atheists who choose to be so because they want to seem edgy, they all have had things happen in their lives to bring them to this point) was somewhat of a challenge, and I thought I felt my faith slipping a bit, or that I wasn't the same Christian as I was before. However, after awhile, I really started to listen to what they said and believed in terms of religion, and I realized that I wouldn't want to live with no hope for anything to look forward to after death, and with nothing to rely on but myself. I feel that from hanging out with these people my overall faith has grown stronger, because I have seen those without faith, had my beliefs questioned and even insulted at times, and yet I can still feel God's presence.
It's definitely been refreshing and revitalizing in terms of my faith to be around those with such radically different perspectives. I'm not in any way saying being around other Christians all the time in youth groups or other organizations is a bad thing at all; for some people, that approach to Christianity works best. For me however, getting outside of the traditional box and broadening my horizons was the change of pace I needed.
Thursday, March 31, 2011
Sunday, March 27, 2011
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Rawkstar lyfe. Not really.
Haven't posted on this joint in awhile. Not really sure what to write about, kinda feeling sleepy and sickish (what else is new), sooo I'm not feeling too deep tonight...hmmm...spring break!
Spring break was awesome. The first part of break pretty much consisted of me just hanging around my house and doing yard work and relaxing, which honestly was awesome. Some of my friends had been being sorta dramatic and whatnot leading up to break, so it was cool to just sorta remove myself from all that for a bit.
Come friday of that week however, all relaxing stopped, as I was going on a weekend tour with my friends band, Break Away! I was dropped off at the Warehouse at about 11am that morning by my friend Ellie, and met up with the band there. We got a little later start than expected because of one of the guys' dogs having some health problems that morning, but it was no biggie...or so we thought. We were heading up to Jersey, and because of our delays we ended up hitting rush hour traffic in DC at about 5pm, which SUCKED. To sum that up, it turned what would have been a four hour drive into a six hour drive, which isn't too bad, but not the most comfortable thing in the world when crammed into a van full of eight big guys!
The NJ show was alright. Kind of a weird scene where they played, not too many people came out, and there was just sorta an odd feel to the whole thing. Still, it was pretty cool overall, and we met up with the band Compound, who are definitely good dudes. We stayed at some guy in the band Lifeless's house that night...which was kinda sketchy. Not the best part of Jersey, judging by the gunshots (yes...gunshots) we heard that night. Sleeping on a hardwood floor's kinda a bummer too, but it was a place to stay and the guy who owned the place was really chill.
Saturday, we woke up early, ate at some awesome bagel place, then peaced out to Washington DC, where we were gonna meet up with the band Compound again and hang out before the Harrisonburg show. DC was definitely cool; it always is. We checked out the art museum (always funny to see a bunch of big tattoo'd rough looking guys appreciating art), the Indian museum, and all the monuments, typical touristy stuff. Good times for sure. At about 7, we left DC for Harrisonburg, home of good ole JMU. We got there at about 9, with the show starting at 10pm. The place was way cool, some heavily spray painted basement in a kid's house. The crowd there was much more receptive of the band, though they seemed a little taken aback at how rough the kids from Richmond and New York were. Whatever, just having a good time haha. Kim came to meet up with us and check out the show too, which was obviously awesome, even though I only saw her for a couple hours. Sigh.
After the show, we hit the road again at about 1am, which put us back in RVA at about 4am. Ellie again saved the day and picked me up from the Warehouse, and I spent the next day sleeping until the final show on the tour, which was of course at the ole Casa de Ware.
Honestly, this was one of the most memorable weekends I think I'll ever have. It was way cool getting to travel around in a van and sorta experience the touring lifestyle, I liked it a lot. Not to mention just getting to spend a weekend goofing around with crazy friends, that's guaranteed good times. I met a bunch of awesome people, and made my friendships with preexisting friends even stronger, so that's another plus for the tour.
Fun.
Spring break was awesome. The first part of break pretty much consisted of me just hanging around my house and doing yard work and relaxing, which honestly was awesome. Some of my friends had been being sorta dramatic and whatnot leading up to break, so it was cool to just sorta remove myself from all that for a bit.
Come friday of that week however, all relaxing stopped, as I was going on a weekend tour with my friends band, Break Away! I was dropped off at the Warehouse at about 11am that morning by my friend Ellie, and met up with the band there. We got a little later start than expected because of one of the guys' dogs having some health problems that morning, but it was no biggie...or so we thought. We were heading up to Jersey, and because of our delays we ended up hitting rush hour traffic in DC at about 5pm, which SUCKED. To sum that up, it turned what would have been a four hour drive into a six hour drive, which isn't too bad, but not the most comfortable thing in the world when crammed into a van full of eight big guys!
The NJ show was alright. Kind of a weird scene where they played, not too many people came out, and there was just sorta an odd feel to the whole thing. Still, it was pretty cool overall, and we met up with the band Compound, who are definitely good dudes. We stayed at some guy in the band Lifeless's house that night...which was kinda sketchy. Not the best part of Jersey, judging by the gunshots (yes...gunshots) we heard that night. Sleeping on a hardwood floor's kinda a bummer too, but it was a place to stay and the guy who owned the place was really chill.Saturday, we woke up early, ate at some awesome bagel place, then peaced out to Washington DC, where we were gonna meet up with the band Compound again and hang out before the Harrisonburg show. DC was definitely cool; it always is. We checked out the art museum (always funny to see a bunch of big tattoo'd rough looking guys appreciating art), the Indian museum, and all the monuments, typical touristy stuff. Good times for sure. At about 7, we left DC for Harrisonburg, home of good ole JMU. We got there at about 9, with the show starting at 10pm. The place was way cool, some heavily spray painted basement in a kid's house. The crowd there was much more receptive of the band, though they seemed a little taken aback at how rough the kids from Richmond and New York were. Whatever, just having a good time haha. Kim came to meet up with us and check out the show too, which was obviously awesome, even though I only saw her for a couple hours. Sigh.
After the show, we hit the road again at about 1am, which put us back in RVA at about 4am. Ellie again saved the day and picked me up from the Warehouse, and I spent the next day sleeping until the final show on the tour, which was of course at the ole Casa de Ware.
Honestly, this was one of the most memorable weekends I think I'll ever have. It was way cool getting to travel around in a van and sorta experience the touring lifestyle, I liked it a lot. Not to mention just getting to spend a weekend goofing around with crazy friends, that's guaranteed good times. I met a bunch of awesome people, and made my friendships with preexisting friends even stronger, so that's another plus for the tour.Fun.
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
It really is an amazing thing to be able to talk all day to a person that you've been talking to for two years, and more or less every day for the past almost nine months, and still be able to get on the phone at night and talk about whatever for three hours. Craziness, in an awesome way. Never had it before, and wouldn't trade it for anything. Nice to have someone who you know will always be there. :)
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