I got Swag

What is wrong with people in the south? Apparently, if you get shiny lights and point them at a rock, fifteen thousand people will show up to watch!

Last weekend, Elizabeth decided to treat ME to a date. I know, shocker. Let me explain the rules of our dating contract. Most of you know that every Thursday night is date night. This is a time that no one or no thing is allowed to interfere with; its our time. However, as part of the contract, if we ever failed to comply with the regulations of the contract, due to extinuating circumstances, Elizabeth is responsible for redeeming the date by planning a substitionary date. In other words, if we miss a date night because of thanksgiving, christmas, etc. Elizabeth gets to plan the make up date at her discretion. To give you an idea of how this works, when we missed a date because I was at Alex’s wedding, she made up for it by taking me to see a Nascar Race. Georgians…

Anyways, back to the story.. Her newest date idea was to take me to a place called Stone Mountain and have a picnic. Stone Mountain is the South’s response to Mt. Rushmore. Let me describe it to you in this way: picture a rock, okay its a big rock, but its not exactly a mountain. It’s Georgia’s best effort at a mountain. Then picture a hundred drunk dixie boys repelling off the side chipping away the stone to create a monument to their favorite confederate generals. I know, I know. I don’t know how I’m surviving down here either! Every night of the summer they put on the world’s largest laser show spectacular. And, I’ll be honest, I like the shiny things as much as the next guy. It is a thirty minute productions where they used lasers put to music to create movies. They played a variety of songs which included songs by famous Georgian musicians, songs that mention Georgia or the south, or just patriotic songs in general. They used visual effects including projectors and fireworks to supplement the lasers. However, to make the experience more unique-- earlier that night, there had been a soul music concert there. So we had the added benefit of sharing this experience with no less than fifteen thousand brothas and sistas. We were unaware until we arrived that we needed a bucket of fried chicken and a skull cap in order to fit in. That is an absolutely unnecessary joke, but I thought I'd go for it while I could. Sorry if you're offended. Over all, it was a pretty fun show, and if you are ever in Georgia you should go. It is free once you are inside the park. I won’t even admit that I cried when they played the national anthem.

In other offensive news, this past Tuesday night, several days after the Stone Mountain episode, Elizabeth and I joined Mrs. Shalom for a movie night. She chose a movie that she had just gotten called Food Inc. I won’t go in to much detail, but I’ll say that it is a documentary describing how food gets from a seed to the table. It was rather upsetting. The film described the cruel treatment of workers, farmers, and animals. As a result of this production, Elizabeth and I became organics-- even on date night. I took her to an organic fast food restaurant (who even knew that existed?). The cows we were eating as hamburgers were not genetically engineered, and were allowed to graze on grass rather than fed corn. No more Taco Bell date nights for us! And this commitment has lasted almost 6 days!

Every Wednesday night, the other interns and I lead a Bible Study. We created this event and affectionately named it SWAG. No, it doesn’t stand for anything deep or spiritual like Students Walking After God or Seven Weeks Accepting Grace. Honestly, it is the name of the Cologne one of the guys I work with wears. In its defense, it smells delicious. Swag isn’t just a name though, its a style. My style. Anyway, we are doing a study on 1 Timothy. We aren’t really teaching it as much as we are just reading through and allowing the students to interact and discuss the material. It is a throw back to old school youth group which is ironic because we’re at NorthPoint. We are meeting a need the students asked for; going deeper. We are teaching them how to study the Bible. Overall, our first night went very well. So much so, in fact, that several students came up to thank me. I thought that was weird, since when do you get thanked for reading a chapter of the Bible? I’ll say this for NorthPoint, one of the things I’ve noticed is that the students don’t know much about God but they are passionate. I’ll take a passionate, naive student over a scholarly, apathetic one any day.

I can’t believe I am half way through my internship already, it seems like I just got here. I love and miss you all. The sun is hot and the humidity is oppressive, but God is GOOD!