Refuel: Faith-Building Pit-Stops On Your Road TripSample

OUT OF PLACE

Imagine Green Lantern living in the Smurfs’ village. How about Michael Jordan wearing a Lakers uniform? Picture Spider-Man in a Narnia Film. Or Donald Duck running alongside Wolverine and battling it out with Magneto in an X-Men movie. That would be weird.

How about this: Youth pastor inside a casino — that’s me in Las Vegas. In 2005, my mom’s friends brought us to the Sin City. And while all the people in the world’s most expensive casinos laughed out loud with the happy slot machines, I went out of the building to get some fresh air.

I got three words for you: Out. Of. Place!

I’m sure you’ve experienced this. Being a Christ follower in a very un-Christian world — and feeling out of place to the max.

• Choosing not to cheat in a classroom where everyone else does.
• Saying no to an invitation to go on a “boys' night out” to watch a pornographic film.
• Making your friends stop as they buffet on green jokes.
• Drinking iced tea while everyone ordered beer.
• Reading your Bible while everybody’s feasting on gossip magazines.
• Going to church on weekends when all the world’s out partying.

All these and more are part of what we sometimes go through for being a follower of Jesus — choosing to be good in a planet that generally thinks that being bad is being cool. Face it, sometimes it’s just so hard to fit in.

And as you battle through the feeling of being left out, sometimes you get tempted to succumb to P — pressure — that comes from another P — peers. Today let us meditate on a phenomenon that you and I go through everyday — peer pressure.

You know what it is. It’s the emotional force that friends apply to try to get us do (or not do) certain things. Do you know that it is an age-old dilemma? King Solomon who lived thousands of years ago dished out good advice to his son about this; check out now our Bible verses in Proverbs for today.

There you have it. Clear as day. In facing peer pressure, it’s always wise to fight it. Choose God. When you do, you stay out of trouble.

So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life — your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life — and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.

One on One with God
Daddy God, as I face the world today, I pray that You accompany me. I know that there will be moments when my “being Christian” will be tested. As I go to class and face my friends, give me the strength to overcome peer pressure, especially when I am enticed to sin. In times when it all becomes too difficult to say no, give me the courage to still do so. More than anybody else’s approval, it is Yours that I want most. I love You, Lord, and my desire is to put a smile on Your face. Amen.