Outliers

  I just finished Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers, and the best thing I can say about it is that Outliers really makes you think.  I had expected to grind through this book, but once I started it, I couldn't put it down.  It's a fascinating study into what makes successful people capable of their success.  Gladwell deconstructs some of the biggest success stories of our time and explains that each and every one was a product of the right person at the right place at the right time.  He doesn't discount their willingness to work, but at the same time emphasizes the cultural factors that went into making them the successes they are.

  Why read Outliers?  It helps me understand how important culture is in shaping who we are.  The era in which we live plays a critical role in determining our fate. But it doesn't take the work out of our hands.  If you want to be truly successful in anything, hard, hard work is required.

  When I start thinking about the spiritual life of most twenty-first century Americans, I wonder if we are doing the hard work asked of us by God.  I know I fall short.  Is it a matter of desire?  Do we not want to offer our best efforts to God?  Or is it simply our short attention spans encouraging us to change the channel rather than remain glued to the task before us?  I suspect it's probably the latter, although the former may be mixed in their as well.  We are sinful, but we are also conditioned to receive and focus in short segments.  Our spiritual life is a life-long effort, and it requires daily labors for us to continue to grow.  Outliers forces me to think about my own spiritual growth--where do I want to be in five years, in ten years, in relation to my prayer life, my devotional life, and am I willing to do the work required to get there?  It's not all in my hands, and I can't earn my salvation, but I can make the choice, every day, to build my relationship with Christ.

  Outliers points out that we cannot control much of the world or our culture, but we do have control in the choices we make of how and where we invest our time and energy.  Will we invest it in a relationship with Christ, or will we choose to be lured by the entertainments of the world, bypassing the opportunity to grow nearer to Christ?