Standing on the Brink of Adulthood

I wrote this whilst returning to York from the Christmas holidays, by no way is it perfect - not even to me - but I feel it sums up the insecurities that I (and I'm sure others) feel as we reach the end of University.

I'm standing on the brink of adulthood

unsure of where to go next.

The life I had planned before me

is coming to an end.

I dreamed of finishing University

with flying colours to my name,

but there my dreaming finished

left for a rainy day.

I guess the dreams then continued 

along a path that was clear to tread,

but now I stand upon the edge,

I know not where to tread.

I feel the weight of expectation,

a job which will make my family proud

I dream a dream, not of wealth nor power,

for my dream is simple, I just wish I'll be happy.

As I stand upon the brink of adulthood,

I do not know what my future brings,

and as my dreams may turn to dust,

upon my Lord I must trust.

Religion is irrational

This week I went to a debate by York Union debate called "Religion is irrational and today's society would be better off without it." Whilst I am, without a doubt, against this notion, I also feel torn by the argument, because for me, my Christian faith is a bit irrational.

When I say I believe in God, I know I can never design an experiment to prove it (although, I cannot design one to disprove God’s existence), I know that my ‘reasoning’ behind my belief will be perceived as irrational, and that is the beauty of it. I have a faith, I believe in what I cannot prove through science, but that doesn’t make it any less true. Augustine said (according to the internet)

“Faith is to believe what we do not see; and the reward of this faith is to see what we believe.”

At the end of the day, regardless of whether I can prove to someone that God is real, I know in my heart that it’s true. And it’s the truth, which for me is the most irrational part of all.

God, created this world to have a relationship with us. And yet, we rebelled. We turned away, decided we could live without him, but despite the fact, God never gave up. He sent prophet after prophet, and finally his son, to die, for me and for you, to save us.

For me, that is what is irrational. God, creator of the Universe was willing to die, for you and for me, because he loves us, despite everything we have done, and will do. God loves you and God loves me. And how can we ever deserve that? God’s love for us is completely and utterly irrational. He does not need us, and yet he calls out to us in love and welcomes us into his family.

(This blog was originally posted on www.belfreystudents.org/blog)

Final Year Fears

It's coming to the end of my final 'student' summer. Next summer I should be starting (or at least looking) for a job. Gone will by the days of reading papers, and jumping through academic hoops. By this time next year, I'll have graduate, and I'm terrified.

In less than 12 months I'll have ended my journey on the road of education. I've learnt to read and count, I've learnt facts and figures, I've learnt how to revise and pass exams, I've learnt social skills (well....I've tried to!) I've learnt about who I am as a person and what I enjoy to do, I've developed skills and discovered my strengths and weaknesses. But despite all this, I have no idea WHAT I'm going to do next.

So here I am, I've managed to delay the decision making year till now, I've seen my friends decided what they are going to do next, whether they've got jobs or continued in education. And I'm none the wiser.

But despite being terrified, I know God's in control. I know he's got a plan for my life, a plan that is perfect. Because God knows what makes me tick, he knows me better than I even know myself. I know that he will reveal his plan for me, he'll make a path for me to walk along, and while it may not be an easy path, I know it'll be the best one for me. I just need to listen to him and work it out.

"Trust in the Lord with all your heart

and lean not on your own understanding:

in all your ways submit to him,

and he will make your paths straight."

Proverbs 3:5-6

It's Upgrade time | Or is it?

The other day I received an email from O2 entitled: It's Upgrade time, Jessica. Which then proceeded to tell me about O2 refresh: 

'A new phone now.

A new phone whenever you want.'

Don't get me wrong, it's a great idea, no longer will people have to be locked into a contract with a phone they no longer like because it's no longer the latest model. But, what is wrong, is our attitude. Why should a perfectly good phone be deemed 'useless' just because it can't use 4G (or whatever the latest techy thing is) or because it's 6 months old so it now deemed 'old.' 

I don't understand this waste culture. My phone works fine, and want to know the reason I bought it in the first place, my old one (bought of a friend several years ago) had stopped working. I didn't ask for the latest model, as I didn't really care, but I did have one requirement: that my new phone stored the texts as a conversation, rather than individual messages.  

But now my two year contract has run out and society says I have two options. Get a new phone (and contract) or buy into this idea of O2 refresh, and get a new phone whenever I want. But the thing is my old phone works fine, it's a bit scratched and damaged, but it works. So what happens to it now. Does it just sit in my draw, a waste of some of the world's resources. Because while my one old phone in a draw doesn't make much differences, if everyone does it, well that's a lot of old phones sitting around all of which contain metals of some desciption. And why should we be wasting the world's limited resources like this?

So instead of following the crowd and going for an upgrade, I'm opting to stay with my phone, and just get a sim only contract. Because at the end of the day, I don't care. I don't own a phone to surf the net, check facebook and tweet, but to text and ring people. Radical I know. But I don't need an upgrade to do that. And if people care more about the model of my phone then me, I really don't see the point in texting them. Because my phone doesn't define me, it's just useful. So come a few weeks time, I'm going onto a Sim Only contract so I can do by bit to save the world's resources (and as an added bonus, save myself some pennies.)