Honestly, these posts come at a time of realization– usually the end of the track where I have fallen, or at complete random– in a period of stagnancy in my walk. These are inspirations that push me forward, out of times when I have been weaker.
Just thought I'd address that.
Now onto a struggle I've been facing recently.
I've only on extremely rare occasions considered myself a "fun" person. When I was about eleven or twelve I often asserted an air of superiority over my older cousins, where I would insist on them being more serious in their actions, games and conversation. I often got "stop acting so mature", in response. I received a similar comment from my boyfriend a week ago regarding my views of fun relating to maturity.
My views of fun have been influenced by conservative notions drilled into my head since young, and the current cultural view of having fun in North America. However, I would like to add one more point of view to the mix– God's.
I believe God has a sense of humour. Out of everyone you can pick, who would understand joy and laughter more than He? God created pleasure. He took great pleasure in spending time with Adam, with enjoying His creation. Our culture encourages enjoying time with friends (this can sometimes include a more self-centred approach: I want to hang out with others so I can be happy). God encourages fellowship (I want to develop these relationships between her/him and myself, in God). His is a pure and eternal lasting kind of pleasure.
God's sense of fun isn't rigid, or boring, or humourlessly distasteful as I was quick to determine it to be. In the name of morals, I had a skewed view that in order to be appropriate and faithful, one had to silence jokes of this world, puts a stop to their ideas of fun. However, this was not necessarily true in every case.
I needed to ask myself about truth. True joy, true enjoyment, comes from the Lord. Does the way our temporary culture encourage, portray and reflect God's true joy? Sometimes it could. Sometimes it doesn't. I need to discern between the two. And finally, ask myself how we can choose to manifest God's true joy, love, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, self-control, goodness, and faithfulness in our interactions in the time we spend with our friends and others that we meet here on Earth.
I don't feel like I have to be a fun person, but I know that I want to be a person who takes joy in interacting with others, takes pleasure in enjoying our fellowship and activities together, and hopefully our conversation and time together will be able to reflect God's love and care.
I don't feel like I have to be a fun person, but I know that I want to be a person who takes joy in interacting with others, takes pleasure in enjoying our fellowship and activities together, and hopefully our conversation and time together will be able to reflect God's love and care.
