- Mosely, The Suite Life
It's funny how quickly the right things in life become the wrong things....and the wrong things become the right things depending on who you are hanging out with.
As you get older you think that wisdom through trial and error will grant you the gift of discernment. It doesn't though. I believe discernment is truly a gift from God that not everyone is given. Certainly as adults we love to have the favortism of those that are well liked, cause then we feel well liked. Who doesn't want to be loved and adored by most people? If you say it doesn't matter what people think, then I believe you are a liar...dig deeper, it's there.
It's those times when folks ask of you to turn a blind eye, wink away certain behavior, or excuse it with immaturity to stay with the well liked group and to "be like everyone else" or "get on board" that we figure out who we really are on our own.
Drama starts as children, rocks hormones to the foundation as teens, annoy's the hell out of us in our 20's and 30's......and by our 40's, heck we are half way to dead. Do we really want to spend the next 40 years of our God given lives dancing around everyones clearly seen stupidity and bad choices?
NO! I just want to be all ...REAL TALK IN YOUR FACE... and be done. By the time I speak all the nice words that coddle your ego and make you feel all furry bunnies and rainbows....I'll dang grow a freaking beard and die.
"Ain't nobody got time for dat"
The thing is, being a Christian now is hard work for me. It shouldn't be, but it is.
Like....feeling God's grace and knowing His presence in my everyday and all day comings and goings is as natural as breathing. I'd suffocate literally without this constant hand holding session God has with me.
Dealing with stupid people = hard work......HARD WORK, intense manual labor. It's funny because these people believe in themselves and their faith is in themselves and the popularity they surround themselves with. So they "are always right." The entourage tells them so because that is what itching ears want to hear.
This is where the gift of discernment is halted. The things you once knew were right and good and planned to never leave, knowing bad things come from making rash decisions.....have now become the wrong things, and unpopular, and hard.....so they are left as thoughts in the file cabinet of the mind.....
.....to be picked back up at a later date when humbleness has forced your hand and won.......again. Discernment will not be gained though, for alas, it is a gift.
If or when you come to the knowledge you haven't been given this gift....surround yourself with the folks who have it. Folks who love the Lord with all their heart, their soul, their strength, and their mind, so that your pathway will be much straighter.
A lot of times people who do the right things that are deemed wrong by the world or by the popular, unknowing, useful crowd. Then they are made to stand alone until (Warning REAL TALK that won't coddle an ego) life blows up in your face and you want to talk about it....just.... a little bit...... that turns into weeks of chaos of the mind.
It's pretty sad really.
I have been thinking a lot about Mulims lately because the beginning of Ramadan was today I think. They are afforded so many rights that we as Christians are not. They are aloud to discriminate and be racist, to celebrate holidays without ridicule and are even celebrated in the media with positivity, they disrespect the role of women in 100 ways, and on and on.....
The reason people give them the respect they command as a religion is because they stand up for their god boldly and believe in what they are doing with the purpose of serving their god to be looked upon as righteous and good, we may see them as radical or crazy.....but what they are is crazy in love with their god, seeking his approval and blessings for faithfulness.....and so many times Christians just aren't.
.....and we are losing our people.....by our own self destruction. Worshipping the world and calling it changing with the times...trying to make God more hip and appealing to younger people ...
.....when the message is already appealing by itself. If we could be as radical and as crazy in love with the ONE TRUE GOD, seeking His approval and boldly standing alone for what is right....just to have Him smile upon us if for no other reason.....because His radical love makes us radical people.
I am downhearted about what our churches are becoming. Not even that you expect to find a perfect church, cause there are none, but just that you hope to find one where integrity and character mimic that of Christ consistently from the leadership down and not vice versa.
I am beginning to think America is surely not mentioned in Revelation because we are so incredibly weak in our faith and our knowledge of what God is really capable of.
There were a lot of things I used to want in a church for my family, but now I long for all Christian churches to put off what we deem as "church" and put on straight up, pure, radical love for Christ, HIS WORD, His adoration and love for one another and our neighbor as ourselves.
..............cause what we do is play church......My heart weighs full to capacity with confusion and sickness.
Warning! REAL TALK is fixing to not coddle your ego, look away now: I am afraid to invite people to church. Scary folks, called Christians, live there and they could hurt you.
They do it all the time, and wink it away.
