Nothing ever changes...

by itself.

So...there has been so much going on! Hmmm...Mission Big Lake was several weeks ago and you can read/see pictures from it here: FBC Mission Big Lake 09

The blisters from scraping, painting and mowing and weed-eating many, many lawns that week are just NOW going away. Not exaggerating. :) some of the work we did seemed to take so long (clean the yard, mow the yard, weed-eat/trim the yard, scrape the paint, prime the paint, paint the house, paint the trim, do touch up...whew!) In the end, however, these houses looked so amazing different after such a *short* amount of time! (2 days tops mostly-we accomplished 22-25 projects this week) But it was soo good, and I was able to talk and get to know so many people as we worked side by side. Not only was God's love shown tangibly to our community, but also to each other as we ate EVERY meal together, took water breaks and wiped paint/grime off each other's faces. You get the idea.

The very next Monday was camp. Ah...camp. We took 15 kids; all Junior Highers (two of them are going to be Freshman this fall...but I think they still count as Junior Highers.) The first day our girls were complaining about how they thought the girls we shared the cabin with were "snobs and hated us." And we encouraged them to keep trying (the other church's girls were almost all High Schoolers) to build relationships...nothing happens or changes in such a short amount of time!! So of course, by Friday, the girls were swapping email addresses and talking about keeping in touch. lol Teenagers make me laugh. And sigh. I've said it before, and I'll probably say it the rest of my life: I hate apathy. So much so that I'm going to skip all other camp stories and our vacation (which was WONDERFUL!!!) to spew about apathy.

Teenagers are amazing creatures. Honestly, they are! They are at a perfect time in life...primed and eager to take risks. All teenagers take risks in some way...bending parents rules on curfew, how fast they drive, etc. God knows that teenagers are amazing at taking risks. That's why most of the modern revivals that have happened were led by young people. (check history..it's true) They believe they are the exception to rules, that they don't apply to THEM. They either don't think about consequences or they decide that the consequences don't matter. And a teenager that takes risks for God...man, they are dangerous. Dangerous FOR God and dangerous To the enemy. Satan hates risk takers living for God. They can get in the way and blow through any obstacle he has set up.

Don't give Satan too much credit, but he is rather smart..and deceiving. To stop these dangerous teenagers, he sets up snares. Drugs, alcohol, sex, etc. (heard this spill before, I know.) But the thing is, even Satan knows it's only distracting for a time...eventually you get bored with sin (whatever it is) so you either drop the habit or you have to find something *harder.* (More thrilling...more alcohol, heavier drugs, different types of sexual impurity, etc.) So he either loses you or gets you hooked even more. It's a gamble to him.

However, there is another option that Satan dangles. One more sinister and damaging than alcohol, drugs and sex combined. Enter apathy.

"Good kids" don't drink alcohol or do drugs or have sex.
They just don't care.

Sure, by all appearances they're "following God" and "living a life of purity" as they secretly cross lines of purity (though *technically* not having sex) and have as much desire for God to rule in their lives as the atheist kid in their biology class. Satan doesn't have to tempt them to blatantly "sin" as long as they're not a threat.
Why wake a sleeping dragon??

So apathy reigns. And it's everywhere. Not just in our teenagers in Big Lake. It happened Arlington too. Probably still is. It's everywhere. And it's not just teenagers. Adults, who are already afraid of taking risks, risk less and less for God every day. (How many *mature* adults jump off of roofs onto trampolines these days?) Adults know that landing on your hands means that you risk breaking your wrists. We know that if we jump on trampolines, our knees will be killing us tomorrow. We can't just quit our jobs to go be Missionaries in London, because we have others depending on us and our income. There are serious consequences for living a life of abandonment for God. And we've weighed the consequences...and we usually find them too demanding.

But teenagers are emotionally and psychologically primed at that point in their life to take risks for God. To set out on the amazing adventures He has planned for them. Where does apathy come from? How does it enter the mind of a risk-taker to "not care?" I'd like to hear your thoughts on this (even if you disagree with me!) please.