So I was just kind of thinking about New Orleans tonight, and I began thinking of the corruption there, and eventually this idea of corruption I was thinking of I realized was worldwide. I began thinking of world peace and why it hasn’t already become a reality…And I came to a realization. I realized… that people focus on the differences between people… instead of the similarities. I wasn’t really sure how to put it into words, so I wrote it in a poem… here it is, its basically my attempt to show that the similarities between all people in the world are more important than superficial differences. I’ll let my poem speak for itself now…

We all know
How it feels to be so angry you want
To scream so loud that everyone hears you

We All know
What its like to question and wonder
WHY
As those hot salty tears stream from your eyes

We all know
How it feels to want them to love
YOU
Not just the person you portray

We all know
What its like to hold their hand
And feel their soft skin against your own

We all know
What it feels like to lose the one person you love
And how you’d give anything to have them back

We all know
How it feels to go crazy
Sick with worries of the future

We all know
What its like to care about someone so much
That you’d give your own life
JUST
To protect them…

Do differences matter… When we all know?

© 2008 Lori McEwen

Enjoy…. and comment if you want…:)

~Lori

Basically, I just got home from youth group, so kinda a sudden blog… but basically Danny’s simulation pissed me off. period end of story.

For those of you not there tonight, Danny played a new member of the youth group who was sort of a pessimist. He came into the youth group talking about how the church has worked for so many years… theres no reason to change the way we worship… and it made me angry… not at Danny, but at the people who in reality think the way Danny did in the simulation…

I AM NOT, NOR HAVE I EVER BEEN, NOR DO I EVER WANT TO BE A TYPICAL CHURCH GOING PERSON.

Let me explain. From my experience, many people who go to church at some point or another lose their faith in a way that they just “go through the motions” in church, and the actions no longer have meaning.

In my mind, there is a difference between having faith and being religious. To me, being religious is going to church, and being active in a church, all that strictly church stuff.

I DO NOT think thats important.

Having faith is much more important. To me, this is knowing what is right and what is wrong, and putting your thoughts and actions forward with optimism that you can make things better. Having faith is showing people that they alone have the power to change the world, to mold and create their perfect world, and truly believing this.

Many churches I’ve been to, not going to name them, have caused me to either lose faith, or become so bored that I get nothing out of it. Church should be a way of practicing your FAITH… which it is not.

No one can tell you the right or wrong way to practice your faith, it is something that is specific to each person. Personally, I help others, I listen to others, and I try to keep a smile on my face while doing it. No one can tell me this is wrong. The St. Stephens Youth Group is a community I have found which allows me to do this.

I DONT NEED CHURCH TO PRACTICE MY FAITH!

People change with the times, and the church has not. Let people worship the way they feel most appropriate… Let them focus on what they think is important in a service. Tradition is not the important part…

sorry to break it to you but HISTORY HAS BEEN WRONG MADE MISTAKES…. WE NEED TO LEARN FROM THEM…

The past is the reason for so many horrible things, such as overreaction causing conflict, misunderstanding, whatever you can think of. So improve on the past, don’t live with it… the past doesn’t have to be our present. I dont think current church services fit our generation… So lets change it, make it fit us, examples, more music, more discussions, whatever it is your thinking of while reading this… your right.

Well, I was just thinking. We always talk about how we ARE the difference… and how we’re going to change things, and for awhile, I was convinced.

I’ve been spreading the word about our nation wide trip, encouraged by people approaching me, asking questions. Until today, when someone came up to me and said, “Thats a stupid idea. Even if you can get 200 youth down there, think of how many youth are in this city, state, country, the world… 200 is NOTHING…” I realized he was right. The world is huge…. There is no way that one person can directly influence every person in the world…. And then I read this…

One song can spark a moment
One flower can wake the dream
One tree can start a forest
One bird can herald spring
One smile begins a friendship
One handclasp lifts a soul
One star can guide a ship at sea
One word can frame the goal
One vote can change a nation
One sunbeam lights a room
One candle wipes out darkness
One laugh will conquer gloom
One step must start each journey
One word must start a prayer
One hope will raise our spirits
One touch can show you care
One voice can speak with wisdom
One heart can know what is true
One Life can make a difference

When I read this, it made me realize that it’s definately true that we cannot fix everything, no matter how much we want to, its not possible to fix the world. Baby steps are needed. Caring is like a chain reaction… Interacting with a caring person strikes something inside them that makes them care… and hopefully the chain continues. Eventually every person could care. Indirectly, we have the power to influence everyone in the world

Every SINGLE BRAINLESS, SENSELESS, SOMETIMES STUPID, RICH, POOR, MAN AND WOMAN HAS THE ABILITY TO BE GREAT…. through caring.

Caring is something that everyone is capable of, the only thing that can cause a change in this screwed up world we live in now.  It is through caring that people feel the need for compassion, love, and understanding….So no matter WHO it is you come in contact with, care for them. They will return the favor, maybe not to you, but to someone else, so that caring may spread across the world and begin change.

I know not many people will read this… but I’ve decided I’m going to blog anyway. I think it is important.

So I wasn’t really sure what to call this blog…. but it all started in Arizona… so there you go…

While driving around in Arizona, I saw a sign that I passed everyday with a new Bible passage posted on it for each day… below the passage it would say… “Share some time with God… Look it up!” So I wrote down a couple of the passages with the intent to look them up out of curiosity. One that I wrote down was Romans 12:2. I just now remembered to look these up and this one really spoke to me and made me think of what we do….It says….

“Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.”

Thinking about this for a second, I realize that when we come together and talk, we have the intent to no longer conform to society, but to help those around us… and figure out how to do that.

This in turn got me thinking about how selfish and motivated people are for self gain. It seems to me, society puts “the spotlight” on those who are rich, and selfish and take for themselves in order to “reach the top” of the career charts. I mean think, actors, CEOs, anyone in Hollywood…. etc etc. My point is that our society has a MIXED up view of others around them. Instead of helping those around us, a lot of society is turning their backs on those in our communities who need the most help.

Its time for more people to step up and decide that conforming to society in this way is not a good thing, and work harder to make the norm of society helping others.

one quick thing….

I was thinking about this… and I was really upset…. so I closed my eyes….. when I opened them I tried to count every single color I could see…. It was a real wake up call about how amazing each of us truly are… think of all the things you can do….

what a wonderful, creative, humorous God that made us all!!

I encourage you to close your eyes, open them and try to count every color….
Just a quick note… but I wanted to share

~Lor

FbSALFNSLKAFN

ok i got that out of my system… some people are SO narrow minded. I’m writing a paper on the lack of help/media coverage and i was telling my friend about it…. guess what he said,…. THIS MADE ME SO ANGRY!!!! like i wanted to cry…

and I quote:
“they’re dumba**es its their fault, they shoul’ve left before the hurricane hit.” I tried telling him that many people didnt get the message… he said “It’ s their fault, they should clean up the mess… it wasn’t our fault.” AH!!! THIS MADE ME WANT TO CRY!!! thinking that our generation can be sooo narrowminded and self centered!

I asked him what he suggest we do… he said “we should take a bunch of busses, get everyone out of there, disperse them , and turn it into a giant land fill” NFSALNFSKLA!!!!!!!!!!

I’m so frustrated… I actually want to cry. I just wanted to share this experience… so that we realize that even people close to us can be more narrow minded and self-centered than we think.  Take from this what you want… but i guarantee there is a message here.

~Lori

Hey all! So today its kind of been a rough couple of days, but it’s definitely got me thinking. I’ve definitely realized… what frustrates me is that people mope around… and are complaining and such, like OH MY LIFE SUCKS blah blah blah… when in reality… there’s people who have it a lot worse, but not only that… like if we truly take a chance to look at our lives, there really is more good than bad…. like we have SOO much to be thankful for, yet when people mope around and complain… they totally miss the fact that so many things are going well. Personally, I think that the reason people tend to focus on the bad, is because there isn’t a lot of it, there’s just more good…also, people focus a lot on the unimportant things in life, the “junk food of life” I guess you could call it… the stuff that isn’t totally necessary yet you cant resist… people get so caught up in the little things in life, which is where the bad things usually are, like an argument, or a break-up, that they don’t even realize that they are missing miracles and amazing, wonderful things that happen every day, just letting those things pass them by completely by not acknowledging them even for a short moment. I know I do this too, we all do… but thinking about the past couple of days, I started to really understand the importance of listening to others, and believing them when they have something important to say, even if you don’t want to hear them, if you trust them… it’s really worth listening. It’s during the times that we’re upset and unfocused… that we really need to take a moment to think about all the good things going on… because whether we see them or not… there are a lot. Granted, there are the times in our lives, when something significant happens… like the death of a loved one, or any tragedy for that matter, but those too are the times people really need to take the time to think about all the good…. I’m sorry if this is scatterbrained… its my first time blogging, but yeah… I wanted to say something because I was just thinking…and so many people have come to me with those little problems totally upset… sometimes we just don’t GET IT! We are amazing people with amazing lives… and I think people (me too) need to pay attention to this more often…

~Lori McEwen