Out of the Wilderness

Take a look at this video and I’m curious about your thoughts. I’ll share mine below.

After just seeing the title of the video I was fully prepared to side with the woman. After all, there is a reputation and a preconceived opinion of these kinds of preachers; even if their heart is in the right place they often come across as judgey and distasteful.

Like I said, I was already in the woman’s corner as I clicked play. She clearly has a tender heart and cares for the people around her and people in the world. There’s no disputing that. But the further I got into the discussion, I began to shift over to supporting the preacher. He has many good points about the role as a Christian in the world. If I had to choose now who’s side I was on… I’d lean more towards the preacher… IF I had to choose.

But I offer another choice: if the woman represents compassion, grace, forgiveness, and love and the preacher represents judgement, law, justice, and the immediate need for repentance…. I believe both the woman and the preacher are right.

God is all of those things.

The preacher’s method, while possibly abrasive and hard to hear, might be exactly what someone passing by needs to hear in the brief time they listen to his preaching. They might feel conviction and that feeling of wrongness might linger long enough to compel them to talk to God about it.

The woman is more about love and grace, living her message through her actions. This is also a good thing. Someone might need months and months of grace shown to them for them to form (or even reverse) their opinion about God. A slow burn that ignites a fire.

What do you think? Is it possible that these two folks can both be right, and therefore shouldn’t be arguing? Let me know in the comments below!

-Out of the Wilderness

Some of you may know I’m attempting to write up at least one post every day for the entire year and so far I haven’t missed a day. In fact, there have been a handful of days where I posted twice in a day. That might come back to bite me but so far so good!

Biggest challenge:

There was a week recently where I was not sure I’d keep up with my goal. It came down to writing something the very same day I’d post it. To make that make sense, a lot of my posts are using the “schedule” setting on WordPress. So let’s say I write two posts in a day, I can schedule them to post on whatever day and at whatever time I choose. That’s really nice when I’m in a zone and can whip out a few posts in a short amount of time. But when a dry spell comes around, I still need to make sure all the days are covered and that’s where it got dramatic a few weeks ago.

Biggest success: 

The most successful posts of this year are usually about music or TV. For instance, a post uploaded about a Bebe Rexha song celebrating 2020 graduates has drawn a lot of traffic and the same can be said for a post listing songs and movies with “mask” in the title. Clearly that one is directly related to the coronavirus pandemic so in a normal year that one wouldn’t be as sought out as it has been in this crazy year.

My advice: 

If you’re trying to post often, I have 2 thoughts that might help you be productive without getting disheartened or burnt out. One… don’t always write long posts. It’s OK to have posts with a few thoughts or even a gallery of photos with a short explanation. Two… write about what you enjoy. If you’re constantly writing about things you have no interest in, that will get old fast. Whatever excites you or interests you, those topics will be the most enjoyable to write about.

I appreciate every single person that stops by to read any of my posts, I’m excited to bring you many more before we ring in a new year 🙂

Thanks for stopping by…

-Out of the Wilderness