makes me wonder how it is that we should feel and act towards people today.
my first thought upon observing david's strong words was yikes, calm it down yo. have a little compassion.
but i think that my reaction, as a product of American 21st century culture, is quite telling.
tolerance.
apathy.
postmodern thought.
i think that these things are normal.
but normal doesn't always constitute right.
right has its roots deep in Reality.
and reality is simply that Jesus is the way, the truth, the life.
bonhoeffer attributes much of the disconnect to the rise of the monastic movement,
which, in and of itself was not bad,
but it helped to develop a dichotomy of thought in regards to the christian life.
the truly pious devoted themselves to Word, the poor, to monestaries and cloisters,
while the rest simply lived life like everyone else. essentially. eventually.
it has since developed to the extreme. today. here.
and i don't want to be content reacting this way to things that go so completely contrary to God and his righteousness.
a new friend from class, who i will clearly be in disagreement with much of this semester, said something to me last week. and i wish i had answered differently.
the context of this situation was that we had just watched a movie in class, a movie that i found the be highly inappropriate (i wish i had not watched it).
talking with m (sitting next to me) afterward, c (the new friend) overhears the conversation and my displeasure and he adds his two cents, "oh please, it was only 12 frames. no big deal."
my response to him was tolerant, accommodating, and stupid.
if i could do it over again i would tell him that the Name of Jesus Christ deserves more respect than that, that our desensitization to sin and narcissism has no place under the authority and worthiness of Him who is the Way, the Truth, the Life.
because really, we should be disgusted to represent Him that way.
the things we watch, the things we listen to, the things we allow ourselves to think.
they all matter. they carry serious weight, whether we allow ourselves to be sensitive to them or not.
i told c that those were my values and i was disappointed, but i wish that i had held him to the same standard as one who also lives here as a representative of Jesus Christ. if i had loved him (c) better i would have pushed back and challenged him to live a life worthy of the calling that he (i assume) has received.
we are capable of living this way.
my prayer is that we hold one another to the standards of the One to whom we will give an answer for everything that we say and do,
that we would speak with boldness to safeguard His Name while we faithfully live out this vapor that is life now,
that we might accurately represent Him to the world in purity, authority, grace.
"to this end we always pray for you, that our God may make you worthy of His calling and may fulfill every resolve for good and every work of faith by His power, so that the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you, and you in Him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ." [2 thess. 1.11-12]
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