“In” crowd

I have a friend who wants to be a part of the “in” crowd. He remains on the periphery and although he is “acquainted” with some of the people with whom he wishes to associate, he does not get invited to their parties. He and his wife do not have many friends and my take on them is that this bothers them a great deal.

For whatever reason, I get invited to numerous “in” crowd parties and consistently decline. I have no interest, because at their parties they drink hard and party hard and things often get out of hand. I get the update on all of the wild events that occur at the various parties and I am often witness to the results of these endeavors including next day hangovers, swollen heads, and foggy remembrances of foolish behavior, etc. It is a scene of which I used to partake; however I cannot in good conscience as a Christian participate anymore. Even though I do not personally drink anymore, I do not even want to be around all of those drunken people. My friend is not cut from that mold either and yet he is drawn to this crowd like a moth to a bug light.

Most of the people who are a part of this crowd are good people when you get them separated from the rest of the crowd. They can be fun to be around when they are not trying to drown themselves in alcohol and hit on each other’s spouses. I often individually invite them over to grill out for an evening of clean fun. My friend has attended some of these events and has as a result grown to know some in this crowd a little better and now has been invited to one of their parties. I feel bad about this as I feel I was the key to unlocking the door to a place he should not go.

I am nobody’s mama, but I have seen my buddy drink and he cannot hold it. I will be interested to hear how well he fares and my hope and prayer is that he will not go and do something stupid, or worse become a regular with this bunch.

I think that peer pressure and the urge to belong regardless of the cost is one of satan’s foremost weapons, particularly with young people. Consider the glitz and the glamour associated with Hollywood. Satan paints a pretty picture of the good life complete with the “beautiful people” and glamorous parties and most anyone would give their “eye” teeth to get invited to one of these parties. Unfortunately the reality of this scene is that it consists largely of black sin that rips this picture to pieces and those tortured souls in Hollywood and elsewhere along with it. In the end it is alcoholism, drug addiction, divorce, jail, rehab, and suicide that end up making these “beautiful” people and their glamorous party scene ugly.

Don’t compromise your integrity to “belong”. Better to be alone in a corner in a rooftop of a house somewhere. We cannot play with fire and not get burned. There are consequences to sin. Jesus said you are better off to pluck out your eye if it causes you to sin; the same goes for your right hand. He said we would be better off to cut it off than allow it to cause us to sin. These are strong metaphors and this is not unintentionally placed in the Bible as an afterthought. Sin can literally destroy our lives and even beyond to our eternal destiny and Jesus is trying to warn us with this passage. We should genuinely fear sin and its consequence.

I have encouraged my friend to attend church. I have related to him that there are decent folks there that he can befriend who will really care about him. To date he has simply ignored that advice opting for the non-christian influence and in my opinion is slowly being swept out to sea by a strong rip current. My hope is that he does not encounter sharks out there and get eaten alive or perhaps drown. Choose your friends wisely.

Luke 12:4
And I say to you, My friends
do not be afraid of those who kill
the body, and after that have no
more that they can do.
But I will show you whom you
should fear; Fear Him who, after He
has killed, has power to cast into
hell; yes I say unto you, fear Him.