Redemption Pt. 1

Here I am. Back at school, ready to begin another semester. You know, the cool thing about semesters at school is that every semester has a story of its own. For example, my fall semester was entirely different than my spring semester last year mainly because at the end of the year I wasn't the person who I was back in fall semester. I had changed mostly because I became heavily consumed and convicted by the Gospel of Christ and in turn, died to myself. So as I sit here pondering about what this semester's story might be, I am continually drawn back to the mission of Christ. 
Earlier today, I was taking the trash from the front of my house to the back of the house. As I was taking it out back I heard from a car passing by, "Get out of the (bad word) street you little (another bad word)!" The following thoughts whirling around my head after this man's daring statement was: was he referring to me (even though I wasn't on the street)? Another was this: Could something as little as a person on the street compel this man to act in a manner that would crush someone else's spirits?
Another road example: Me and my friend, Andrew, were driving down the highway when our annoying GPS tells us to take the next exit. I glance at him, he glances at me, and then like magic we somehow arrived at the conclusion: we needed to take the next exit. The only problem was there was this huge truck hogging up the right lane and when we turned on our blinker they decided to speed up. They were still a good distance behind us when we needed to switch over last moment. So we switched over to the right lane and the truck sped up more and then switch to the left lane. As we were taking the exit, the truck honked and the driver decided to give us a symbol of his admiration for us (and no, it was not a thumbs up but another finger). The following thoughts whirling around my head after this man's bold action was this: why did that man feel the need to express his anger with us? We didn't need to know that!
Now, it would not be right of me to assume that the truck driver and the person driving the car were not believers. They could have been believers and read every verse in the Bible, but skipped verses like Colossians 3:8 ("But now you must also rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips.") But despite them being believers or not, they are here to prove a point, and that is this: there is evil in the world. It is evil to not chose the action of building up one another in love in exchange for expressing anger. There is evil that exists out there.
To really drive the point home, I have one more story. I had the pleasure of working with a youth group from New York this summer who had suffered a tragic loss in their youth group. It was a youth worker and Deputy Sheriff by the name of Kurt Wyman. He was a man who was more concerned about the Gospel of Christ than his own life, and as a result his life was taken by a man with a gun in a domestic dispute. The worst part was, he was trying to save the man's life, in more ways than one.
There is evil in this world. There is a depreciation of life, ignorance of others, and hatred towards others that exists in this world. But then there is the evil that stares back at us when we look in the mirror. The evil of pride deprives us of the surpassing glory of being fully reliant on God. It deceives us to believe that we could do this whole "living" thing on our own.  Ha! That is the biggest lie since toe thumbs (toe thumbs: fact or fiction? Find it out for yourself)! 
I don't mean to be morbid through my acknowledgment of evil in this world. But I believe an acknowledgment of evil is necessary for the discernment of righteousness in this world. The acknowledgment of evil also makes our mission of Christ more clear in this world. In my next post I'll discuss the hope of redemption as well as how it ties into my hopes for this semester.