I Live in a World Obsessed With Looks...

I walk a very fine line with the things I am about to say yet, they are my personal convictions and this is my statement, my stand.

I live in a world that is obsessed with looks. There are so many ads about weight lost, perfect skin/hair/teeth, how to achieve the perfect look and I am surrounded with them daily in magazines, in books, in movies and on TV.

I live in a world that is obsessed about love. The kind of love shown on TV and sung in love songs, where you meet someone you find physically attractive and go on a few dates with them and then you “move on to the next one” or "fall in love" and get married and live happily until divorce or separation due to some minor incompatibility or the lost of that physical pull.

I live in a world obsessed with money. The biggest, best, newest things that money can buy. Living in luxury or living a comfortable life. Being at the top of the ladder. Being well off. Being in control of your finances. Being financially stable.

I live in a world obsessed with self.

I can obsess about my looks, I can dress fashionably or change my body to look a certain way, but what use is that when I die and the worms eat away the flesh? If I see my spiritual self now, how would it look? Would I be buff? Would I be healthy? God gave me this physical body and I should take care of it, and I want to be physically healthy and I want to live a physically healthy life, but I am convinced that if I cannot take care of my spiritual life with the same zeal as I want to take care of my physical self then it is all in vain. If I exercise every day but do not read the word and study the word every day, then what does it matter? I become a person who does not know what to do with the beauty that was sculptured, I become aimless. The physical that I created becomes useless to what really matters.

I can obsess about finding the perfect fit, the person that gives me all the goose bumps and butterflies or has the stable life and can support me. That can become my goal and I can be disappointed over and over again when no one fits that pedestal.

Love is patient and kind. It does not envy, does not boast and is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered and it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, and always perseveres. Love never fails. This is real love, if I cannot have this, then anything else is fake (a poor imitation) and I might as well just be an empty barrel tumbling down a hill making a racket.

I am convinced that if I cannot love my fellow man - if I cannot love myself - this way then I will never be truly satisfied when it comes to love. I am convinced that if a majority of my efforts is just focused on finding Mr. Right then I am missing out on the things that life has to offer right now.

I can obsess about my finances. I can try to get rich and say that I will give to the poor, but if I cannot give with the little I have now, how much more will I give when I have more? What use is it to build up treasures on earth that can be here today and gone tomorrow when my treasure chest in heaven is empty?

I suppose in the end my convictions is based on just one thing - eternity. Is what I am doing now useful for eternity? I am not saying that I shouldn't take care of myself, that I shouldn’t get married, that I shouldn't work, I am only saying that these should never overshadow the spiritual aspect of my life and that is, that Jesus died for me and has a purpose for my life and that I should really work hard towards that purpose because I do not know how much longer my place is secured on Earth.

In the end it comes down to me not being obsessed about self, if my affections can be set first on spiritual things, then these other things will fall into a happy medium that is just right for me.

Do you ever feel like the things of this world overshadow the spiritual aspect of your life? How do you keep things in an eternal perspective?

Story from Iraq

BAGHDAD – Spotting irregularities is a tactic that is drilled into the minds of Multi-National Division – Baghdad Soldiers throughout training and in practice while in Iraq.

Soldiers recently watched as a car pulled up to an entry control point at Forward Operating Base Callahan in northern Baghdad. They continued to watch as a woman stepped out of the car holding a bag. Once the woman dropped the bag near the gate, internal alarms were ringing and a careful search was called for and conducted...

...That search yielded a newborn baby wrapped tightly in several cloths. Soldiers raced to the bag, retrieved the child and brought him to the aid station to be examined.

“We unwrapped it to make sure he was alive – and he wasn’t sick, he wasn’t dead, he wasn’t injured,” said Staff Sgt. Paul Briscoe, the aid station non-commissioned officer in charge at FOB Callahan. “He was a perfectly healthy baby. I’m guessing three to seven days old. He was in perfect health. There wasn’t a scratch on him.”

This unlikely sight brought images of the Las Vegas native’s two children to mind.

“It was like my kids were newborns again,” said Briscoe, who serves with Headquarters and Headquarters Company, 1st Combined Arms Battalion, 68th Armor Regiment, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division, Multi-National Division – Baghdad.

After the medics were satisfied the baby, who by this time had drawn the nickname “Alex Callahan” after the Soldier who found him and the name of the base, was in no need of immediate medical attention, the focus shifted to what they would do with the child.

An interpreter working at the base volunteered to go to a nearby store to buy diapers and formula while another interpreter took care of Alex. Briscoe said the aid station became a hub of activity as word spread throughout the small base of the new arrival.

“I’ve fed him twice, just holding him, watching him, making sure that he’s alright,” said Doreen Haddad, an interpreter with 1-68 AR, who helped care for Alex. “I’ve changed his diapers twice. I wanted to give him a bath, but I wasn’t able to.”

While a forward operating base isn’t the ideal location for a baby, Soldiers and those working at FOB Callahan ensured that Alex’s stay there was as comfortable as possible.

The baby is to be adopted by the brother of a local national, who works at the base. The brother, and his wife, have been married five years and have been unable to have a baby of their own. The interpreters at FOB Callahan have taken a collection to donate to the family to help care for the baby.

Despite the thousands of miles that separates the Soldiers from their families in Colorado, one constant remains with this baby and those they left behind.

“He’s sleeping and pooping – just like a regular baby,” Briscoe said.