Urrgh. As I get older, things inconsistent with my values bother me more.

Today on a local Christian radio station, I heard an awesome song that I haven't heard much that made me think about the true meaning of Christmas. It's called "How Many Kings" by a band called Downhere (I'll post a video or the lyrics or both in a minute). As the music faded, I found myself in a thoughtful state of mind, considering the words I'd just heard--and then a sudden, irritating twang of a guitar blared on, followed by a loud declaration of, "Jingle bell, jingle bell, jingle bell rock." I can't even explain how irritating it was to me.

I have been more and more disappointed with this radio station. They play good music most of the time--but then they'll play 10 minutes of commercials for local grocery stores or jewelry stores or some new weight loss plan. Ugh! It seriously grates on my nerves. The commercials don't break for the Christmas season, either. And I hear two different mottos played on this station periodically. "*******'s Official Christmas music station!" and "Keeping the 'Christ' in 'Christmas.'" But once I heard the "Keeping the 'Christ' in 'Christmas'" motto immediately followed by Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. Seriously?! And the line about it being the official Christmas station isn't even true. I can guarantee that it is NOT the #1 listened-to radio station in the area.

Other things bother me more, too. Things I would have never dreamed about having opinions of. Things popular culture promotes, things I never even had an opinion about before. Waves of trends washing over the Christian community...I have always hated trends in the secular world, hated the idea of buying into something simply because it's "the popular thing to do." Never before in my life, though, have I felt it so strongly applied to the Christian world as well. If anything, I dislike it more in the Christian world than I do in the secular world anymore.

Well, that's not true. The non-Christian world, I think, still grates on my nerves more than shortcomings I see in the Christian world. Like the number one thing that bothers me right now is all this "positive thinking," self-help crap. Self-salvation, Timothy Keller calls it. I was in the library one Thursday, shelving because there were no books left to check in. I shelved one of those "positive thinking" books and for the first time noted the call number: 158 point something. I see these books ALL the TIME in my bins and it occurred to me, "How many books like this ARE there in the library?" Glancing over the shelf I was looking at, I concluded that 158 was the general self-help section in the Dewey decimal system. At first I tried to estimate how many 158s there were--but my guess fell waaaaaaay short as I saw shelf after shelf after shelf after shelf of 158 call numbers. Instead I decided to count up a row and multiply it by how many rows of 158s there were. I counted 20 in a row--and counted fifteen rows. My eyes got wider as I realized there were three-hundred self-help books in just this ONE library that I volunteer at. All saying the same. Exact. Thing.

I walked away in a daze. You would think, with 300 titles in the self-help section of ONE library, that there would be some progress in the world towards "happiness"--or whatever it is we are all looking for, but one glance at the world around you tells you it's not true. It amazes me how blind we all are.

So on this note, today I saw yet another 158 call number book in the library. But this one's title caught my attenion. "The Last Self-Help Book You'll Ever Need." Not to worry--I'm not saying self-help books are stupid and then turning right around and trying to use one for my own needs, LOL. But the title suggested humor to me, which spoke of counter-culturalism, which got my attention, since I agree with countering the culture of self-help. If that makes any sense. :) i even wondered if the author was a Christian and had somehow magically gotten onto the mainstream publishing market.

Here are some snippets from the back cover:

"On Self Esteem: 'High self-esteem can be damaging to you and others around you. Try a little humility.'
"On Hope: 'Let go of hope--and savor today rather than desperately focusing your energies on tomorrow.'
"On Grief: 'Grieving is not a symptom. It is a necessary life process. Because we die, we were made to grieve.'
"On Perseverance: 'Give up. Strength means knowing when to engage in enlightened surrender, willingness to give in and move on.'
"On blaming: 'To err may be human, but to forgive is not always divine.'"

A glance over these snippets told me that this guy was probably not a Christian. Which means he's missing a BIG part of the picture, which means at best, it will be full of partial-truths. There is definitely truth in some of the things he says--but all of it is just in part. Yeah, you should be humble, but not to live better. Because God tells us to. Yeah, you should love others more than yourself. But you need to love God more than others, and your love for others needs to come from God! Anyway.... So it was disappointing and interesting all at the same time. I feel like I need to write Dr. Paul Pearsall and share the Gospel with him or something, so he could know the WHOLE truth, not just the truth in part. :/

Well, that is enough rambling from me, I think. My eyes are starting to hurt from looking too much at a computer screen. :S

-Stephanie

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