BY DEFAULT...

I'm currently reading John Piper's "Don't Waste Your Life". It's actually a book that I gave to a friend as a birthday gift, but has been "lent" to me to read. Catchy title by most marketing standards, and Piper is a good writer. However, as I read, I am having problems getting into it. Yes, he concludes that in order to not waste our lives, we need to live with one passion only, and that passion is to have Christ glorified in all we do. But I feel that as I'm reading, there seems to be some cynical reflex reaction. I find this reflex happening when people offer me encouragement or advice during my crisis. I think that it has to do with THE DEFAULT SITUATION. I understand (and certainly do not mean to trivialize or minimize the fact) that everyone has their own trials to deal with. But it is also so much easier to dole out advice (regardless of whether or not it was asked for) when the default situation is not so bad. At the end of the day, Piper has a loving wife to go home to, 3 children that have been raised in Christ, and I forget how many grandchildren. At the end of the day, he is serving God in a capacity which fully utilizes his talents AND he gets to write creatively. Piper aside, most people that I run into (particularly the community that I am currently plugged into) have decent default situations. The purpose of this observation is not to be judgemental or comparative or to create a pity party. It's more to paint a picture of how my "world" is and how much more challenging it is to find the genuine threads of hope and grace to hang on to make it through.