thoughts of today

I started thinking yesterday how I want to move to a foreign country at some point. Probably not for very long, maybe just a couple of years, but at some point I want to. I have no idea how to go about doing that though. I even thought "what if I go somewhere after I graduate? I can take some time before I go to med school or grad school. . ." I should talk to one of my aunts. One lives in England (that is where I'm leaning towards, france or italy would be nice but that would be harder because I don't know anybody there and the language) and the other lives in the Dominican Republic. (I don't want to live there because of the hurricanes). Anyway I could talk to one of them about what I have to do. How cool would that be to pick up and move to a different country?
Which led me to thinking that maybe I should plan on taking some time off after I graduate. I wonder if I should so that I can work and get serious about paying off some of my credit cards before I think about continuing my schooling. But then that brings up the question, would I be able to find a good enough job that would pay enough to actually allow me to pay off my credit cards? And I'd be paying school loans too (maybe, I need to take a few more classes after I graduate so I may be able to put off paying the loans if I wanted to). I don't know. I do know that I hate being in debt and something has got to change. BIG time. It's my own fault, I know. I just need to be happy with not buying things. Right now the problem is that I don't have a job and so I'm having to use credit to buy necessities like gas and food. Next weekend I'll go fill out some applications. . .the past few weeks I've been studying like crazy for tests. I hate job hunting. Especially now because all the retail places will only be looking for holiday help and I need something more than that. Just part time but more than holiday. I don't want to work retail anyway because it's almost christmas and I hate working christmas.

This morning I read some of my book for one of my classes. It's called American Jesus by Stephen Prothero. It is about all of the forms Jesus has taken in the United States. The author is very clear that he's not trying to make a statement about who Jesus was or is (like calling him the messiah or something) but it's just to look back at how Americans have portrayed him throughout the years. It's a very good book. I highly recommend it. Today I read about Jesus the Rabbi. In the 20s and 30s, Jews in America started recognizing Jesus, as a Jew and as a prophet like Moses and Jeremiah. They weren't accepting Jesus as the Messiah but they were rejecting that he was a Jew. In the Middle Ages, Jews rejected Jesus completely especially because of the fact Christians constantly called them "Christ-killers." Which amazes me that people could be so well dumb. They just dwelled on that so much. I mean the whole point of Christianity was that Jesus died and was resurrected. And people still dwell on it today. Just look at when "The Passion" came out. There was even a church that posted on their billboard (or whatever the board is out in front of the church, i can't think of what it's called) some verse that said something about the Jews killing Jesus. I was just like "who the hell cares? You're missing the point."

Oh and this week in class (a gen ed all seniors are required to take) we talked basically about the point of Christianity. We talked about the Bible and how we read it. One thing that was said was, "The Resurrection helps us understand the Bible, just as telos helps us understand the Resurrection. The Resurrection is the context and fulfillment of the whole canon." Many times in Prothero's book (mentioned about) he talks about liberal Protestants who reject the idea that Christ was resurrected. Now even though I feel like I've moved away from my conservative Christian roots I can't go that far left. One thing that I thought during the lecture was "I've never doubted the resurrection or the significance of Jesus (at least not too much). I don't have a problem with saying Jesus died and rose again. I've had a problem with everything else." I've had a problem with the Bible and how much authority it has. I've had a problem with the teachings of Paul. I really wonder if the Christianity Paul wrote about is what Jesus really wanted. Did Jesus even want there to be a whole new religion? Do people have to accept Christianity in order to accept Jesus?
So even though I don't know about all that stuff, yet, I do know this, I believe that Jesus was the Messiah, that he died for the sins of the world, and was resurrected. And I do believe that without this there is no point to Christianity. Like my professor eluded to in his lecture, without the resurrection you may as well find a new religion. Buddhism and other religions are a lot more helpful if you just want to live a good life. I agree with him.

Here is the link to the PowerPoint presentation (I don't know how to actually make it a link. . .so you'll just have copy and paste): http://faculty.ccu.edu/jmallinson/ (if that doesn't take you directly to it, click on "classes" and then it's the first class listed (INT 402 - Monday powerpoint 9/19)