Does Anybody Know What We’re Living For?

The setting was Boulder Colorado, at the university campus. We had worked in conjunction with local believers as to a good location to engage in street evangelism, and Mitch and I were excited to find a spot to engage young folks with that oft repeated question: ‘What do you believe brings Shalom, true and lasting peace?’ For several hours, in an area with a good foot print, we talked with many folks who gave us many answers to the ultimate question. We offered cold water and snacks on a 85F beautiful Colorado day and the conversations were all done with smiles and good humor. We offered tracts and New Testaments and with one or two exceptions they were willing taken. Some even exchanged contact information for further follow up, by both ourselves and the local volunteers who had joined us.

But as I watched many young lives heading to and from class, I was reminded of a song by Freddie Mercury and Queen:

‘Empty spaces, what are we living for?
Abandoned places, I guess we know the score, on and on,
Does anybody know what we are living for?
The show must go on.’

I talked with a Biology professor who had visited Ireland and I immediately made a connection. He had no desire to consider the gospel but was willing to listen, both to a brief explanation of gospel truth and some simple apologetics challenging his worldview. All three of us engaged with him in a very friendly manner for over 45 minutes.

Furthermore we talked with a young man of Jewish/Jesuit descent who was the president of one of the fraternities in which 30% of the membership is Jewish. He has given opportunities for some of our local friends to give a talk on anti-semitism at that fraternity. We talked with a young Christian girl whose roommate is a Jewish believer and while engaged in that conversation another young girl came over who knew her. She greeted us, ‘Shana Tova’ (Happy New Year) and we responded with the same greeting back at her.

I then specifically asked her, ‘What do you believe brings peace?’ Her answer was not unusual, but it was declared firmly as something she dearly believed: ‘mitzvot’(good works). I strongly challenged this, with reference to shedding of blood required by the God of Israel in Leviticus and spoke of the one final sacrifice of Jesus as promised in the New Covenant of Jeremiah 31:31. After further conversation I offered her a New Covenant (Testament), but she declined to take it. Pray for her and the seeds we have sown as she obviously has Christian friends.

Mitch also witnessed to a young man who immediately opened up concerning his depression and we promised to pray for him and gave him some literature. Another young man came over and when Mitch asked him where he was from, he said, ‘Denver’. Mitch then said, ‘Oh, a nice Colorado boy?’ ‘No’, was the answer, ‘I identify as a girl’. That didn’t end the conversation, but it did certainly change the tone.

On another day we were in a park in central Denver, close to a Jewish area, and had several long conversations with one who had sold drugs in his youth to ‘put food on the table’, and another who lived out of his car and walked around barefoot.

For me, the preacher, I was way out of my comfort zone. But dear friends, we MUST so exit ourselves from our reformed monasteries of secluded learning and ‘learn’ what the world is thinking and saying. I found it deeply concerning that I could amicably challenge the Biology professor about his view of reality, but dare I challenge the ‘trans’ concerning his view of reality? Are there some truths that are off limits?

The truth is, that this microcosm of the world in Boulder Colorado, truly did not know what we are living for. Freddie Mercury’s song continues:

‘The show must go on.
Inside my heart is breaking.
My makeup may be flaking
But my smile still stays on.
… the show must go on…’

Increasingly the sad, depressed, individuals in our world are walking through life aimlessly, with flaking makeup and false smiles. Does anybody know what we are living for?

Jesus said, ‘I am the way, the truth and the life’. Yes, the ‘life’. He it is, who we are ‘living for’. He, is the center of our exultation, proclamation and conversation. He will have the pre-eminence ultimately. These are ultimate questions of ultimate reality. We share gospel truth and I will challenge your view of reality. The flaking makeup of your ‘show’ must not go on. Without arrogance we proclaim that we do know ‘what we are living for’, and we want all to hear it.

STEPHEN ATKINSON