Summer.

I have some random things to say today. I think I should number them. Here we go.

1. Pickles are cucumbers soaked in evil.
2. Pickles are the opposite of raisins. Think about it... Raisins are dehydrated and pickles are weird and hydrated???
3. Raisins, I think, are highly overlooked. They are nummy.
4. Figs are very sugary.
5. Apples and peanut butter is really yummy.
6. Pears and light laughing cow cheese are really yummy.
   
7. I have a sunburn.
8. Sunscreen smells like Summer.
   
9. I won't be taking any classes this summer!
10. That means I'll probably be going to camp!
11. I have the highest grade in my math class!
12. I made friends with a dog named Bear, he's nice.
13. I have a stalker! He was Mary's stalker last quarter and yesterday morning he was walking out and he said, "See ya, Elyse!" even though Mary was standing right there. He only acknowledged my existence. I told Mary that she wasn't allowed to dump her stalkers on me.
    
14. Amelia's birthday is a week from tomorrow and I have something special planned.
    
15. A week from today there is no school.
16. I only have 4 weeks of school and finals week left.
17. Next Monday I will be done with high school.
18. That is surreal, since I only started in 2005.
19. I enjoy driving myself to school.
20. There are Russians working on Mary's yard....
    
21. Gabe is in Norway with his mother.
    
22. I need to catch up on Heroes.
23. I have a lot of homework to do.
24. But I'm almost done....
25. I'm learning how to love unlovable people, because God is placing them in my life.
    
26. He's been reminding me that I'm not very love able all of the time.
27. And He's reminding me that while I was being unlovable He sent His only son to die for me, so that I could learn to love others like God has loved me.
28. Because Christians are supposed to be Ambassadors for Christ.
29. God is reminding me to treat others as if they were perfect in Christ. He's reminding me that I was in their shoes and that I can be ruder, prouder, and more obnoxious than they are.

2 Corinthians 5:11-21 (New International Version) [with emphasis added by me for those of you who glaze over when Scripture is presented. And by the way, read this passage, k? Do it for me!]

The Ministry of Reconciliation

11Since, then, we know what it is to fear the Lord, we try to persuade men. What we are is plain to God, and I hope it is also plain to your conscience. 12We are not trying to commend ourselves to you again, but are giving you an opportunity to take pride in us, so that you can answer those who take pride in what is seen rather than in what is in the heart. 13If we are out of our mind, it is for the sake of God; if we are in our right mind, it is for you. 14For Christ's love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. 15And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again.

16So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. 17Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! 18All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: 19that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men's sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. 20We are therefore Christ's ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ's behalf: Be reconciled to God. 21God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

And on that note, I leave you. I think I will go watch some Star Trek.

All my love, Elyse.