Beaches.

Last week my sister graduated college, congrats April. Then I went to the Beach with Lauren, it was fun. We laid out in the sun a lot, we also got some books to read, I read Blue Like Jazz by Don Miller, She got The Ragamuffin Gospel by Brennan manning. Blue Like Jazz was enjoyable, it really striked a lot with Discovery. It was all narrative and not backed up with very much scripture. One of the biggest things I got out of the book was loving others, no matter what they believe or how they feel about you. We should also be confident in ourselves as God, our father made us to be how we are... Another big idea the book brought out to me was Believing what I believe. Why do I believe what I believe and do I really believe it? What would I do for the things I believe. And how passion is different from belief, I have a passion for 3 but that doesn't mean its important. I believe my life should be more than just me, it should be about others. Then one cool part of the book was were he talked about living with other guys in community, I liked this because I'm in a great position to grow with my roommates as well. So, I guess what I am saying is that my heart really wants to love people. Today I started reading The Ragamuffin Gospel at work. I read the first chapter entitled somethign radically wrong, it talked about grace and how the American church has merely used it as theology but not any use for it. All of this is while I am at work, then a SUPPPPERRR annoying guy comes in and B.S.'s for 30 minutes then he askes about the book, I tell him its about Grace, how none of us are deserving of it and so forth. He then explains " I beg to differ if theres anyone in the world that deserves to go to heaven its my wife, shes not got a mean bone in her, never gossips, she might cuss every now and then or have a drink, but shes the nicest person i know...." I sit there amazed and want to talk back and explain further but i'm mute, I can't make my mouth move... Might I add this was all after he talked to a man with cancer that came in, and when he left he said " When he falls over, theres gonna be a line of guys trying to get with her." Which i don't suppose is too terribly bad but rather super annoying. But this is all where Grace comes in to play, yeah he is annoying, yeah he is full of crap, yeah he is a ragamuffin, and its so hard to seperate myself from him and not put him in a lower catergory or ranking as me. Just like yesterday I wanted to stop and talk to the homeless guys in downtown Knoxville but I didn't I suppose I was afraid they would ask for my money, and I didn't want to say no to them. But what is crazy about the Grace of God is that he loves us long before we love him. While we are sinning and turning our backs on God he is still loving us and wants us.

*I do not proofread, so if there are errors...Deal with it, have some grace on a brotha.*