Friday Feels
With everything that's going on in the world these days, our country especially, I find myself prone to anger. At the events taking place, sure. But more so with the way the people around me react, think, and feel about them.
I'm a Christian. I asked Jesus into my heart when I was eleven years old. I wake up every day and do the best my lowly human self can do to live in a way that both serves and pleases the Father. I fail, yes. I fail often and spectacularly. I own that. But it doesn't stop me from trying to do better. To be better. To live better and leave this earth better than it was when I woke up this morning.
The current political climate, the current U.S. Administration and all the ills that have come with it...it's hard on my Christian heart. Made even harder by the Christians around me who blindly support everything that's been happening. All but worshiping at the feet of a president who displays the least Christ-like behavior imaginable. And I don't understand it! I pray about it, cry about it. It just doesn't make any sense to me.
I'm at the point where I wonder if there's something wrong with me. Is there something they see that I don't? Something about Christ's message that I missed? Am I too caught up in the things of the world? Am I listening to the world too much? What?
But my heart...man, my heart just can't see it. Every fiber of my being cringes at the very thought of our president. To be clear, I don't hate him. I just don't like or trust him. He is a petulant, greedy, misogynistic child who desperately needs a good spanking and some quality time in time-out. Maybe even needs to be sent to bed without supper.
He is a terrible representation of "conservative" values. I hate to even hear him utter God's name with his egotistical lips. But everyone I love...the very people who led me to Christ, who taught me about Christianity...they eat it up! Just because he is Republican, they trust him to lead our country and eat up every stupid thing he says as though it were gospel. I've even heard a few compare him to the second coming of Christ. And it KILLS ME. It makes me feel all the bad emotions...anger, sadness, despair, incredulity, disbelief, disappointment...it's all there and then some.
I don't question my faith. I don't think for one second that our current administration and those he would like to add to the supreme court or other positions of power are anywhere near God's own heart. I DO believe they are part of God's overall plan. He is using them for a purpose, that I know. I don't know what that purpose is...may never know, but God's will is perfect and He doesn't do anything willy-nilly. That part of all this is clear to me. The part I will never understand is why do all my Christian family not see the spade for a spade and love him so much and I don't? I realize that in order for God's will to happen, His people had to play a part but why didn't I?
It's not that I WANT to foolishly and blindly follow a lunatic, but in many ways it would be easier if I had. If I wasn't "woke" to the fact that he is a danger to the free world. If I could just happily agree with my loved ones and live blindly in blissful ignorance.
But I am "woke." I see the lizard under his mask and I can't stand being the only one in my family who does. But I can't see a clear way of opening their eyes. Believe me, I've tried. But I get shut down, often in a very ugly way. A way that makes ME feel unloved and stupid. Which also is at odds with the Christian values I was raised with. It's as though the universe has tilted on it's side and what was right is now wrong and what was wrong is now right. And somehow I was asleep when it happened and missed the transition and woke up in a crazy reality I no longer understand.
I stayed off Twitter for a while, I unfollowed/blocked several people on Facebook and Instagram thinking that would help at least keep me in the dark about the current state of affairs. But there's nowhere to run that it doesn't follow me. Nowhere I can hide that it can't find me.
And so here I sit. Confused. Angry. Biting my tongue. Trying not to let it get in my head or anywhere near my heart. Trying to stay sane in an insane world surrounded by insane people I love but desperately want to escape from.
I'm a Christian. I asked Jesus into my heart when I was eleven years old. I wake up every day and do the best my lowly human self can do to live in a way that both serves and pleases the Father. I fail, yes. I fail often and spectacularly. I own that. But it doesn't stop me from trying to do better. To be better. To live better and leave this earth better than it was when I woke up this morning.
The current political climate, the current U.S. Administration and all the ills that have come with it...it's hard on my Christian heart. Made even harder by the Christians around me who blindly support everything that's been happening. All but worshiping at the feet of a president who displays the least Christ-like behavior imaginable. And I don't understand it! I pray about it, cry about it. It just doesn't make any sense to me.
I'm at the point where I wonder if there's something wrong with me. Is there something they see that I don't? Something about Christ's message that I missed? Am I too caught up in the things of the world? Am I listening to the world too much? What?
But my heart...man, my heart just can't see it. Every fiber of my being cringes at the very thought of our president. To be clear, I don't hate him. I just don't like or trust him. He is a petulant, greedy, misogynistic child who desperately needs a good spanking and some quality time in time-out. Maybe even needs to be sent to bed without supper.
He is a terrible representation of "conservative" values. I hate to even hear him utter God's name with his egotistical lips. But everyone I love...the very people who led me to Christ, who taught me about Christianity...they eat it up! Just because he is Republican, they trust him to lead our country and eat up every stupid thing he says as though it were gospel. I've even heard a few compare him to the second coming of Christ. And it KILLS ME. It makes me feel all the bad emotions...anger, sadness, despair, incredulity, disbelief, disappointment...it's all there and then some.
I don't question my faith. I don't think for one second that our current administration and those he would like to add to the supreme court or other positions of power are anywhere near God's own heart. I DO believe they are part of God's overall plan. He is using them for a purpose, that I know. I don't know what that purpose is...may never know, but God's will is perfect and He doesn't do anything willy-nilly. That part of all this is clear to me. The part I will never understand is why do all my Christian family not see the spade for a spade and love him so much and I don't? I realize that in order for God's will to happen, His people had to play a part but why didn't I?
It's not that I WANT to foolishly and blindly follow a lunatic, but in many ways it would be easier if I had. If I wasn't "woke" to the fact that he is a danger to the free world. If I could just happily agree with my loved ones and live blindly in blissful ignorance.
But I am "woke." I see the lizard under his mask and I can't stand being the only one in my family who does. But I can't see a clear way of opening their eyes. Believe me, I've tried. But I get shut down, often in a very ugly way. A way that makes ME feel unloved and stupid. Which also is at odds with the Christian values I was raised with. It's as though the universe has tilted on it's side and what was right is now wrong and what was wrong is now right. And somehow I was asleep when it happened and missed the transition and woke up in a crazy reality I no longer understand.
I stayed off Twitter for a while, I unfollowed/blocked several people on Facebook and Instagram thinking that would help at least keep me in the dark about the current state of affairs. But there's nowhere to run that it doesn't follow me. Nowhere I can hide that it can't find me.
And so here I sit. Confused. Angry. Biting my tongue. Trying not to let it get in my head or anywhere near my heart. Trying to stay sane in an insane world surrounded by insane people I love but desperately want to escape from.
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