Status Quo



BUILDING A FAMILY
© Artaniss8  Dreamstime.com

Status Quo: To maintain the status quo is to keep the things the way they presently are.

If the Status Quo is to maintain the way that things are presently.  The question you must ask is: the way they are presently for whom?  Hasn’t the United States become the most diverse county in the world?  And are things the way they are working?

In America the largest group of people living together are couples with no kids (27%), but there are 73% of Americans that don’t fit into that category.  The divorce rate still hovers right around 50%, so which half is the Status Quo.   Most of us live in a city, but we still need farmers to survive.  While white Americans are still the majority, there are over 100 million people other ethnicities in the 50 states.  If the average American over 25 makes $35,000; that doesn’t buy a nice house, 2 new cars, yearly vacations to a magical land, name brand cloths, and allow kids to be in every activity imaginable?  So the average American is up to their eye balls in debt: mortgage, home equity loan, upside down car loans, school loans, and who can think about their retirement accounts.  While most Americans say they are Christians, the weekly attendance doesn’t reflect that.

We are so busy running from one activity to the next that we stop at the yellow arches and then drive to the gym to work out.  We’re working 10 hour days, sleeping 6 hours at night, and driving kids around the rest of the time.  We die of stress related diseases.  We put up fences to have our privacy.  We buy big screen TV’s to watch 3 feet away.  We don’t know our neighbor’s, we gossip about our co-workers, we hover over our kids, we put our happy faces on at church, we buy toys we don’t have time to use, we join the gym every January, and  we are surrounded by people all day long and yet are so lonely.

In such a society can we really live out the second commandment that Jesus gave us?  Can we love our neighbor?  Can we love our neighbor as ourselves?  What does it look like?  Should we maintain the status quo and keep things the way they presently are?  How can we possibly love everyone?  How can we fit it in our already overbooked schedule?  Wouldn’t it be better to just leave our neighbors alone?  Who exactly is our neighbor?  We wonder if we can count it as billable hours.  Or will the little I can offer make a difference?

We can no longer lump people into statistics and averages, but we must look at them as an individuals.  If we are to love our neighbor than we better know our neighbor.  What do they enjoy?  What do you have in common and what differs?  Where did they come from and what are their future dreams?  We cannot guess, because outward appearance isn’t going to allow us appreciate the unique person that God created, who has been fearfully and wonderfully made (Gen. 1:27 and Psalm 139:14).

Over the next few months I will be exploring this topic further.  Will you join me in pondering what it looks like to ‘love our neighbor as ourselves’?  So with that Venti Latte in hand, please leave a few comments so we can begin this conversation.