God is not a Sugar Daddy.

An important part of college is living with people who are different than you. Whether it's your roommate, the people in your dorm or the people in your classes, everyone is different than you, yet, somehow we all manage to live together in a community.

I know we usually don't like to be around people with different opinions than us, but I think it is important to be around good people whose views differ from my own. There's a girl in my hallway who has opposite views than me on almost every issue, and I absolutely love it. We sit there and have long discussions about our views. It's amazing because even though we disagree, we are both heard and we respect each other's opinions. We never tell the other person that they're wrong, call each other names, or offend each other; we just have a conversation. It gives us a new perspective that we can each chew on and that might alter our overall view in some way.  Really, that is how society should be.

My friend and I are in the same Bible class, and we often discuss issues that come up because of that class. The thing is, my friend believes in God and that Jesus died so she could go to heaven. Here's the catch: she doesn't believe the Bible. She says she just doesn't trust it because of the potential for human error between what God intended and what the original writers wrote. Because of this and the fact that God gave her free will, she feels that she can do whatever she wants, even things that
I would consider to be a sin.

I disagree. I do not think it is possible to be a Christian without believing in and trying to follow the Bible.

First off, where does the idea of Jesus dying for us come from? The Bible. If you believe that, you already believe some of the Bible. She herself always tells me she hates it when people pick and choose from the Bible; she says either don't believe it or believe it. The problem is, by picking only the part about Jesus dying for her sins, she is picking and choosing. Our societies basic morals are in the Bible. If she believes in justice, fairness, love, responsibility, peace, and self-sacrifice in terms of charity, she believes in the Bible.

Secondly, after God chose people to write it, it was passed down through centuries of people, copied by hand and translated, all of which explain minor inconsistencies. Yes, there is a little human error, but it doesn't matter because of all the things that are constant. For a book written over centuries with several different authors from several different time periods, it is incredibly consistent. In several parts of the Bible, it is constant in its depiction of salvation by God's grace through faith in Christ.

Thirdly, is it that she really doesn't believe the Bible? Or is it that she doesn't WANT to believe the Bible? She is a very independent person, and I respect that. However, she wants to be able to do whatever she wants. She hates rules and being told what to do. Maybe she just doesn't like the idea of having rules or of being told a certain way she should be living, so she chooses not to follow the Bible.

Okay, moving on..

I have a few strange uncles on my mom's side. One, Uncle George, has schizophrenia. The other, Uncle Warren, is just.. well.. odd. I kid you not, he looks almost exactly like Si from Duck Dynasty: Beard, glasses, hat and all.

Si Robertson from Duck Dynasty. Actually, this could be Uncle Warren. I'm not really sure.

While he's odd, he's also very religious. He goes on "God rants" at family dinners, and, honestly, I usually zone out. However, sometimes he has some interesting words of wisdom. At Thanksgiving this year, he said something that stuck with me because I was surprised by a term he used: "Sugar Daddy." I don't know how he even knows what that is; I guess he must be more cultured than I thought. And even weirder was the sentence he used:

"God is not a Sugar Daddy." 

Of course not! How could God even be compared to one?

For those of you who are somehow less in-the-know than my uncle, a sugar daddy is a rich old man who lavishes gifts on a young woman in return for her company.

Think about it: How many people, like my friend, just hang out with God once in awhile, yanno, pray a few times just to let him know that they believe in him, and then just expect to be lavished with all of his gifts?

That isn't how it works.

Salvation is an undeserved gift from God. It isn't defined by our actions. However, when you are saved and when you are God-fearing, you have to go the extra step and try to live your life for him. He requires us to follow his commandments. God did give us free will, but with that he gave us a responsibility to his own.

Being saved doesn't end with the initial act. The act of being saved should inspire a change in your heart, which should change your life from living out actions of the flesh to producing fruits of the spirit. In other words, we need to stop doing bad things and instead, do good things because of what Christ has done for us. When you are truly saved, living sinfully just isn't an option because you convert to a new nature of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Not sin.

Therefore, you can not be a Christian and ignore the rest of the Bible.



Shoutout to my friend, Will, and his blog: Halfway to Perfect
You can't just say you're going to be fit and just magically be fit. Living a healthy lifestyle also requires working for it.

The Joker on Caffeine

Caffeine is a fabulous thing in life. It can increase memory, prevent skin cancer, help muscles recover faster, detox the liver and colon, and help us stay alert when we don't sleep enough. It's great.

Unless you're like me. For me, caffeine is evil. At first when I drink it, it wakes me up, I get hyper, and it's great. However, after an hour or so, sometimes faster depending on what I'm doing, something horrible happens. Caffeine increases insulin in the blood and lowers the blood sugar level. Then, yada yada yada, caffeine does weird things to my brain and makes my depression and anxiety worse. Normally, despite having anxiety and depression, I have trained my brain to think pretty positively in most areas of my life, and I manage to be decently happy and sort of upbeat most of the time. However, my brain on caffeine is different; my thoughts reach their lowest point, where nearly every thought is negative.

I drink decaf tea every day, just because I love the stuff and I can't get enough. I ran out of tea today, so my roommate gave me some that she took from the dining commons. It had medium caffeine content. Well, I really wanted tea, and, since it wasn't highly caffeinated, I decided to drink it. Bad idea. I was sitting in class like a half hour later, and I basically started to hate my life. All of a sudden, I hated Bible class. When I left class, I wanted to eat dinner alone because being around people was stressing me out way more than usual. Unfortunately, people sat and my table anyway and I was sad that I couldn't just be alone. Then I was sad that I couldn't talk to them because I just wasn't feelin it. I felt anxiety because I wasn't saying anything, so I scarfed down my food and left. As I was walking away, I had anxiety that they were talking about how worthless I was for not talking and running off, and that no one likes me anyway because I'm just boring and unappealing. They must have actually been relieved that I left.

Now, a few hours later, I know that that's probably ridiculous, they probably didn't talk behind my back, and they probably don't think I'm worthless.. Probably.. But that's just what I think because of my depression and anxiety, especially when caffeine messes with my brain. It's not just bad for people with mental disorders. When people have too much caffeine, it can keep them up at night or even kill them.

It just goes to show how something good can also be evil.

I'm sure you guys know Batman and the Joker.. Well, did you know the Joker was initially good, too? He started out as just a normal guy. Supposedly, he worked as a chemical engineer at a plant, and then he quit to follow his dream of being a comedian. He failed, and in trying to provide for his pregnant wife, he decided to rob the chemical company he used to work for. His wife and child died in a car crash, Batman chased him until he fell into some chemicals, and then he came out all white-faced, green-haired, and psychotic. Again, something created good became something evil. 

I'm just sayin', since the Joker obviously has some kind of mental disorder, I'm pretty sure that if the Joker had caffeine, he would be right up next to Satan himself. 

Like caffeine and the Joker, all of God's creation was created good. In Genesis, God created everything and saw that it was good. Humans, he actually saw as "very good." 

So if God created everything to be good, why does evil exist? Did God create evil?

My youth leader once compared it to the light and the darkness. Darkness doesn't exist. There is no source of darkness. Rather, there is a source of light, and darkness is just the word we use to describe the absence of light. In the same way, evil doesn't exist. There is no source of evil, but rather, evil is just the absence of good. Therefore, God didn't create evil. God only created good.

Evil became a thing because of Satan. You see, Satan isn't some creepy red monster with horns. Satan's name used to be Lucifer, and he was the most beautiful angel in heaven. God created Lucifer to be good. At some point, Lucifer tried to take his power to the next level; he tried to be like God. By doing this, he was up to no good, and that's when he became evil. God cast him and his followers out of heaven, and now they tempt us. 

In the same way, humans became evil when Eve tried to eat the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. By using the fruit to gain this knowledge, she was trying to be like God, and that made her evil. 

Evil just fits into our lives like the shadows. It's just there and there's not really much we can do to avoid it. God did give us a solution, though. Because Jesus is the Light of the World, with him, we can cast away the darkness.