Liv'in in the Burbs

I met Will and Lisa Samson over two years ago. We were attending a spiritual advance in the mountains of WV. During that weekend meeting Will spoke passionately about justice. At that time I had never thought about justice as an attribute of a person of faith. Will's use of the word in context disturbed me at the time. It disturbed me because I knew in my heart he was correct, I knew as I know my name a person who claims to have been radically invaded by Jesus Christ should be concerned about justice. I knew that living a life of justice would change me. I knew it would change my family. I knew it would change my faith community. I knew it would shake my priorities, my wallet, my free time, my world. I knew it would cause my attention to move from me to asking a dangerous question..."How does God view this and how do I respond?" I knew that once that question was asked/answered life as I knew it would move from exciting to frenetic. I know that "exciting" and "frenetic" are synonyms. I know that flying one of these is exciting, but flying one of these would be frenetic. I left that first meeting hoping to forget about justice.

It did not work. The next twelve months I fought with God about justice. I argued with God about justice. I attempted to avoid any and all scripture about justice. Do you know you cannot read Proverbs without being hit in the face with justice? And if you have one of those RED LETTER Edition bibles, you cannot read the red and not be smacked down by the voice of Jesus in red talking and living justice. Forget it, it won't work...I tried.

This past fall I again attended a spiritual advance in the mountains of WV. Will and Lisa Samson were again participants. This past fall Will and Lisa were still talking about justice. Not only were they talking about justice, they were writing a book about justice. This time, I enjoyed the conversations. I was excited about the book. Why? What had changed? It is pretty simple, you cannot fight and argue with God and win. Twelve months of battling had changed me and my heart. I was now wanting to live justly.

Will and Lisa grew up in the church. The churches where they grew up loved God, Jesus and USAmerica. Will and Lisa grew up in Christian families with Judeo-Christian values. They married, had children and started to live "the American Dream". All was well until they started learning about the word justice. They fought with it, argued with God and finally realized they were being pushed toward justice by a force much bigger then they. That decision to obey God has transformed a daily journey to a life long quest. A quest is a long and difficult journey with dangerous obstacles, but in the end is great reward. Will and Lisa have written about their metamorphosis in a very personal , yet non-preachy voice. Scripture will not be used as a club against you, they will not shake a finger in your face and tell you how bad you have been. If you will read with a quiet heart and open mind, you will laugh, you will cry, you will become angry, you will pray for forgiveness and you will see your life in a different way when you close the last page. This book should be a primer for living a faith life in the 21st century. Read it, I double dog dare you!!