Florida's Prestigious Community Colleges

Yesterday I went to register for the summer semester at Brevard Community College here in Titusville. I was very excited because the advisor had told me that 11 of my 14 credits would transfer over. Imagine my surprise when I arrive in the advisor’s office with a list of classes I would like to enrol in only to be told that I have to go back to 101. “What?” I say politely (scream impatiently in my head) “I thought my credits would transfer.” “Yes they do,” explains the very helpful advisor, “but only as electives, you will need to take the core classes again.”

    Out came the class schedule again and we drummed through, her helpfully pointing out possible classes and me trying to downplay the whole idea of having to repeat courses. When I finally emerged from the darkness that is the ‘Student Center’ I had managed to register for 3 classes totalling $678.25. $250 of which will be spent on repeating English 101! Oh well, such is life. At least I am looking forward to being in a classroom again. That said, what if we have to move again and, heaven forbid, it is out of state – will another Com College accept BCC credits? Or will I be stuck in the land of 101 classes forever more?

     The funny thing about this, and yes there is a little humour involved, that another guy had it much worse than me. Dad sent me an excerpt from a blog titled, “The Night Watch Sees All”, if I am remembering right this guy is also a former (or current?) Mercy Shipper. Anyhow, here’s what he wrote…poor bloke…

 

30 November 2005 7:51 PM

An Extremely Unhappy Post Wherein I May Seem To Question The Sanity Of Florida's Community College System

Number of high school AP courses I completed: Four

Years of my life spent at a well-known liberal arts college: Four and a half

Degree already completed: Bachelor of Science

Major type: Double

Number of credits amassed: One hundred and sixty (160)

Number of classes for which this local community college will grant me transfer credit: One (1)

 

Wait. Sorry. Sorry, let me just make sure, one more time, that I have this right. I spent eighty thousand dollars and a full one-fifth of my life earning a double-major bachelor's degree, and of those hundred and sixty credit hours I have earned through hard work, study, and an unbelievable amount of money, your community college will accept ONE CLASS???

 

Thank you. I just wanted to make the world aware of that.

(read blog here)http://rand-o-blog.blogspot.com/2005/11/extremely-unhappy-post-wherein-i-may.html

 

 

 

The Way Out

“Way out people know the way out”.  – Michael Frost

 

     I love Richard Adams’s book, Watership Down. I especially love one of the central characters, a young rabbit named Fiver. Fiver is strange right from the start. His brother Hazel, when telling another rabbit where Fiver’s name came from explains, “Five in a litter, you know: he was the last – and the smallest. You’d wonder nothing had got him by now. I always say a man couldn’t see him and a fox wouldn’t want him.” Being last and small, however, is only the beginning of Fiver’s oddities. Fiver has insights. Although not clearly being able to express them, he gets feelings and seems especially adept at sensing danger. The other rabbits think he is crazy and dismiss him as peculiar yet harmless, only Hazel listens, although he is rarely quick to act.

     The book begins at the warren with Fiver desperately trying to convince Hazel that something horrible will happen and they must leave the warren at once. Hazel finally believes him and they set out to tell the Threarah (chief rabbit). The Threarah does not believe Fiver and dismisses them, punishing the rabbit who permitted them to enter his hole.

     Eventually Fiver and Hazel convince a small band of ‘outskirters’ (fringe of society) and a few ‘Owsla’ (Threarah’s guards) to depart with them. This motley crew quickly head out of the warren and find themselves facing all kinds of danger. They are forced to travel through woods, swim rivers, dodge predators, and all with no clear sense of direction or leadership. They are fearful, cold, tired and drenched when they happen upon another warren. There they meet big, beautiful, well fed rabbits who seem strangely friendly and invite Hazel and the others to join them in their warren.

     The rabbits quickly overcome any anxious feelings about the new rabbits and settle down to join their warren, only Fiver is ill at ease and refuses to have anything to do with them. Hazel is frustrated with Fiver’s insolent behavior. After some time in this new warren a rabbit is caught in a snare, to Hazel’s dismay the warren rabbits refuse to help free the trapped rabbit. Instead they abuse Fiver when he calls for help. Once the trapped rabbit is freed they decided to head back to the warren, but Fiver shouts out and calls for them to leave immediately. Still the rabbits believe in the safety of the warren. Finally Fiver explains to them the meaning of everything that had happened to them since the day they arrived.

     Fiver explains that the warren and meadows are snared, traps set everywhere by the farmer. That is why the farmer throws out food for the rabbits, to fatten them for good meat and silky fur, it is also why the farmer shoots the prey animals. Fiver goes on to tell that all the warren rabbits know this, but they choose to stay - putting to the back of their minds that every now and again a few rabbits will disappear, never to be seen again.
      “They forgot the ways of wild rabbits. They forgot El-hrairah (godlike mythical rabbit), for what use had they for tricks and cunning, living in the enemy’s warren and paying his price? They found out other marvelous arts to take the place of tricks and old stories. They danced in ceremonious greeting. They sang songs like the birds and made Shapes on the walls; and though these could help them not at all, yet they passed the time and enabled them to tell themselves that they were splendid fellows, the very flower of Rabbitry, cleverer than magpies...But one strict rule they had; oh yes, the strictest. No one must ever ask where another rabbit was and anyone who asked, ‘Where?’ – except in a song or a poem – must be silenced. To say ‘Where?’ was bad enough, but to speak openly of the wires – that was intolerable. For that they would scratch and kill.”

     The stories told in Watership Down, and especially in Fiver’s above discourse, strike at my heart. Like the rabbits, I headed out of the warren and into the wild. Taking up my cross to follow after the real El-hrairah, not a godlike hero, but the God-Man hero; seeking to live by His stories.

     What troubles me the most is that like these rabbits, I escaped death, but quickly find myself right back in it, only this time death is sly and massively deceptive. This new snare beckons me in with the promise of a full stomach and a good night’s sleep, with friends and fresh ideas. It says, “You have come so far and struggled so much. Rest here with me. See how happy and content I am? I will keep you safe.”

      Is this not the opposite of what Jesus said? As I remember He said, “Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head” (Mat 8:20). And then there is Paul, a man like Fiver, who writes in Galatians 5:1, “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by the yoke of slavery.” This is what we are called to, to be like Fiver, to be like Paul.

     I dare say we are called to the warren rabbits, not to the warren, not for a night’s sleep and certainly not to stay. But called to the warren rabbits none the less; for it is impossible to journey through life without meeting souls who are living in the “enemy’s warren”. We are called to speak and live truth, bidding others to join the journey into the wild, into freedom. Even in Richard Adam’s story we find a warren rabbit, Strawberry, joins Hazel’s group. Strawberry has known all along about the wire snares, but only after his doe is killed, when he hits rock bottom, does he choose to the leave the warren.    

     In Jude 1:20-23 we read, “Be merciful to those who doubt; snatch others from the fire and save them; to others show mercy, mixed with fear--hating even the clothing stained by corrupted flesh.”

     This is not an easy command to live up to, nor will it make you popular. Fiver wisely understood this, “…one strict rule they had; oh yes, the strictest. No one must ever ask where another rabbit was and anyone who asked, ‘Where?’ – except in a song or a poem – must be silenced. To say ‘Where?’ was bad enough, but to speak openly of the wires – that was intolerable. For that they would scratch and kill.”

     Most will not want to hear the message of truth, Strawberry was the only one to leave the warren and follow after Hazel’s group. In fact, not only is the truth unpopular, but deadly, “for that they would scratch and kill.”

    In 1 John 3:13 we are warned, “Do not be surprised, my brothers, if the world hates you.” Jesus also asks us to “count the cost” before setting out to follow him. Yet despite the cost, the story inspires.

     In some respects I want to be like Fiver - a way out soul who knows the way out, but also like Hazel, a compassionate leader who is able to welcome in a rabbit who was longing to escape the ‘enemy’s warren’. Mostly I want to be like Jesus, the wild God-Man who had no warren on earth and lived His life as a journey on the way to the heavenly dwelling “so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life”(2Cor5:4).

 

Rambling

I am alone in the apartment trying to kill time before work this afternoon. If I had a little extra cash I would be shopping, but that it out of the question. I very nearly went out the door credit card in hand, but thankfully gave in and did my quiet time instead. The time with HS pretty much killed any desire to be irresponsible and spend lots of money we don’t have…ugh.

The bunnies are running around the living room and jumping all over a couple of thrift shop bound bags of clothes. Roast was chewing the plastic and now, after several attempts to stop him, I have decided he probably isn’t really ingesting much of it anyway – lots of holes and stretch marks in the bag now. Is this what it is like having a two year old?

Speaking of babies, seems like everyone around me is having one. Couple of months ago Mandy had her second child and Sarah had her first, couple of days ago Candice had her first, Katie is preggers with her second and Ben’s cousin Laura with her third! Yesterday Ben and I were talking about it, is this what people do when they get to be mid-twenties and are we weird for not joining in? Funny thing is that when we were first married I was much more comfortable with the idea, get married and have kids - that’s the way it goes right? Well, now that we are six months from our fourth wedding anniversary I am more scared than ever about having children! I can hardly handle some plastic bag chewing bunnies!.

---It is now an hour since I wrote the above. Boy do I ramble.. Just got back from Scott and Chris’s house. Scott cut the legs of a table for me and transformed it into a coffee table. I cut us the bunny cage and placed it inside the coffee table. It frees up quite an bit of room and will be nice to have a cage that also works as a table. I’ll take pics of it so you can see. The wood table top currently just sits, it is not screwed to the legs in any way, maybe I can put it on a hinge? That way it would open like a trunk…we shall see. Hope Ben approves, but then again if he doesn’t it’s to late anyhow, the old cage is in pieces. Oh, for the record, Ben is aware of the coffee table cage plan, he just isn’t here to see it executed.

Better be off now, need to put the clothes in the drier.

Anisha

Jesus Style

Crosswalk (our church here in T’ville) are all on the same bible reading schedule and much to my dismay the schedule turned to the book of Job in the first week of April. I was not excited. I had not heard a peep from HS in a month and now we were reading Job?! Of all the possible readings why Job? Well, HS has begun to speak again. He never told me the reason for the silence, but did open my eyes to see the fruit of it. HS eased back into dialog with me, quietly speaking a word or turning my heart, only yesterday did he drop a revelation bombshell on me.

     In true Jesus style, the revelation came from the most unlikely source, Job, the book I was dreading re-reading.

     As I started Job, taking a chapter a day, I did not see anything new. It all lined up with what I had heard preached on the book countless times. I was aching for something new, something fresh and was certain it would not come from Job. Thankfully, I was wrong.

Nine days into the book in chapter, you guessed it, nine I read the following statement from Job about God [9:32-35]

“He is not a man like me that I might answer Him, that we might confront each other in court. If only there were someone to arbitrate between us, to lay his hand upon us both, someone to remove God’s rod from me, so that his terror would frighten me no more. Then I would speak up without fear of Him, but as it stands with me now, I cannot.”

 

In chapter 11 Zophar answers Job telling him to repent and later in verse 20 accusing him of being “wicked”.

     Thankfully Job replies in 12:3

 

“I have a mind as well as you; I am not inferior to you.”

 

It was in these words, “I am not inferior to you” that HS spoke to me. Job was yearning with all his might for the coming Messiah, he had actually unknowingly spoken out prophetically about Jesus. His friend Zophar, instead of joining in with Job’s longing for an arbitrator told him what he must “do”. Thankfully Job recognized Zophar’s prideful heart and responded accordingly. With this ancient situation in mind, HS opened my eyes and I realized I have been like Zophar. There are people around me everyday who are crying out for Jesus, the Messiah, and I am literally blocking their view of Him. I immediately began to repent and it all flooded in, what restrictions and I placing before people who are searching for Jesus? How is my ‘religion’ getting in the way? There were three choices before Job that day

1. To continue to seek God

2. To follow Zophar’s advice

3. To reject God completely

Thankfully Job continues to seek God, although discouraged, he was not deterred. This brings me to Luke 18:10-14

 

“To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everybody else, Jesus told this parable: Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood up and prayed about himself, “God, I thank you that I am not like other men – robbers, evildoers, adulterers- or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.” But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, “God, have mercy on me, a sinner.” I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”

 

  After giving this parable, Jesus does something incredible; he welcomes little children and proclaims “The kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.” Jesus wisely knew that simply giving this teaching wasn’t enough, the hearers then, as I have done now, would think, ‘Yes, but I have never done such a thing, I have never said such an evil prayer.’ So he makes it very clear that in fact we have said that prayer and lived arrogantly, by proclaiming that the kingdom belongs to children.

     As I read Job, it is quite easy to say to myself, ‘I would never do that, I wouldn’t insist that my friend is a sinner and will not receive relief until they repent, this book doesn’t apply to me.’ But it is exactly that attitude Jesus is trying to pry out of me. My ‘spirituality’ is my stumbling block and I willfully place it in front of others, especially those who are seeking. In my religious zeal, I box up my Messiah and he is no longer the Lion of Judah, but a stuffed teddy bear. I cuddle and love this teddy and try to convince others how wonderful it is, they are searching for an untamable Lion and all I offer is a stuffed toy.
     I am not ok with this. It was the Lion who won my heart, the Saviour who would not fit in any box, the one who promised to take me on out of this world adventures and reveal unfathomable mysteries.  He is the one I long to follow, he is the one who lights an irrepressible fire in my soul.

     With this knowledge, I take a fresh look at Job and realize there is a lot for me to learn. I pray, “HS show me how to abandon my puffed up spirituality and live the life of uncontainable love Jesus lived.”

Silence is not Forgetting.

The last month has been a tiresome one. It has been four weeks now since my last word from God; I feel out of place and terribly lonely. I am used to quite a bit of conversation with HS (Holy Spirit) on a daily basis, His voice always clear and constant.

     When I first noticed the eerie silence, I felt I must have done something wrong, some sin somewhere had hidden His voice. But after heart searching and praying, I realized it was not on account of error, but simply silence for silence sake. Within a few days my nerves were shot, I felt like someone had died, His presence was there, but not His voice. During this time Ben left for a week’s mountain flying course in Nevada. Now I was really alone. I kept up in my quiet time and still sat silently, waiting for some word, any word, to be spoken to my heart, telling HS this new quietness is ok with me, but that I would really like to hear from Him.

     One evening, while driving to dinner at a friend’s house, my Dad called and told me my Grandfather was not doing well and was very ill. I pulled to the side of the road, unable to drive I began sweating and was sick. Later that evening, as I lay on my friend’s bed I asked HS to speak to me, after more than an hour, there was nothing, no spoken word, only silence.      

     Last Sunday evening, during small group I shared how dejected I felt. After, as I was checking my e-mail, I came across a message from a West African friend whom I have not heard from in many months. His opening line was, “Silence is not forgetting.” Those four words have made all the difference, I wrote them with huge letters on the white board above our computer desk and find myself reflecting on them throughout the day. I realize now that it is not my right to hear HS speak to me and the fact that I have for such a long time is a blessing and a gift. My heart is right and there is no guilt or condemnation for me, after all, none of this life is really about me and what I want anyways.  

 

Anisha