So much going on in my mind right now.
Mostly having to do with this whole thing of "first world problems" and this generation....but God's love and grace too. You have to take the first with the second in mind or I think you'd go crazy. (See paragraphs below for evidence of this, haha.)
It makes me feel hopeless sometimes. Okay...when I say sometimes, I mean more like every time I really let my mind meditate on the state of this world. It's the reason I don't want to bring children into this world (rather, I've been thinking a lot more about adoption; they're already in it).
It sickens me. We are broken, awful, wretched, hateful people that don't give a care in the world for anyone but ourselves and maybe a few others (please know that I am including myself here). We are the luckiest and most blessed people in the world - financially, provisionally, and governmentally (freedoms). So what do we do? We complain. We ask for, no, demand more. We go on with our lives thinking that we can satisfy our cravings with the next gadget, the next culinary expedition, or the next relationship. And we do all this while glued to our phones that we "can't live without," while looking through our overly stocked pantries saying "I've got nothing to eat," while skipping classes and complaining about how much we "have" to learn, while begging our parents for a little more money or digging into our savings so that we can keep up eating out as much as we do (guilty), while dating in an attempt to "satisfy" our need to be loved physically and emotionally, binge drinking because that's how you "fit in" around here or because you just can't bear all the stress, while meeting people and developing relationships just to get ahead, and spending our free time plopped on the couch watching Netflix or scrolling through Buzzfeed.
We don't care about people. We care about ourselves and our happiness. But, perhaps what starts to scare each of us at a different time in our own life is that no matter what we do, what we get, we can't make ourselves truly happy. I think most of the time when we say we're "really quite happy," we're lying to ourselves. (I just realized that this sounds extremely cynical and depressing...bear with me. It's the mood I'm in; heck, it's just the truth of the world.) Happiness is fleeting; what we really, honestly crave is JOY not HAPPINESS. And guess what? JOY is not going to come out of a self-centered, worldly life. If anything, that is something I'm sure of. Joy is born of hope. And if there's one thing this world can't offer us, it's an everlasting hope.
Then this "first world problems" thing that's been popular recently...have we no shame?! It's in the name...that it's not really a problem at all. Yet the popularity of the saying has given us a reason to say all these stupid problems anyways. Example: "Ended up watching a TV show I didn't want to watch because the remote was out of reach. #firstworldproblems"
Like I said....have we no shame?
It's not a secret that there are millions of children around the world suffering in the agony of unadulterated starvation every day. Yet we have the audacity to say after a few hours without a meal that we're "absolutely starving" and then go on to indulge our hunger with a humungous Chipotle burrito that we didn't even think about not having the money for which to pay. I think, honestly, what this saying is doing is helping us further increase the distance between our world and the world that hungers, that suffers injustices of basic human rights, that has never known a functional society, that doesn't even have the access to clean water...
Let's be honest. I think most of us do want to get away from those "third world problems." We don't want to have to think about anything that makes us uncomfortable, that makes us question the way we've been richly living and frivolously spending our entire lives, that challenges our basic beliefs, because if we are okay with letting these people die of starvation when we throw away half a meal because we "don't like eating leftovers," that makes us look like not-so-good people. And we don't want to think that we aren't good people, because when the cashier asks if you'd like to donate a dollar to some charity you say why not? and you volunteered for a few hours on MLK day and oh yeah, you lent your friend $20 and never asked for it back...and so this, this folly to not help those who are literally living off of nothing, this makes us bad people and we can't quite be okay with that.
We live our lives thinking that there are good people, and there are bad people.
Guess what? I think that as long as there are people suffering out there, we are all bad people. Plus, we've all sinned...our sins might be different from our neighbor's sins, but they are still sins. There is something we must understand before we can change: WE ARE BAD PEOPLE. From birth. There's no escape from it.
God...Jesus...they know it. They knew it well enough to know that we needed saving. God didn't want His creation, His most wonderful work, to be eternally separated from Him because of our human nature that leads to mistakes and sin and tragedy. Jesus took it on himself to die the most horrible of deaths so that we didn't have to be separate- that we could be seen in God's eyes as GOOD. Blameless. Holy. Pure. Righteous. Though it is so clear that we are not.
And THAT my friends, THAT is why there is hope.
So you ask, what does that have to do with anything else you've been talking about?
Everything. We have been shown incredible amounts of mercy and love and grace. What do we do with that? Most of us show it to others a little...but mostly just sit there with it, scared that if we do anything it'll get noticed and taken away or something silly like that. What are we to do? SHOW IT. God has shown us mercy...so we can show others mercy. God has loved us...so that we can show love to other people.
Jesus gave us a charge- to care for the widow, the orphan, the poor, the powerless.
James 1:27 Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.
Isaiah 1:17 Learn to do good; seek justice, correct oppression; bring justice to the fatherless, plead the widow's cause.
Hebrews 13:1-2 Let brotherly love continue. Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares. Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body.
We are called to take care of people. We don't do it well. I want to do it better. But I can't do it alone! It is God in me, the Holy Spirit, that empowers me to serve, that has given me a love and a passion for it. Others in the body of the church encourage me and serve with me. I hope that I can get others excited about serving too. That is my goal. I love seeing people on fire for service! I think it is the most beautiful quality. That and humility. (Though I feel like they go hand in hand usually, though I still work on the humility part myself...I can be quite proud.)
Like I told my youth pastor back in 7th grade at a youth conference (I don't know if you remember this, Kaye!), I want to change the world. But by loving and serving, and getting people excited about the two, not by earthly power. And only through God, because I know I don't have what it takes to do this on my own. God has a plan, and I might just be a little part, but I am PSYCHED to be a little part :)
If you guys see me and I am not living this out...remind me of it! Rebuke me in love! I need it!
Much love. Peace & Blessings
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