Bubbles

I haven't written in a bit. Haha! I start a lot of my blog posts with that. Then I talk about how I start a lot of my blog posts by talking about how I talk about how I start my blog posts... What? Anyway. It's been a while. I've been super busy. New school. New students. New schedule. It's crazy, it really is. Rhythm, I'm trying to get in one. I think I'm almost there. There have been some things on my mind.

iPhone 7, my community, my job, biking to work, my kids, my marriage

I was about to say that the things I'm listing aren't in an order of importance. But, why did I write them down in that order? Maybe they are in order of importance. If that's the case, I've got some work to do this week.

Where I want to be.
My faith, my marriage, my kids, my community, my job, biking to work, iPhone 7

I won't talk about all those things here. I'll start with iPhone 7. First of all I don't want one. My brain thinks I want one, but I really don't. My brain is mistaken. I think the jet black color is neat. I think the camera improvements look cool, especially in the 7 Plus. Who doesn't want more processing power? Headphone jack is gone...(shrugs shoulders). Okay. iPhone 7 is done.

Next, my community. This last weekend, I went out with Lindsey and we handed out flyers to advertise a fund raiser for a non profit organization. It was great fun. We had a chance to talk with people in our community. We made conversation, and we met some people. But, there was one interaction that stuck with me. I walked into this locally run shop and I asked the person at the counter if they had a community board to post an announcement. She made a face. Not a happy face. Not a grumpy face. It was more of a suspicious face.

Before she agreed to anything, she asked to take a look at the flyer I had. I handed the flyer to her and she looked it over. It didn't seem long for her to decide that she was not going to post the flyer. I asked her why. She responded that she couldn't post flyers with the cross on it.

This is where she works. I was just a visitor. She has the say on what to post and what not to post. It's nice that they do have a community board. And she has every right to decide what's posted and what's not.

That being said, I didn't feel very good when I was denied the privilege to post this flyer. I like to be accepted and I wasn't. I was rejected. I was discriminated against. She had decided that I was a Christian and their store does not want "Christian" non-profit flyers posted at her store.

I talked to her for a bit. She explained to me why she didn't want to post it. I continued to gather information why. I wasn't a jerk. She wasn't either. We just talked. It's fine. When I walked out of the doors, I wondered if it was discrimination. That word gets tossed around a lot. Because it happens a lot. I'll be okay, but I started to think about all the people that felt like I did just then. People are discriminated against all the time.

I can change my religion. I'm making the choice to be a Christian. But, there are a lot of people who are discriminated against for things they can't help.

I learned a few things in that short interaction. People don't like Christians. People probably have good reasons for disliking Christians. Maybe they fill in the rest with some reasons that aren't that great. I want to be a reason for them to like Christians. I want to be in my community--interacting and helping regardless of who the person is. It's hard. It's hard to get past my own prejudices. It's hard to get over my selfishness and set time aside.

I thought I had more to say. I guess I don't. I'm not saying that Christians have it bad. I think we have it good. I'm not trying to say the person I spoke with was a jerk. She wasn't. She agreed to at least talk to me. I don't know what I'm saying. Maybe I'm saying that Christians need to be better. We have a rep. We've separated ourselves from our community. We have our own music. We have out own buildings. We have out own schools. We have our own political party. We have our crowd that we feel comfortable around. We've made the bubble. Now, when I try to go out of the bubble, there's push back. What should I expect?