Worth It All

Rita Springer: Worth it All
From the album “Effortless”

I don't understand Your ways
Oh but I will give You my song
Give You all of my praise
You hold on to all my pain
With it You are pulling me closer
And pulling me into Your ways

Now around every corner
And up every mountain
I'm not looking for crowns
Or the water from fountains
I'm desperate in seeking, frantic believing
That the sight of Your face
Is all that I need
I will say to You

It's gonna be worth it
It's gonna be worth it
It's gonna be worth it all
I believe this
It's gonna be worth it
It's gonna be worth it
It's gonna be worth it all
I believe this

This song has struck a chord with me that I can only play it over and over again. You know when a song comes along every once in awhile that just cuts to your core. You just squint your eyes and sing it from the bottom of diaphragm, and just feel your soul pour out. I feel like this just speaks to where I am at. A friend of mine has taught me to sing and praise not necessarily from believing the words but singing out of hope and prayer. If you can’t sing out of a reassuring confidence than sing as if you are asking God to be those words you are singing. I have no idea why things are happening or not happening but I will give him my song even in my doubts. With our pain He holds and reels us in, that is such an awesome thought. But having the words to put this emotion is just freeing, that I’m not looking for all the thrills and being blown away by a great beam of light that cast down as the seas part. I’m not looking for miracles, I’m desperately seeking and frantically believing that just the sight of His face, that’s all I need. That everything I encounter, fight through, endure that it will be worth it just from a glance from His eyes. That something that I have fought through for the last year, with my constant struggle with things that just aren’t ever going to go away, that it will one day be worth it. God, I continue to choose your words over my experience, my pain, and my better judgment, and year after year, I feel like I am stuck in the same spot over and over again, I am so far away from you. I want to believe that it is worth it, that you are going to be worth it, just one sight of your face.

A Downside to the Psychology World

There are many things that I have learned to love about psychology and the study of human behavior. There is a lot of use for it in our world, however, there are a lot of things that psychology has introduced into the world that has tainted the truth. I have recently discussed the philosophies of the good nature of human beings that has been infiltrated into our society. Everyone has their own story, and no matter what those stories entail: No one chooses evil, we are coerced by it. Now, as a well-learned Southern Baptist, I am well acquainted with the truth and concept that humans have sinful natures, and we are capable of no good on our own. So once again there is a harsh clash between how are government is run and the beliefs of Christianity (no, surprise, I know). But even in my church background, I have been influenced by this thinking, I am taught to look at a person and see all the good in them, and love them because Jesus loves them, no matter what they do. Now, there is a time and place for those words, and I am not saying not to love on people, I am addressing something completely different here, so just hold on…

I think it starts with the decrepitating of the value of people’s decisions. As much as I love psychology, psychologists like Freud, Watson, and Maslow have simply reverted human behavior as pure reaction to the elements of the environment, hence you control and manipulate variables, and you can control people. There is no evil, people don’t meaningly make these horrible decisions, and they are just victims of their environment. When someone makes a choice it is just the result of an equation of experiences and environmental stimuli. To some, this is viewed as a uncovering a sort of freedom, because my choices aren’t my fault, so I shouldn’t have to pay the consequences. However, I believe it does something else; I believe that is demeans us and transforms us in to pawns. Suddenly what you doesn’t matter, there is no meaning in your actions. If I were to volunteer with troubled kids, it’s a result my instinct and environment, it has nothing to do with trying to love them and influence their lives. If I were to jump in front of car in order to push my sister out of the way to save them, it is because my experiences have taught me quick reaction, not because I love and care for her more than my physical comfort. So what do you do when nothing you do matters? How do you live your life? Well, if there is no common good, I guess the only thing we can do fulfill our good, gratification in every means. How is this suppose to bring out the good in everyone? It does the complete opposite.

“I know that nothing good lives within me, that is my sinful nature.” ~Romans 7:18

The Disaster of Utopia

Alexis De Tocqueville stated in his observances of America, that we have developed a tyranny of “soft despotism”, “an oversolicitous nanny state that debilitates its citizens just as thoroughly, but by coddling them instead of coercing them.” The more I come to understand about the state, the more I see how the state whispers sweet incantations, woes us to sleep in its arms, claiming it can solve our problems. We hand over more and more power and slowly, we, individuals have no hand in our democracy anymore. It is scary when you look back at history, at all the attempts at a utopian society including Hitler, Stalin and Mao; which is all based on one conclusion: Humans are naturally good. These ideas were first introduced by Jean Jacques Rousseau, who declared that humans are good, however, we are corrupted but society. It is these duties and responsibilities that are holding us back from our full potential. In this, the state has become our hero: liberate us from these social conventions because they limit our freedom. The war cry of the individuals of America has drowned out the sensibilities and heart of community.

In these philosophies, our country has taken its place in relinquishing us from our duties and commitments. You don’t have to stay married, you don’t have to have the baby that you made, you don’t have to raise your kids, you don’t have to care about anyone’s problems but your own. And in return the state will grant you your rights as citizens and entitlement to welfare. In doing this, the state is just reinforcing the behavior, no one has to change. It’s sad, because when you disconnect from these commitments, you become an island and are free to fulfill any desire you wish. For some reason, that is believed to be freeing, to allow your immediate gratifications run wild, so how come it always ends in slavery, to addictions, to prison, whatever. If freeing ourselves is enabling us to become our full selves, according our philosophy we should be thriving.

Unknowingly, we paint ourselves into a corner. As the state plays hero, we become dependent on the it. More and more power is given, and more and more power is lost. We now depend on the government to take care of the environment, instead taking up the call to care for the earth. The government teaches are kids, not the parents. The government, is suppose to be responsible for keeping everyone healthy. The government is suppose to take care of me when I have no job or when I am to old to work. As we have looked for them for these things, the support of the community has disappeared, and the government is all you have left, allowing them to pull some mighty tight strings.

It is frustrating to me, because I feel there is absolutely nothing I can do about it. I am one voice, a murmur in the sea of “the faceless majority”. There is no face to my enemy, there is no direction to fight back in. What can a young person do to stop this snowball effect?