LoveWithAMission.com - November 2007

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Tuesday, November 6th
Last week I learned about something in school which made me think, and it actually made me quite upset... I learned about prejudice. Something that's very important when you want to be a teacher is that you aren't prejudiced. You should treat all your students as equals. (By the way, that does not mean you should necessarily treat them all the same...but that's a different topic, which makes this one a hundred times more complicated than it already is...) Now, some very smart people found out that prejudice does not have to be obvious. In fact, most of the time it happens without anyone ever noticing! It's usually very subtle and not consciously done. Two examples: one student is wearing very baggy jeans and an iPod, so the teacher (subconsciously!) assumes that student isn't going to be the smartest in the class. Another example: A student speaks with a very clear, pleasent, strong voice; the teacher assumes (again, without realizing the reason) that student is smart and hard-working. These are just examples, things could turn out very differently depending on the teacher. Now for the really interesting part: if a teacher thinks that a certain student isn't all that smart, the teacher won't have high expectations from that student, and a number of things can happen because of that. For example: (I'm gonna be a teacher. Teachers use lot's of examples... ;-)) during an oral test the teacher won't wait as long for the student to answer as they would with a (supposedly) smarter student. Or: the teacher won't direct as many questions towards that student because she/he assumes they won't know the answer anyway. Or: the student can tell that the teacher doesn't have high expectations and consequently assumes him-/herself (!) that they aren't very smart, and, because they think it's a waste of time, stop working hard, and, consequently, get worse grades...and the cycle continues...
Isn't it amazing what prejudice can do? It can affect someone's entire future! (Just imagine: a different teacher and I might have been good in French!! ;-))
It made me wonder whether I was prejudiced, too... And the answer is: absolutely. For example, I'm prejudiced against every single other car driver on the planet (some drive way too fast, some way too slow, all the rest drive just slow enough to be annoying...) I'm generally prejudiced against people who talk slow, I tend to think they're a little bit stupid. I'm prejudiced against parents (they're always waaaaaay to protective... Right mom? ;-)) I'm prejudiced against very good-looking people, I tend to think they're stuck up. Etc. etc. I'm probably prejudiced in many, many more ways, but I'm simply not aware of it.
I think we need to be aware of the harm we can do others when we're prejudiced. When we're prejudiced against someone, we're basically judging them, eventhough we may hardly know them. And even if we did know them, it's not our duty to judge them at all, that's God's job...

"Stop judging others, and you will not be judged. Stop criticizing others, or it will all come back on you. If you forgive others, you will be forgiven."
Luke 6:37

"Stop judging others, and you will not be judged. For others will treat you as you treat them. Whatever measure you use in judging others, it will be used to measure how you are judged. And why worry about a speck in your friend's eye when you have a log in your own eye?"
Matthew 7:1-3

Monday, November 12th
Yesterday I had small group with the youngest kids from Sunday School for the first time. I thought I was going to be sick at first, I was so nervous, but I think it actually went quite well. The theme of the story was Moses and the "burning" bush, and I gave them a picture to color of Moses kneeling in front of the bush that stood in flames but wouldn't burn. While some of them tried to use the "right" colors (e.g. brown for the wood, green for the leaves), some of them just picked random colors that they liked and colored wherever they felt like it. One girl in particular had some unusual combinations of green, orange, red, and lots of purple, and some of the kids didn't think that looked very nice, and said so, too... But before I could even say anything, the little girl's sister spoke up, telling them (in a not particularly friendly way) that her sister happened to like colors, and that if she wanted to she could color her picture whichever way she liked. Period. I think this little story is simply adorable... Wouldn't it be nice if we were all so protective of each other? But we tend to think mostly about ourselves, sometimes not even noticing when one of our brothers or sisters in Christ is hurting. I wonder if this is a tactic of the devil. Maybe he's trying to break up all of our friendships by simply letting us drift apart... My youth group used to spend a lot more time together, now we hardly ever do anything outside of church. I don't think this is anyone's fault in particular, but everyone's responsible. And I don't think this is what God wants for us...

A friend is always loyal, and a brother is born to help in time of need.
Proverbs 17:17

Tuesday, November 20th
I have been doing a lot of complaining lately. Yes, the pooooooor little baby's been at it again... This time it was my church that landed in the crossfire. I've been unhappy with my church for...as long as I can remember. From the time I had to play a shepherd in the sunday school play (and a very grumpy shepherd I was indeed) I've always managed to find something to complain about. Why? Because my church ain't perfect.
It's kinda funny, I keep remembering little scraps of things I read or heard in different places that seem to fit... For example in Janet Oak's The Bluebird And The Sparrow the main character learns that when the devil whispers some lie into your ear, and you start believing it, and start looking for proof, you'll definitely find lots... But actually that "proof" is usually really just misinterpretation... What that means is this: if you want to see something, you will see it. For example, once upon a time I was had pretty big crush on a certain feller, and I was absolutely convinced (sort of...) that he had that same feeling for me, too. And guess what? I kept seeing him look at me, barely able to keep his eyes off me he was! Well, in hindsight I realize that he didn't look at me more often than he did at any other girl, and if he did, that might have had to do with the fact that I kept staring at him...
Or in High Society (Frank Sinatra and Bing Crosby - Whop de doo!) the guy tells the girl that she won't ever really be a good wife, woman, or even a good human being, until she begins to have some regard for human frailty. (She broke up with him because, well, basically because he wasn't perfect.) She ends up saying almost the exact same thing to another guy, but, of course, ends up marrying the first one after all. (Bing Crosby and non-happy endings just don't go together...)
Alright, now this third thing is something I heard my dad say, who read it in a book which was quoting C.S. Lewis, who said that the only person you can change is yourself. I can preach on street corners, play really loud Christian music, pray for someone for seven hours straight, I can even write scripture verses on toilet paper rolls and throw them at people (don't ask me where I got that idea,) I can do whatever I want, but I can't change other people. God can change people. I can't. (Not even if I draw little flowers on the toilet paper rolls...)
Ok, the point is, my church isn't perfect. But if I go to church with a prejudiced attitude that I'll definitely will find something or other to complain about, I definitely will find something to complain about, because that's what my eyes and ears will be looking and listening for. If you go to church thinking "Oh, the sermon's gonna be boring again," well, it probably will be. But if you go instead praying "God, please teach me something from today's sermon," well, you figure it out...
Some churches may send out more missionaries, some churches may have really fiery preachers, but no church is perfect. Because people aren't perfect. I certainly am not... (Unless throwing toilet paper rolls at people is considered polite.) I think we just need to learn how to love people as they are. By the way, that has nothing whatsoever to do with tolerance or accepting sin... We should love people, not their sin. That's not always easy... But with God's help it's possible. And it helps to remember that, even though He knows all of my innermost feelings, knows every single one of my dirty little thoughts, knows the depths of my selfishness and laziness, God still loves me. So I should love others, too.
Last but not least, I may be utterly unsatisfied with every single person in my church, but I still can't change them. How others behave is their business. I can point out to them what I believe they're doing wrong, but it's their choice whether they want to listen or not. (And I'm usually not 100% right anyway...) The only single person on this planet that I can change is me. And oh, how much work I still have to do...
One very last thing that I learned that I think is really important... So often we think that we don't have enough to give away. E.g. we don't know enough about the Bible in order to share the gospel, we don't have a close enough relationship with God to pray for others to get healed, etc. But my dad explained it to me using the story in the Bible where Jesus told his disciples to feed five thousand men. They only had five loaves of bread and two fish, so I can imagine that Jesus got some rather queer looks from them, but He just said: "You feed them." (Mark 6:37) Then Jesus prayed over the food, and guess what! Now, if they could feed five thousand men (and their wives and families that were with them) with just five loaves of bread and two fish, then I believe that we don't have any excuse for not sharing the gospel with others. Even if we're "newbies" at Christianity, God can still use what we have.

Monday, November 26th
Why do I exist? What is my purpose in life? Why am I here? At times I feel utterly useless. I mean, I sleep, I eat, I go to school, I eat some more, maybe I do the dishes, then I sleep some more... What's the good in that?
I believe that God put me (and every single other person) on this earth for a reason, in fact, for several reasons... The first and most important one is that He loves me. (And He loves you.) That's a wonderful reason to have been created, isn't it? I also believe that He created us for different purposes. If He really does love us, it stands to reason that He'd like for us to love Him, too. If we love Him, we should also obey Him. And this is where it gets interesting, because we're all called to obey Him in individual ways...
The important thing is that we find out what God wants us to do, then to live our lives accordingly. Everything else is a waste of time.

If someone claims, “I know God,” but doesn’t obey God’s commandments, that person is a liar and is not living in the truth. But those who obey God’s word truly show how completely they love him. That is how we know we are living in him. Those who say they live in God should live their lives as Jesus did.
1 John 2:4-6

And never forget the YWAM motto: To know God and to make Him known.
I believe we are all meant to share the gospel; for some that may mean becoming a missionary in a foreign country, for others reaching out to the people at work. It can be done through simple conversation, through street evangelism, through music, through preaching, through dance, through art.

...so, what does God want you to do?

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