Dichotomy

I've had this overwhelming feeling of ... awareness of self, which just eats at my laziness, complacency, and calls me to have zeal for life. I have been finishing up a paper on sex trafficking that just invigorates the ugly/pretty/dark/light things out of me. It turns everything upside down when I watch movies, informational broadcasts, peer related journals, and news articles of women and children victim to the slave trade.

It goes back to a few years ago when Woods coerced Larsen, Tori and I into watching "awareness" videos in college. She would make us her delicious home made meals and put on a video her mother sent from World Vision. We would sit around, and painfully become aware of the world around our middle-class, sheltered outlook on life. We were in college. We didn't watch T.V. Let's just say Woods was our main source of knowledge regarding the depravity of this fallen world.

Nowadays I am either researching, writing, or case working with these unlovely parts of life. Driving through, Harry Hines Blvd. today was overwhelming [although nothing new]. I have heightened senses to what's going on behind doors [thanks to my case-working]. It's such a dichotomy: to be a social worker : aware of the injustices, expected to be full of compassion; without bias or judgment upon my client population - YET - [which comes too often] entitlement; elitism; straight up snobbery, shallowness & narrow-mindedness.

THIS.IS.ME.

O. And - on TOP of that, the dichotomy of all these ugly thoughts I have to the compassion, love, laying-down-your-life as Jesus has done for others, for me. WHERE IS THE DISCONNECT?

Here it is. This is the reality. This is me. For example, today I was so hungry I was shaking {thank you low blood sugar}. Enough so that I stopped into Subway on Harry Hines Blvd. It's hard to divulge, but I did not think I could eat a sandwich from the person handing it to me. I've seen my client's homes. I've had the bottom of my shoes stick to their motel floors due to grime. I've smelled of second hand smoke leaving their homes. I've almost passed out sweating on their couches because of no air conditioning at their house & left reeking of body odor. . . I know what goes on. I know their cleaning habits or lack their of. Today, I didn't want to eat from their Subway.

BUT. . . The lovely b-u-t. I am educated on these things. I am a professional. I am a human. I am filled with the Holy Spirit. The question arose in line, Will I sense you Spirit? Will I stand to your calling? Will I purge these dark - narrow minded thoughts? I must.

I am completely humbled inside for these thoughts, trust me. Friends, feel free to remind me. I love a swift beating every once in awhile, so I invite you in. Anyways, I've gathered this horrible elitist idea. I am passionate about my work [when connected with my Maker] but am devastated at how separated my comfort of life with my Apple computer, my full closet of options, my expensive taste, my wonderful world of iTunes, my clean sheets, and my save - smooth driving & clean car .... is .... from .... walking with the poor, the broken, the widowed ...the uncleanly, the battered, the "undeserving".

How do I do this? How do I not be one of society? How do I strip myself of racism, selfish and self-loathing thoughts? How do I become more like Him?

Abide.

I am redeemed [2 Corinthians 3: 18].