Reality Check Pt.2
August 16, 2010
My other little dose of reality came in the form of a girl I met about a year ago. I have always been drawn to eccentric people and this girl is no exception. I realize that in some way we are all dysfunctional, some of us more than others. Without going into personal detail, she is the poster child for dysfunctional upbringing. It’s really heart-breaking actually.
Having been in youth ministry for years, we came across many different cases and situations, but most of the kids had some kind of churched background. So basically, their parents had some kind of religious sense or knowledge even if the kids could care less. That is not true when you step out of the church; there are a startling number of people who have no true knowledge of a traditional God and even fewer who feel it necessary to find one. I forget what the real world is like, I forget how insulated I am, how safely stowed away and protected I am.
So back to my story. Last week our paths crossed again after about a 9 month hiatus and we hung out one afternoon. She is very low maintainance and just likes to hang around, come with me to run errands, watch me cook or stick around for “family movie night.” She is hungry for a family.
She talked with me while I made dinner and shared about her friends and their search for universal enlightenment, oneness and a united cosmic awareness. Then she showed me some YouTube videos about changing your life through changing your mental state and altering your reality and then went on to show me music videos that really speak to her. My heart just broke. I was suddenly seized by fear. It was like God gave me a glimpse into her heart, her struggle for salvation and meaning, her overwhelming desperation to make sense of everything. I forget what it’s like not to know God. He has been weaved in and out of my life for years that I have no idea anymore what it’s like to live without Him, without hope. It’s one thing to grow up in a decent family, and party on the weekends -there’s still a spark of godly knowledge, but with her, there are years of lies stuffed into her through what she’s been taught, told and what she has witnessed. The love of God and the grace of Christ is completely foreign, but exactly what she longs for.
It’s amazing that when you show God’s love to someone who has no contact with anything divine, how quickly they respond to it; they eat it up and are hungry for more. I need to always be reminded how blessed I am to be found in Him and how desperate others are to know Him.
