Perspective

I received a letter today from a good friend who is serving in the Peace Corps in Ethiopia. Talk about putting things in perspective. She has electricity... most of the time and running water... about every four days, and a toilet she can flush... about every four days when the water is running. WOW. I was ready to complain about my rotten egg smelling water this morning until I read the letter and I though "hmm, I have water. Hooray." In middle and upper class America we've gotten so used to having things like water and electricity that I think we forget that there are those who don't. There is so much that I could live without and I am constantly ignoring that. It's time for me to quit ignoring the blessings in my life and start sharing them.

My name is Samantha Lewis and it's time for me to change.

Jesus, camp and Mr. Joe

So, the title of this blog entry pretty much sums up everything going on in my life right now. I am reading the book Resident Aliens which is basically tackling the problem that we face as Christians living in a world where people have made Christianity into something it's not AND how we respond to the issue of both being American and being Christian. It has brought a lot of questions and challenges to everything that I think. Honestly, I think that this might be the most formative piece of literature that I've ever read. It's opened my eyes to the real call of Jesus who (I think) doesn't care as much about an individual and their "personal relationship with Jesus Christ" as he does about what the church as a body of believers is doing for the "least of these" in His name. I think that it's time the church (including me) stopped sitting around on Sundays and Wednesdays and talking about our faith and trying to make it as appealing to the world as possible, and we started going and doing what God has called us to do. Helping people, loving people. I don't really think that we can sit around anymore and ignore the problems of those around us.

Camp is extremely busy right now. Constantly going, lots to do. It's good for me to be busy. It's when I'm not that I get lonely and bored.

Mr. Joe is good. He had one of the festering wounds that he gets because of allergies but it is now all healed up. Unfortunately there is a bald spot where the sore was and it kind of looks like he has the mange.

That's about all that's going on in my life right now. Dare to lead is at camp this weekend. Should be a good time.

My name is Samantha Lewis and I am ready to put faith into action.