Might as well give up

From the Washington Post

"Here's to the winners," Frank Sinatra used to sing, belting out Joe Raposo's lyrics as only a winner can. "Here's to the winners all of us can be." Right, and if you believe that, have I got a bridge for you. One of the truths of human existence is that, to one degree or another, all of us are born losers -- in the end, of course, everyone loses, even Michael Jordan and Donald Trump -- and that coming to terms with disappointment, accepting the inevitability of it, is one of life's inescapable challenges. Kris Kristofferson, not Raposo, got it right: "Nobody wins."
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As the 18th century began, Sandage argues, American attitudes toward failure were divided. On the one hand people tended to believe that it was a sign of personal and moral shortcomings (Benjamin Franklin "blamed failure on laziness, drunkenness, greed, ignorance, extravagance and a host of other sins"), but on the other there was the nettlesome dilemma posed when upright, decent people failed: "The vicissitudes of capitalism were such that honest dealings and hard work could earn failure. Moral maxims never seemed to fit when the 'great loser' was a hardworking chap around the corner."
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The credit bureaus altered the American vocabulary. A risky person was a "bad egg" or "good for nothing," a safe bet was "good as wheat" or "Number one." Sometimes men emerged as "trustworthy yet not to be trusted." Sandage writes about two men who fell into that unhappy category: "Foresighted and uniquely successful in their own ways, these good men were not 'good for' much if any financial credit. In the agency's ledgers, the moral of these failure stories became clear: redeeming characters sometimes had no book value."

Phl 1:21 For to me to live [is] Christ, and to die [is] gain.

This is why Christians will always be inherently different from the world. We are just too different, too separate and our goals never match up with the grand goals of the world. Without Christ, the best that they can hope is the now.

E-mail Sean at 99blogger@ninetyandnine.com