We only live once... so why do what people expect you to do!?
We were at an Ingrid Michaelson (AMAZING) concert at the Pittsburgh Arts Festival and it was full of hippies and people that really express themselves through art and their appearance simultaneously. I thought to myself, their weird... but then I thought so many of them are really not weird and are only doing what makes them happy. Although as a Christian I believe we have to draw a line, but that is not what I am talking about. I mean if I want to shave my head or get a tattoo or even just wear things that don't necessarily match, why shouldn't I? I think we need to ask ourselves is what people think driving is or holding us back?
Somethings seem faddish and everyone is doing them, but they make me happy anyway!
I try my best to avoid what's popular at the moment. I feel like if I am a sheep and I do what everyone else is doing than I can't be true to myself or be my own person. But at the same time, some things are a part of my just like they are a part of everyone else! Photography for example. I LOVE taking pictures. I know everyone just about loves taking pictures and if you have a keen eye and a good lens you'll get good results. So sometimes I feel like I am just like everyone else. But that is honestly what I LOVE about photography. It is the art form for unskilled artists. And when I say "unskilled" I realize that it does take some skill. But ANYONE can get behind a lens and press a button. No need to spend the time slaving away at a painting when, for me at least, it's going to turn out ugly anyway.
God's grace is everywhere I turn.
Grace is stalking me. I don't fully understand God's grace, but the more I understand about it the more I am blown away with how surrounded I am by it and how inescapable it is! I would love to go into a deep theological topical discussion on GRACE and how it is undeserved and I keep trying to earn it and how it is the basis of our salvation in many ways, but I won't because I am not theologically trained and I am sure there are great books out there on it like this really great one I read called... The Bible. :)
Think about it.
I think this seems to be a mixture of Christian Liberty and antinomianism... I believe that we are given freedom to indeed wear tattoos or even wear your hair long ;). We should be careful, however, of mistaking grace for an excuse to have or get anything that makes us "feel" happy. A lot of times, that feeling can be an obsession for us idolaters. Please correct me if I'm wrong about how I interpreted your blog post.
ReplyDeleteI appreciate your clarifying comment. I should have made it more clear that the three thoughts I was writing about were three very separate thoughts.
ReplyDelete1. I basically don't want to feel bad for avoiding the expected because I do believe Christian freedom would allow me to do some different things that are not addressed directly in the Bible.
2. Sometimes I do what everyone else is doing even though I want really badly not to, and that's okay too.
3. And on a very different and unrelated stream of thought... I have seen the grace of God in so many ways in the last year or so that it's almost constantly on my mind.
If the first point you disagree with, i tried to clarify that I said there is a line that is obvious to me as a Christian where whether I want to do some things or not, God calls me not to. I am not discussing those things. I am merely discussing the conservative Christian preference that seems to make me feel bad for wanting to do things differently, such as how I dress. And I don't mean modest or immodest, I mean conservative versus artsy. Although I shouldn't be obsessing with material things that make me feel happy, if wearing things that are unusual or acting a little out of the ordinary makes me happy, I believe that God desires that we take delight in all of life. And I think that's why you are wearing those crazy sunglasses in your grad picture. ;)
I hope this makes sense. Thanks for commenting.