...And, sadly, I wasn't terribly surprised...

"A gunman opened fire on a geology class at Northern Illinois University Thursday afternoon, killing five people before taking his own life on stage as panicked students ran and ducked for cover."
-CBS

I didn't hear anybody say anything about this all day. I read about after I got home from class and, sadly, I wasn't terribly surprised. I know, it seems terribly insensitive of me, but it's true. Nobody seems to care, but there have been 3 other shootings (that I know of) since the Virginia Tech shooting. One at my friends church and two other school shootings. One in Finland and the other today, at North Illinois University. It makes me think of a picture I saw on my sisters myspace. This homeless guy, sitting on the sidewalk with a piece of cardboard with some writing on it.

"Keep your coins. I want change."

Toto, I've got a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore.

In the rather popular film The Wizard of Oz Judy Garland's character tells her
dog, Toto, that she is of the opinion that they aren't in Kansas anymore. Which I think is a fair statement considering what happens throughout the rest of the film.

I've been thinking about that recently. That line, the one about not being in Kansas anymore, came to mind the other night and I thought it was quite profound, especially around midnight. If you think about it; it draws a great parallel with the way Christians should be viewing where they are right now. I don't mean the kind of where I am right now like I just happen to be sitting in a coffee shop listening to Death Cab for Cutie right now. But the kind of I'm on Spaceship Earth in this physical body kind of where I am right now.

We're on a journey, you know? We're actually on a lot of journeys right now. From Birth to Death. From Day to Day. From Naive to Wise. From Dollar to Dollar. We're also on a spiritual journey. From Death to Life. From this Life to the next One. And I was thinking that we are a long ways away from where we were supposed to be when God first created us.

He created us to be in Union with Him. But we screwed up and now we are separated from Him by Sin. So I was thinking the other day that we are a long way from where we started(Kansas) and that we are on a journey(the Yellow Brick Road) and we have a destination to work towards(the Emerald City).

There will be a lot of distractions on the Road, but there will also be friends to help us along the way. People with Courage, Heart, and Brains. I'm not gonna say that you need a dog named Toto, but a faithful companion is always a good person to have around.

I know that's a lot of stuff to go through but I really liked the Wizard of Oz and thought that I might impart some of my thoughts on it and Spirituality. I hope you enjoyed it. I also hope that this is just the first in a long list of Coffee Station Writings. I'll leave you with two quotes from two movies that go together very well:

The first:
"Mama always said life was like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're gonna get."

And with that in Mind:
"Carpe diem. Seize the day, boys. Make your lives extraordinary."

Winter

So Winter is here and it's awesome. You're probably saying, "Jon, it's almost February.
Winter has been here for a long time." Aha! But Jon Foreman's new Winter EP just came out today! And it's really good. If you haven't listened to his Fall EP you should check that out as well. Just go over to Jon Foreman's MySpace and you can listen to the whole EP. Give it a listen. It's really different from Switchfoot's music. Jon's seasonal EPs are much more acoustic jazz kind of stuff with all these little goodies thrown in to add spice to it. Go check it out!

Welcome

So I'll just be writing about what's been happening to me and the varied adventures I have on this blog. I can't guarantee how much I'll write on here but if something interesting happens you'll be able to find it here.