Vanity

Vanity, vanity. All is vanity.

If you've ever read the book of Ecclesiastes, you know that it's probably the most depressing book in the bible, bar Job. It was written by Solomon, after he went after other gods, giving the throne to his son and retiring. He obviously underwent a conversion, repented. Meaning he realized how much he messed up. His wisdom finally came back to him.

He says all is vanity and grasping for the wind. Is that true?

Her name was Kiara. She was sixteen, and she was a high school student. She was in a car with four friends. One was nineteen and the rest were juveniles. The nineteen year old was going too fast and the street was wet. She drove right across the divider on the road, and into a tree at the entrance to an apartment complex.

Kiara was in the car. And she didn't have her seat belt on. From my house at 11 o clock P.M., I could hear the screams, the sirens, even the initial crash when the car hit the post. Of course, I didn't know what was happening.

I did the next day.

Today, I visited Kiara's Facebook page.

Posted pictures, on her page, had "Selfies" Of her and her friends. She had two lip piercings, ear piercings, nose piercings. Her dresses looked like oversized shirts, tight and barely stretching past her upper thighs. To be honest, she and her "Friends" Looked like exotic dancers. Of course, in our generation, that's no surprise. She followed Bob Marely, Beyonce, Backwoods Boys, and Drake. She had over one thousand friends. My mother is fifty one; she has 195. That is normal. This girl has OVER ONE THOUSAND, and that's just sad. She was sixteen. A "Popular Girl."

She wanted to fit in, to be accepted. And she was obviously playing the rebel in many ways, especially with no seat belt. Ooooh, bad girl.

Where is she now?

Dead.

Kiara is dead, one of her freinds is in critical, and the other three are badly injured.

All is vanity.

I see a world of hate and intolerance. A world where sodomy is encouraged. A world where even us "Christians" walk around with the "Populars" swearing, drinking, covering themselves with tatoos, and piercings. Wearing enough makeup to create a false center of gravity. Young Christian boys? booze, and I hate to say this, but many of them aren't even virgins anymore. That's insane. Girls? What inspires the tight pants, the cropped shorts? The makeup? You want to fit in, get a boyfriend, roll with the punches.

All is vanity.

 Believe me, being a blonde, homeschooled, sabbatarian, Irish German with the name "Shiloh" and is a Tea Party Republican, left handed, and a hardcore Christian isn't easy, and it never was, nor will it ever be. For goodness sake, my computer doesn't even recognize the words "Homeschooled" Or "Sabbatarian". Needless to say, friends are few and far between for this guy.

I don't mind much. I've never really cared what people thought about me, as long as I looked and smelled halfway decent and kept the sarcastic remarks to a minimum.

But I can still see the drive.

The Devil's greatest weapon is pride. You need pride first. Then pride needs to:

"He can't have that! I have to have it!" -Covetousness.

"If I have it, I'll look great. I need to look great or people with think I'm dumb, stupid, cray cray, (whatever is in my vernacular right now)" -Vanity.

"I'll never get it, and I feel terrible. I hate life. I'm forever alone." -Self pity.

"When I get this thing, it's gonna make me look SO GOOD in front of other people. I need to take good care of it. Make sure it has the place of honor." -Idolatry.

"If I have this, he/she will totally fall for me." -False representation.

Believe you me, I have experienced any and all of these emotions in my life before. In fact, I recently started a YouTube channel, and I have made it the center of my focus for the last three months, hence the lack of posts. I've come to grips with the fact that this is important. This should be much more important to me than that. So here I am.

What I'm trying to get at here is, especially in the Christian community, we need to stop pretending that life is Heaven on Earth. IT ISN'T. Unless, of course, you are Catholic. But that's not the point. The point is that life wasn't structured to be a cake walk. It is BOOT CAMP. SO SUCK IT UP! God wants us to be out there! Not just blending in! If we blend in, fit in, shape in, mold into society, what good does it do us? Believe in the Lord and you'll be saved, but picture it like this.

Let's say for a second that Mr. Rodriguez goes to heaven. Now, Mr. Rogriguez was a Christian, but he also did drugs, went out, smoked weed, and had numerous *Immoral* Relationships. He goes to heaven, and St. Peter says; "You made it! Let's check out your final score." So he pulls a meter and hooks it to Mr. R., and it reads; 100 points.

Mr. Peter frowns and says, "Mr. Rodriguez, please step through the gate, your name is on the building slate to the left." So he walks over and sees something resembling a Soviet Apartment Block. He goes to his room, and it's all pretty and stuff, and he sees a chest. So he opens it. It says; "Treasures stored in heaven" On it. Inside is a few gold coins.

Then, Mr. Ramirez, Mr. R.'s neighbor, goes to heaven a few months later.

Peter goes through the proceedings, and his score is: 10,000,000. Mr. Ramirez went to church every week, prayed all hte time and started a charity. He is directed to another part of the apartment block. It looks like a mansion with many rooms. He goes up to his floor, which is a beutiful home with furnishings and everything. It's huge.

He opens his chest, which is much, much large than Mr. Rodriguez's, and out onto the floor spills hundreds of gold coins.

Moral of the story: You do a little, you get a little. You do a lot, you get a lot.

It's obvious, really, that Joan of Arc, burned at stake, has to receive more than Mr. Rodriguez. That's where storing your treasures in heaven comes into play.

I hope I really drove this into the ground for you guys, and provided some encouragement for you. In the end, I hope that you remember that all IS vanity-except serving the Lord Jesus Christ. And, He accepts you just as you are, no strings attached.