October 23, 2009

Enjoy another devotional from one of our guest writer's today!

Living a Counter Cultural Life

Have you ever thought about how your group defines who you should be? Have you been in a situation where the group defines what "normal" or "acceptable" is? Everyone in the world is defined by the people around us. Whether you live in a tribal village in Africa, in the Western world of Europe or America or in the Far East of Asia, you are influenced by the culture around you. Television, the news media, your place of employment all have acceptable norms of what a person should look like, what they should act like, what is acceptable to say or how to speak. Everywhere we go we are influenced by our culture. We watch television shows and look at magazines to see what the new "norm" is. How should we decorate our house? What do the experts tell us what we should do? We look at the magazines and professional journals to see the leading trends of our work situation. Everywhere we go, we are influenced by our culture.

While I would never say that we should try to live irrelevant to our culture, the world is trying to form our image, our thinking and our way of life to their culture. The Bible says in Romans 12:1-2 Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is — his good, pleasing and perfect will.

The Old Testament figure, Daniel was the perfect example of a Godly man living a counter-cultural life. Daniel and his friends were taken captive by Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon. Then the King ordered Ashpanez, overseer of the young men taken from Judah, to train them in the ways of the Babylonian language, culture, literature & life. Daniel and his friends were to be given specific food from the King's table to strengthen their bodies. But this is where the problem came in. Daniel was an observant Jew who followed the food regimen that God established for the Jewish people. The Bible tells us that "Daniel's resolved to not defile himself with the royal food and wine and he asked the chief official if he could not defile himself this way." The chief official was scared that if he did not give Daniel and his friends the rich food from the King's table, that they would look sickly. Daniel asked that they be tested for 10 days. After 10 days, Daniel and his friends looked healthier than the other captives who ate the King's food. Daniel knew what it was to live a counter-cultural life.

Ron Luce in his book Recreate Your World says that "Most of what influences us in culture is not obvious. It's sly, it's sneaky, it's deceptive, it's addictive and it's attractive. It lures us into a bit of a trap by creating a desire inside of us that makes us want to go back to it like a dog returning to it's vomit. It's insidious." He further goes on to describe how lions stalk their prey before attacking. Lions often sneak up near their victim until they are about 98 feet away. Typically, several female lions work together and encircle the herd from different points. Once they have closed with a herd, they usually target the prey that is closest to them. Their attack is short and powerful-they attempt to catch the victim with a fast rush and final leap. Usually it is too late for the stalked to save itself, not realizing that the enemy has singled them out to be caught and killed.
Ron Luce continues to explain that "the plan of this world is to lure us into its trap by taking us to higher levels of entertainment and adventure than we've ever known. Then it wraps its jaws around our necks and chokes the life out of us." So how do we protect ourselves?
We should be actively placing boundaries around ourselves, asking God to form us and shape us. But this does come with a need to pull away from some of the worldly pleasures and entertainment of our culture to see what God says in His Word. How much time are we spending on God's Word and prayer versus how much time do we focus on newspapers, television shows, popular music? Everywhere we see these things, they are trying to influence us to their opinion, their point of view and their worldly system.
So the question today is, are you allowing the culture to define who you are or are you allowing God's Word and His principles to form you? Let's work to offer ourselves as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God, not being formed by the principles or norms of this world, but by God's Word.