Motivation

The session at church approved the "Worshiping Community Endorsement" for me and should be sending it in any time now. The potential for actually being able to go out and work whether overseas or stateside is growing more and more exciting every day.

Thursday night I had the opportunity to hear Shane Claiborne speak at Whitworth College. I read his book "The Irresistible Revolution" back in June and simply fell in love with his approach to the gospel. He has what some might consider to be a fairly liberal approach to politics, but his theology is right on so it's hard to argue with, mostly because he's not trying to argue.

So that's me sitting in the front row at Shane's talk. I believe this photo was taken right after he has answered my question and had moved on to one of the people behind me who was asking a question.

To learn more about him, or even better the community he's a member of, check out http://www.thesimpleway.org

And so I titled this post "motivation" because in filling out all my forms so I can be a Young Adult Volunteer I was frequently asked why I wanted to go into mission work, what my motivation was. Over and over again my atheist and agnostic friends will try to argue that we should do good things whether there is a God or not, we shouldn't need motivation based on the fact that it's what God wants of us, or that the people we help are children of God, and while I say they're absolutely right, we *should* do it anyway I think they're missing the point. If there's not standard of equality, for example we are all made in the image of God, then there is no reason to give preferential treatment to some and not others. Why would we need to love our enemy? These are the same people who would rather ignore those they don't like than trying to engage them and talk with them, that might seem like a better option but it's simply the violence of indifference. In order to work for peace one cannot be passive, if we want peace we must love our enemies and love is a verb, an action, we have to *DO* something.

We are called to love.
Love in Christ,
Maggs

It Begins

To my dear Friends and Family,

I have started this blog in an effort to allow you all to keep up with me wherever in the world I may be. I have begun the process of applying for "Young Adult Volunteers" positions through the Presbyterian Church USA. These positions include a few overseas posts as well as several posts stateside. A major step in this process will be asking my church to recommend me for international service, this Tuesday, the 13th of February I will be attending the session meeting at my home church in Walla Walla to ask for their support. I am so grateful to my church family for loving and supporting me over the years and I am excited for the opportunity to ask their blessing at this time.

Of all the places I am currently considering service Northern Ireland would be my dream, as I have spent much time studying the culture, conflict, and integration efforts in that region. Regardless I will be happy to serve wherever I am placed.

In naming this journal I have chosen a phrase close to my heart "Not All Who Wander Are Lost," whenever I travel I love being able to make different turns off the path to simply see what's out there and to give myself a better understanding of my surroundings. A few times I may have had a passenger in my vehicle a friend or sibling who adamantly claimed that we were lost just because I didn't take the normal route home, or to the dorms. In my journey through college I am choosing, and God is leading me, to stray a bit off the beaten path and look at the other possibilities around me. This seems like the most opportune time to take a break from the classroom and not let school get in the way of my education. The nearest I can find to this quote's origin would be J.R.R. Tolkien who chose a slightly different wording "Not all those who wander are lost." however I came upon the quote after it had been translated into Irish Gaelic and posted in a list of Irish Phrases as "Níl gach uile fhánaí caillte" and I simply fell in love with the concept.

The URL seems much more obscure, so allow me to explain, I'm aware that the address of such a page should be simple, so that it is easy to find, unfortunately the name "Wanderer" was taken and so I chose a different word "seachránaí" the Irish word for wanderer or rover, of course I cannot use the accents in the word lest I make the URL even more difficult so, as I'm sure you already know because you're here, the address is http://seachranai.blogspot.com bookmark it! :P

Love in Christ,
Maggs