Passionless Existence?

So the last week has been another week full of weird thoughts.

It is a little ironic that immediately after writing my last blog about all things political, I had an encounter with my music appreciation class. The story goes something like this. This young woman, whose neck and political leanings are red, came into class and asked me if I liked Obama or McCain. I was noncommittal so she went on to describe this website with all of these jokes about Obama. This led to an "interesting" altercation of sorts between several of the students. It was congenial, but this same young woman commented that she might move to Canada if Obama was elected president. I did not have the heart to tell her they have universal health care and are much more socialistic. Someone else commented that Canada was getting hard to immigrate to. Then the other young woman dropped the bombshell. "I am afraid that Obama is the Antichrist and that all the stuff in Revelation will come to pass if he is elected." There was silence and nervous laughter when much of the class realized she was not kidding. She did tell us it was not because he is BLACK. I told her, after I picked up my mouth off the floor, that if Obama was indeed the Antichrist, then we needed to pray that he would be elected in order to bring on end times events. Then everything would be better.

I had this interesting conversation with an African-American student who has grown up in a military family and has been primarily home-schooled for much of her life. She is articulate and well-versed in current affairs. She is one student with whom I am able to have an intelligent conversation about politics or other pertinent topics. She is a Baptist. I have no problem asking dumb questions. We talked about whether or not the black man can get a break. She talked about how difficult it is for her to communicate with others of her race since she has been socialized primarily with Anglo-Americans and has been well-educated and has no interest in pretending to be something she is not. What struck me was how much she was like me when I was her age: pro-capital punishment, extremely pro-life, hates fags, thinks inmates want to be in prison, etc. I did not say much, but in the end I told her that I used to feel the same way, until I realized that I was a sinner and needed people to be compassionate toward me sometimes. It is hard to be pro-life when it is fine to send people to the electric chair (many of whom are people of color, so don't get me started). I told her if we were to be pro-life, we needed to be interested in dealing with poverty and improving educational opportunities for the poor not just preach on about the evils of abortion (which, are many, I agree). I also told her that it is easy to be in favor of capital punishment until you meet someone who has had a member of their family face the death sentence. Things look different when they have a name and a face.

I received an email from a "friend" of mine who is what one might call a Messianic Christian. She is a Gentile who absolutely loves Israel and thinks that we all should love Israel just as much. She is very opposed to any concession of land to the Palestinians because God gave Israel that land. When we worked together, it was difficult for me to be completely neutral because I have visited Israel and the West Bank and see the plight of the Palestinians. It is also hard to explain that one can be both pro-Israel and in favor of human rights for the Palestinians. Well, God help us, Sarah Palin, in the vice-presidential debate last Thursday mentioned that the two-state solution was the only solution to the Middle East peace process. Well this friend is devastated.

My point is not to deal with the political ramifications at the heart of the Middle East peace process. What struck me, and has always struck me about this person, is how passionate she is about Israel, often to the extreme. I have at times thought she sees things where nothing exists. But, come what may, she will stand by her strong-held beliefs, beliefs that she feels follow whole-heartedly after God's plan for his chosen people. Whether she is right or wrong, I will leave up to the Lord to judge. It is neither here nor there.

I just have to ask myself: Is there anything in my life that I am so passionate about that I am willing to walk off the proverbial cliff for? Is there anything that I believe so strongly that I am willing to give up everything to follow after it?

I hear the sound of crickets chirping as I think about it. I wonder what the ramifications of a passionless existence truly are. Granted, I was willing to drop everything that seemed important to me in order to make the biggest change in my life to follow after God's calling. But that was yesterday. I wonder how often we need to reevaluate how we are doing in the passion department. Every year? Every month? Every day? Hourly?

In other news:
I received word that I had been accepted into the Master of Arts in Theological Studies program at Asbury Theological Seminary and I will begin classes in January 2009. I guess I am excited. I will be taking a course on campus in Kentucky in January and then I will take a couple of courses through Asbury's distance education program.

I am looking for money. Any givers? My new ministry will be called Christian Academics Studying from Home. You can make checks out to C A S H.