Sometimes i wonder who i am.

I feel like i am two different people.
On the one hand i am very deep and intellectual and have a heart to serve God and serve people.
Then on the other hand, I am someone totally different who's number one priority is having fun and being liked by everyone.
And sadly, when i am the latter it completely takes over and nulls any glimpse of the former.
Why do i allow this?

If you were asked by the people around me what the "spine" of my life is... most of them would probably say, strictly from observation, that it was 'to have fun' or 'to be liked'.

But that is not something that i want to be known for... nor is it what i want to be the driving force in my life. I want it to be God, and God's love for people, and serving people, serving God.

But that doesnt always show very well.
I dont like that.
I dont like who i am in that sense.

But in general i really do like who i am.... and that kinda bugs me.
How can i like who i am when i hate what i do and what i allow to influence me?

FOCUS

I ran acrost an old journal of mine yesterday and as I was reading through it I noticed a note I had written to myself that hit me maybe even more than it did when I first wrote it. It was one of 5 insights I had uncovered after listening to a certain speaker. Here is what I wrote:
"It's time to stop trying to 'be a better Christian' and start focusing on 'knowing God more.' This takes the focus off of me and puts it onto Him."
I really like this comment. Not only is it great advice that helps us put things in perspective but it points something else out about what Christianity has become today. It seems we have made "being a Christian" into some sort of club. If you want to be in our club you have to look like this and dress like this and vote like this and spend your money like this. And the focus is taken completely off of knowing God and replaced with how much we can outwardly look and act like the Christian person we're supposed to look and act like.
Let's stop doing that.

WAR

Why is war so okay with everyone?
I don’t mean this war in particular, but any war. I mean I know there are causes for which war is necessary or unavoidable, but I figure, unless it is a cause for which I am willing to give up my own life for, or one that I can understand losing my own brother for. Then I have a hard time accepting it. And it would take quite a serious cause for that to be worth it in my mind. Because the people dying in these wars are just that. They are people, giving up their lives for something we as the American people decided is a worthy cause. They are brothers and fathers and husbands and sons. They are innocent bystanders. All of them are giving their lives for our freedom and for our safety every time we decide that war is necessary.

I just think that in this day and age of technology and communication and everything that it seems so primitive to have to resort to killing each other to solve our problems. I mean isn’t there something else we can do to solve problems other than resorting to violence and killing? There has to be a better way.

Politics

I hate politics. It just all seems so shady.
I really think that anyone who lasts in politics all the way up to being President must have been corrupted somewhere along the way…. Making ties with people and organizations that would one day come back to collect on their investments.

But my biggest annoyance is the people. The extremists. Anyone who is a die hard democrat or a die hard republican. Because these are the people that will defend to their death anything that their party does or stands for and will shoot down and ridicule anything the opposite party does, stands for, or decides. Even if it something as trivial as how one of their party leaders gives a speech or how they grew up. But what seems so ridiculous is the fact that people are willing to buy into such a one sided belief. Is there anything in life, short of the the Bible itself, where we are given only two choices and we choose one, whole-heartedly embracing everything that is included without question and passionately disputing anything that the opposing choice includes.

Especially with republicans, since they are the supposed “Christian” party, the republican party seems to reserve the right to add almost anything to their list of what republicans stand for and then just send out marketing materials to convince everyone that this is what they should agree with. But it isn’t very hard to convince the republicans because they will just agree with anything the “Christian” party says. As long as they don’t change their stance on the obvious issues, they can continue manipulating and deceiving people to believe anything they want them to believe.

And so many of them eat it up. I think it has a lot to do with the fact that we are lazy. We don’t want to have to actually get informed or do any kind of research or even any kind of speculative thinking of our own. We as Christians use issues like abortion and homosexuality as an excuse to vote for and buy into only one party and not even have a discussion about the other issues in our country, such as poverty, healthcare, education, the environment, unemployment, war, economics, national debt etc. These are all important issues in our society. Issues which we should have some sort of stance on. Issues which we, as Christians, should be at the forefront of, leading our country to a biblical solution and promoting compassion and generosity in the legislation. But as Christians we have made up our minds which party to agree with based on the two most controversial issues and therefore anything else that party stands for we think must be biblical and anything the baby killers and gay lovers agree with must be of the devil. Even some of my friends that I respect the most as intellectuals and profound thinkers seem fooled by the republican party propaganda. It’s an excuse. It’s an excuse for people to not have to think for themselves and come up with what they believe about government and about the way this country should be run. And I find that many people don’t even want to discuss it.

But the democrats aren't any better. They are so sure that they are right about everything that they won't even consider looking at things from another perspective. And nothing you say can change their minds because they'll just respond with, "Well that's not true, you can't believe anything these people say because they all lie." Well in that case, why even bother debating since nobody really knows anything that is true.

The problem is that these people are either one side or the other and therefore anything they hear on the news and anything they read in the paper is already slanted going in. Because they know what side they choose before they even hear all the facts. Their minds are already made up. So they hear what they want to hear and they don’t hear what they disagree with. Some if not most of them even go as far as only listening to news stations that report the news from this slant. Or only listening to radio programs that are agreeing with everything one party has to say. It’s like brainwashing at it’s best.

Convincing

I don’t want to try to convince you to agree with me on political issues or on any issue for that matter. But I do want to somehow get you to open your mind to the possibility that God does indeed exist and not only that but He loves you and wants to be involved in your life. My hope is to help you realize that there is more to life than just this. There is meaning and purpose and hope. And the reason I want to try to convince you of this is not because I want to be right nor is it because I want to prove anything to you…. Rather it is because I know through my own experience how fulfilling it is to know God. And how great it is to not ever be alone in anything I am going through. I want everyone to be able to experience that and to be able to have hope and to be rescued from ourselves, if you will.

I know that I am not perfect and I know that people have done and said a lot of stupid things in the name of religion that makes Christianity as a whole seem like it is completely irrelevant to the human race today. This makes it seem as though the only ones dumb enough to subscribe to such a belief are old fashioned, uneducated people who cant think for themselves. But that is simply not true. There may not be many of us, but we do exist. Christians who think for themselves, but still hold true to the bible. Christians who want what’s best for the world and not just ourselves. Christians who can have an intelligent discussion without letting our need to be right get in the way. Christians who focus more on helping people in a practical way than trying to force them into a prayer of repentance. This is the kind of Christian I am striving to be.

But as much as I know I am not perfect, I know that you are not perfect either. Nobody is. And maybe it is time we all consider the fact that there may be a flaw in our thinking. Maybe you are not completely correct either.

So let’s start by focusing on what we agree on and go from there.