Shattering A Culture That Cares More About Coffee than People

“Soy, green tea latte, no classic syrup, one raw sugar, 170 degrees, and no foam”, I order a friend’s drink from my favorite barista, down at our local coffee stand.

“Oh, we don’t have what we need to make that”, she shrinks back, pointing me to Starbucks.

Ugh. I really need that exact order, I reluctantly drive away as if betrayed by a long, lost friend.

I wait in line at Starbucks. A lady in a truck in front of me sticks her head out of her vehicle into the ordering window, chatting thoughtlessly for what seems like forever.

I’m stagnant, trying to be patient. She chats nonchalantly, apparently reminiscing. My brains spins with business, wondering how I’ll fit everything in.

Finally, frustration kicks in; lists taunt me of all my “important” things to do, while this lady visits and I want my drink.

It’s Sunday. I hear a Pastor from Uganda tell us of Ugandans coming hungry, naked, just to hear the gospel. He challenges us from our American complacency, rising us from our shallow self-centeredness, to go and be the church.

And yet, as tears flood down my face, I wonder why it’s easy to feel stuck between this culture and our calling?  Why do we stand with two feet in both worlds, expecting our God to bless us?

Is it because we get lost on the internet?  Caught up like in a web, letting this culture define us and tell us who we should be? Do we let our surroundings fill our heads with the lies of materialism, people pleasing, getting caught in unforseen webs of complacency?

Is it because we somehow over-inflate ourselves, thinking our time is precious, or that our coffee orders are what matters when the day is done?

Might our worlds collapse if we set our hearts on eternity and lived responding to heaven call, instead of our own?

I sit down to read.  Opening the only truth that bridges the lies keeping me from my calling.

Scribes and Pharisees muttering and indignantly complain, saying, “This man accesses and receives and welcomes [predominantly wicked] sinners and eats with them”. 

While tax collectors and sinners draw close to Jesus, to listen.

And I wonder if our culture fools us into thinking; we too can stand back and judge.  We can be far off and must wait for things to be perfect before we step outside of us…and live boldly counter to this culture?

Don’t we get…the mirror of our culture lies to us telling us we are good, or capable, or smart, or self-sufficient…when what we are is needy.  

Another man eats with pigs.  He used his father for his inheritance, like many of us have used God today.

And yet, when broke and helpless, alone, and disregarded, the prodigal turns his eyes toward home, learning his culture didn’t offer him anything but destitution and spiritual poverty.

And could it be the rich are poor, the needy of this world experience something we only dream about here in America…a desperation that makes Our Father run to us?

Still, we puff ourselves up thinking long lines at Starbucks are somehow our nemesis, or get distant and angry when things stop or hinder us?

Did God ever promise He’d clothe the self-righteous?  While, over and over He is a magnet to the broken, the outcasts of our culture.

Like the Father of the prodigal, He runs to the inadequate, those who are in desperate need of Him.

A Pharisee prays, “Oh God, I am so happy I am not like other people”, counting off the good things he has done.  Another man beats his chest, cries out into the heavens saying, “God have mercy on me, I am a sinner”.

Scripture tells us…The sinner, not the Pharisee, went home justified before God.  Luke 18:14 crashes against our culture, reminding us, “For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted”.

• And I don’t want to think that coffee is more important than the needy.
• I don’t want to waist thousands on the temporary; when a world is naked, children are hungry; while the pride of my agenda blinds me from seeing people.
• I don’t want to place my plans above what God has for me, the passing of the eternal exchanged for the fleeting.

I want to live wildly full of grace.  I want to look in the mirror, not seeing some clone of my culture, some re-manufactured static brand resembling a fake person trying to fit into the pattern of the world around me; shattering my mirror of self-sufficiency, reflecting everything He intended me to be.

And I wonder, will you look with me in the mirror today?  Will you ask yourself; “Do I look, and think, and act like my culture?  Or do I resemble a sacrificial lover of grace, a sold out warrior who perseveres for His great name?  

Do I forget my sin, thinking, “Well, at least I am not like them?” Or am I humble that He might be exalted?

Oh God, help us shatter the mirrors of our culture today!

Let us shed more tears over the needy than our coffee.

Break us Lord.  Rid us of self-abasing, turn us from a world that’s “me” pleasing, and create in us a clean heart, oh God…

Making us world changers, reflecting the God we love…

Not our culture.

UNITE LINK PARTY

Tuesday’s are seriously the best time of the week!  Know why?  I get to spend it here with you!  I can’t tell you all the amazing testimonies of the posts listed and how they have influences me (and so many others) over this past year.

This is how it works:

1)  Add to the link a post below.

2)  Link back, then comment on the post before yours.

You will never know the extent of how your worlds have blessed someone else. \

And remember, it doesn’t matter who you are, UNITE is a blog hop that is all about people!  So, don’t even hesitate, link  and/or comment below.  

YOU are welcome here!