Oh these Yutes...

Since I am finally starting to emerge from the fog of total immersion job training, I find my brain is able to start thinking about things other than KLI289, license plates, radio verbiage, 10851s, what the H&S5411 code means (ask if you wanna know), how many banks and coffee shops there are in Scotts Valley(the knowledge of the latter I am intimately acquainted with), and so on and so forth. However, this freeing up of some of my headspace is a mixed blessing as it allows me to pontificate on things that I can't just turn to my services manual and get answers for.

I have of late been struggling with the idea of ineffectuality and my lack of ability to hold the hand of and provide step by step help for my youth group. This idea and struggle is not new, not only to me, but also to I believe most people who serve in any type of ministry. However, it is the most current struggle for me as several of my youth are struggling with simply living their day to day life. I would love to take a sweeping look at the group as a whole and just say, "overall I think everything is going good, they will be fine, they are doing just fine" but that would be to foolishly ignore each of them as individuals.


There is my iceberg - she reveals only the tiniest bit of herself to me and the world as a whole, but underneath the surface there is much of herself that she works very hard to hide. She talks about some of the struggles she is going through and some of her secrets, but I know that for each thing she shares there are ten more she doesn't and those are what are going to eat away at her from the inside out. I want to take that pain and that struggle away from her, I want to help her ease that burden that she carries, but I can only help her as much as she lets me. I love her sense of humor and the wisdom beyond her age that she doesn't even know she has.



There is one who on the outside appears to not really have all that much going on in her life outside of school and sports, but when you dig just a little, the sheer amount of stress, anxiety and pressure to perform perfectly to the point of complete and total exhaustion are right there under the surface. She is struggling to try and find herself in this world but can't because she has so many other people telling her who she should be, not to even figure out who she wants to be. I want to just take her out and give her a moment without that stress, without having to perform, but how can I when to spend a few hours with her would only put her more behind in her work and add more stress to her life? I love her randomness and her adaptability.

The one who is beginning to learn what it is really like to be an adult in this funky world. That being an adult actually sucks sometimes when there isn't enough money, not enough hours to work enough to make enough, that being 18 doesn't mean that there is an instant understanding of how the world works, that wisdom is something that (hopefully) comes with age. There is something bigger for her out there, and I desperately hope that life doesn't bog her down and exhaust her before she finds it. I love her energy, faith, and positive outlook on life no matter what happens.

And my last girl, off on her own, completely at the mercy of the outside world, its pressures, its temptations, its pitfalls, and of course all of its possibilities as well. I miss her, and am scared for her, not because of who she is, I love who she is, but because I know this world can be a scary place, and I wish I could protect her from any unnecessary pain or struggle in her faith. But what is so great, and one of the things I love about her is that she would see the challenge life is presenting and absolutely rise to meet it, I just want her to know she doesn't have to do it on her own, that she is not alone, that she not only has me of course, but bigger and better than that, she has God to get her through all of it. I love her questioning nature, her compassion, and her desire to do what is right.

And then there are the boys, ah...the boys. Our boys are special as most boys are, and since I do not meet with them one on one, I have less of a glimpse into their thoughts and struggles, but I know that they have them of course. Learning how to be a man of God in this faithless world with its decaying values is enough of a struggle, never mind the added frustration of just figuring out who they are in life in general. I always hope that they will learn to see what God values and take on those values and can go into the world and become the men that we all want to see the girls we love in our lives, fall in love with and be worthy of.

As one speaker that I still hold in very high regard said...our girls need to be Queens and our boys, Kings. I want to have Queens and Kings in my youth group, and I know that no matter what I do, it all comes down to whatever God is going to do in their lives. It can be frustrating feeling that sense of helplessness and that I am not doing enough, but of course knowing that God is ultimately in control also gives me the greatest freedom. I become free to simply enjoy their presence in my life, doing what I can, and knowing that I am not in charge of their futures, but am grateful that God allows me to be a part of their present. I cannot express the amount of joy I get from this group, they keep me laughing, they keep me young, and of course, they keep me praying...I owe them at least that much.

Perfection

My Sunday Afternoon:

My Pumpkin Chai

Perfect Crispy Fall Weather



The Delicious Fresh Smell of Redwoods



A Great Book



The Sound of a Train Whistle in the Distance



In Other Words - Heaven

entitlement

The more time I spend around people, interacting, listening, watching, etc. the more I realize that there is an increasing attitude of entitlement that people carry with them throughout their lives. It of course starts when we are young, and when we can’t get something we want, we declare definitively and often quite loudly “it’s not fair!” thus implying that if things were always fair, we would always get what we want, for the time being I will leave that inherently unwise thought process alone, that’s for another day.

But we often continue this idea that we deserve things in this life, that good things are supposed to come our way because we “deserve it” my question for that is...really? We deserve it? You deserve it? I deserve it? Of course this train of logic often ignores the other half of what we do, the things we deem as bad, we never want to claim we deserve anything related to those behaviors, just the good ones. We reach this fevered pitch defending the idea that we deserve better, that we deserve more, that we don’t deserve what we have, etc. we use this idea of entitlement – that we are somehow owed something in this life – by whom, I am not completely sure, but we use this idea to justify an amazing amount of not only immoral and integrity shattering behaviors and actions, but we continue this amazing sense of entitlement in our relationship with God. We foolishly charge the throne of the King with a list of demands that we feel we have deserved.

This is something I was already thinking about when I started studying the book of Malachi. I came upon the same theme with the Hebrews. They were in exile because they continuously refused to put God first in their lives and so they received the consequences that they had been warned about for generations. In Malachi, some were starting to return to their homeland and were turning God’s covenantal plan for them into a mere formality, something they weren’t even doing all that well even as a formality. Then in the midst of this decidedly backwards behavior they turned to God and asked him where his promises were. The response was not as they had expected;

Malachi 3 “You have wearied the LORD with your words. "How have we wearied him?" you ask. By saying, "All who do evil are good in the eyes of the LORD, and he is pleased with them" or "Where is the God of justice?" "See, I will send my messenger, who will prepare the way before me. Then suddenly the Lord you are seeking will come to his temple; the messenger of the covenant, whom you desire, will come," says the LORD Almighty. 2 But who can endure the day of his coming? Who can stand when he appears? For he will be like a refiner's fire or a launderer's soap. 3 He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver; he will purify the Levites and refine them like gold and silver. Then the LORD will have men who will bring offerings in righteousness, 4 and the offerings of Judah and Jerusalem will be acceptable to the LORD, as in days gone by, as in former years. 5 "So I will come near to you for judgment. I will be quick to testify against sorcerers, adulterers and perjurers, against those who defraud laborers of their wages, who oppress the widows and the fatherless, and deprive aliens of justice, but do not fear me," says the LORD Almighty."

The Israelites felt as though they were doing their part (with a rather large helping of denial) and so where was God in doing his? They turned to God and said “hey, we went through all this suffering that you put us through by the way, we deserve to see some justice, we deserve your attention” and God turned around and said, “oh I’ll give you my attention…” and then even goes on to say “I the LORD do not change. So you, O descendants of Jacob, are not destroyed” he is reminding them that they are lucky he is so faithful because they are so faithless. In the book of Malachi the people continue to push God and wonder why they are not getting that they think they deserve not realizing that God in his infinite mercy is keeping them from what they really deserve.

Which is exactly the point, Psalm 103 says, “The LORD is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love. 9 He will not always accuse, nor will he harbor his anger forever; 10 he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities”

Because he loves us so deeply God doesn’t treat us the way we deserve, we as humans, because of our inherently selfish nature deserve only one thing, death, it’s harsh, it’s a heavy thought but it is after all, what we all deserve. It is the sin in our lives that is so ingrained in the human experience that it taints everything we do and see. Sin lurks in the background everywhere, taking even our most beautiful accomplishments and marking them, the sin that leads to death.

This idea is throughout Paul’s writings in the book of Romans
Romans 6:23For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord
Romans 7:5For when we were controlled by the sinful nature, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in our bodies, so that we bore fruit for death
Romans 8:6The mind of sinful man is death, but the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace

There are many more, but I think I have already gone on too long. This idea of entitlement, of getting what we deserve, it’s a broken, delusional idea that has been happening since humans have been around, and I have no doubt that it will continue. I don’t think a popular saying that most of us know now was known by the Israelites but I think they certainly could have been forewarned had they known it, and I think it is something that in light of their hard learned lesson, we can also consider ourselves warned, “be careful what you wish for because you just might get it” Lucky for us, God isn’t dictated to by human adages and sayings, and I for one am filled with gratitude for that. Just something I have been thinking about...