Pointing Fingers

 I know a great many people, late teens through thirties, facing a chronic adolescence. Some take pride in their prolonged immaturity, others are ashamed of it.  There are many that live games; video games, board games, card games, whatever kind of game you can imagine.
 I want to point out that i have this immaturity issue as well, in many ways, and it's by a force of will that it is put to rest. This was once a crutch of mine; as someone who was vying for the top position of the worldwide leaderboard on a video game, six hours of this video game in a single day was not uncommon. It's shameful in hindsight, but at the time i took pride in it.
 It can be about music, movies, tv shows, books, anything that keeps us "amused" (from the Greek, meaning non-inspired).

 I want to say that if you're more concerned knowing the top 200 on the Billboard charts than you are about knowing your Maker, you have messed up priorities. If you'are more excited about seeing that movie than you are about seeing a life changed, you have messed up priorities. In fact, Christ demands we hate all else in comparison to Him.
 God's first command to us was to multiply and fill the earth; this is to be productive, not to just exist here. Be productive! Get up, go outside, build something (maybe a legitimate relationship), work towards a goal, accomplish it, be productive. Fill the earth. What purpose or skill set is that remote control nurturing but more immaturity? It serves no purpose in life. None. It is a- (meaning non) musing (meaning inspiring). Amusements, amusements, amusements. That's what society tells us makes us happy.

 With this immature generation and its lack of "growing up," for lack of better term, comes a gross lack of responsibility. We have people who lack the commitment to stay with one person for more than a few months, people who are convinced that everything is someone else's fault; in this we have twenty-five year olds who are financially broke despite every chance given to them (myself), thirty year olds who blame every circumstance for their present state, and this is wrong.
Society has convinced those my age that nothing is our fault, that our problems are caused by others; we're poor because of the rich-class, we're depressed because others bully us, we have acne because of our genes--it doesn't end.
 More than this, we have a tendency to blame God, saying that we wouldn't have eaten from the Tree of Knowledge, but we're fools. We say it's not fair for us to die because of the sin of Adam. We say a lot of things, but i want to offer a question: are we paying for Adam's sin, or for our own? We can't blame God, we can't blame Adam, we can't blame our parents. No one will be standing beside us on the Day of Judgement, none to point fingers at, none to place the blame on; just you and God, just me and God, each of us, alone with our sin and the Judge.
 In this same train of thought, we can't blame external forces for our misfortunes.

 I am currently trying to make up for years of financial frivolousness, and i could sit here and say it's my parents fault for having not been more stern about teaching me to budget, but it comes down to this; i was stupid, i was careless, and i made mistakes. Instead of saving money and investing wisely, i spent my paycheck. And i know many others who do the same. But i can't blame my parents, the financial system, or anyone but myself.
 If you can't get out of your rut, then get out and push. Roll up your sleeves, get dirty, do something about it. For me, the hardest thing has been to learn financial responsibility. It's taken me a lot of work, and a seriously force of will, but i have learned to budget.
 We must all put down the remote, the games, the movies, and grow up. We must stop blaming others, realize the fault is our own, and start working today, in our means, to right the wrongs we've done.

 It's not Adam's sin, it's ours. We will be alone in front of the Throne of Judgement. We will have no one to blame. We can't say, "It's their fault."
It's your fault. And it's my fault.
The best thing we can do is acknowledge that, and begin working to fix it by prayer and much of your own effort. Faith without works is dead; what use is praying if you don't do your own part?
Work. Toil. Step away from your entertainment. Do what makes you uncomfortable. Live. Mature. And stop blaming others.

Cliché Jesus

There was an interesting image that came to mind earlier at work. It was like a very short scene played out in front of me, and it seems that it could make others think about their own personal idea of Christ.

There were two men before me, and there was a choice that had to be made; follow one, or follow the other.
The first one was the idea i all-too-often have of Christ: handsome face, chiseled jaw, groomed facial hair, you name it. His hair was immaculate, long and tangle-free, wavy and smooth. He was quite muscular, wearing a royal purple sash, a brilliant crown on his head, and he had thousands of followers in nice clothes, preachers and well-to-do people all rather urbanely dressed, and he told me that he was Christ. From his voice and manner, it seemed wasn't a decision for me to make, he simply was the Messiah, and he said it with authority.
The second man was really ragged looking. He was skinny, like a homeless man. His hands were cut up, scabbed, scarred, blistered and calloused, with split fingernails to top them off. His face was weak and feeble, covered mostly by a muddy and matted beard, His face had all manner of sun-damage and weariness. His clothes were torn and stained like a mechanic's favorite t-shirt, His hair was shaggy, and He somewhat ugly in the way that you'd walk around this person while purposefully avoiding eye-contact. His followers were few, but looked much like Him. He asked me who i believed He was.

I've actually thought of this quite a bit and always figured Jesus was of the more lowly type, but until this came to mind, it never struck me just how lowly.
He was a carpenter, which results in lots of cuts and scrapes, many callouses, splinters, and the like. Foxes (these are wild scavengers, mind you), have holes, but the King has no place for His head; He was homeless. When the disciples asked what there was for Him to eat, He said doing the will of His Father was His food. He walked from town to town, not always on a donkey. He was without money, and so most likely without clean water the majority of the time.
We glamorize Jesus, even when we attempt to portray Him as a "nobody" from that time--clean (or at least without tear) clothes, clean face, soft beard, flowing hair. These things were for those in the houses of royalty of that era, not workers, carpenters, wanderers.

The thing that hit me most about that little image was that the one stated He was Christ, the other asked who I said He was.
After all, it doesn't matter to the non-believer whether or not Jesus was the Christ; it matters to those who call Him the Son of God. It matters who I say He is. It matters who you say He is. He could walk around proclaiming to be the Christ all day long, and yet it wouldn't matter if nobody else said He was the Christ.
In the same way, we can proclaim to be Christians day in and day out, bumper stickers plastered on our cars, t-shirts with "edgy" Christian slogans or Bible verse, cross and fish jewelry adorning our necks and fingers, and it won't matter. It won't matter one bit.
If someone can't look at our lives and tell who we follow, are we actually following Him? Does His light really shine from us, or are we just perpetuating the Christianity Machine?

Here's a question i am asking, paraphrasing a question Christ presented His disciples, and i implore each and every one of you to ask it to a close friend, preferably a non-believing one; aside from my shouting, aside from my claims, aside from my apparel, who do you say that i follow?