being neighborly

our pastor at our church recently was talking about loving our neighbors. so we got an assignment at our small group to reach out to our neighbors, the 5 that are directly around you. we were to take them cookies and introduce ourselves. normally i would have been peeved that we were forced to do this, but i have been wanting to do this for some time now and just needed a shove.
ill be perfectly honest with you, i am scared of my neighbors. i am totally the kind of person that drives into the garage and just wants people to leave me alone. we have had some interesting situations with neighbors in the past (possible attempt at stealing our lawnmower, miscommunications about yard work, language barrier, loud parties, etc.) but after venturing out last night i realized something. our neighbors are just people, people that have the same needs and wants i do, like wanting to protect and nurture their families in whatever way they think is the best. so it was good for me and we actually got to find out the names of one of our neighbors, the others did not divulge that information. so thank you formerly old couple, we now know you are jim and betty. :)