Idealism not Idle-ism

When I took a personality and temperment quiz when I was in collge I was amazed at how accurate and telling the test was. It was comforting to know that I must've done something right because the computer screen was telling me true things about myself. The information before me nailed it--I'm a champion idealist.

My short summary of that is that things either look really good in the past or in the future; it's the here and now that I have trouble with. I'm always antsy to go to the next level; to do more; to not be satisfied with the status quo or with any status, for a matter of fact. It has its ups and its downs. One cannot go through life with just total idealism and at the same time when one is a realist life can be a cyclical system of cyniscism.

I guess this helps explain why I love the prophets of the Old Testament. Not necessarily because Nehemiah pulled the hair of the men.
Ouch! In college I was able to study the book of Amos, which Martin Luther King Jr. sited several times in his I Have a Dream speech. In seminary I wrote a paper on the social gospel movement and compared and contrasted Walter Rauschenbusch, King, and Archbishop Desmond Tutu. That was one of my favorite papers.

I'm trying to crawl and claw my way up this steep learning curve about how to be a true Jesus follower and seek justice and equity. It seems that many Christians see the "gospel" as not being campatible with the "social gospel." However, what is driving me forward is the fact that our spiritual lives should have a social consequence. In light of this I've added "People of Interest" to the sidebar. I'll add more later.