I have a hard time not being selfish.
It comes so naturally to me. I know it is innate. I know that I will struggle with loving myself too much for the rest of my life. And I've come to realize recently that I struggle to love God more than I love myself.
I guess If I were being perfectly honest, I would even admit that a great deal of my Christian ministries are coupled with selfishness. Or done because they come easy to me. Worship is something I love to do. But it comes easily to me. There is something sweet and precious about drawing close to the heart of God. But music and singing songs to God are easy for me to do... There really isn't much of a challenge behind it. It's not self-sacrificing.
I love ministering to lost youth. I've tried to pour myself into our church's youth ministry for the past 5 years. But those kids come to me. I've not gone out to the streets to find them. I haven't walked into the high schools to introduce them to Jesus.
I guess the question I've been asking myself is "what have I reached out to do lately?" I was proud of myself the other night because a new girl came to church and I sat next to her. By the time she left I felt like I'd made a new friend. I felt like I'd done my Christian duty.
But God is seriously challenging me: that is not enough. What have I done to reach my next-door neighbor? I know his name. I know he sits on his front porch smoking cigarettes and drinking beer. He whistles at me sometimes to get my attention if I don't say hello to him. He's a friendly person and I'll joke around with him when I see him, but we are not friends.
And those people in Wal Mart? I laugh at them. We point and make jokes about their crazy hair, or their ridiculous clothes. When was the last time that it occured to me that maybe the hair and clothes are a cry for attention because no one gives it to them? No one shows them the kind of love that they've been looking for their whole live. I HAVE that love. I've experienced it. And for all my snobbery and shortcomings in sharing it, that love lives inside of me.
Jesus built his church outside of a building. He didn't wait on people to come to him. He went to the people. He met them at the point of their need. I'm sure he would have sat with the newcomer at church, but I also bet he would sit on the front porch with my neighbor while my neighbor drinks his beer. And that girl at Wal Mart with the five facial piercings? He probably would have asked her name and taken her to lunch.
I read in Blue Like Jazz that a group of kids lived on 3 dollars a day for a month, just so they could understand what real need felt like. I think I might try that this summer. I participated in Tom's One Day Without Shoes event a few years ago- so I could empathize with people who have none. (I put my shoes on when I went to the restroom at the school though because public bathrooms gross me out). I felt very charitable that day. But God wants me to go beyond feeling charitable and He wants me to feel real passion for those people. I don't want to do just enough good to pacify my conscience. And I don't want to be a do-gooder so that people will think how self sacrificing and loving I am... I want to be completely over the top in my love for people. Jesus was the first person to do that well, and He's the only person who can teach me to really love people.
I guess what I'm saying is that God is revealing my selfishness to me, bit by bit. And I think it's ugly and unattractive. So my prayer for this summer is that I would start to learn to show my love for God even more on the outside of the church than I do on the inside of the church. I want to be remade. I pray sometimes that God would hide me in the cross, and I mean it. I want ME to disappear, and I want Jesus to be made apparent in the way that I treat people. I can't think of anything more beautiful than that...
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