By: Elise Cobb, Staff Writer
The Ouachita “bubble” provides a great environment to become complacent. We go to a Christian school with Christian professors and Christian peers. Most of us do not even have to work that hard to stay here. We enjoy our comfortable dorm rooms and our easy conversations with friends.
We work a DNOW every couple of weekends and go to church on Sundays when we feel like it. We get so caught up in making the grades while trying to balance a social life that we let ourselves fall into becoming average. But no one wants to be average. We want to be “hipster” or “unique” or “different.” But are we really different when we all have the same ideas and all wear the same kinds of clothes? We all want to be different, but by trying to be different we all end up the same.
The current generation of young Christians is in a dilemma. We want to be cool with the world while also loving Jesus. We want to be recognized as the best at our faith while also being humble. We want all the clothes in the world but don’t want to be seen as materialistic. We want Instagram fame for incredible photography skills but want the humility of someone who does not actually try. We want to be seen as people who love Jesus to the point of doing anything for him, but we do not actually look anything like him. Jesus did not live a comfortable or “hipster” life. He lived a life of pure sacrifice. He wanted people to see that He was the only way into heaven and that materialism was nowhere near what He wanted for us.
We complain about our cracked iPhone screen, unreliable Wifi, gross caf food and all other types of unimportant issues. The deal is we have become complacent. We have become so focused on our happiness that we have missed the point. True happiness is found in helping others and being unattached to possessions. Countries all over the world are in extreme poverty while we look down from our “Christian” ivory towers of wealth and power and complain about being rich.
We forget that we do not deserve any of this. We deserve death on a cross. We do not deserve our beautiful families, loving relationships, expensive clothes, huge homes, or anything we have. All we deserve is death, but we expect everything. We tell ourselves we absolutely must have happiness. That we are Christians who work hard for Jesus and deserve to be taken care of by the God we serve.
We are wrong. Once we realize that, the sooner we are to becoming who we need to be. Men and women of God that do not complain of all our “first world probs,” but rather thank God for them. Thank you, Lord, for letting me even own a cell phone or go to a school that provides me with the Internet. Thank you for the food that is in the caf that my family or my scholarships have generously paid for. Thank you for my family, my home, my life. I am so blessed to have what I have. All because of you and your generosity.
How do we combat our tendency to focus on only what we want from this world? We proactively work on trying to help each other. Focus less on what we want and focus more on what God wants. We can be encouraging in our words and in our actions. Write someone a nice letter out of the blue or give someone a compliment when you pass them in the hall. Donate the clothes you do not wear to Goodwill or another charity. Freely give your time and effort to children, the elderly and the poor. You can give so much to others by just spending time sitting and listening to them.
But the key here is not to just talk about doing something. We MUST actually do it. We need to take action now. We are not promised tomorrow. We do not know what the next hour brings for ourselves or for anyone. We should use each moment to serve the God that has so lovingly forgiven us of our sins. If we are to say we are God’s children, we should strive to make him known. Let us love one another and give our time freely to the people who need us. Christians can make a bigger impact on the world if we would just try and try hard.
