Last summer a 13 year old just two blocks away shot himself in his front yard. Witnesses said the mother, in great anguish and horror, kept crying out, “But this isn’t supposed to happen in Parker! This isn’t supposed to happen out here!” But it is happening here. And it has happened here way too many times. I think my friend is right, we’ve gained the world but we’re losing our souls.
Jesus asked that rhetorical question in the context of teaching his disciples. Right before that he said, “For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it” (Matthew 16:25). It sounds almost too simple to be true, but I believe it with my whole heart: Jesus is the answer. He is our creator and he created us for a purpose: to bear his image, to bring him glory, to complete the good works he prepared in advance for us to do.
My county, my town, my neighborhood, myself—we need Jesus. We just do. He made us. He knows what we need and it’s to lose ourselves in him.
Our facades are pretty, but Jesus is better! Our homes are big, but God is greater! May we in Parker proclaim with Paul, “I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord” (Philippians 3:8).
May my neighbors and I be like the psalmist and say, “You make known to me the path of life; in your presence there is fullness of joy; at your righthand are pleasures for evermore” (Psalm 16:11).
May the God who brings life from death do so here in my very own neighborhood.
This article originally appeared at JenOshman.com.
