Being a Christian in modern day society is a challenge where difficult decisions have to be made and the thought that you will most likely be ridiculed for your beliefs is ever present. Now add onto this being a student in college who is racking up student debt and getting ridiculous loans for their dream job; this is what me and thousands of others across campuses have to face every day. You never realize how dangerous and evil the world is while living at home until you go away to college where you can see the Devil's hand working in people's lives and situations. I think we should understand that college is a place where you can make friends and long-lasting memories but you should also recognize that you are living in the Devil's playground where different obstacles are going to be thrown at you. Here are some of the obstacles that you may face:
Temptations
In college there are going to be several temptations like drugs or alcohol for example that are going to be thrown at you. They may not be as obvious as they make them out to be like in the movies or commercials, they build off each experience creating a monster leaving you completely defenseless; for example you may take a drink of alcohol saying you will have one drink but then you eventually start drinking heavily leading to you being drunk having no way to get home. After this experience you will be continuously tempted to drink or even get drunk again so that you can enjoy that amazing "high" you experienced for the first time. Obviously God views drunkenness as a serious sin, he says this in Proverbs 23:21 "For the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty: and drowsiness shall clothe a man in rags." This means that when you get drunk no good actions happen, you usually have no clear conscious to what you are doing leading to something far worse happening.
Relationships
Now relationships in modern day are very different then lets say 30 years ago, they are extremely more about the benefit of the individual person versus building a good foundation with your significant other; we now have a society that rather hook up for pleasure using apps like Tinder for example and never planning on building rapport with someone. You see these types of relationships in college indefinitely, there are many of my friends who do use Tinder having fun meeting with people for dates even finding their future boyfriends but there are many who use it for ways of hooking up with someone. Obviously things in a relationship can escalate and some actions that are only meant for marriage can occur which is a serious sin in God's eyes, in 1Thessalonians 4:3-4 he commands us to hold from having sex until marriage: "For this is the Will of God, even your sanctification, that ye should abstain from fornication: That every one of you should know how to possess his vessel in sanctification and honor." Though not many keep these commands any longer, I urge you to please be careful when you are in a relationship with someone and try to wait to have sex; it will benefit you in the long run and avoid the countless heartbreaks that you may endure.
Intimacy with God
While in college you learn to adjust to having a hectic schedule from school, work and any outside organizations like sororities and fraternities leaving you to have small windows for any time for relaxing. With having little time for anything you relationship/intimacy with God can take a hit, you make excuses as why you don't attend church or you plan to read the Bible the next day which usually never happens. When you aren't intimate with God your strength fails leaving you to start sinning on a more frequent basis, at least that is what i have noticed from my own experience. We need to have a good relationship with God because he provides us nourishment like when he provided manna to the Israelites in Exodus; when we don't have his daily nourishment we feel drained from the world and the Devil uses that to his advantage. To avoid having the Devil control your life, plan out when you should b communicating with God whether that is in the morning or evening as lang as you have alone time with him.
