The Next Stage: Adulthood

We began today with the best possible exposition on adult faith that I could have requested from our lovely Dr. Anna. She didn’t know what we were going to be talking about and I didn’t know what she was going to say, but somehow she managed to cover each of the 10 points we discussed today!

As always, every topic we touch on has so, SO much more to cover than we have time to discuss in our 1 hour allotments, but even so, we managed to talk about the top ten faith struggles people have as adults (particularly as they head off into adulthood or go to college):

1. Faith: Many teens (and adults) have questions that they don’t seek answers to. This leaves them with a shaky faith foundation, particularly as they head off on their own; unsurprisingly, this doesn’t bode well for their faith in the future. What you believe is NOT irrelevant to the rest of your life! Ask questions! Explore! And then keep asking! Your faith (or lack thereof) is the grid through which you see the rest of the world- there is no integrity or honor in pretending those questions don’t really impact anything. In Luke 11:19 Jesus tells us “Ask and you’ll get; Seek and you’ll find; Knock and the door will open.” 
2.  Freedom: You’ve been waiting your whole life to make your own rules! Cereal for dinner? Check! Want to move to Costa Rica? Go ahead and book those tickets! Netflix marathon for an entire weekend? Thirsty Thursday? Roommate out of town the same night you have a hot date? With great power comes great responsibility- or, as Paul put it, “Just because something is technically legal doesn’t mean that it’s spiritually appropriate. If I went around doing whatever I thought I could get by with, I’d be a slave to my whims.” (1 Corinthians 6:12, MSG). Don’t get confused by the heady buzz of freedom and forget that not every choice is going to be a good one. Though cereal for dinner is almost always a good one.
3.   Input: What you put in front of your eyes and into your ears is what you think about. Duh, right? Your brain HAS to think about it, constantly, because it has to process that information, and often in ways that you’re not even conscious of (Anything on fire? No. Good. What about the TV- is it still working? Yes. Good.). This is true for the things you choose to explore and those you don’t- but all of it, passing through your brain, is being dealt with in ways that can change how you see the world. Reading a history of US Interventions or a biochemistry textbook is giving your brain new ways think about things- and while new knowledge is always good (even if it's rejected, it helps us clarify things), the manner in which it’s presented can be challenging to faith. Particularly when the format/teacher is openly hostile to your faith. Keep learning (PLEASE keep learning), but make sure to balance the scales of “anti-faith” with “faith-forming” material, too. And remember that all of us are human, given to prejudices, grudges, and incomplete world-views. That includes your brilliant professor or boss, too!
4.  Output: Many people experience God through service (though there are about a million ways to change the world through your personal choices, I’m talking about face-to-face, intentional service here). Make sure you don’t get so distracted by yourself and your changing life that you forget about others. Intentional service can be organizational or individual, ongoing or once, big or small. But it’s crucial to avoid that shriveled, stunted faith that refuses to fruit.
5.  Love: Ahh, amore. The onrushing emotions that make us believe all differences are small change because we FEEL like he/she’s the one! THE ONE! Many differences truly can be worked out, but it’s important to remember, too, that you can respect and love someone and still realize that you would both be happier with someone else. But for Pete’s sake, PLEASE examine what’s important to you and your partner now, what might be important in the future, and what you couldn’t care less about and then TALK about it. A relationship that can’t stand those kinds of talks is pretty much destined to a rocky patch (even diving off a cliff) in the future. Don’t deal with it by pretending your faith and church expectations are not that important. That’s the road that leads to heartache. 
6. Time: So… you’ve got a job, and potentially classes and homework, and hey, there’s a really neat club that would help you network, and you should probably spend time with your family, and that new movie just came out, and… and… and… There’s never any end to the things you could be doing with your time. And it barely warrants mentioning that you should avoid the not-so-shinebright ways you could occupy yourself. The biggest issue here is that you can get so caught up in doing things that are “good” that you miss out on the BEST. Getting to know God is what you were made for- and He wants more from you than just the occasional nod of acknowledgement. Make sure you schedule in time to pray, to learn, to act.. and to let Him act, speak, and teach, too!
7. Community: So, you’ve moved. Or your friends have moved. Or things are just different and you find yourself feeling like no one understands. Chances are good that someone does- you just need to reach out and find your community. If you’re in a new place, start searching for a church to help support you and answer those tough questions; it’s often the difference between staying connected to your faith and forgetting it all together. And if you’ve stayed in the same place, keep involved in the community you already have, even if you find you’d like to add to it. You might just find that the people you knew all along suddenly have different roles in your life- filling voids you never thought you’d have (or have them fill). No matter your situation, it’s important to remember that no man is an island-- even hermits usually need some contact with others to survive.
8. Social: Particularly at college, but also in certain job situations, you might find yourself unable to get away from your peers. That means peer pressure is there all the time, and you can find yourself cracking under that pressure- doing things you wouldn’t do otherwise. Watch your fault lines and know when to take a break, or how to find different peers (even if it’s only temporary).
9. Diversity: It can be a challenge learning how to separate “respect and tolerate” from “assimilate.” Remember when you had a paint palate as a kid, and some nice adult put glops of red, blue, and yellow paint on it? Those sure were pretty colors. And then you got to mix some of those colors to make green and purple and orange. Also lovely. But then you got a little crazy trying to put all the colors together- and what did you end up with? A murky brown that might have faintly resembled something you’d find in your younger brother’s diaper. Not so pretty. Don’t fall into that trap with people. Love the blue for being blue and the red for its redness. Know when you can take small parts of another culture into yourself and enhance the beauty that’s already there. But don’t think you can or should be just like everyone else, in every way. That’s the way that leads to the color that gets quickly washed away ('cause ain’t nobody gonna paint with that!)
10. Commitment: If you don’t decide beforehand that your faith is important to you, you’ll find that, in fact, it’s not. Making the decision to actively put your faith first, figuring out who you want to be and how you want to get there, and then COMMITTING to those ideals is so, so important. There’s so much out there warring for your attention and time, it’s easy to forget that we’re the ones in charge of our choices. Choose well.

(This list was freely adapted from this site. Their list is worth looking at, too!)

5 Minutes of God Time: Fix My Eyes by for King and Country