Trayvon Martin was Made For God's Glory

I love the post-grad life. I now have a schedule that is mostly dictated by what I decide is important, not a syllabus, and includes things like sleeping and eating meals that are not Cheezits. Also, even though Ben and I have been married 5 years, we almost feel like newlyweds because our home-lives aren't dominated by homework. We've gone to more movies together in the last 6 months than the last 6 years (3) and are working on the Newlywed Nine lbs we never had time for before. Students are selfish. You have to be, or you won't get anything done. I tried to keep track of what was going on in the world, but whole semesters could go by where I couldn't keep my elections,trials and national disasters straight. So I really don't know if the world is getting that much worse or if I just have my head more consistently out of the Student Sandbox. I've had theories about some of these things: there has ALWAYS been gross social injustice everywhere, we just didn't have the Internet telling us about it. And the dinosaurs can attest that climate change has always been a problem. But the thing that impresses me most about the news today is how divisive it is. Facebook and Twitter are dangerous places! Disturbed about what the DOMA overturn means for the future of marriage? You're homophobic and a hater. Think Zimmerman should have been locked up? You're blinded by your racial bias. Sometimes I barely read a news article, just skip to comments (I know other people do too because there's a button for it!) We idolize our own points of view, and we are always right. Ben shared with me something God has been teaching him, a lens to see that ridiculous person that makes you exclaim "Some people" through. It made sense when he said it but I felt it when I checked my Twitter at about 2am this morning... We were watching Les Mis with the Vapor interns (who are awesome) but I got really distracted by the Zimmerman trial and the news of the death of Cory Monteith. I watched Glee every once in awhile but got depressed because it was so trashy and aimed at such a young audience. Haven't really followed too much, but based on random tabloid sightings my line of thought was progressing to the disgusting level that thoughts will fall to with more attention to tabloid than Bible... Something along the lines of "he spent his life creating smut and going to rehab, maybe he deserved it." It so sickens me to even write that I thought that. But I know our heads are all filled with similar condemnations! And yes, we do all deserve the same death, alone and hopeless, even though our lives may seem full. But the fact that we all deserve it seriously undercuts our right to speak those words over anyone else. The fact is, as far as I'm concerned, Cory Monteith was created by God for his glory. George Zimmerman's voice could join Trayvon Martin's in a chorus of Holy ,Holy, Holy. Trayvon's girlfriend says she didn't know calling someone a "creepy-ass cracker" is a problem? Withhold your judgmental comments, you can praise Jesus in Ebonics; I hear it all the time. I'm not saying Christians do not need to stand up for what they believe in. But I think sometimes it is really worth asking ourselves why we stand up for what we believe in. Is it to prove something? About how great we are? Do we long for the oppression of the early Church and find it by making people hate us? We are not oppressed in the US. Tolerance is the soup du jour, other than from most Christians. Was Jesus tolerant of sin? No. He died because of our sin. He takes it seriously and so should we. But how much more did he focus on love? When you love someone, you will try to help them see the light. But so much of the well-intentioned differences of opinion that I see cannot be based in love. If I am sitting around (on my creepy cracker-ass) judging you instead of belaboring over how to encourage your glorification of God, shame on me.