So a coworker was asking me about my vacation and I mentioned Creation Festival which is a Christian festival which my friends all well know is more my passion than any other work I've ever done. Then she asked, "So how was your Christian... camp...?"
Let's get a few things straight: A Christian Festival does not mean we all hold hands and sing gay lovey songs and clap and wield our bibles around in some flowery, dainty little show of affection to God. I told her it was a festival of music, like... a music festival <shock face!> and we aren't all hands-in-the-air lunatics. We're music fanatics who use the medium to express Christian values. Many of us even grimace at the crazy-heads who skip around trying to save the saved... okay, All of us grimace at that kind. There's TONS of genres of Christian music. Pop, rap, reggae, metal, grunge... you name it! She was shocked. I was pleased. Conversation ended.
Before I am anything else, I am a Christian. I am not a good prayer. I am no good at Bible knowledge. I suck at times as a mother/daughter/friend/wife/etc. But what makes me more human is that I know it's okay because I have a God Who Loves me regardless and will lift me up and put me right back in place... sometimes painfully, sometimes begrudgingly, sometimes desperately. I know I can do better and I'm so hard on myself sometimes, but as depressed as I've ever been I've always known one thing without any doubt in any fiber of my being. The time in this world is short - nothing - compared to eternity. And because I have a God who loves me, as long as I continue to turn to Him in any situation, I don't have to work for it. He's already done all the work, all the Bloodshed, all the Sacrificing, all the Suffering. Mock me, shake your head, wonder at my faith, my words of certainty which many doubt. Fine. I'm so used to it. I know where I'm going.
So to those in the world, primping your hair and wasting money on your looks and caring about gossip and who does what for a living: Are you sure you have your priorities straight? Is your Gucci bag coming to the next life with you. Or a more short-term question: will it help you satisfy yourself and your self-image. If the answer is yes then you're missing the point. Often the things people see and hear and taste and touch miss the point.
We look to the horizon and long ago thought it was the edge of the world. We finally learned how to sail beyond and saw more than we'd ever imagined. Then we learned how to fly and saw another horizon. Soon we learned how to soar higher until we got the whole picture: the Earth, a sphere of life, held together by means we were barely discovering! Think we know much more than the horizon of our souls yet? Doubt it. For me, I'd like to place my trust in Someone Who Knows all about it.
Christianity isn't some silly little phase of humanity. It isn't some cute little gathering where we all cry about our little feelings in the big mean world. It's certainly not just a bunch of limitations and rules to punish people and control people. All those kinds of people are, again, missing the point. Christianity is putting your heart on Jesus and knowing that He'll guide you through this life and into the next. It's knowing that He's been there and knows the way and goes before you to prepare it. It's raw, unadulterated, unfiltered LOVE. It's about a God Who became Man and Bled and Died for us. That's not frilly people! That's solid heart-wrenching!
So for those who think our cute little Christian fests are a waste of time and the music is some quaint little love song with boring repetitious ballads and choir-like backgrounds, check out some Tobymac or Newboys or Jars of Clay. Yes there are melodic praise songs, but listen to the words and compare them to the crap lyrics on secular radio. What do you want your child singing along to?
_Stepping off the soapbox now._
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