Standing Out

Yesterday I started reading "The Life You've Always Wanted" by John Ortberg. There was one paragraph that jumped off the page and slapped me in the face. That is what I want to talk about today.

Here is where the thought begins. The Bible tells us that we are to be separate from the world (in the world but not of the world).

In John 13:35 Jesus commands us to love one another. Love in a radical, real way. Love in a big, bold way. Love in a way that is so pure that when other people see us they automatically know that we are Christians. By having a love like this, we would be separated from the world all around us regardless of our environment. We would be separate like a rainbow in a cloudy sky.

Yet most of the time we fail at loving like this. Because of this failure to be separated by love, we instead try to separate ourselves by making boundries. We make rules like no dancing, no rock music, no movies, no...

Now, I'm not saying that having rules and boundries is bad, because we all need fences in our lives. The problem is that many times as we build these boundries around our lives we forget to have that big, bold love that Jesus commands for us. Additionally many times these fences serve not only to keep us in, but to also keep others out. Fences are no substitute for big, bold love. We must be known by our love. People should know by looking at us that we follow Christ. But this distinction should come by our great love for others.

Here is my last thought. If people cannot recognize that you are a Christian by your great love, maybe it is better that they don't know that you are a Christian at all.

Mid 20's Crisis Part IV

This is part IV of this discussion. As a recap, I've noticed that many of the people in our age group struggle with the same issues. This is designed to be a discussion and a time where we can offer ideas to each other. The main rule is to not gossip about others.

The topic this week is money, or more specifically debt. Most of us have some pretty real issues with debt. I think that this comes from a variety of reasons. On the income side, most of us are on the lower end of the pay scale for our jobs because we haven't yet received promotions and big raises. Many of us are also trying to pay off student loans from college. These are parts of the problem, yet I believe that the biggest factor lies on the spending side. The truth is that most of us spend way too much money. There are many reasons for this, but I believe that the biggest cause of our over spending is that we try to live like our parents live. We live in a house like they live in, we drive the same cars that they do, and our TV is the same size as theirs (or maybe even bigger). I am guilty of this.

What we tend to forget is that our parents didn't live like this when they were in their 20's. I remember that growing up we hardly ever ate out. When we did it was usually McDonalds. When we ate at McDonalds we had to order hamburgers...because cheeseburgers were too expensive. Think about what our financial situations would be like if we could show that kind of discipline! This is really hard for me.

Lets offer each other suggestions this week. Post a comment about your favorite way to save money. What are your favorite cheap restraunts? What is a good way to save on utility bills? What is a great cheap date idea? What other suggestions can you give?