Update from the Hinterlands

Sorry everyone. I’m not as disciplined as Janna, so I won’t be writing as regularly or as often. I’m going to try and post something about my daily happenings at least once a month, but no promises. So here it goes.

In the past month or so since everyone’s gone away I’ve:

Spent $5,232 on tuition, $622 on a laptop, and $165 on gas, nearly finished “Mere Christianity” by C.S. Lewis, written letters to Janna and my Nana II, become a fan of the band Nightwish, stopped drinking pop (mostly), reread some old favorites from my bookshelf, started watching “Memoirs of a Geisha” twice (it’s one of my favorite movies) and haven’t made it to the end yet, made apple crisp from the tree in our backyard, and walked out of a church service.
In all this time Tommy and I have only seen each other once, at Aboveground. We’re both too lazy to walk across the street. The Koch’s have repainted their house since we’re all not there to destroy the walls anymore. One kitchen wall is red.

Stephanie and I are both looking for service work to do in Dekalb. We haven’t found anything yet that works for us. There isn’t much for the homeless in Dekalb, though they are there. They have to walk to Elgin or Rockford to get help most of the time. Working with the homeless has always been my calling before. Maybe I just like to feed people. I think I’m going to look into working with the food pantry at my church.

Speaking of church…yes…I walked out of a church service. The high school youth were talking about their summer mission trip, or they were supposed to be. I don’t count mouthing chants and words that people have told you to say. Not when I can see they don’t really believe what they’re saying. Not when I can see the boredom in their eyes. For them it was all about their experience, how they felt, and what they got out of it. True, the missionaries tend to learn more and be helped more than those they are helping, but that shouldn’t be why one serves. Our youth got caught up in the Mountain Top High. They forgot why they were serving, and few of them were serving because of love. James says “faith without works is dead,” but it works the other way around too. If one serves without love then what is the point of serving? The actions become meaningless. It’s been a long time since I’ve been that angry about something, disappointed too. I thought it was better to leave.
I
’ve been thinking a lot about what I can do to change my church recently because of the above. I realized that, maybe, the reason I’m seeing the changes that need to be made is because I’m seeing my church from the outside. I’m not there very often because I work on Sundays most of the time. I think I need to get involved before I blame anyone. Change works better if it occurs from the inside anyway. It’s one of the reasons I want to get involved in the food pantry. In the meantime I’ll be going to Aboveground as much as I can. Please pray for me.

Classes are going well. We just read a book in history about an 1818 trial on whether or not a whale is a fish. I’m not kidding. It actually happened. We’re a week behind in Literature already because our discussions are so in-depth. I’m really enjoying it. Public Relations Writing is my current favorite, because we always get out early. I’ve discovered the pool and the Rec. Center on campus and am trying to work out at least once a week.

And that’s my life. I miss you all like crazy.

In Christ, with Love,

Jessica