looking back... 4:13 PM

" LOVE MUST BE OUR REGULATING IDEAL. " - martin luther king jr.

" There are three words in the Greek language for love, one is the word eros. This is a beautiful type of love, it is an aesthetic love. Plato talks about it a great deal in his Dialogue, the yearning of the soul for the realm of the divine. It has come to us to be a sort of romantic love, and so in a sense we have read about it and experienced it. We've read about it in all the beauties of literature. I guess in a sense Edgar Allan Poe was talking about eros when he talked about his beautiful Annabel Lee with the love surrounded by the halo of eternity. In a sense Shakespeare was talking about eros when he said ` Love is not love which alters when it alteration finds, or bends with the remover to remove: O, no! it is an ever-fixed mark that looks on tempests and is never shaken; it is the star to every wandering bark. . . .´ (You know, I remember that because I used to quote it to this little lady when we were courting; that's eros.)

The Greek language talks about Philia which was another level of love. It is an intimate affection between personal friends, it is a reciprocal love. On this level you love because you are loved. It is friendship.

Then the Greek language came out with another word which is called the agape. Agape is more than romantic love, agape is more than friendship. Agape is understanding, creative, redemptive, goodwill to all men. It is an overflowing love which seeks nothing in return. Theologians would say that it is the love of God operating in the human heart. So that when one rises to love on this level, he loves men not because he likes them, not because their ways appeal to him, but he loves every man because God loves him. And he rises to the point of loving the person who does an evil deed while hating the deed that the person does. I think this is what Jesus meant when he said ` love your enemies.´

I'm very happy that he didn't say like your enemies, because it is very difficult to like someone bombing your home; it is pretty difficult to like somebody threatening your children; it is difficult to like congressmen who spend all of their time trying to defeat civil rights. But Jesus says love them, and love is greater than like. Love is understanding, redemptive, creative, goodwill for all men. "

- Martin Luther King Jr. Love, Law, and Civil Disobedience

i thought this was really cool :)

~ginger

A.BEAUTIFUL.MESSAGE 3:55 PM

TRUE PURPOSE THRIFT 3:25 PM

My Aunt put us up here in Knoxville.   The top of a mountain is a much different place than the suburbs of Miami.  It's beautiful.  

Outside of banana pudding and eclair pie, Tennessee has been amazing because of this place.  True Purpose Recovery is a group that is helping men clean up their lives after the disasters that come with drug and alcohol addiction.  Their hearts are so tender.  They are thankful.  They had to be some of the most genuine people I have ever met in my life. Alot of these guys are coming from tough situations and life threatening addictions.  You would expect them to be calloused and hopeless.  On the contrary, they seemed to be some of the most pure examples of unconditional love I have ever met in my life.

The thrift store helps fund the recovery program.  In the program, all the guys live, eat and work together.  They generate the money through the store and jobs, like mowing lawns, and spend the rest of their time learning how to live a more controlled life and growing spiritually.

The guys we got to work with were awesome.  Their stories left me in tears.  We hope to have footage up soon.  We asked one of them what love is.  The answer was so genuine.  He was one of the most loving people I have met.  He told us his story, which included almost losing his life to drugs, doing prison time, and getting shot in both of his legs in a drug deal gone wrong.  He described it as a miracle that he was alive and walking today.

He's been through so much and because of it, he was so thankful.  He went on about how great it is just to be alive.  He looks forward to finishing the recovery program and being the dad he has always wanted to be for his baby boy.  He said that just being alive was reason to be happy.  He said that even a smile can be loving someone.  That day, I saw him greet everyone that came into the store so lovingly.   He really cared about people.  He said if his smile and his reaching out to the customer could brighten their day, that's all he wanted.

 As we left the store, they were so kind to us.  They told us that coming their and helping without expecting a thing really touched them.  I think they changed me more.

:) 3:21 PM

this is for a special friend :)

<3333

GETTING DOWN TO BUSINESS 2:57 PM

The trip has been amazing. It's only been a few days and i feel like my life has been changed. All the places we've gone to are places I've been before. Its interesting how the mindset we go to a place with changes what happens there. I'm walking the same streets but seeing them in different ways.

Our mindset has been love. Looking for people to help. The people that we've encountered here in Tennessee are changing the way I think.

As we drive along the highway I see every car and I'm trying to think about how that car isn't just a car cluttering the highway. It's a person. It's a mother. It's a son. It's a person with fears, and hopes, and needs, and dreams. Maybe something I do can help them reach their dreams. Maybe something I do can lead them to a Love that could calm their fear.

By the end of this trip I want to stop using the word I. It seems that 90% of my thoughts are about myself. I want to make it the other way around.

In LOVE EACH ONE news, here are our business cards!! :) They are much better than writing the blog name down on scraps of papers like we have had to. The cards feel so nice in the hand. They represent a dream coming into reality. They make me feel like this trip is bigger than us. We are handing them out where ever we can. Every act of love is accompanied by them.

I can't wait to see what the next few days hold. :) <3 Stan