7.55 - "i dont want to be a Christian"

sometimes i have these random feelings of, "i wish i wasnt Christian."

dont jump the gun just yet. what i mean is, sometimes, i imagine what my life would be like if i was born as a non-believer, or maybe even a sunday church goer, but didnt take the path of life i am living now.

i like to sit in the passenger side of cars sometimes because i can stare out the window and observe the world around me. i guess its my meloncholy side, but i love to do this especially in the city. there i can peer through windows and see how people are living, notice the cars people are driving, notice the people on the sidewalks. what they're doing, eating, drinking, smoking..whatever.

and i often say to myself (and others), i sometimes wish i could be like them.

i sometimes wish i could be working making lots of money, partying at nights, living in a nice place in the city, driving any car i want, meeting many people and doing it over and over again. and ive done that here and there during college. but sometimes, i imagine doing it everynight. and the scary part is, i think i would rather enjoy it.

in an alternate life, i fantasize about myself having tatoos, piercings (not saying any of these are un-Christian), a mean mug on my face and a lifestyle to match.

and then i remember the Cross. i remember my sin. i remember that my forefathers lived a life before me, neglecting their Creator, and many paid the price for it. i remember that the life i am living now is by unimaginable Grace and Mercy and Love and Compassion from God. i remember that i am living this life i live because God's salvation arm was mighty to save.

my flesh desires what the world craves and offers. careless love, sex, materialistic pornography, money, success, godlike fame, unceasing fortune, food... it still desires these things at a regular basis.

but i reminded that it is my flesh, which will come to pass. like psalm 4:7, "there is greater joy" and that joy is found in Jesus.

Driscoll in his book, Death by Love, writes about how:

Jesus is our Substitutionary Atonement.

Jesus is our Christus Victor.

Jesus is our Redemption.

Jesus is our New covenant sacrifice.

Jesus is our Righteousness.

Jesus is our Justification.

Jesus is our Propitiation.

Jesus is our Expiation.

Jesus is our Atonement.

Jesus is our Ransom.

Jesus is our Christus Exemplar.

Jesus is our Reconciliation.

Jesus is our Revelation.

Jesus should be my sustenance. i should be desiring Jesus, not the world.

and so, although my flesh is always desiring the world, i find myself echoing Paul where he wrote in Phil 3:12-14

¹²Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. ¹³Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, ¹⁴I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.