Last night my wife and I sat in the living room with the group of like-minded friends in Boise's Northend. I arrived late, as I unfortunately have been in a habit of doing. My wife and friends were already in the middle of a spiritual conversation. As the conversation progressed we drove into an uncomfortable paragraph on the freedoms that we to often practice in our everyday lives.
"It is obvious what kind of life develops out of trying to get your own way all the time: repetitive, loveless, cheap sex; a stinking accumulation of mental and emotional garbage; frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness; trinket gods; magic-show religion; paranoid loneliness; cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants; a brutal temper; an impotence to love or be loved; divided homes and divided lives; small-minded and lopsided pursuits; the vicious habit of depersonalizing everyone into a rival; uncontrolled and uncontrollable addictions; ugly parodies of community. I could go on. This isn’t the first time I have warned you, you know. If you use your freedom this way, you will not inherit God’s kingdom. But what happens when we live God’s way? He brings gifts into our lives, much the same way that fruit appears in an orchard—things like affection for others, exuberance about life, serenity. We develop a willingness to stick with things, a sense of compassion in the heart, and a conviction that a basic holiness permeates things and people. We find ourselves involved in loyal commitments, not needing to force our way in life, able to marshal and direct our energies wisely. Legalism is helpless in bringing this about; it only gets in the way. Among those who belong to Christ, everything connected with getting our own way and mindlessly responding to what everyone else calls necessities is killed off for good—crucified. Since this is the kind of life we have chosen, the life of the Spirit, let us make sure that we do not just hold it as an idea in our heads or a sentiment in our hearts, but work out its implications in every detail of our lives. That means we will not compare ourselves with each other as if one of us were better and another worse. We have far more interesting things to do with our lives. Each of us is an original." Galatians 5:19-26 MSG
This part really hit home for me :
"Frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness... Small minded and lopsided pursuits... Cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants Vicious habit of depersonalizing everyone into a rival; uncontrolled and uncontrollable addictions; ugly parodies of community."
Frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness? Yeah... I can understand that, because I had been feeling as if I had lost my joy.
Since I moved to Boise I have been struggling to get involved in the community. Particularly the local community of improvisers in the area. It has been a real struggle of mine. I have come to realize that I have grown a calloused heart or a hard heart towards some of the people in the community of improvisers in the area, and I longed for the kind of community that I had prior to moving to Boise. I became angry with them, and disgusted that they would treat me poorly or talk badly about me. That they would hold grudges toward me and never tell me why. And began to wish that they would fail at what they were doing, that others would see how poorly they treated people who they once called friend. Then I wanted to give up. I wanted to give up working in the improv scene here in Boise. It seemed so much easier to give up than to press on, to try and work out relationships to try and be good to people seems like the most difficult of climbs, let alone to pray for these people who I felt had wronged me. But then when I look at myself, how ridiculous had I been acting? Why was I allowing improv or the improv community or other people govern how I felt in this place? How did I let it get to me so much that I began to believe that these relationships and community could grow, it couldn't be healthy, or encouraging or beneficial to one another. However I can't feel that way anymore, I can't compare myself with them, I can judge them or continue to be frustrated with them. I have since begun to pray for them and hope the best for them, the more I do it the easier it becomes. It's hard to treat someone poorly or think badly of someone when you begin to want the best for them and pray for blessing in their life. God help, me that's what I'm going to do.
"We develop a willingness to stick with things, a sense of compassion in the heart, and a conviction that a basic holiness permeates things and people. We find ourselves involved in loyal commitments, not needing to force our way in life, able to marshal and direct our energies wisely."
"It is obvious what kind of life develops out of trying to get your own way all the time: repetitive, loveless, cheap sex; a stinking accumulation of mental and emotional garbage; frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness; trinket gods; magic-show religion; paranoid loneliness; cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants; a brutal temper; an impotence to love or be loved; divided homes and divided lives; small-minded and lopsided pursuits; the vicious habit of depersonalizing everyone into a rival; uncontrolled and uncontrollable addictions; ugly parodies of community. I could go on. This isn’t the first time I have warned you, you know. If you use your freedom this way, you will not inherit God’s kingdom. But what happens when we live God’s way? He brings gifts into our lives, much the same way that fruit appears in an orchard—things like affection for others, exuberance about life, serenity. We develop a willingness to stick with things, a sense of compassion in the heart, and a conviction that a basic holiness permeates things and people. We find ourselves involved in loyal commitments, not needing to force our way in life, able to marshal and direct our energies wisely. Legalism is helpless in bringing this about; it only gets in the way. Among those who belong to Christ, everything connected with getting our own way and mindlessly responding to what everyone else calls necessities is killed off for good—crucified. Since this is the kind of life we have chosen, the life of the Spirit, let us make sure that we do not just hold it as an idea in our heads or a sentiment in our hearts, but work out its implications in every detail of our lives. That means we will not compare ourselves with each other as if one of us were better and another worse. We have far more interesting things to do with our lives. Each of us is an original." Galatians 5:19-26 MSG
This part really hit home for me :
"Frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness... Small minded and lopsided pursuits... Cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants Vicious habit of depersonalizing everyone into a rival; uncontrolled and uncontrollable addictions; ugly parodies of community."
Frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness? Yeah... I can understand that, because I had been feeling as if I had lost my joy.
Since I moved to Boise I have been struggling to get involved in the community. Particularly the local community of improvisers in the area. It has been a real struggle of mine. I have come to realize that I have grown a calloused heart or a hard heart towards some of the people in the community of improvisers in the area, and I longed for the kind of community that I had prior to moving to Boise. I became angry with them, and disgusted that they would treat me poorly or talk badly about me. That they would hold grudges toward me and never tell me why. And began to wish that they would fail at what they were doing, that others would see how poorly they treated people who they once called friend. Then I wanted to give up. I wanted to give up working in the improv scene here in Boise. It seemed so much easier to give up than to press on, to try and work out relationships to try and be good to people seems like the most difficult of climbs, let alone to pray for these people who I felt had wronged me. But then when I look at myself, how ridiculous had I been acting? Why was I allowing improv or the improv community or other people govern how I felt in this place? How did I let it get to me so much that I began to believe that these relationships and community could grow, it couldn't be healthy, or encouraging or beneficial to one another. However I can't feel that way anymore, I can't compare myself with them, I can judge them or continue to be frustrated with them. I have since begun to pray for them and hope the best for them, the more I do it the easier it becomes. It's hard to treat someone poorly or think badly of someone when you begin to want the best for them and pray for blessing in their life. God help, me that's what I'm going to do.
"We develop a willingness to stick with things, a sense of compassion in the heart, and a conviction that a basic holiness permeates things and people. We find ourselves involved in loyal commitments, not needing to force our way in life, able to marshal and direct our energies wisely."
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