Christian Living

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As far as music goes, I like all kinds. Contemporary Christian being a favorite, I have Mercy Me’s “So Long Self” set as my ring tone. I also like jazz, oldies and, if the lyrics are okay, country and classic rock.

From that last genre, one of my all-time favorite songs is “Beautiful Loser” by the Bob Seger Band. I recently bought the CD and have pretty much caused my children to hate the song, thanks to me playing it over and over and over and over and over when we’re in the car.

Most likely, the opening lyrics will remind you of somebody you know:

“He wants to dream like a young man, with the wisdom of an old man;
He wants his home and security, he wants to live like a sailor at sea.”

The song tells the story of a good guy, but a restless soul, torn between the offerings of two different worlds.

Back in the 1980’s, my “dating decade”, there were a lot of books written about guys like this, and women packed the “Relationships” section of every bookstore trying to figure out what was going on with Mr. Can’t Make Up His Mind.

The “experts” who wrote these books claimed such men were suffering from the “Peter Pan Syndrome”, while others labeled them as “Commitment-phobics.” My friends and I had a simpler term for them:: Jerks.

I went out with a guy like that for awhile. Though he really was a nice enough fellow, he drove me crazy with his inconsistencies, his back and forth behavior and his pattern of “pursue then retreat.” Finally, I told him to take a long walk on that famous short bridge—and I guess he did, because I never heard from him again.

I must admit, though—as a Christian, there have been times when I’ve felt like the Peter Pan-commitment-phobic-jerkette in those books, someone with one foot in Godliness and the other in worldliness.

In Luke 9:62, Jesus said, “No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God.” (NIV)

Those are heavy words—and while I can honestly say that I’ve never looked back and longed for my sinful past, or waxed nostalgic for the days I was bound for hell, there were certainly times when I seemed to rock back and forth between life in the Spirit and life in the flesh.


In retrospect, I can see a lot of things that contributed to this inconsistency. I was young, both in age and in my walk with Christ. I was spiritually immature, easily influenced, insecure in many areas of life and not firmly grounded in the Word.

Are those good reasons? No. They’re explanations, maybe, but poor excuses. The bottom line to my wishy-washy walk was my lack of commitment to Christ. I had not totally surrendered every part of my heart or life to Him. As a result, I was living on a see-saw.

Speaking as one sheep that’s tumbled into the worldly pit more than once, praise God for never abandoning those who belong to Him! Nothing separates us from His love, and nothing plucks us from His hand. (Romans 8: 38 – 39, John 10: 28 – 29 NIV) Yet, trouble-prone sheep must take responsibility for who they are in Christ and commit everything to their Shepherd. As the lyrics in Beautiful Dreamer warn the soul struggling between two worlds:

“Read it on the wall—and realize you just can’t have it all.”

It’s true—we can’t have it all, not when “all” tries to combine worldliness and Godliness. We can’t mix and match those opposites, nor can we jump back and forth between the two. We must commit ourselves wholly to Christ, and make it a priority to deepen our relationship with Him.

That’s how we stay out of the worldly pit. Until then, we may be beautiful because of who our Shepherd is, but we’re losing so much because we haven’t completely committed to following Him.

“I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.” (John 10:10 NIV)



c.Donna G. Morton July 2007

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