Riley's World

There are times in my life where I simply didn’t care. When I look back at those times and even now consider some frustration in my life, I have begun to realize several common threads. I have put this entry in the theological section of my blog because I think Christianity offers real answers to the question, “Why don’t I care?” or “Why does life suck?”

But before I talk about some Christian answer, let’s look into the heart. I can only offer mine at this point, but if you feel you have something to add, please leave a comment.

When I have felt like I don’t care it is usually a result of a few things going on in my life. In particular regard to classes, I was usually in a class where I hated doing the work or didn’t see the point of it. That is my first point:

#1) You start not to care when you loose sight of what it is you are doing and why.

This question raises several others. Why is it that I am doing what am I doing? Is there any point to what I am doing? Is what I am doing really satisfying and how do I know that it is?

I think the heart of it is that we want to be satisfied. My friend commented that he wasn’t satisfied. In life, I too have been completely unstatisfied to the point of frustration. Are you unsatisfied now?

Considering point one, I think it raises the deeper questions of, “What is it in life that I am really living for and what is it out of life that I really expect to gain?” Thus point two:

#2) You srart not to care when you are unable to connect what it is you are doing to what it is in life that you are living for and or striving to gain.

Before I go any further, because you are either going to hate my answer or love it, I want to make one thing clear. I don’t care much for the answer either. In fact, I think, in the depths of my heart, I really hate it too. So I want to make it clear, I am not only speaking to you out there who doesn’t care but also to myself.

For those who are not Christians. I belive you are on your own. I was there at one point in my life. I used to be an atheist running after certain life goals. And as I look back (and in the depths of my own heart) at them, I see constant striving to remove pain, burden and strife out of my life. I think to get out of the cycle of not caring you must be able to clearly express what it is you are living for and be able to clearly connect what it is you are living for to what it is you are currently doing. If you can’t, then I would consider doing something else or start by cleary expressing what it is you want to do with life.

But I feel it necessary to point out several things about life that the Christian must keep in full view and for the non-Christian to be watchful off. That is there are things in life that you must accept. Those things you can’t change nor can you prevent. They may even completely prevent you from fulfiling what it is in life you want to gain, and that is simply life. It’s not fair, and making it so, I belive is just as fruitless as attempting to make it your life goal to be something that can’t be done; like preventing the earth from rotating. I’ll offer some illustrations in my own life:

Several of my life gains were to have deep friendships, a wife and a close father. However:
1) I couldn’t help the fact that my peers (schoolmates) didn’t want anything to do with me.
2) I couldn’t stop them from taking every opportunity to make fun of me, tease me or ridicule me.
3) I couldn’t make people like me.
4) There was nothing I oculd have done to make a girl like me despite all the negative peer pressure/ridicule that was upon my life.
5) I was in no way able to prevent the cancer that showed up in my dad in 1992 and later came back to take his life in 1997. [I was 17 at the time. {Jr. in HS}]

Subtle to all of this is another point:

#3) You must be able to define a life end that is safe from the attacks and threats of others or circumstance.

Otherwise, I believe you’ll start down a road of pain, bitterness and eventually hatred. Though, if you are able to derive a life goal that is devoid of the pitfalls of life, please let me know. I’d be most interested in hearing what it is you have to say. {I later thought of self-actualization as a goal as I was revising this entry, but that too I think can be thwarted by a mental illness.}

This is at the point that I belive Christianity offers real answers to the problem our discussion begins raise.

If you logically follow where this dicussion leads, you will realize you need a life end that transends this world, circumstance and potentially all the bad things that can happen. Sure you can get lucky in life and things work out. But I’ll assert that a life that relys on that and actually suceeds, is a rarity and for the common person, not achieveable.

The ‘duh’ answer is that Jesus Christ transends this life and is the one we must put our hope in. I’ll spare you the cheesy Christian pat answers here. I want to focus on some spiritual truths to help the Christian in times when they are not feeling as if they care anymore about life or what it is they are doing. (And yes, I have been there myself.)

I also think it is important to point out right now, that I personally believe, from what I have seen growing up and now as a person involved in this Christian thing full time, that apathy is one of the greatest evils our world faces and is the greatest pain causer man has ever invented. (Why I belive this is for another discussion.)

To the Christian, the one who has accepted Jesus Christ as personal Lord and Savior who trusts in His divine work to bridge the gap between man and God and who hopes in His second coming and knows that He wants more than religious duty, but rather a deep relationship:

When you don’t care, you must ask yourself what it is you are living for? Are you genuinely living for the things of God or have you placed something else in the way that is ultimately unsatisfying?

When I look at my life, the times where I begin not to care, the times where I get down right frustrated at life, I see a constant stiving towards something that isn’t found in the Lord. So I’ll speak from experience.

I have come to realize that my biggest Christian hangup, the thing that constantly keeps me from purusing and connecting with the Living God is a constant strife to avoid pain, difficulty and to achieve satisfaction. (What is your constant stive that pulls you away from Him?)

You see, my aim in life prior to being a Christian was to be as perfect as possible as soon as possible. So now, as a Christian I’m bugged by the fact that I’m not perfect. Thankfully God brought John Meyer to this last weekend’s GCLI and things in this Christian life are starting to make a little more sense.

There are several spirtual truths I want to bring to bear on this “don’t care” mentality that can easily plague us. (You see, my frustration, in the end, leads to not caring. Your’s will too, if you let it.) We need to remind ourselves of these to help end the cycle of not caring or apathy.

The first truth is that Christ did not promise satisfaction in this life. We are not promised that things will go well, that God will bless us (in ways that we may want to define {this is a tricky point so if you are confused by what I mean, ask}). In fact we are promised the exact opposite: Paul the Apostle encouraged the saints in Lystra, Iconium and Antioch with this truth, “We must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God” (Acts 14:21-23 NIV) “Endure hardship as disciple for God is treating you like sons. For what son is not disciplined by his father?” (Hebrews 12:7 NIV) Christ said the world will hate us. (John 15:18-24)

When we get our eyes off of Him, carrying the cross and focused on what it is that will please or satisfy us, is what in the end will lead to frustration and then a general attitude of not carrying or apathy.

I’m still learning what this means in application but I do know that if we don’t take the higher ground, the more difficult path to find satisfaction in the Lord, we will always end up disappointed.

John Meyer talked about the placing our hope in the second coming of Christ. You see, things in this life, are broken. I belive much of my deeper sense of tension is a result of an internal realization that things are not right and my drive to fix everything. You see, we are not saved in the sense that life will make sence and things will all work out. I could list many examples from the lives of the saints to demonstrate this or you could turn to your Bible and read about the lives of the first myarters.

We are saved from our sinful nature. We are no longer slaves to our flesh. We are new creations (endwelled by the Holy Spirit), with some old baggage still but that will eventually be removed. Thus we are also saved to a new kingdom. An eternal kingdom. A kingdom where all the problems are fixed. John hit this point well, we are saved to something new. A time when every knee will bow and tounge confess that Christ is Lord. A time when all wrongs are corrected, all hurts healed all dissapointment turned into satisfaction. But it is not in this life. I’ll write more on this topic when I understand it to a greater degree.

The overall point is this: If you don’t care you are attempting to find, either directly or subtly in the depths of your heart satisfaction in something that isn’t of God or in the Lord. You must therefore learn, as I am starting to as well, learn to find satisfaction in Him and hope in the second coming of the Kingdom where all things will be made right.

Upon third review of this entry, I was thinking of the college graduate or the person who feels stuck in the rut of life. It’s easy to get hung there and feel dissatisfied and start not to care about work. This too I think is a loss of sight of what we are to be living for. We are not to live for the work, but the people at the work. We don’t live for the money, but for the opportunity to give that money to build the Kingdom. We are not interested in chugging out eight or more hours of productive work for some company that in the end will burn, but chug out eight hours of glorious service to our King on High for the opportunity to advance His Kingdom in our midst and/or through the finances he bestows upon us to be faithful with. I’ll add though, if you feel as if you go to work and keep wishing you were doing more on the mission field, I would consider full time staff. Just remember, it isn’t easier nor better than the full time job.

P.S. After the 4th revision, I realized that I never said why I don’t care for the Christain answer. Put simply, I want things fixed now and it irks the heck out of me that they aren’t or cannot be fixed in this life.