"Pathetic Emptiness of Their Consumer Driven Lives"

I haven't blogged in a couple days because I have been rather sick. I wasn't sure if anyone wanted to read a Mucinex/Nyquil induced blog post. Chances are it would have been rather funny, but I didn't want to risk anyone thinking I needed to join a psych ward. If you could see the amount of medicine on my desk right now, you would think I needed to go to rehab. The struggle is real.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Easter celebrating our risen savior! (and eating candy like it's going out of style) But should our celebrating only be confined to one weekend? After Sunday, are we meant to go back to our normal lives? The title of this blog seems rather harsh and it is meant to be because, it's a quote. This quote is from 10 Things I Hate About You, which is by far the best 90's movie, in my opinion. I mean, Heath Ledger is in it. Who doesn't love him? (He is my favorite actor. I'm biased.) Kat Stratford says this quote in the movie. Kat is so full of anger and angst from her mother leaving that she just despises everyone. She turns out to be pretty bomb though, but how many of us think our lives are "meaningless" and "consumer driven"? You may not say it out loud, but a lot of people go through the motions of everyday life thinking that their life is meaningless and end up setting aside Easter to "really" celebrate Jesus, myself included.

It's really been hitting me lately the mindset I have been in in past years around Easter. The thought that I had and some other people might have is that fact that I had done everything the Bible had told me to do. I have accepted Jesus into my heart, but will Jesus accept me? I mean, I want to go to heaven. I want to live forever with Jesus, but does he want me to? So, I usually would just continue on with my life living like I know I should and just hoping Jesus actually wants me. Don't we all think that? We are Christians and we love the Lord and everything he has done for us, but actually believing he loves us no matter what we do, isn't that the hardest thing to believe? Is unconditional love actually a thing? It wasn't until recently I realized that it is. Most of us have heard about the man that was on the cross next to Jesus. He was a criminal hanging next to an innocent man and in his last breaths he claimed the Jesus as the messiah. Jesus told him he would spend eternity in heaven. He got to go to heaven even after his life of crime because he accepted Jesus and because God loved him and wanted him. He actually loves us and wants us. Strangely enough, the proof is in our everyday lives.

We have a family that loves us. If you don't, you have friends that love you. If you don't think you have friends that love you, shoot. I love you. We are blessed with opportunities. We have clothes and food. Nature itself is proof of God's love. Everything is so beautiful. Birds sing and flowers bloom and the sun sets in amazing colors just because God wants to show us his love. The sunset itself is just one big love letter from God and he thinks you are MORE beautiful than that?! Is that possible? I'm sorry to start sounding like a Disney princess, but his love for everyone is just so vast, yet so focused on each human being. It's unexplainable.

Because of this, shouldn't he be celebrated more than just one weekend? Obviously, he is worthy to be praised for other reasons as well, but his love changes us though. It gives us joy in times of grief. It gives us hope when there seems to be no hope. It give us life when we feel like there might not be a reason to live. Shouldn't that fact alone gives us a reason to praise him extravagantly for more than 3 days?