Nothing More Than Apathy

“It’s coming down to nothing more than apathy
I’d rather run the other way than stay and see
The smoke and who’s still standing when it clears”

Over My Head–The Fray

Rather than hook with you an exciting introduction, allow me to start this post with a question: How many times have you seen Christians with this attitude? This attitude of total apathy, that someone else will take care of it, because I, I of course, am too busy and have already made my weekly offering to “the church” (which is, in fact, only a building, but that is a different topic, for a different day). The attitude of sadness and irritation over our moral decline, but hey, what can you do about it? All nations fall, right? They hear “Be the change you wish to see in this world”, say “Hey, great concept, really amazing thought”, and do what the next day? Go to work, keep your mouth shut about anything that goes against God, because “I’m not pushy”.

American Christians are in a total state of apathy. The ones that aren’t are called radicals. “Hurrah!” we say, “Good for them! But that life is not for me, oh no, I can’t do that.” What would you say if I said this life was not about you? What really matters at the end of your life? For God to say to you, “Well, congratulation, I’m so proud of you, you never stepped outside your comfort zone”? Or for Him to say to you, “You fell crazily in love with Me and did all you could. You lived for Me, you died for Me. Everything you did was for Me. Well done, My good and faithful servant.”

As a Christian, Christ is within you. Anything you say about yourself, you are saying about Christ. Replace “I” with “Christ” every time you make an excuse. “Christ can’t afford to make that sort of donation to World Vision. Christ doesn’t have the time to go on a missions trip. Christ doesn’t have the interest in traveling to that conference, He’d much rather focus on buying a house.” Would you ever say that about Christ? Would you ever say that Christ didn’t have the patience to work with misbehaving inner-city kids? Would you ever say that Christ didn’t have the optimistic spirit of others and couldn’t help but spread doom-and-gloom everywhere He went?

Perhaps I am a little zealous at this point because of the past few chapters I’ve read in Crazy Love by Francis Chan. Perhaps it is only a stage. But I pray, I pray with my whole heart that it’s not a stage. My life was made by God, for God. If I can’t live for Him, what is the sense in wearing Christ’s name? One cannot call themselves an engineer, then commit 30 minutes a day to being an engineer and spend the rest of the day being a zookeeper. One cannot call themselves a Christian, then commit only 30 minutes a day to being one. In a way, this is a bad example, because being an engineer would not be your identity; however, being a Christian is. Christian is what you are. You are not who you want to be, because in the end, you don’t matter. To borrow a comparison from Crazy Love, you are only an extra. People don’t watch the movie to see you, they watch it to see God, the main character. There are several other characters in the movie, but in the end, what do we really care about? That we were happy? Or that others saw that we loved God with all and every fiber of our being?

I understand that much of this is probably gibberish. They’re only thoughts flowing from my brain to my fingers in an unorganized and quite confusing fashion. It’s likely I’ll sit down soon and convert it into something more structured. But until then, I want you to think about it. Are you apathetic? Or are you in love — and showing it.

"Taking My Sin, My Cross, My Shame"

Last Thursday, a friend on Facebook posted a video featuring the song "You Are My All In All" sung by Nichole Nordeman and Point of Grace. I watched the video, being slightly familiar with the song, and it brought me to tears. Unlike many other contemporary Christian songs, the lyrics are meaningful, humble, and reverent. My mom's favorite passage is "Taking my sin, my cross, my shame/Rising up again, I bless Your name". Friday morning at breakfast, she told me it meant a lot to her because she could never imagine doing that herself. It takes such an awesome Individual to do that. She also made mention that He was a gentleman. This made me think of something I had read at one point. (If you know where it could have been that I read it, please tell me!) God is the only god of all men to sacrifice His Son for an undeserving people. This alone sets Him far apart from other gods. The fact that He would send His only Son to bear our sins, our crosses, our shames when we have done nothing -- absolutely nothing -- to deserve it is way beyond just interesting, touching, or cool. It is awe-inspiring, humbling, worth crying over.

Perhaps brought on by these reflective thoughts, I have finally heeded God's call. For months now, He has been calling me away from my dependency on the internet. Being stubborn, lazy, and habitual, I have each time told myself and God that I didn't need to cut back, I'd get things done, and it'd all be okay. But it's not. I do need to cut back, I wasn't getting anything done, and it wasn't all okay. Why on earth have I been struggling so much with whether or not I can guard my heart? Because my heart was being called away from God, and it was becoming very vulnerable. It's no one's fault but my own that I did not have the self-control to set limits for myself. But I no longer need be slave to my dependency. "The truth will set you free" indeed. I have finally realized the truth about my addiction and the experience will hopefully be freeing. At the time, it hurts. I am still proud and want to toss my resolve out the window; I want to go back to my old ways. But the only way things will change is if I change. And I believe cutting out much of my internet time will change quite a bit for me. Thanks for putting up with my rant; it's still pretty fresh in my mind and heart and I'm feeling the need to talk it out several times.

Ever growing, ever changing, ever seeking, ever hoping. May we all be drawn closer to Him during this week following the celebration of His resurrection.

Questions of the Heart

Who would've guessed that one could give a piece of her heart away to some man she had never met and merely thought was “hot”, implying she had little respect for him. Yet apparently it can happen. I did it.

One day, I mentioned to my friend how good-looking I thought some actors were. She believed I had seriously fallen for them, and hinted that I shouldn't say such things. I replied that I couldn't help it if they were hot. “Hot” is a term I reserve for those I have never met, have little respect for as people, and are extremely good-looking, yet she mentioned that by saying things like that my future husband would only have a tiny, gnawed-on piece of my heart left. Needless to say, this not only seemed illogical to me as I could never give a piece of my heart to someone I've never met, but also peaked my curiosity. Where did this idea of “pieces of the heart” come from?

Through the next year or so, I kept hearing about “pieces of the heart”, usually in direct correlation with “emotional purity”. At first, I found the idea rational, as most ideas are. But the more I read, the more it didn't make sense. Of course it had its valid points, but the logic just wasn't matching up.

Deciding to sort out my thoughts on paper, the idea for this research paper was born. My goal is not to change minds, nor to attack those who follow the emotional purity movement, rather to share what I have found and to inspire others to think for themselves on this subject. It is with much prayer, thought, and discussion with others that I have written this. Unfortunately, not all points may be covered as thoroughly as I would like, but it should suffice for now. I may recant my position on some of this eventually. However, this is my current decision on emotional purity.

Click here to read the full paper.

New Beginnings

Everyone must start somewhere. Our first beginning is conception. From there, our lives are full of new beginnings. We begin our lives as we know them at birth. We begin to walk and talk, love and learn. Without beginnings, our lives would be worthless. None of us can stay at the stage of conception, infantry, toddler, child, teenager, or adult. Even then, after death, we begin our afterlives.

I started thinking about beginnings, first of all because of the new year and secondly because I read Genesis 1-4. As I contemplated all this, I thought of another connection that is very apparent and I'm sure you all have heard, yet it can never be said too many times.

It is never too late to become a “new man” *, make a new beginning. “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new” (II Corinthians 5:17). This new beginning signals a new stage in your life, a time for growing and learning, just like every other new beginning and stage in your life. Just like you cannot always remain an infant, you cannot always remain a babe in Christ either. You must grow and learn, if you are to go on to be anything in this world.

Unfortunately, not all Christians have done this. Many are still in habitual sin. Does this mean they are Christians? If they truly believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, that He came to earth to die for their sins, was crucified, buried, and rose again the third day according to Scripture, then yes, they are Christians. Their standing is sealed. It is their state that is carnal, reflecting their position as babes in Christ who have not grown and learned.

This misunderstanding of “standing and state” has caused much confusion in many a Christian life. In fact, I never understood it until recently, nor did I understand the importance to know the difference. The author of the tract “Standing and State” explains it this way: “Briefly stated, the believer's standing is the way God sees him in Christ, as perfect in Him. But his state is the way God sees him in his daily walk, which is sinful and erring, and needs to be improved and corrected.” Some Scriptures used to back this statement up are Romans 5:1-2, I Corinthians 15:1, I Peter 5:12, Philippians 2:19-20, Philippians 4:11, and Colossians 4:7.

Another good point addressed in this tract is the fact that Ephesians is broken into two parts. The first part (the first three chapters) deal with the believer's standing in Christ. At the end of the third chapter, Paul writes, “Amen”, marking the conclusion of this topic. Chapter four begins thus: “I therefore...beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called”. Notice the word “walk”. This second half on Ephesians dwells mostly on the believer's walk, his state.

With New Year's and resolutions upon us, I would like to encourage you to consider your new beginning. Maybe you have been a Christian for many years. Maybe you are a brand-new Christian. In any case, are you growing and learning? Your standing is in Christ, where is your state?


* To become a “new man”, a Christian, you must simply believe that Christ came to earth to die for your sins, was crucified, buried, and rose again the third day according to Scripture. “That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.” (Romans 10:9), “For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.” (Romans 10:13).