thetinymite.com

It’s great to be back in College Station to begin a new semester, making new friends, meeting my new roommate, and starting new classes. Yes, Sterling, the old roommate, moved to an apartment. We certainly got along, but he wanted more space so he moved off-campus. My new roommate, Scott, is an Animal Science major from Round Rock. He’s a nice guy and very easy to live. The biggest difference is bedtimes. I rarely go to bed before 2am; he’s in bed before midnight. Since he has 8 o’clocks everyday and I have 3, he’s helping me get up for those early labs. Speaking of classes, I am taking all lab classes (engineering, math, physics, and chemistry), but it’s only 14 credit hours. This is the semester that makes or breaks the engineering students at A&M. Also, this weekend was the Freshman Leadership Development Retreat (FLDR), and I had so much fun. Of the many stories, I think the most memorable ones are the friendships I made with the Fish in Squadron 3 in the Core (or the T-Birds). If there were some way I could be in two places at once, I would be both a T-Bird and a Non-Reg (not in the Core). There’s not a chance in the world I’d join the Core, and being called an honorary member of the T-Birds by those guys was awesome. Speaking of the Sq3 guys, let me know if anyone else wants to be added to the list. And now for something different…

As I mentioned I went on FLDR this weekend, but I was close to not going. I really did not want to sit through a bunch of workshops with people telling me the secular doctrine for success, how to climb a corporate a ladder, how to make contacts with people that can help me make more money, etc. My assumptions for the weekend could not have been farther from reality, and I left with a renewed sense of purpose for this semester. The speakers emphasized that success was not measured in money, power, or status. To them, success was finding what you had a passion for and chasing after it with everything. I couldn’t agree more. America is too career oriented and too interested in salaries. A career should not dictate the direction of you life. Instead, we can live desiring good and seeking it wherever our days takes us, being swept up in heavenly love, wrapped tight in wings of grace. No matter how much stuff a person can accumulate in a lifespan, it will never satisfy him. To the life completely surrendered in faithful obedience to loving others and God, he will intimately know joy and peace. Please choose to live today in the present even in the tough times… under wings of Gold and Silver sometimes we have to hide.

-Reese

“Now listen, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.’ Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, ‘If it is the Lord’s will, then we will live and do this or that.’ As it is you boast and brag. All such boasting is evil.”(James 4:13-16)

“…‘but let him who boasts boast of this, that he understands and knows Me, that I am the Lord who exercises lovingkindness, justice and righteousness on earth; for I delight in these things,’ declares the Lord.” (Jeremiah 9:24)

Wow, what a great past few days. Seriously, I’ve had so much fun bowling, playing volleyball, seeing family, and just visiting with everyone. Sad to see all the Baylor women go back to rush, and even more disturbing is Laura, Carrie, and Katie all in one sorority. Too much kindness, you ladies might actually do something remarkable. Well, I’ve gotten the chance to see at least half of you these past few days which is awesome. There are a good handful of you that I haven’t seen, and not to name names, but Bryce, Stacie, Lissa, and David where have you been? I’ll be in town for until at least the January 14 and maybe even until the 18th so there is still plenty of time. To my A&M friends, I can’t wait to get back to FHK and even Sbisa (we all know it’s not because of the food, just all that good Northside loving).

Brad Holmes once told me something very important at a church camp. Looking me square in the eyes, he explained the fullness of Jesus’ greatest commandment. In Matthew, Jesus told us to love our neighbors as ourselves and to love God with all of our heart, with all of our soul, and with all of our mind. Yes, I know most of you have heard the 37th, 38th, and 39th verse of the 22nd chapter of Matthew enough to repeat it word for word. What I had failed to see and what Brad told me was this: Reese Hopkins needs love very different than the love that you need. I’m an entirely different person with entirely different problems and struggles that I handle in an entirely different way. So when we’re called to love others, Jesus did not want us to love everyone the exact same way we love ourselves. The quality of the love, the unending forgiveness we extended to ourselves, the refusal to judge is the love Jesus wants us to give to others. This is how we are known as Disciples of Christ, our freedom to love others according to their needs, not to what is comfortable for me. Each time I went beyond my comfort zone to love someone, the blessings overflowed my heart to joy, real joy. So, why is there hesitation to love others? To love someone according to his needs requires an incredible amount of vulnerability. Too often I want to stay closed off, and I don’t give love and even sometimes receive other people’s love. Where this self defense impulse comes from I do not know, but it’s roots are buried deep in pride of the most selfish kind. If there’s anything I’ve discovered lately, it’s that I don’t want myself anymore. I need something higher, something greater than me to rescue me from this hell I’ve created. As humans we have such so much unrealized good and with each day that passes, I now more fully how much good can be done through me. I say done through me because it’s not really me at all doing any of the good but a loving God who deeply cares for me and my soul. It’s to Him that I want to surrender my pride and choose love, choose vulnerability, choose freedom… choose Him. Keep Waiting, I’ll be right on time.