Wednesday, March 25, 2009

Filters

For a few weeks my sister and I have been going to Youth Group at one of the churches in town. (There are three, and I can never remember which is which. xD) It's a lot of fun! We go there and hang out with other people our age, and play games. At the end, one of the adults has us all sit and he/she talks to us about something they think is important, then they say a prayer. The first time I went, I'll admit it, I was a little uncomfortable because I've never gone to church before. I'm over it now, and love going every Wednesday.

Tonight the person who was talking said something interesting, and more importantly he brought it up in an interesting way. He held up a coffee filter and asked "What's this?" Someone said what it was, so then he asked "What does it do?" We all proceeded to say what we thought it did. "It let's water through." "It makes coffee." "It keeps the coffee grounds out of your coffee." "It separates!" Etc.

He went on to say that he believed everyone should have a filter. I thought he meant a mind filter, like some of our teachers have said. Something to keep us from saying everything we think. But then he said "The world tries to throw a lot of bad stuff our way. We all need something to keep what we don't want out of our minds, so we can focus on the good."

This isn't a new idea to anyone, I'm sure. We've all said in one way or another that we needed to focus more on the positive aspects of our life rather than the negative!

I just love how straightforward he was. "I can't make you do this," he says "you need to do it for yourselves." He made it so clear that the responsibility was ours to live our lives in joy. I 100% agree. We too often let the little bit of bad take over our life, instead of seeing the great amount of good that lies there. It's waiting for us to notice it. It's calling our names. It wants to be part of our daily lives. So, let's all use our filters to keep the bad out and let the good in. We owe it to ourselves.

4 comments:

  1. What a great lesson to try to impart! What led me to paganism was going to a great church youth group when I was in high school (I'm not sure that they'd be thrilled to hear that, though!).

    I had such fun, I wanted to join a church. So I started researching different churches. Eventually, that led me to Wicca. Weird how things turn out.

    I'm a big believer in staying positive :O)

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  2. So mote it be! We all need a good filter also not to let the bad things to stick to our minds. How god it would be if we could always do that!

    I'vew coming here when I'm online, but commenting less than I wanted. But your sweet words are always so welcome, I want to thank you for your attention.

    Kisses!

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  3. I'll raise my coffee mug to a filtered life! :)

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  4. What a great way to present think of it & lovely way to present the idea!! I had fun experiences with 'Youth for Christ' when I was a teen - & was brought up going to church with my parents. I've also enjoyed studying & learning from various paths. I tend to look for the positive & gracious ideas & ways of being in the world.

    I'm glad you're enjoying this experience! One interim pastor we had (he was Buddhist & Christian) commented going to church was kind of like a fish dinner - pick out the bones (things he said we didn't agree with) & eat the fish. another way of 'filtering.'

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