Back to the Serious...Kind of...

In early December, I was asked by one of my youth leaders if I would be willing to share about my trip to Greece and also a little bit of my testimony on our youth group's winter retreat. He wanted me to talk about how my trip impacted my life and what I got out of it, and how exciting it was to be in a foreign country. We decided I'd talk for 20 minutes.

Now I've only really spoken in front of a group once, and that was for 2 minutes at my church on Sunday. That had also been in front of 2000 people, lol. But I was kinda nervous, to say the least. But I came up with stuff I wanted to talk about, and I figured it would be great. :) Boy was that a misconception.

I got to Winter Camp, and the first night we had our speaker give the first message (I was scheduled for the next morning). His topic was "Who am I?". No big, I've heard those messages before. First half was pretty easy stuff...He told a few stories about his childhood, and it was pretty cool. The last half though, it seemed like every sentance cut deeper than the last. In the beginning I was smiling and excited to be there, but at the end I had my head burried in my Bible and tears running down my cheeks. Everything he said (stuff about us belonging to God, being special to Him, being created for special purposes, etc.) was soooo true, and I had been ignoring all of it just so I could live in my own pity-party life. But the very last thing he pulled was HUGE. He read Ephesians 1:4, which says, "For He chose us in Him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in His sight. In love He predestined us to be adopted as His sons through Jesus Christ with His pleasure and will." For He chose us in Him before the creation of the world...He chose ME in Him before the creation of the world. Wow. I know it's true, but it's sooo hard to believe!

Anyway, this is long enough for now. I'll finish the rest of the story later.

Chosen by Him,

<>< Christi <><

Hey HEy HEY!!!

Fat Albert's coming to save the day!!!! :)



Have you guys seen the movie Fat Albert yet? It's a comedy put together by Bill Cosby (who also appears in the movie), and it's got more class and clean laugh-your-face-off jokes and plot lines than I have seen in a LONG time! The Fat Albert Gang are just the greatest bunch, and the actors in the movie are fantastic, and they would *definiatly* make a GREAT band!! ;)



But aside from it just being a funny movie, there's also a serious side to it. Doris Robinson is kind of an outcast from school. No one will hang out with her except her adopted sister Lauri, and she's barely making it in her classes and is lucky to finish in track (which she used to be one of the best runners). She goes home after school and sits down to watch tv with tears running down her cheeks. So, she turns on the cartoon Fat Albert and a tear drop falls unto the remote, which magicly trasports the teardrom into the cartoon. Fat Albert stops what he was doing and hears a girl crying, and then a tear drop hits the ground and creates a sort of "black hole" between the cartoon world and the real world the Doris' tv set. So Fat Albert decides to leave the cartoon world and help Doris. Then, the entire Fat Albert crew head through the tv screen, and promise to help Doris solve her problems.



I know it sounds kinda stupid to read about it, but it's really not. It's an exciting, heartfelt, and funny adventure that the movie then takes you on, reminding the audience that it's not what everyone else around you thinks you are on the outside...It's what's on the inside that counts. And even though that's an age-old lesson, Fat Albert puts a TOTALLY new spin on it that makes you wanna run and be no one but yourself again! :)



Anyway, never forget that you (yes, YOU!!! The one who's reading this by now! You ROCK!!! :D) are special and wonderful and are one-of-a-kind! I hope you have a wonderful new year of 2005, and I'll update more later! :)

In Him,

<>< Christi <><

P.S. You HAVE to see Fat Albert!!! It's the must-see movie of the year! ;)

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Fat Albert pictures found at: http://members.tripod.com/BobCurry2/FatAlbert.html