So for those who keep up with my blog, you may remember the day back in October when my car broke down in Charlotte. If not you can read here. Any way, I stopped in there on my way back to Thomasville for the camp out a couple weeks ago and saw the same guy who was kind enough to help me and allow me to leave my car there over night. Again, on my way back to Gardner-Webb last night there was a LOT of traffic, what is normally a 2 hour drive to GWU, took 3 hours. I was also getting very tired so I decided to stop for what I thought would be a brief moment to pick up a drink at the same gas station I had broken down at earlier.

When I pulled in, I immediately noticed the man who had helped me out. He was outside picking up the trash that people had left outside. I walked in grabbed a drink and a snack and went to pay. He walked in while I was paying and to my surprise, he recognized me from that night. We got to talking about the holidays and how he celebrates holidays. He went to his mom’s house to eat with his mom and brothers and sisters. Nothing out of the ordinary. We joked around about things that had been going on. He has a great sense of humor. We talked about plans for the future. He wants to join the army. We talked about religion. He is Hindu. We talked about the languages. He speaks Urdu (pronounced Urru do roll the r’s like spanish). We talked about our homes. His is 7000 miles away in Pakistan.

This man had nothing against me. He did not look at me differently. He did not think differently of me because of my religion. I am amazed by this man. He holds no blanket judgments. He simply wanted to talk. He wanted to talk about life. Just like I did.

After talking for about 30 minutes, I realized that I must be getting back to school and Ali wished me safe travels back to school. Since the traffic was horrendous, I had a lot of time to think about this. I was the one who had the blanket judgments. I was the one that thought he was automatically a bad person. I was the one who was completely wrong in the whole thing. He is a normal guy who has an awesome story. I have been blown away today by the lack of judgment cast on me while I was talking to him, and the incredible amount of judgment cast by myself during the conversation. Yet every one of those judgments was broken to pieces after talking to him. People are people no matter what color, background, or religion. That is probably one of the neatest things I have realized lately. People are People

People around here have all seen my shirt that says “Procrastinators unite Tomorrow.” This was me in high school. I would wait until the VERY last minute to get everything done and just barely get by. Now though, I am different. I just finished a project early. I am ahead. Not behind. Ahead. This is a weird feeling for me. I am not used to not having homework to do. I do not know what to do.

Over the past few days I have been REALLY bored for some weird reason… and mostly LATE at night. I have picked up a new hobby. Origami. It all started off when I got bored in precal and folded an Origami Swan.. I will show you some pictures of my creations!

is it spring time?

this took FOREVER!!

Last night was the Shawn McDonald concert, and I had a BLAST!! I felt at home down here for the first time. You know how when youre at home and you run into people you know out in public, well that happened to me for the first time last night, and I was SUPER excited about that!

Also, I talked to my good friend from back home, Chris Thompson, last night and hopefully he will be coming down after Thanksgiving break! I cannot wait to get to hang out with him while he is home! We always have a blast doing stupid things together and talking sports, life, and whatever else comes our way.

The last two days have been quite exciting. Basketball has been a large extra-curricular event here lately. Tonight I went to church and stayed after to play some basketball with the youth there. I had a BLAST man it was fun!

I also registered for classes on Tuesday which was an exciting thing to have finished. There is one class in particular that I am really excited about taking and that is Acting 1. I have never done any acting before in my life, except for those little plays that the children’s chiors would put on. But that was nearly a decade ago. I am really excited to see where this goes and try it out. New things are fun and I really hope this is something I will enjoy.

So tonight kicked off the Gardner-Webb basketball season. It was quite a sloppy game with the final score ending 62-52 in favor of the Runnin’ Bull Dogs. College basketball has to be one of my favorite things to watch. There is always something going on and, as we experienced tonight, heckling. “Sloth” was his name. He was a big guy with a shaved head who we heckled to no end. It was a BLAST! I love heckling people, it may get me into trouble one day, but it sure would be one GREAT story to tell. Can you imagine the story the guy that heckled Ron Artest in Detroit has to tell. He got two players suspended from the league for a long time. That would be an AMAZING story to tell grand children one day.

Racism. Antisemitism. Genocide. Discrimination – its all around us. From one generation to the next we pass it down; hatred toward a group of people. For the majority of the time in America it has been the African American population, but it has also been the Italians, Chinese, Hispanic, you name the nationality, and there is a group out there that has or does hate them. These people are tortured, burned, and murdered in the most violent of ways by a “supreme” nationality or group.

I would say I do not fully understand the concept of racism or any of this hatred toward a certain nationality, but I would be lying.

I have been raised in a loving, caring home that supports my decisions and has taught me to love people to the best of my ability. But there is something overly present, something just as deadly as racism, antisemitism, discrimination. Something that we all do. It is, in my opinion, the root of the hatred. Judgment.

Wayne Dyer, a motivational speaker, once said that judgments prevent us from seeing the good that lies beyond appearances. Our judgments are based solely on what we see from someone, and most often, someone we do not know. This is concept of judgment by appearance is one we see iterated in the parable of the good Samaritan.

In the passage of the good Samaritan, an EXPERT who does not know everything (Luke 10:25), is the one who inspired this parable. Why is that significant? You are in no position to judge unless you know everything (Jessica Beaver – Passing Judgment Lesson). Psalm 143:2 says,

Do not bring your servant into judgment, for no one is living righteous before you.

This verse sets up the hierarchy that is so common in today’s society. “Do not bring your servant into judgment” tells us much more than just not to judge others, but instead to eradicate the throne of earthly selfishness that devours every person.

The verse goes on to say “for no one is living righteous before you.” It sets the stage for how life should be. It tells us plain and simple, we are equal.

Now as Jesus goes on to tell the parable of the Good Samaritan, He mentions three groups of people. He mentions a priest, a Levite, and a Samaritan. Lets take a deeper look at this.

The priest. Priests were very religious people. They were experts in the law, and in this case, missing one thing (action James 2:14). He passed right by and actually went to the other side of the road.

The Levite. Now to understand why Jesus chose a Levite we have to go back to the Old Testament. When the Twelve tribes were assigned land, the Levites were the only ones who were given cities instead of land. Which gave them a head start and easily an arrogant auora to themselves. The Levites also had particular religious and political responsibilities. So they too were experts in areas, but also lacking one thing (Development). He passed by as well.

Finally the Samaritan. The Samaritans were hated by the Jews. The Samaritans were a mixed “race”. Highly frowned upon. He has no expertise in anything, he is the lowest of the low in that society, yet He is the one who does not judge this beaten man. He helps out and gives graciously, mastering the two things the priest and the levite were missing.

If you look closely at the Priest, he supposedly knew all of the laws. He missed one. In Leviticus 19:18 it reminds us of the greatest commandment of all “Love your neighbor as yourself.” (Which is the answer to the question presented by the original expert Luke 10:27) He missed it. And because he missed it he missed his action.

One of the most quoted verses in James, 2:14, says “Dear brothers and sisters, what’s the use of saying you have faith if you don’t prove it with your actions? That kind of faith doesn’t save anyone.” Clearly the priest missed the mark and did not come through with action. However, the Samaritan did take action, his faith was not based on just the principles.

Now more closely at the Levite and his history. The Levites were given cities, not land. Cities have no room to grow and develop, they are established. The tribes that were given land had room to grow and develop. The Samaritan, on the other hand, developed the sick man back to health.

So, if you have made it this far you are probably ready for a conclusion. Here it is.

In order to stop the racism, discrimination, and whatever other injustice is going on, we must first and foremost love our neighbors as ourselves. But secondly, when we see something that makes us mad, take action, and through that action develop the person or group back to health.

The game today was an amazing game despite the fact that Gardner-Webb lost. Accoding to ESPN’s stats, Gardner-Webb dominated in every statistical category, but just could not punch it in when they had the opportunities. Overall the game was definitely a GREAT way to end the season on. Next up, basketball! I am really looking forward to that!

This week has flown by, and for the most part its been an easy, yet uncomfortable week. It started off great, until Monday afternoon when I got VERY sick. I had a fever and was throwing up, it was just not an enjoyable time. It continued on Tuesday with the fever, thankfully the throwing up subsided early Tuesday morning. It wasn’t until Wednesday that I began to feel up to par. Wednesday I went to work and got pegged with a baseball right in the back of the knee. It did not feel to great. I am still working on getting caught up from the day I missed. Man it takes a lot of work to fully get caught up from missing just one day of classes.

Today has been amazing. All my classes were easy and I got to come home today and see Grace. We hung out and handed out candy to trick or treaters. Then watched movies and caught up. I am always amazed by her – always. And this post is just about us. We have been friends since I moved to Thomasville in 2004, and although we didn’t date until ten days before I left for school, she continues to be one of my absolute best and truest friends. If I have a major problem, or just want to talk to someone, I know that I can call her. I cannot put enough information in this post as I want to, but here are just some of the things about her that amaze me on a daily basis.

She is always careful, not in the safety sense for these purposes, but in her actions. She thinks things through and makes the decision that would be best for her. As an example, we were making candy bags for some friends up here and me being me threw all the candy in the bags. She, on the other hand, thought about the bags ripping and spilling the candy everywhere, so she organized the candy in the bag. It sounds OCD, I know, but it makes sense. This leads me to my next point.

She cares about other people like no other. In that example, not only does it tell about her carefulness to make the right decision for herself, but she considers how it will effect others. I never would have thought about all that. I thought about the kids finding things unfair, but not the inconvienece of have a bag break. She always amazes me.

If you read this Grace, I just want you to know how INCREDIBLY blessed I am to call you, my bestfriend, my girlfriend. And even though we are separated by about 200 miles, I would do ANYTHING for you.