HOA on Steroids

There are a lot of things in the world that are worth expending the energy to get excited (positively or negatively) about. Child kidnapping in Uganda, racism, sexism, abuse, the list could go on for a while. But for some reason people like to get worked up about things that aren’t worth the time (maybe at the end you’ll throw this post in that category). Two examples in the last day—

I am now on the HOA board at my town home complex. I did it to try and get to know more people and make a positive influence on our community. We had a meeting last night and there were two guys on the board who disagreed about some things and then as their disagreement got more heated they started to get personal with each other. Without exaggerating, they shouted at each other for about half an hour of the hour and a half we were together. What were they so upset about? Two things—hiring a full-time site manager vs. contracting the work out and whether or not to keep our current management company. You’d think they were arguing about whether or not to send relief aid to Africa.

The second was when I was listening to sports radio this morning. They were talking about how Barry Bonds is probably going to be indicted of perjury for saying he didn’t do steroids. One of the djs started to go off about how the use of steroids in baseball is so horrible and these people are liars and cheaters and record stealers (that is probably all true) and how he has no respect for them. The thing that amazed me was that he got to the point where he was out of control with passion. You could picture the veins popping out of his forehead.

In both situations I think Jesus would be much more concerned with the people involved than the issues at hand. I pray that the Holy Spirit would help us be discerning about what issues are worth our emotional investment.