1) It has snowed 12 times in the 20 days that I've lived here. Yes, 12. ARE YOU KIDDING ME?! CRAZY! I kinda love it, though cuz it's been fun for the most part, and as a friend of mine recently told me why he's loves Minnesota: "The weather builds character." Ha, yeah...
2) The average temperature has been 10 degrees…don't believe me on those first 2? Check here, Doubting Thomas's:
http://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/KSTP/2014/1/26/MonthlyHistory.html#calendar
3) I wrote a paper BEFORE the night before it was due…I was a terrible procrastinator in college…and in high school :-(
4) I saw the Mississippi River a lot thinner than I'm used to seeing in Missouri, and I took some pictures of it frozen over…scroll to the bottom to see them, then click on the photo that you want to enlarge.
On a more spiritual note…I'd like to share a journal entry of mine that I think fits this blog well. I named it "I Will Love Fearlessly" so I would have a constant reminder that no matter what, God is calling me to love…to love Him, to love myself, and to love each and every one of His children. IN EVERY MOMENT! I do this poorly, so please pray for me that I may grow in holiness and in love with our God more and more each day.
Based off mediating on 1 John 4:11-18:
This reading is incredible. It really is the basis for my word of the year, "Love." Verse 18--"There is NO FEAR in love, but PERFECT LOVE drives out fear because fear has to do with punishment, and so one who fears is not yet perfect in love" (emphasis added). WOW!! Reminds me that I MUST SURRENDER my entire heart to Jesus. Most of my struggles lately have been because of anger, impatience, negative thoughts of other people, judging others and their intentions, etc…I have failed to have charity in my heart; rather, my "hardness of heart" (Mark 3) obstructs me from allowing God to work in my life and the lives of others because they can't see God in me when my heart is so hardened.
In the Acts of the Apostles, the Gentiles (or non-Jews) knew who the Christians were by their love: how they genuinely loved each other, served and cared for each other, even fraternally corrected each other. They were allowing God to infiltrate their hearts and clean out every dirty room in that house. Getting the bedrooms, the spare rooms, under the beds, the bathrooms, the closets, everything! And their response was to love the Lord through deep, personal prayer (communal prayer, too), the holy Mass, and their love & service for the people God placed before them…
[Pray with me here, if you wish:]
O my Jesus, help me to love as you love. Help me to serve as you serve. Help me to die on the cross with you this day, and every day, that when my time on Earth is finished, I may live with you forever in Heaven. Help me to truly live as St. Catherine of Siena put it: "All the way to heaven is heaven, because Jesus said, 'I am the Way.'" Help me to be the man you MADE ME to be. Help me to love you fearlessly, radically different and better and purer than I ever have before. And help me to love others by putting their good as more important than my own. I ask this in your most precious name, through the intercession of Mary most holy, who I ask to make my prayer pure and perfect. Amen.
Cheers, and thank you all so very much for your prayers.
Heart, Ryan
If you haven't already, you need to go up to Itasca State Park, where the Mississippi starts. It's not even recognizable up there. And it's fun to say you've walked across the Mississippi (in the summer, of course).
ReplyDeleteGreat advice, Angie! I'll definitely do that, but I tell ya, I'm gonna wait until it's nice outside…so maybe August?
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