Stop. Come Together. (My Favorite Christmas YouTube Video This Week)

If you haven't seen this one yet, I recommend it!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g6RlCSSbBXk

I love that folks stop and come together for a few moments. Rushing, rushing, rushing, we forget to stop and come together.

We forget the why of it all.

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Enjoy your Thursday! 

Through My Being With You

Today I read in Philippians 2:25 Paul reason's for continuing in ministry even though he just wanted to depart to be with Jesus. He writes, "I know that I will remain, and I will continue with all of you for your progress and joy in the faith, so that through my being with you again your joy in Christ Jesus will overflow on account of me."

His words turn into the prayer of my heart; I want to be the kind of woman who causes your joy in Christ Jesus to overflow.

Imagine!

I fear this isn't always the case. Lord, make it so that--on account of me--joy in Christ Jesus overflows.  I wonder about the kind of person about which this statement could be true. Does this person display weakness so God's power is obvious in her? Does this person rejoice and proclaim with her mouth about God's wonders?

I'm thinking about this. I'm praying about being the kind of person who enables others' joy in Christ Jesus to overflow.

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Do you know people like this?

Unparalleled, Unique, and Exclusive

I'm teaching characterization this week, so we're talking all about vivid, unique descriptions. We want characters so unique in our writing that they cannot be interchanged with anyone else. And we want descriptions that avoid any type of cliche.

Tomorrow, we'll write down a description of ourselves and see if everyone else can match the descriptions to their owners. The quirkier the better; we're all so completely individual.

I love thinking about the uniqueness of people. It's simply amazing that we aren't like anyone else on the planet. We are unparalleled, unique, and exclusive.

By the way, my favorite character description of all time is J.K.Rowling's Hagrid. She writes:

If the motorcycle was huge, it was nothing to the man sitting astride it. He was twice as tall as a normal man and at least five times as wide. He looked simply too big to be allowed, and so wild--long tangles of bushy black hair and beard hid most of his face, he had hand the size of trash can lids, and his feet in their leather boots were like baby dolphins.

Living with flair means we embrace everything unique and quirky about us.

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Do you have a favorite character description in literature?