Church, Civil War, and Berry Picking :)

Sunday - one of my all time favorite days. First we went to church, surprisingly I don't remember what the sermon was about. However, I do remember Sunday School. We were reading II Corinthians 13. In which Paul tells the people of Corinth that he will be returning a third time, and this time he will not be as nice. He urges the Corinthians to take a look at themselves and prepare for his arrival. The Corinthians were people who participated in some questionable behavior and Paul was trying to break them of there immorality and turn them toward the ways of God. Well the people in Sunday school debated as to whether Paul should have the authority to tell the people of Corinth that what they were doing was wrong. This got me thinking and I realized something pretty valuable. We as people are not supposed to judge another human being. However, Paul was chosen to lead people to Christ, as we all are - essentially. But to me what Paul was doing wasn't judging, he was stating the obvious. The people of Corinth weren't following Gods laws and teachings and Paul was merely pointing that out. As Sandy put it, it's like a Doctor telling someone they're morbidly obese and that person getting mad - the doctor is just stating the obvious [we saw this in a show lol]. This realization brought me back to all the times I had thought my family and friends weren't acting morally in the ways of God. Now I would never tell someone who is not a believer that they are not following God - but when someone claims to be of strong Christian faith I think it's important to point out when we aren't following Gods desires for us. And although I am totally guilty of not following all that God asks of me, I felt that if I pointed it out in others that I would be judging them - but its the exact opposite. Simply stating the obvious is not judging, it's when we take those observations and turn them into character flaws. Such as - you drink and sleep around, you must be an alcoholic hussy. The first one is the obvious observation of two things God has called us not to do, the second is a judgement, and who are we to judge. In my opinion Paul was doing the former - pointing out the obvious, the things that God has called on us not to do. 



After Church the family and I headed out to the Civil War camp where they were reenacting a battle. We walked around for two or three hours doing a scavenger hunt for the kids. We learned that a "housewife" wasn't actually a housewife in the war but rather a little sewing kit that a soldier would carry around to mend things haha! We also learned that the reason their bayonets had three sides was to make it harder for the wound to be closed up and it allowed for people to die quicker. However, many bayonets were used for holding candles rather than killing in the Civil War. We were also told that East Tennessee supplied more Union Soldiers than Confederate Soldiers. Oh and, for all the Northern [and Southern] people who use the Confederate flag as a symbol for racism - the flag was far from a symbol of racism. Not only proven by facts of the war but also by the black soldiers who openly supported the Souths desire to become independent. 

A man by the name of William was sitting in a booth selling Confederate tshirts and memorabilia, each of them with the confederate flag and in a picture with me he also held one - he is black. When I asked to take a picture with him he first demanded he get his flag. The war was about commerce. Not racism. Yes there was racism, it ran rampant, and there is still racism. But it comes down to money - the South was going to lose a lot of money with the loss of slavery. In fact, we also learned that England - who could not supply guns to one side or the other would sell the guns to third party investors who would then sell the guns to the South because England stood to lose a lot of money on cotton imports. Either way, thank god the North won and we do not have slavery today. 
The battle in the streets lasted a total of 40 minutes tops and was so loud your whole body vibrated each time the guns were loaded and fired in unison. I had to laugh because both sides had musicians playing while the battle was being fought - apparently this was normal battle etiquette. The confederates had a violin player while the unions had a four person marching band lol!! 

After all the excitement of the day, I curled up to finish my book and watch the kids swim. Our friend Forrest invited us berry picking and so we suited up and headed up to his riding trails to pick blackberries and raspberries galore. We had so much fun riding the four wheeler through the thick trees and finding the berries, we decided next time to wear long pants and shirts so we could go deeper into the thorny branches that held life's sweet little rewards. :)