Love is Loving the Fatherless

Let me tell you all a story.  It's a very personal story. . . well yeah it's the story of me.  I don't know how many of you know my story but I am sure even those that do might take something away from this.  I never knew my father (Yes, many of you just went back to Bruce from Finding Nemo when I said that.)  It's true.  For reasons out of my control and realm of understanding, my dad was removed from my life before I could even walk or talk or celebrate my 1st birthday.  Never once have I heard from him, never once has he taught me anything, never once growing up did I ever even think something was missing. 

Theres some interesting statistics that I'm not too fond of.  I found a lot of them at The Fatherless Generation  blog and also at this page.  63% of youth suicides are from fatherless homes...90% of runaways and homeless...80% of rapists...71% of high school dropouts...less likely to get 'A's, to enjoy school, to participate in extracurricular activities, to not repeat a grade, to go to college...more likely to use drugs, participate in sex before marriage, be aggressive, be expelled, be in poverty,  to have psychiatric problems and struggle with emotional distress. 

Those are heart wrenching statistics.  It's hard to read the entirety of them without just breaking down, especially considering 43% live without their father.  26% of fathers live in a different state.  I couldn't find a statistic, but I would be interested in knowing how many, like me, grew up the entirety of their lives with no biological father, and whose mother never got remarried.  Or what percentage of those living with a father never really experienced a true father.  Maybe he was gone all the time, or immature, or didn't represent manhood very well. 

Like I just mentioned, I have never met my father.  Never grew up with a replacement father.  But let me tell you how I did grow up.  My siblings are very spaced out.  My sister is nearly 19 years older and my brother is a little over 9 years older.  My mom worked her hiny off to support us by herself.  Up to the age of 7, we moved a lot as my mom finished her college degree and struggled financially.  I was too little to understand that though.  I was just living life.  We went to Bellingham, and Medford, and most of the time Kennewick, where my grandma helped my mom get on her feet. 

I loved having my brother around.  We would go swimming, and he would try to kill me sledding, and he would teach me how to ride a bike, and teach me about the Bible, and how to dress.  He would also take my matchbox cars and loved picking on me.  But that didnt matter, I loved having him around.  He taught me how to mow the lawn, how to take care of my mom, how to be courageous.  I loved my mom too.  She would drive me to pre school at St Josephs, and set up birthday parties for me, and always go above what she was able to get me presents.  She would take me bowling, and to watch NASCAR races in the diner, and to play racing games in the arcade.  I lived the dream!  Eventually my brother moved away and went to college and I lived alone with my mom until I graduated.  She wrung her neck trying to survive off what most would call a impoverished income.  But you would never know that looking in from the outside.  We lived in a nice neighborhood and went to a nice school.  Yeah, maybe I never got new clothes all the time, or was able to travel very much, or never got to experience a lot of things I'm coming to find out a regular home had, but it never affected me growing up. 

Those statistics never even came close to denting the way I lived.  To pass time with the excess of loneliness i encountered (which I never realized was loneliness until later in middle school) I would read encyclopedias, work on ginormous puzzles with my grandma, pain stakingly move my NASCAR matchbox cars one car length at a time as they raced around the house, create mansion forts in the basement.  I would adventure into the wilderness to make bike jumps, to race around the neighborhood, to climb trees.  I loved being active.  My mom raised me as hard as she could free of societal evils.  Alcoholism, drugs, sex, etc., other than from family members who were dealing with those problems, never entered my scope of reality.  I excelled in school from the onset.  By 7th grade, I was already taking high school math classes.  I graduated with 30 college credits, crushed my SAT, and continued on to college.  I loved track and field and excelled in that too.  I did orchestra playing the violin for 8 years and even did symphonic orchestra in high school.  And I dont say all of that to brag.  I say it to show that just because I was raised fatherless, does not mean I am a statistic!

I had an extraordinarily loving mother who although wasn't able to teach me about cars, or how to work in the yard, was able to place me in a home where I could grow and learn.  I had a biblical teacher in my brother who gave me incredible opportunities to travel and experience life.  I saw other kids dads and learned from them. I even learned from countless mistakes and errors and I grew from each one of them. But most of all, I look back, and I see the biggest contributor to being my father was God himself.  Psalm 68 says that He is "a father to the fatherless"...He "sets the solitary in families".  All along the way, God placed male mentors in my life to show me how to be a man.  From my brother, to camp counselors, to middle school and high school youth directors, to friend's dads. 

Now why did I write that? Why did you need to know my story?  To me, my story has never been anything to me.  I didn't feel disadvantaged growing up.  I definitely didn't feel like I was incapable of anything at life! But lately I'm realizing a subtle fact that has been there all along and has recently come to a head.  There is a growing sentiment in church that because of those statistics, that because having two parents is the biblical model, and because fatherless kids "don't learn about manhood", that kids like me, without fathers, are somehow not good.  I've come to realize multiples times growing up that people judge me or my mom based on our family dynamic.  And while I am not going to tell you my mom's story, or why we ended up this way, there is also nothing I did, or could do to change the way I grew up any better than how God directed it. 

Isaiah 1:17 says "Learn to do right, seek justice, defend the oppressed, take up the cause of the fatherless, plead the case of the widow."  Isaiah later goes on to prophecy against a civilization that judged the fatherless, and abused the widow.  I feel like people that judge the fatherless as incapable of certain tasks have a lack of faith in God who promises to be a father to the fatherless.  It's not right and it needs to be addressed. 

I found a catchy little blog post about The art of manliness.  He writes about what he's learned from observation about what it means to be a man despite being fatherless, and I couldn't agree more.  I especially like #3.  "Becoming a man doesn't come with age.  Through experience, a boy becomes a man by: Taking ownerships of failure, letting go of stubbornness and accepting lessons, knowing how to handle challenging situations and fixing their incorrect reactions and attitudes, learning more about themselves."  I love it because it changes the whole notion of what being a man is.  A man isn't someone who is a father.  I've met countless dads who's idea of manhood is ruling over the household, pride, stubbornness, yelling, football, etc etc.  Under this notion of manhood, A man becomes a man separate from his upbringing.  He becomes a man solely out of humility, and following God. 

It's about time we stop judging the fatherless as "broken homes" and start looking compassionately at those statistics I laid out previously.  That is a statistic you can't let slip away and have no feeling over.  There are some hurting people out there without dads, with bad dads, with bad mothers, who made bad decisions, whose parents made bad decisions and they need someone to step in and walk along side of them, not outcast them.  And even for those who aren't that statistic, who grew up with fathers.  Don't judge them, or alienate them.  Step in along side them and teach them.  I know countless times where I have just wanted to learn something and there was no teacher available.  I still don't know hardly anything about cars, or building.  There are people out there that are struggling and I feel a lot of the time most of us just don't care. 

I hope this long post made any sense. It's kind of a jumbled mess the way it came out. I wanted to share my story to those of you who may not know and to show proof that God is not a statistic.  And I also wanted to confront an issue in my life currently where I have been unjustly judged for not having a dad (which I didn't even know was possible).  I hope those statistics and my story stir your heart toward love and compassion and not judgement.  And if anything I have said in this post or during my lifetime is out of line with the Bible, I would love to have you teach me the right way.  Maturity isn't a destination, it's an adventure.  I still have a lot to learn.  Thanks for reading  :)

Love the fatherless!!!!!!

Love is Redemptive

Redemptive: Acting to save someone from error or evil.

Revelation states in chapter 2, during the letters to the churches, "I know your works, your labor, your patience, and that you cannot bear those who are evil. And you have tested those who say they are apostles and are not, and have found them liars; and you have persevered and have patience, and have labored for My name’s sake and have not become weary. Nevertheless I have this against you, that you have left your first love. Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent and do the first works, or else I will come to you quickly and remove your lampstand from its place—unless you repent." (verse 2-5)

Thousands of years before this letter was penned lived Abraham, the patriarch of Israel.  We see his story start in the 12th chapter of Genesis when God says to Abraham, leave your family and then promises to make his descendents as many as the stars of the sky and the dust of the earth.  So Abraham (Abram at this point) leaves his family with his wife Sarah and Lot.  He starts out on a journey of his own away from his family.  On a new journey with a God who gave him a promise.  We see him travel across ancient Mesopotamia and down into the land of the Canaanites (present day Israel).  And in verse 8, he camps his tent perched on the hill lands between Bethel (literally meaning "house of God") and Ai ("City of Ruin).

Sidenote: Isn't that so often where Jesus meets us.  He provides the bridge from our ruin to the house of God.  I find that interesting in regards to where Abraham builds his alter and calls on the Lord.

Anyway, back to the main point at hand.  Abraham calls on the Lord for the first time.  He, by faith, starts a two sided relationship with God.  I imagine this as a very intimate moment in Abraham's life, here camped on the hills, looking over the land that God has promised him, and communicating with God.  It's where we see the first love of Abraham.

Eventually, due to a immense famine in the land, Abraham goes to Egypt to survive.  And in coming in to their land, he devises a lie to protect himself by telling them that Sarah is his sister.  A big ordeal happens when Pharaoh finds out and he sends him away.  Abraham has sinned.  The man who has so far in the record, lived a faithful, righteous life, has fallen short of the promise that God had for him.  By lying he has shown that he didn't believe God would make a great nation out of him because he feared more that the Egyptians would kill him.  Now he's in a rut.  The Egyptians have sent him away from their rich agricultural lands, back to a place of famine.

But here's the key.  Pay attention to this part right here if nothing else.  What does Abraham do.  Chapter 13:1-4 reads, "Then Abram went up from Egypt, he and his wife and all that he had, and Lot with him, to the South. Abram was very rich in livestock, in silver, and in gold. And he went on his journey from the South as far as Bethel, to the place where his tent had been at the beginning, between Bethel and Ai, to the place of the altar which he had made there at first. And there Abram called on the name of the Lord"

Abraham returns to the very same spot where he called on the Lord, where he had his intimate moment of seeking the Lord.  He returns to his first love.

God's love is redemptive.  Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent and do the first works.  Go to where you met God the first time, when you were excited to meet with Him, to study his word, to pray, to worship.  Maybe it's a physical location, or a location of mind, or a location of the word.  Whatever it is, go there, repent of where you have fallen from, and God's redemptive love will ignite your lampstand again.  It is such a beautiful illustration that so often gets read over in the haste of reading through Genesis.  But in it we find what Abraham found out on his journey of faith.

Love is redemptive! 

Love is Stealthy

I have this eccentric love of aerodynamics and jets.  How can you not see a jet fly over you and just be incredibly in awe! Isn't that why we have air shows? People are just drawn to see these planes exhibit gravity-defying tricks at speeds that probably make the pilots lips numb.  When I went to school in Arizona we lived directly in line with the landing runway of the Air Force base down the road.  Every 30 minutes we would have A-10's in rows hover over campus.  Conversations would stop and almost every time I would look up, just in fear and awe (and annoyance).  I remember the first time it happened to me (because, well, we don't have an Air Force base where I live) I was so in shock, the sound, the precision, the aesthetics, the team work, the speed.  I told you it was an eccentric love.  And don't even get me started on the Tomahawks.  But if I ever had the ability to see any jet, it would have to be the stealth bombers and jet fighters (if I was even able to see one).  Take a look at these things brought to you by Google.

To me, those planes look like they shouldn't be able to fly and yet they do, very quickly. They are made in such a way to reduce their emission of heat, sound, sight and anything else used to detect it, and are capable of being almost invisible to radar preventing it from the likelihood of being seen, tracked, or attacked. They blow my mind.

Sometimes, I think Jesus works a lot like these planes.  He comes in under the radar when you least expect it, leaving no trace of detection until He drops a love bomb in your life, and your left in awe at the incredible power and presence of Him.  I might have stretched that analogy but I think you can understand the point. There are times in our life when we just sit there and wonder why God has pulled the rug out from underneath our feet.  Pain, death, relationships, jobs, bankruptcy, moving away, having your favorite sports team lose.  Whatever it might be for you right now, big or small, the world just won't stop spinning.  Maybe you can feel the depth of such lyrics as "I know I need to lift my eyes up, but I'm too weak, life just won't let up" from worn by Tenth Avenue North.  Listen to what the lead singer, Mike Donehey, has to say about that song!!

"When I look back on the photo album of my life and I'm flipping through the pages, it's rarely the easy and comfortable times that God's doing good. Every time God's really doing something amazing in my heart, it's when everything was falling part around me." Isn't that so true? For me personally, it is so easy to see that in my own life. You can probably tell too. I write so much more during the hard times in my life, then I do during the easy times. Why is that? Why is it so hard for me to feel inspired to write something when life is moving along so well? God is still teaching me during that time, I am still reading and listening. Is it that I just don't need, or feel like I need, that teaching at that moment? Maybe it's only when I am in the thick of pain, loss, mistreatment, solitude, change, fear, etc. that I cling to those teachings and see everything in a desperate light. And possibly, you can agree with me on that in your own life. I know, looking back, the times that I've felt most like God was holding me close, were in those hard times.

Psalm 34:18
"The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit."

Psalm 73:26
"My flesh and my heart may fall, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever"

God has a way of stealthily coming in and changing everything. He did it with his son Jesus even when those looking for him didn't expect it, and believe me, He is doing it with you right now. He's not in the business of flashy lights and signs. Most frequently he will talk to you in a still, small voice, during desperate times when pain and loss are blanketing you. So if you're going through one of those times right now, like I am, take heart and listen for God because a year, 5 years, 20 years down the road you'll look back and remember THAT as the time that God changed your life!

Love is Committed

Commitment is a rapidly declining term these days.  I like statistics so put your boots on, we're gonna be jumping in a few rain puddles here.  Of marriages that start with people between the age of 20-24, 37% end in divorce.  America's divorce rate is the second highest of any country and twice as high as the world average.  2/3 of people in their 20's think living together is a good way to avoid divorce, resulting in a 10 percent higher percentage of divorces (of those who actually get married) than those who did not live together.  12% of couples who live together nationwide are not married.  Ben Courson, said in September 9th teaching, "We are a generation of quitters.  We think that quitting is going to make us happy.  That's why the divorce rates are absurd!" 

This cultural phenomena crosses to many other areas as well.  The average job in America these days has dropped to 5 years, mostly due to promotions, life changes, and the job becoming mundane.  More and more songs and movies and TV shows these days represent couples living together before marriage, or support uncommitted relationships.  "How I Met Your Mother" is a show I like to watch, but just watching it points out all of the cultural ideas that have seeped into our lives.  Dating for dating sake; Sleeping together as a emotional prize, not a commitment; Living together as a norm.  It's easy to see how if we continue to let culture surround our day, Christianity's call to holiness becomes blurred.  It has the ability to distract us from what we're called to be, and lure us to such fruits as pride, selfishness, sexual immorality, etc. 

EPHESIANS 4:17-24
So this I say, and affirm together with the Lord, that you walk no longer just as the Gentiles also walk, in the futility of their mind, being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart; and they, having become callous, have given themselves over to sensuality for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness. But you did not learn Christ in this way, if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught in Him, just as truth is in Jesus, that, in reference to your former manner of life, you lay aside the old self, which is being corrupted in accordance with the lusts of deceit, and that you be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth.

It's a dangerous line to walk! Immersing yourself in the culture so that you fit in, or because you like it, has a tendency to change our values, thus changing our heart, changing our minds, changing our words, our actions, and ultimately our lives.  It's like a new snowboarder on the bunny slope who hasn't quite mastered the brakes and once going just continues on faster and faster until they ultimately bail out and crash.  A wise Lorax once asked, "Which way does a tree fall? A tree falls whichever way it is leaning.  Be careful which way you lean."  You can see how culture has affected Christianity just by looking at the differences in generations at our churches.  It has become more about the visual and emotional appeal than the life changing appeal; more about the type of worship than the lyrics and meaning themselves; more about going to church to benefit ourselves rather than those sitting around us. 

I currently started reading "Why Holiness Matters" by Tyler Braun and couple quotes stuck out to me right from the beginning.  "Somehow we've bought the lie that if we are our good Christian selves enough of the time, God will have mercy on us and take us to heaven.  He does love us with an unending grace, right? So we choose to stay as immature Christian believers who go to church to hear great music and be convicted by great teaching." Just a paragraph later he writes, "We've bought into the lie of the total and complete Christian message being that we're sinners and God, through his great love, saved us.  Christianity then becomes just something we accept, nothing else.  It doesn't take much to simply believe in Jesus.  In fact, that doesn't cost us anything.  But following Jesus, that's another matter."

And that's ultimately what Jesus calls from us isn't it? He didn't go up to his disciples and say "accept me". NO! He goes up to them time after time and says "follow me".  You can't follow Jesus and have your actions continually following the cultural whims.  Your actions have a tendency to follow your heart.  Is your heart committed to Jesus and His word? or are you just going to church because you feel guilty when you don't? Because you grew up that way? Because you are afraid of failing someone? failing yourself?

Take a moment and honestly think about that one for a minute and began to introspect on your life.  It's so easy to let culture affect our lives and not be aware of the issues it's causing within us. 

May we be a generation acting out of humility and grace and love and holiness, constantly asking the Lord to unharden and search our calloused hearts.  And my prayer today is that we would listen and ask the Lord to change the things which we need to change, and begin to commit again to our first love, Jesus Christ. 

Love is Losing ... To Win

 I don't like losing.  Never have.  Ever.  Elementary school playground games and races.  Grades.  Track and Field.  Monopoly.  Volleyball.  Capture the Flag.  I am very very very competitive.  I remember during my senior year in my high school track and field career, winning every hurdle race in my district......until the district championship race where I lost to my best friend by .02 of a second.  Does anyone actually like losing? Is there anyone honestly out there who is like, "yeah, I love losing! It's one of my hobbies." I would love to meet you!  You know what the hardest aspect of losing is? Love. Forgiveness.  Compromise.  I am still struggling with this concept even as I write it so bear with me.

I think the act of losing in regards to love and forgiveness is inconceivably selfless.  Jesus tells us to forgive 70*7 times or in essence, just continually forgive! Oh so often, I continue to think that if a person continually wrongs me, or doesn't learn, after about 10 times (or like 3 depending on the situation) . . . . (ok more like 1) ... then I should not have to forgive them.  Whats the point if their not going to learn?  When selflessness and selfishness end up in the same bowl, they separate like oil and water.  I know I've had instances in my life where this has occurred - Where you continually forgive and apologize and rectify situations with someone who doesn't care.  It's hard.  I really have nothing else to say about that.  I'm sure we've all been there.  It's in those instances where we feel used, neglected, one sided, even trampled, that we want to take up our pride and our anger and fight back.  That happened to me today.  Dealing with scenarios like that, it feels like losing.  over.  and over.  and over.  How many times do I have to continue to forgive that person? How many times do I have to keep losing?

And then Jesus answers and says keep going.
"Why?"
"Because I'm still forgiving you. and you haven't caught me yet."
*silence*
"I momentarily lost everything for all of you.  But I want you to know, that losing brings victory! I know you can't see that right now, but keep going!"

That's basically the convo I had with God earlier today during my prayer.

There won't always be compromise.  Some times people, (usually we most often notice it in others, but we all have it in ourselves) will continually wrong you and not give anything back.  They will only want to serve themselves and not bring anything even remotely resembling humility to the table.  That's when losing is the hardest.  Nothing about that feels like winning.  I have had one relationship in my life that comes to mind where criticisms would be brought up.  They would criticize me and initially I internally wouldn't like it, but eventually I would take it and think about it and grow.  There would never be a conflict or quarrel.  But the minute I would ever criticize them, a scenario would explode that caused the two parties to get upset and escalate the situation.  And it wouldn't be until I got back to losing did anything ever resolve.  I could never expect them to lose.  Believe me, I tried.  It's hard to continually lose that one-sided conflict every time.  But I also know that God took my one-sided relationship with Him and loved me anyway! no matter what! He knew the secret to winning.  Love and forgiveness.  He conquered it all and gave us all victory even though we didn't deserve it.

I know I have been that selfish person a lot in my life that continually just wants to win those small battles and doesn't secede.  Let's be honest, that's the side that we most often find ourselves on and the side we often want to be on.  And even when friends say "sayonara" and give up losing, God never does.  So no matter what side of the spectrum you are on, you can glean from what Jesus did for you! This short video Journal by Tenth Avenue North speaks right to this post...

Here is how most of that song that he is journaling about goes.  I couldn't write it out any better so I will leave you with these lyrics.  - -

"I can't believe what she said
I can't believe what he did
Oh, don't they know that it's wrong
Well maybe there's something I missed
But how could they treat me like this
It's wearing out my heart,
The way they disregard.
Well it's only the dead that can live
But I still wrestle with this
To lose the pain that's mine
seventy times seven times
Cause Lord it doesnt feel right
For me to turn a blind eye
Though I guess it's not that much
When I think of what You've done.
This is love or this is hate
We all have a choice to make. 

Why do we think that our hate's gonna break a hard heart?
We're rippin' arms over wars that don't need to be fought
Cause pride won't let us lay our weapons on the ground.......
.....Well truth be told it doesn't matter if they're sorry or not
cause freedom comes when we surrender to the sound of Your mercy and grace...

Oh Father give me the grace to forgive them cause I feel like the one losing. "

Love is Patient (and will overcome)

In 1 Corinthians 13, this section in verse 4 has a lot of different wordings.  Love is patient.  Love suffers long. Love endures long.  Love never gives up.  I have been dealing with this concept a lot in my life lately - in conversations, in actions with people, in friendships.  So often in life we are in a rush.  I'm pretty sure I ate my lunch yesterday in grand total of 8 minutes because I had to rush to get back to work.  We are always on the move from one calendar appointment to the next, from one place to another.  It's hard to sit still in one place for a long period of time in complete serenity and peace with everything we seemingly have to get done.  There's always something right in front of us that keeps us moving.  And believe it or not, this concept has seeped into more than our schedule.  I mean look at our cultural relationship phenomena.  Society just wants to continue moving.  40-50% of first marriages end in divorce and it only gets worse from there - And that doesn't even count the ones that live together but don't get married.  So many people seem to not be committed enough to be patient and endure, instead just ending up moving from one relationship to the next, one friendship to the next.  When times get rough, give up.  When feelings fade, leave.  The more impatient we get, the more stupid and devastating decisions we make.  

I think there is a reason Paul started his list with patience and enduring and never giving up.  This is the foundational base to every relationship.  What kind of friendship is going to last if one just leaves when there's a fight?  or what relationship is ever going to last if you don't know that both parties can endure patiently through every life trial?  It's like Paul is saying, if you can be patient and endure, then as the last part of the list says, your love will never fail.  

Patience is a hard thing in a relationship.  Especially starting out.  But I am realizing more and more that the more patience you exercise at the beginning, the more you realize you can endure over time, and the more you are likely to never give up.  This is the essence of agape, that no matter what insane situations happen, no matter what someone does, no matter what lemons life hands you, that you still love through it all, just as God endured the hardest trial of all and loved us the entire time.  

Maybe you're like me and you've struggled with patience in the past and you've seen those consequences.  You might even think there is no hope of changing the mistakes you've always made, and you constantly live in fear that you will continue to make those mistakes again and again.  But I have a secret for you.  We don't have to live in that fear.  We have overcome by the word of our testimony for our Savior is worthy of honor and glory and all of our praise and He has overcome ALL.  He can change you, he can give you the strength and power to conquer any struggle you have.  He loves you and overcame for you, so that you might be able to overcome and love him, and spread that love to a world whose love is a complete mess.  Our goal is to love the world, not have the world love us.  John 15:19 says "If you were of the world, the world would love it's own.  Yet because you are not of the world, but i chose you out of the world, the world hates you."  Are we being a thermostat to those around us, loving others, constantly controlling the temperature of the room, or is our relationship with God more of a thermometer where the world controls our temperature and has the ability to rule how intimate of a relationship with God we have?  That is a dangerous spot! 

"I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble, But take heart! For I have overcome the world." John 16:33

It's time patience and endurance were added back into the way we love. Let us overcome!

Love is Happy

Happiness. This seems to be the issue continuously popping up in my life lately. It was the topic of discussion at our college youth ministry last night and even popped up on one of my favorite shows, Ellen, this afternoon. What makes us happy? Should we be happy? Is that the purpose of life? How do we become happy? At the college age discussion last night we focused primarily on relationships and their correlation to happiness. Not just our relationships with friends and the opposite gender, but more holistically, our relationship with God. Does God want us to be happy or should we be only set on glorifying his Name, and is there even any difference between those two somewhat seemingly contradictory ends? How can we be selflessly serving a God at the same time pursuing what seems to be a selfish need of happiness and joy? I'll come back to this, but first I want to breach into what Ellen has to do with this whole discussion (besides being awesome).

Today on Ellen, she interviewed, Tom Shadyac, the visionary behind a documentary entitled, "Happy". The documentary is set from a non-Christian viewpoint, and yet is still quite amazing with the points they raised. She highlighted the point that it was free to rent on ITunes for today (i think). If you get a chance, I highly recommend it. They look at various answers to what causes happiness and document different areas around the globe that have completely opposite happiness standards. The conclusion they drew from the different countries, I felt, was a very Biblical answer. The common ideas surrounding the subject were immediately ruled out. It is not money or appearance or popularity status. According to their studies, and many other studies I've read, those three wants tend to lead to no happiness growth and can even lower your overall happiness with life. After going from Okinawa to Denmark to Namibia to Bhutan to India, they began to pull what they believed caused happiness in every place. You ready for this? Loving-kindness, compassion, friendships of trust and caring respect, being outdoors and experiencing nature, actively pursuing the needs of others, and being able to spend time doing what makes you happy. At the end, of the speakers says one of my favorite quotes, "The secret is being authentically you." Interesting conclusion right? How does being involved with what other people need make me happy? Seems almost culturally counter-intuitive. Through the entire documentary, I could not stop thinking about one thing.

Galatians 5:22-23 - "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self control. Against such there is no law."

So many of those fruits were highlighted in that video. Loving others, being in nature at complete peace, walking beside someone (maybe even yourself) that is going through hard traumatic times, being kind and good and gentle to others, having faithful relationships. I am not really sure how self control fits in too much so i wont try to stretch it - although working so hard to get money and status that you die, as they showed in cities of Japan, could correlate to that. And although the documentary never brings much Christianity into the video (only briefly touching on spirituality), I find that a highly encouraging Christian message.

1 Corinthians 13-4-8a - "Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; Does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things; Love never fails."

I love this. So much of happiness and joy is wrapped into love. And study after study proves that the more we are intertwined by love and selflessness and peace, the happier we tend to be. Soooooooo, back to the discussion with the college peeps. The main point of the study was relationships and marriage and where happiness fits into that. Some ground level characteristics in relationships that make us happy were trust, co-operation, sacrifice, and unconditional love. And we all agreed those are just mini snapshots of the characteristics we love about our relationship with our Lord and Savior. Praising a God who selflessly sent His son to die for our sins and who is continually with us and loves us puts everything in perspective. And as we aim to be more like Him, praising His name, that is where happiness and joy are fulfilled. Our God loves that we love him and Glory him and He pours so many blessings for those whose aim is to spread and witness the message of His love. And though the blessings may not seem as such in the moment, His joy is seen through it all. He loves to provide us joy and happiness.

God has created you to be uniquely, exactly, who you are, with your hopes and dreams and passions and interests and characteristics. Don't let society or money rob you of those passions. Wholeheartedly lift those things that make you, YOU, and use them to serve and love others, and to connect with God. Don't ever be afraid to be you, because God wasn't afraid to make you. He made you to have joy and to experience joy in Him.

The secret is being authentically YOU.