Skylar Ogren

This is a beautiful project designed and created by one of the art professors at Abilene Christian University.  The project was a brilliant and well designed work of inspiration.  You can only see the cross from one point and there are many different verses scattered across the stone formations.  Walking along the path and admiring it definitely takes one’s breath away.

Lately I have  been comparing Christian faith to the information I learn in my classes.  The other day in class we watched a video with the title “The Overspent American”.  Like most movies that I have watched in class, I was expecting another 80’s video with rinky-dink music and people with expired fashion (large glasses, Gola shoes and patch pockets…etc).  Despite these expectations I was intrigued by the movies contents.  The narrator spent 32 minutes talking about the spending that we as Americans do.  It’s not just a ridiculous amount of spending that we are doing, but also the amount of work that the average American has to do.  The work people do in order to keep their spending affordable is almost ridiculous.  With more income you have more spending, more acquired things and more landfills.  With out sounding too cynical and negative I want to briefly give my philosophical and unprofessional opinion of how this video impacted me.

“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.” – Romans 12:2

The society that we live is constantly looking for bigger, better, faster… NOW!  I have heard this so many times, but the reality is that we all want the latest and greatest gizmo that makes what ever chore or manual labor we do easier and more convenient.  One of the biggest things that people notice about us is the stuff we have.  We can tell if someone is well to do or living on the streets by how they dress, if their teeth are clean and if there are well fed.  It’s not hard to deduce someone’s financial status. There is a saying, “Keeping up with the Joneses” that refers to comparing one’s belongings to others with more.  One of the biggest points of this video was how we have moved from a society of simply having access to basic needs to a society that lives off status goods.  Having the big house, the nice car and the expensive clothes has become a new standard for a lot of Americans.  The roles that media plays in this standard are horrendous and only provide people with more fuel to get even more lost.  Making “happy and content” look like we all need to have things.

I’m not going to lie; having really nice clothes, cool gadgets and a nice car is really awesome.  I would really enjoy having an I-phone, a 72-inch flat screen TV and some sports car, but I also enjoy not having those things.  The values that a lot of people have are based on places traveled, income, things bought and people known.  There is nothing wrong with having stuff, but when it comes to the purpose and drive of life, things can’t even be on the list.  If our life is driven by the stuff we have then we are definitely going to struggle when God decides to “clean out the garage”.

The fact that our lives are becoming more consumed more with things of the world and less things of God is something that I think is serious.  Life isn’t something that can be spent twice, we don’t get a return option, when we reach our last day we get a receipt and the total is either life or death.  If we are more concerned with the world in a selfish way and not concerned with the world in a spiritual way then the total cost of our life is definitely going to be death.  The value of our life doesn’t come from the world; it comes from the creator of the world, the one who gives us value! If we don’t recognize and accept the sacrifice of God’s son who made it possible for us to be worth something then we become worthless.  You want to take a quick test to see the value you are giving to God?  How much time do you spend in God’s word, praying or sharing your faith compared to the time you spend doing things about yourself.  T.V., work, vacation, books, music…. Etc.  If we include God in all that we are doing, then there is never a moment that we AREN’T spending with Him.

The main thing that this video reminded me of is that our faith needs to be genuine and real.  It can’t have all these funky gadgets and gizmos that look cool, but don’t mean anything.  God’s word says that, “Faith with out actions is dead” (James 2:17).  Instead of overspending to receive treasures of this world, we need to love and receive eternal and heavenly treasures.  There is nothing that we can’t do under God’s authority.  Making money is important and it is a huge resource, but we can’t serve two masters.  We have to make sure that the priority in our life is to live and serve God.  We CAN do that with the things we have, we CAN do that with the lives we live and it IS worth every thing we invest.  The world is overspent and under-loved, as lights to the world we need to love more and shine brighter.  My challenge is to step out, love on others more and spend less on our selves.

“Watch out that you do not lose what you have worked for, but that you may be rewarded fully.” – 2 John 8

I have been challenged a lot in the past couple of months to write down and share my testimony.  I have never really felt like I had a story worth sharing, but over the last month I was really shown how important my life is.  Anyone who has had an encounter with God’s saving grace has a story that needs to be shared.  I would encouraged you if you are interested to read my testimony under the “Tale of a Sky” tab.  If you have any questions or want to know more, feel free to email me (swogren@skylarogren.com) or ask me about it in person some time!  I pray that it is an encouragement to you where ever you are in your own journey

Sky

Last night I celebrated New Years Eve with my family and some friends.  It has always been interesting to me how so many people start out the New Year with so many goals and resolutions, but don’t always make it very far before going back to their old habits.  I have experienced that myself.  It’s really easy to set a goal and start out after it, but then when it gets hard, it becomes even easier to make up excuses and reasons why that goal wasn’t worth it anyway.  What happens to the passion and excitement that we start out with?  The beginning is so easy, then it seems like life catches up to us and we find ourselves too busy to put energy into the new habits or goals we started off to reach.  There is so much potential in being who we picture ourselves becoming, but it’s the hard work in getting there that can surprise us and stop us in our tracks.  We shouldn’t let the world strip us of our confidence in wanting to be the people God created us to become.  So many people settle for less then who they were meant to be, but we were meant to live for so much more than this world offers.  Have we lost ourselves?  To quote one of my favorite Christian bands… “I want more then fine, more than just ok…”

“Don’t spend today away, because soon it will be gone…. We are not infinite, we are not permanent, nothing is immediate, we’re so confident in our accomplishments, look at how dark it is.  Life if still worth living.”

- Switchfoot (“Gone”)

Life would be so much easier if we could go through it twice.  The second time around we would actually know what we were doing and get a head start on being who we want to be.  We would know what job we actually liked, we wouldn’t have to waste time going through different relationships because we know who we were going to marry, we wouldn’t have to worry about where to live or many other things that we often question.  Life would be a LOT easier… but then again it sure wouldn’t be much of an adventure if we had to live it twice (Plus, life isn’t meant to be easy, it’s meant to be a journey). It’s hard not knowing everything about life.  I’m only 17 and yet, I look back on experiences and situations wishing I was able to go back with the wisdom and knowledge I have now and do it differently.  Every decision has an outcome and every path a destination.  The decisions we make can only be made once.  We can’t rewind time and make them over again, we have to live through the results of choices we make.  Sometimes we ARE blessed and receive a second chance to make certain decisions again, but we can’t rely on that all the time.  We have to be intentional about the decisions we make everyday so that we can use the results to their full potential.

“The prudent see danger and take refuge, but the simple keep going and suffer for it.”

- Proverbs 27:12

When we are confronted with decisions or situations we will often have a ‘good or bad choice’ scenario.  Most of the time we receive many different signals about where we are going. Either things are going well and we are on the right path, or things are going not so well and we want to think we are on the right path.  We have to be very mindful about the direction our life is going.  It shouldn’t be in the world hands… and we shouldn’t even trust our own hands to hold it, our life needs to be in God’s hands.  It is so silly to think that the worry, anxiety or questioning we busy ourselves with will actually help our future, because it really doesn’t.  The only trustworthy and sure thing in this world is God and His plan for us.  So why not put some confidence in that and experience a life filled with blessings and miracles that blow our mind, rather then the average life that everyone can live?  The sensible people who take wisdom from those around them, and most of all GOD, see the dangers that come from ignorant decisions and avoid them by taking refuge in God’s law.  The simple carefree people will experience many warnings about the road they are on, but don’t see them or disregard them.  They find themselves suffering through all the consequences of their decisions.  It doesn’t have to be something big like a pregnancy before marriage or addiction, it can be something simple like not caring enough about important people in your life and feeling lonely, being too proud and making a mistake and feeling humiliated or putting to much faith in yourself and feeling God’s discipline.  It’s what we do that makes the difference not just what we see.  Seeing a bad outcome and not avoiding it is only a set up for ruin.  However, heading to warning signs of danger and finding refuge in God’s arms provides us with a good harvest.

“Live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave Himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.”

- Ephesians 5:2

When finding wisdom or coming to a realization, we have to be patient.  The people around us may come to the same point too, but we all think differently and God works in our hearts at different times.  We need to be vessels for God to use to change and we can’t set sail with out a heading!  We have to be sure that God is leading us and wait for His guidence.  When we are surrounded by simple people we need to remember that even when they make us feel foolish or make it out like we are overreacting, we need to patient in knowing that God works in our lives in different ways and we shouldn’t judge how other people do thins…. if we open up our eyes, God might show us something that we can apply to our own lives.  Some people don’t always ‘get it’ and find confidence in what they can understand.  We can be caught off guard by those people who question what we do or even disagree.  If we are following God’s Spirit and sowing good fruit then we can’t second guess ourselves or God! That only leads to confusion and can harm us.  It’s hard to go through life with out feeling 100% sure of where we are going, but we CAN have full assurance in knowing that God know’s where we are going and we need to just trust in Him!  As we remove the bad things in our life and transition from season to season, we need to do so with a sigh of relief rather than a pain of regret.  It’s the direction of our lives that determines the destination.

“About the only value the story of my life may have is to show that one an, even without any particular gifts, overcome obstacles that seem insurmountable.” – Eleanor Roosevelt (1961)

You may not be a famous athlete with incredible talent, you might not be good at math, playing with play-do or you may only know how to play “Mary had a little lamb” on the piano, but the level of our talents and abilities doesn’t decide who we can become.  It’s the confidence and trust that we put in God that determines who we are capable of being.  Even if we seem simple to the world, we are all amazing creations in Christ.  My prayer is that we can all really understand that all things are possible with God and not take for granted the possibilities that promise hold!  I hope it’s sooner rather than later!  As we begin 2010 let’s remember to strive not for who we want to be, but for who God will make us capable of being.  Let’s strive for those goals with confidence and achieve more than just ok!