Xanga Said That I Had to Post in Order to Keep This

So, hello. And goodbye.

Wow have I changed.

Mr. Nesmith will always be amazing, though.

Today....

Is just another one of those days that marks a significant change.

Too bad my Xanga won't allow for that sort of change.

Which is exactly why I'm getting rid of it; it won't allow for change.

No, seriously. It won't allow me to change anything about it.   

I have a bad code in my Header box, and I can't get rid of it because the defective code took away my "Save Changes" button and also, every option below the Header box.

I asked Xanga for help, but they apparently could not help me. So, I figured that I might as well get rid of my site before the link to my background either changed or expired. It's still going to be around, but I'm not going to use it.

Oh well. Out with the old; in with the new! God bless!

(The link leads to my new Xanga. It is more so for people who read my site but don't use the TSM blogring. )

All I Want For Christmas is...

Enamel for my teeth.

Seriously.

It's kind of ironic, actually; most of the time your enamel is destroyed by not taking good enough care of your teeth. My enamel was destroyed by taking too much care of my teeth.

Brushing too hard... brushing too much.... Yep, I looked it up, and it's definitely possible.

My dentist has always told me that I brush my teeth too hard. I tried to lighten up a bit, and I thought I had.

Apparently not.

I never make myself bleed or anything, so it's not like I knew I was brushing too hard. I guess, perhaps, the fact that I can ruin a toothbrush within 2 weeks should have been a sign...

Or, the fact that I had to spit a bucket-load of bristles out of my mouth should have triggered something... (It has only happened to me twice, though. Come on!)

I also have a habit of clenching my teeth while I'm asleep. That could be a problem as well.

I guess now, I'll just have to deal with the consequences of my actions. My teeth have been super sensitive for the longest time, and I couldn't figure out why. Now I know. Huh.

All I was trying to do was whiten my teeth! How bad could that be?!

Expect Good Things

I'm not sure if I have trouble with this because I'm used to things going wrong, or because I'm actually more of a pessimist than I thought I was.

Nonetheless, I realize that I will more often expect to be disappointed in something than I expect to be pleased with it. I guess, in a way, I do it to save myself from the pain of disappointment. You can't be disappointed in something if you're already expecting disappointment.

One of the areas in which I realize that I do not expect good things is in relationships. I admit, I'm quite the pessimist when it comes to relationships. I used to try not to get my hopes up about making friends, because I was convinced that sooner or later it would come to an end, and I'd end up being disappointed. I can't figure out if I still believe that. I don't think that method of dealing with my friendlessness was an entirely good one, though, because it caused me to go into a state of apathy. I stopped caring about whether or not I had friends. I stopped praying for friends. I was quite content in being alone.

God has recently blessed me with some amazing friends, though, and I must say, I'm thrilled about it. I finally understand why people enjoy hanging out with their friends so much. I can actually refer to people as my friends and not mean "acquaintances". 

Deep inside of me, though, I can't help but expect it not to last. I've never really had friends before, and so I'm completely humbled that God would bless me with people in whose eyes I seem to have found favor. I can never stay at a Godly state of humbleness, though. It always turns into not being good enough. I keep thinking to myself, "Why do these people even choose to be my friend? What if what they considered to be likable about me is actually a quality that I do not possess? How am I supposed to keep their favor? How am I supposed to gain it?" And I end up believing that my friendships are all based on works, and that I have to prove myself to my friends in order to gain the favor I already had with them in the first place.

And then there's the Worship Team. O the Worship Team. I don't think anybody really understood why I was so upset about making it. In my eyes, I was being set up for failure. To me, God chose a mediocre singer to try to lead people into worship. "It isn't fair," I kept saying to myself, and often to others. And actually, I sometimes still find myself saying that it isn't fair. It's not that I thought that God was out to get me, but to me it seemed that He had in mind for me to fail so that I could learn something from it. I didn't want to fail in doing something I never wanted to do in the first place. I only tried out because God was telling me to.

I've come to terms with my current position, and I can actually say, "If this is the lot apportioned to me by the Lord, then so be it," but sometimes I still can't see past my own opinions that I should not be in this position. God never said anything about me being a worship leader, so what am I doing here? I can't lead these people into worship. I can't even lead the practices. Marcus tried to get me to lead tonight, and he's asked me to lead on Sunday because he won't be there. I didn't even know what I was doing. I still don't. I know I'm supposed to be the "lead worshipper", but I can't be when I'm much too afraid of failing. I'd rather just do what Marcus says to do. I never wanted to be in this position because I knew it would bring all of my fears to the surface for me to deal with, and indeed it has.

I don't want any of this to sound as if I am doubting God's goodness. I know that God is Good, and Romans 8:28 is a HUGE promise of His; as are other verses (Jeremiah 15:10, Jeremiah 29:11, 2 Cor. 9:12 and Phil. 4:13.) Nor do I doubt the goodness of others. I just have trouble believe that I will receive good things, and I think it's because I'm used to being content in not receiving things, and also because I don't think I deserve good things-well, no one does, actually. You'd think I would get that by now. Grace is a constant theme in my entries.

EDIT:
I'm hopeful, but I'm not very expecting.

Sometimes I'm so discouraged that I feel like throwing up. Like now.

Uh..../Jesus Glorified in Christmas

It's snowing a lot right now.

According to the Smith Family Tradition, tomorrow we decorate!

Also, the season finale of Avatar: The Last Airbender airs tomorrow night. I bet no one cares, though.

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I think this entry seemed darker than I intended it to seem, but try to see the "lightness" of it. The lightness comes toward the end, which greatly relates to Advent. I said in another entry of mine that I enjoy finding the deeper meaning of things, which is why I often seem to post about potentially controversial topics that wouldn't usually be controversial until I decide to "overanalyze" them.. I hope this isn't controversial though, because it isn't meant to be. Yeah.

I was upset earlier this week because there was no joy in my thinking about Christmas. I've been wanting for it to snow so that perhaps, I would be filled with the "Christmas Spirit". On Tuesday night, on my way to Bible study, I was talking with my mom about how we often make a mockery of Christmas. It seems that, no matter how much we try to avoid it, we end up thinking, "Christmas is about Giving, Sharing, and Caring... Oh, and I'm sure Jesus has something to do with it as well."

The three things I mentioned are good, and they're great actions for a Christian to take, but I'm still convinced that Christmas means more than that. I wasn't raised in a Christian home, so Jesus was never really the focus of Christmas when I was a kid. I was told that it was Jesus' birthday, but I was also told that Santa was coming.

The Jesus part meant nothing to me.

All I was actually concerned about was whether or not Santa was going to place a lump of coal within my stocking for anything I had possibly done earlier that year, and I was of course concerned about what I was going to be receiving in the morning. As I've gotten older, the main reason behind my Christmas excitement has been the decorations and the opportunity to give gifts to others. Those things are not exactly bad, per se, but they come nowhere near the true meaning of Christmas. I don't want to celebrate another Christmas with these two factors being the source of my excitement. I want Jesus to be the source of my excitement. I want Jesus to be glorified on Christmas.

The term, "Jesus' birthday" has never really sat well with me, because to me, it was never exactly celebrated. "Why on earth," I often wondered to myself, "do we give gifts to each other? It isn't any of our birthdays." (Unless your birthday happens to land on Christmas day. )

I've heard it said that we give gifts to each other because God gave the Gift of His Son to us. That's a pretty good reason, I think, but there has to be more to this holiday. There has to be a specific way in which Jesus is glorified through all of the things we've made Christmas out to be. There just has to be more.

Val brought up Advent on Tuesday, and how the children are learning about it in Children's Church. In these few weeks before Christmas, we're supposed to be commemorating Christ's coming into the world.

She then pointed out how it gets dark really early in December, and that it's a slight metaphor of how Advent is supposed to be a time of darkness, until Christmas, when Christ was born into the world.

Ah, finally; there it was! This is exactly what I had been searching for! At last, this all has meaning to me. No more mockery. No more claiming that Jesus is the Reason for the Season without actually comprehending the true meaning behind it. Check this out:

O little town of Bethlehem,
How still we see thee lie.
Above thy deep and dreamless sleep
The silent stars go by;
Yet in thy dark streets shineth
The everlasting Light;
The hopes and fears of all the years
Are met in thee tonight.

Woah. Talk about powerful. Talk about significant. Every time I read the words to this, it makes my heart race. This says more to me than "Christmas is Jesus' birthday" ever has, and probably ever will. Jesus' birthday is one thing, but Jesus bringing light into an unsuspecting and darkened world is another. It's the same thing, basically, but I think the latter has more meaning. The hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight. Seriously, this is amazing to me. I can't even put it into words. The most significant thing in history happened in the small town of Bethlehem, while the whole entire world, including Bethlehem itself, was "sleeping." It's amazing. I'm excited. This is now my favorite Christmas Carol.

I'm not saying that I've never before focused on Jesus at Christmas time, because I have, but I can finally understand how one can focus on Jesus at Christmas in this fallen world of ours. We've distorted Christmas' meaning, and my attempts to bring Jesus back into Christmas have always seemed futile and clichéd. All of the ways I had heard before, that were meant to tell me how to make Christ the main focus of Christmas, weren't good enough. I still felt like I was robbing God. I want to have a Christmas where Jesus is truly glorified, and where He is the True Focus.

I've always said that my favorite holiday was Good Friday, because it's one of the only holidays where Jesus is the complete focus. No holiday mascots, no gifts, no huge dinners (in my family, at least.) We gain nothing from it but Jesus himself.

Now, finally, I can see Christmas in this way.

This was a long entry. Sorry about that. I hope it was worth your time, though, because I found this to be really exciting. Perhaps you did as well? Maybe not. Haha. God bless.