Questions that matter

Asking myself questions that matter.

What gift will I give the rest of humanity?
What will I contribute to the human race?
What will I do that will justify my existence?
Will the rest of humanity say that it was good for me to have existed?

What I know is the following...
There is a tendency to implicitly give the idea that a positive existence should be linked to ideas of happiness, or how much fun a person can grab for oneself. An example of this would be coming to the conclusion that I have lived a good life, because I had a lot of smiles and happiness throughout my years. But I submit that this is dead wrong as an assessment for determining the quality of one's life. The quality of life should not be linked to how many smiles or how much happiness one can selfishly grab hold of for oneself.

Happiness sometimes gives a hint also of a selfish undercurrent where the individual is at center stage, and that the world exists for oneself and is at that person's personal disposal to fit one's fancies and whims. Christians are just as much of the problem as anyone else. Me included, I always see myself as part of the problem. I never speak of me on an island with the solutions looking in at the masses with the problems. In my mind I always preach to myself as the ultimate problem. Christians fall into the trap stripping Jesus from the voice he wishes to give when they try to make Jesus fill this selfish gap and void of personal whims and fancies in various ways, many times merely couching it in "spiritual terms" so that it seems less sinful and scandalous. Jesus isn't about fulfilling the whims and fancies surrounding a human's selfish definition of happiness and shallow reason for existence. Jesus' existence was about giving himself away, not about a greedy fat kid at Halloween trying to grab all that sweet tasty candy happiness for himself. Jesus gave himself wholly away to the other.

Christians are not exempt from such terrible traps of selfcenteredness. All such traps produced by the undercurrent of our American culture end in a useless existence. We see the byproduct of that today in our churches, because many Christians are absolutely useless in their service to the Lord. I don't believe this is a harsh assessment or overstatement in the least. We as a whole stand pathetic in our witness in America. We as a whole do indeed stand as totally useless when it comes to us being used by God as his servants. There is nothing meaningful in endless pursuit of happiness as our American culture defines happiness. Christians pursuing this kind of happiness doesn't have a redeeming affect on anyone. But on Sunday morning when the service ends and the doors open we still look unchanged, and look like a bunch of fat kids looking to go trick or treating. If I want to be utterly useless and incapable of being used by God all I need to do is to keep following a shallow definition of what it means to have a positive existence. A meaningful existence isn't about happiness or fun. I don't want to be another American fat kid craving a sugar high.

A positive existence should never be marked by how many times one is able to have fun experiences. But our churches seem to steer themselves down this vomit laced road. Church activities are far too geared to fun, fellowship, and having a good time. I'm so glad we instill in our youth a message that my Jesus exists solely for entertaining me myself and I. Fun, fellowship, and having a good time in my mind is a recipe for church death. This simply cannot be the core message. But still churches echo that message far more than any real message Jesus would have to give us. Let's produce some more fat kids craving candy and then wonder in two decades why the American churches are completely extinct. We are by and large simply screwing ourselves in our churches here in America.

Moving through life there is but one thing which we can use to measure a positive existence. That one thing is one's closeness to the Divine. Positive existence is not to be tied to how much happiness one can attain, or how many fun experiences one can hoard for oneself. A meaningful existence is about being a useful servant.

There is nothing wrong with Jesus as the ultimate hard worker. This is in no way works based salvation. This is a little bit of taking seriously Jesus' message about picking up one's cross and following the ultimate servant. Our churches will soon die in America because we are too lazy to get out of bed to hear a serious call that demands complete domination and absolute discipline of oneself and one's will. I myself would do well to force myself to work a little harder for my master each and every day. After all, what does being a useful servant mean if it doesn't mean submission to a painful message?