Arg

I'm so sick of everyone white washing their views and broadsweeping everyone else's views. I'm sick of all of the hypocrisy and arrogance of people when they fight. It makes me so angry, especially when one loudmouth starts yelling "ignorant!" or "heathen!" "@$$hole!" and crowds of people follow suit. What makes it worse is when people deny that their side ever uses the antics and the below-the-belt tactics that the other side does.

"...Anyone who says to his brother "You Fool!" is in danger of the fire of hell." I think Jesus doesn't like it when we insult each-other like two little kids fighting over a toy.

It happens everywhere. Politics, Religion, Science, School catfights, Civil Disputes, HOAs. Ugh.

Do you ever just wonder why we can't all just get along?

We all just want to look good. I think that is the bottom line here. Its a power struggle. We want to be "right." We want to win the election. We want other people's respect.

But, in the words of Zoolander, "Maybe there is something more to life than being really, really, ridiculously good looking." I know, he was just talking about physical looks, but I think it can be applied to most aspects of life. There's more to life than being right all the time, or winning, or being the best mathematician, or coming up with that argument that completely PWNS the other side.

Not everyone has to be a hero. In fact, most people shouldn't be a hero in the god-like sense of telling people how they should think. Because all of us have some flaw in our thinking.

Ideally, "As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another." Ideally, we would all learn from each-other. But instead of iron, we are like rubber, and we just keep bouncing and bonking off of each other.

It leads me to doubt the sincerity of some people who call for "bridging the gap" in our highly divided country. I feel like many of the people who say this are also the ones who throw insults around.

Of course, there are many people who do want to work together with those who are different. But I don't think there are enough.

I think everyone has validity in what they think about the world. From their perspective, from their observations, deductions, conjectures, they have formed a worldview. I think anyone can learn from a different worldview while holding on to their deepest convictions. But we're too scared to find out what might burst our happy little bubble (or angry, secluded, shielded bubble, for that matter).

Confused Part II

So I have a lot more peace about my boyfriend situation. I asked God to give me His heart and His mind on the situation, and I feel a lot better about everything. I feel like I can make a decision and have the courage to go through with it.

I guess God really does answer prayer. Where before, i would mull over a problem and let it stress me out until I made a decision purely out of frustration, this time I looked it square in the face and asked God to give me the courage and discernment to make the right decision. There were no tears or tantrums this time. Before, I had my own mindset, and I was going to do what I wanted to do no matter what God said. Now, I see how childish that is.

I wonder what would have happened if I had had the right attitude when I got these feelings before. I might have a completely different life. Or maybe it would be the same, but with less regrets. I don't know. But that would have required me to be a different person, so I guess the issue is moot.

I think I've learned more about God's character and my own character through this relationship than going to church has ever taught me. I don't know if that is a good or a bad thing. Maybe its not a thing, its just how it is.

I've learned to trust my feelings. I've learned that prayer works if you have the right attitude. I've learned to be open about what I'm thinking. I've learned that I'm not crazy. I've learned a lot more, and I wont bore anyone with the laundry list.

Its crazy what God will do with your attitude when you open your heart to Him.

So I guess the title of this post is misleading, but it continues what was said on Confused but Waiting.

Childlike Faith

I used to think that "childlike faith" meant unquestioning, unfailing devotion to Christ. But I don't think that way anymore. I think that should be called "robot-like faith." And God did not create robots.

I'm sure parents sometimes would love little robots that cleaned their rooms when asked and didn't jump on the bed or talk with their mouths full. But along with the disobedience would go the character, personality, and most importantly, the love.

I feel like people say that God didn't create robots all the time, but that we are expected to behave like them. That could be just me though.

Children question everything. I feel like they always ask "Why why why?" about everything there is to know. They are always learning. If they don't understand something, they ask. Sometimes they ask embarrassing questions and say odd things. When you tell them not to touch the stove or climb the shelves, they interpret that as exactly the opposite.

But do parents love them anyway? Yes! Do they provide for them anyway? Yes!

And despite the household rules we must follow and the punishments that follow, do we still love our parents? Yes!

This is how I feel a relationship with Christ should look like. Us just exploring life and learning everything we can about it, sometimes getting hurt and often breaking rules in the process. Christ using whatever means necessary to steer us in the right direction. With a relationship of love in both directions. Being able to go to Him with our problems and questions, no matter how "strange" or "blasphemous" the questions seem. I think He wants us to bring those to Him especially so he can give us the correct answer, instead of the world's (often) incorrect answer.

This is my ideal. It may be extreme, because I tend to live in the opposite world of self-repression, but its what I wish I was more like.

Confused but waiting

Sometimes I feel like I really should do something, but I don't know where the urge is coming from.

A few years ago, I felt this strong urge to quit my basketball team. I didn't want to quit the team. Well, I did and I didn't, but that's a long story. Anyway, I convinced myself that it was God telling me to quit, and if I didn't, I would die and go to hell that very night, like in the Old Testament. I had a huge panic attack and couldn't sleep for hours. Of course, I finally went to sleep and woke up fine. I never did end up quitting, but I had this guilt following like I was doing something wrong.

Last year, I had another similar urge to quit my water polo team. Same situation: I kinda did and I kinda didn't want to quit. I mulled over it a long time, read the Bible, listened to sermons, and they seemed to confirm that I should quit. So that time I acted on my feelings and quit for a semester, to see what happened. I got some hang out time with my friends, but I ended up missing it so much that I went back to play, somewhat guiltily but happily none-the-less. Now I'm doing amazingly and improving a lot. Nothing amazing happened when I quit. I didn't feel any "good job"s from God or anything. Just some more relaxation time.

Now the new urge is to break up with my boyfriend of a few years. I don't want to. I love him. I would marry him if he asked me to. And the guilt trip my mind is putting me on is that I am idolizing my boyfriend and putting him above God. So my conscience says "So if this really is God, I should break up with him to show him that I do not idolize my boyfriend." Like how Abraham had to sacrifice Isaac to prove his love for God (I know God told him not to go through with it, but he would have if God asked him to). Then my logic says "But how do you know this is actually God speaking to you?" All the while, my heart is crying "Nooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!" This puts me into all kinds of moral conundrums and whatever that just make me feel worse after thinking through them, and I wonder if God is trying to test me or if I'm just putting it all on myself.

Sometimes I'm afraid to pray, because these thoughts flood my brain immediately after I say "Dear Lord", either in my head or out loud.

It reminds me, on a lesser level, of the people who are absolutely sure God wanted them to go out and kill that one guy, or that God wanted them to commit genocide, when it was really what was in their own hearts that was the problem. But I can't seem to shake the feelings. Wherever I go they are there (except when I am playing water polo or with my boyfriend).

It confuses me. But writing it out kind of helped me see the patterns, the similarities and differences in the three situations. I figure when the moment comes that I absolutely must decide what to do about my boyfriend, I will know in my heart what to do. I hope.

Love

I just realized today what a depressing person I can be.

Not with my words. Not with my actions really. I just feel like I emit depressing vibes to everyone I touch sometimes. Because sometimes I get really, really depressed, for no apparent reason. No one has died in my circle of life. No accidents. Just the usual stress of school and work.

Don't you love it when something you have known for a long time just walks up and smacks you in the face? Bible study today was 1 John 4:12-2o-something, and I think reading it aloud I read "love" about 50 times in that short passage. I glossed over it, thinking "yeah, yeah, I know" the whole time.

But now, I realize that my life has been very much lacking this core ingredient. Love makes your life worth living. We were created for love. But this past semester I have just been putting up this cold wall between myself and the world, and it has ruined it for me. A life without love sucks. It is torture. It is wandering through the jungle by yourself with no end in sight. It is being alone among thousands of people.

The only things I ever feel like doing involve something I love. Water polo, hanging out with my boyfriend or my family or my ever-shrinking list of friends.

I need to figure out how to express my love for others, whatever that means. Of course its different for different people, but I need to learn to not hide it. I'm an awkward person because I have a hard time expressing what I really feel. I get so so so awkward I can't even stand it. My awkwardness comes from my unwillingless to express what I really feel.

Love can fix things. Love is what we were created to do, above everything else. Love God, love others, as the saying goes.

A Christian life without love is like Calculus without Algebra: You will fail without it. Algebra is the basic building block of all higher math. Algebra is everywhere. Solving for those Xs and those Ys don't seem so important your freshman year of high school. But you use it more and more as you get higher in math. You can't do the math without all that Algebra. I think love is the same. You can't live the Christian life without love. It is the basic building block of everything.

Its my cheesy metaphor. But it works for me.

Debates

I get so indignant when people argue with me about something I believe strongly (it doesn't happen too often, but when it does, WATCH OUT). In high school I remember arguing about Creation vs. Evolution with some friends, and about Abortion another time. I also would go onto Christian message boards where Christians and Atheists and Pagans and Everyone Else would just go at it about everything under the sun, and it would anger me sometimes and depress me at others the things all parties would say. NONE of it, and I mean ZERO, went toward furthering my faith. When a Christian would use a cheap debate tactic to prove a point, I actually felt myself die a little bit inside, although I didn't quite understand why at the time.

I brought my concerns up to my dad once, and he told me something that I try to remember when I am ready to go tell some arrogant "heathen" what-for (because ultimately, in the heat of battle, that is how I see them. Bad, I know, but that's just how it is). He told me that ultimately, "it" isn't about Creation vs. Evolution, or Abortion, or Homosexuality, or Supporting Barack Obama, or any of that. Ultimatley, "it" is about Christ's sacrifice on the cross, and about His blood cleansing us from sin, saving us from ourselves and from hell. That is what matters.

For this reason, I get angry when in discussing politics or issues like the ones above people say or act like "God is on their side." Are you really going to speak for God? Are you His appointed messenger on the sins of Homosexuality? Abortion? Illegal Immigration? The Book of Revelation? What about that other guy that thinks he's right and that his ideas must be what God thinks, and therefore you're wrong? Do you really know what God thinks about everything?

I read about the Pharisees and the Sadducees, and my mind immediately goes to United States politics. They would go to Jesus with their political issues and try to debate him or try to one-up either Jesus himself or someone else. Did Jesus engage their debate? Nope, the conversations were pretty short. He would either confound them and the watching crowd with such a simple concept that a child could understand it, or he would say something so bold that they were ready to stone him. Or, as with "marriage after the ressurection" confrontation with the Sadducees, he would just discard the idea altogether.

"And they were astonished at his teaching."

I think if Jesus were to come back today, despite our vast knowledge and our access to His word, we would all be "astonished" and "amazed" (and probably deeply humbled) at what He has to say. But we walk around like we have all the answers to everyone's problems. You're gay? Become a Christian!! You'll be straight in no time! Depressed? Let God carry your burdens! Oh, you're still sad? You must not have good enough faith. It couldn't possibly be a chemical imbalance in your brain or something. Pregnant? Keep your child at all costs! Don't even consider the economic hardship it might put you through or how much it will change your life. If you keep it, you'll get heaven points. If not, well, I hope you like heat.

Are the unsaved really going to be "astonished" at our words? My experience tells me that they know exactly what we will say to them before we say it. Will even other Christians be more than mildly affected with your "amazing insights"? Honestly? I understand that those are exaggerations of what is actually said, but what are the undertones of the statements of "truth" you are making? I feel like they are often as ridiculous as the ones above, but that people are not bold enough to say what their beliefs actually imply (and for good reason).

So what good is debating then? I believe it gives you the credibility of knowing what you're talking about and not just having blind faith. It is good for pulling out every little implication or oversight of every theory or "truth" that someone claims to be fact, if you have a talent for it. DEBATE IS GOOD!!! But everything should not lean on it. I feel like Christians fall into the debate trap far, far too much, especially when they do not have a gift for it or have too much "zeal without knowledge". There are other ways to spread Christ with your own gifts and talents than arguing with people about the validity of that one verse in 2 Kings that seems to contradict that other verse in 2 Chronicles.

I suppose my point here is to PICK YOUR BATTLES. Decide how much this argument really matters in the long run. Ask yourself and God if it is simply a friendly discussion or an angry discourse. And please, please, PLEASE don't end off anything with "Well, I'll pray that God changes your mind" or something similar. This shows such a disrespect for the other person's intellect that any respect they might have had for you will go out the window and into oncoming traffic.

Vampires

A mood vampire. Do you know one?

Sometimes it is your roommate. Sometimes it is your family. Sometimes it is even your best friend.

What is a mood vampire?

A mood vampire is someone or something that just makes your day go bad every time you must come into contact with it. It sucks anything good that happened out of your day and leaves you with bad feelings, usually anger and frustration.

What happens when a person is bitten by a vampire in the movies? Well, they become a vampire. This is exactly what happens with mood vampires: Once it sucks the happy out of you, you go around with all these negative feelings inside. Then you find someone happy and your bad mood bites their happy one, and puts them in a bad mood too. And so the cycle goes.

A mood vampire usually has no idea that they are one: they just go along with what they do, not realizing that they are just ruining your day. In which case, it is your responsibility to tell them, is it not? How will they ever know if you don't tell them?

But even if they do know, will they change? They could write it off as "just their personality." They might argue that it isn't their fault. They might try to make you feel badly. How does someone kill a mood vampire? Do you just force a silver stake of happiness into their anger? Do you shed joyful sunlight on the negative feelings rotting away inside them? And how can you continue to stick by someone so depressing that they call a coffin their bed?

I suppose "With man this is impossible, but God all things are possible. (Matthew 19:26). "But this is a hard thing to accept and live with. Where does someone call it quits so that their own sanity doesn't deteriorate? Should you ever?