Little things happen along the way to me. I believe in God because in these things that have happened, it would be irrational not to. For example, my prayers get answered. No, not all of them, but enough of them, and that really makes you think. And then there is the music. God has talked to me in music — not in so many words, out of the thin air, but piggybacking on what is playing; I’ll give you an example of that. In the song “Just the Way You Are,” by Billy Joel, there are the lines, “What will it take till you believe in me / The way that I believe in you,” and it feels inside me that God (or more precisely, Jesus) is the one who is at that moment asking me that exact question. And when this happened to me, I was filled with such hope, such religious joy. This is what it means to be saved: not in some distant dying day, but as one goes through life, that you never ever walk alone, no matter where you are.
Jean-Paul Sartre was the one who said that modern man has a God-shaped hole in his heart. I know for myself that I didn’t do any growing up until that hole was filled by the only thing that can properly do it justice — I was seeking something that I didn’t know what it was, and didn’t know that I was even looking. And when I happened to find it, I realized that it was That finding me, for there is no path from man to God, only the other way around. Now, I for one try not to be annoying to non-believers, and my apologies if you’re offput by this post; but one day you may understand the feeling of faith. And if you don’t right now, I know it is merely because you have not yet been called — I hated this stuff, too, before I was found, who was lost. There is another quote I will end with, and I forget who said it, but it is that faith in Christ does not lead to eternal life — it is eternal life. Heady stuff.
reflection
10:15pm wednesday, 1st march
When you are eating imitation crab or lobster, are you really eating imitation crab or lobster.Step inside the illusion.
Strawberry
3:09am thursday, 2nd march
I know you don't want to hear this because 1)you are a boy and 2)it isn't Christian. I'm Pagen and a girl but I'll tell you anyway because this is an example of how my faith was strengthened.
Last Friday I want to the doctor and she did a physical exam. She found something in my breast and schedualed an ultrasound test for Monday. The hospital doesn't waste any time, because if it was cancer, you have to catch it and cut it out quick before it spreads.
So I had the whole weekend to worry. Yeah, I cried a bit. My husband told me a whole bunch of statistics (that I bet he made up) all trying to prove that the chance was small that I had cancer. He seemed to want to ignore the whole thing and it made me really mad.
Finally on Sunday I couldn't take the suspense. I made a long prayer for safety and guidence (to my three spiritual guides and one gaurdian angel) and then shuffled my Tarot deck. It is Enochian, an unusual deck, and you can ask it simple yes or no questions to be answered by one card. I asked, "Do I have cancer?"
I cut the deck and turned over the top card. It was a scary looking card. A deamon under a dense layer of rock. The card for disease. My heart dropped. And then I remembered that it is the position of the card, not the card itself, that answers yes or no. Since the image on the card was normal and not reversed (upside-down), the answer with the disease card is "no". Any card could have answered my question just by it's position. I didn't need to get the disease card to have the sign for yes or no. But how exacting and appropriate!
Later when I told my husband about the card and the answer he sighed and said, "I didn't think you were sick because your aura looks normal. I didn't say anything because I didn't think you would beleive me."
All those statistics and theories about cancer he kept telling me hadn't helped me feel better one bit. But when he told me about what he "saw", and how he instictively knew that he "saw" in the color and energy around my head none of the signs of disease, well, it calmed him. It calmed him, but because he was hesitant to say anything, I took his calm as an insult.
Yeah, I know, we sound like a bunch of new age loonies and I act like a shrew. But Stand, you have no idea how concervative our upbringing was! As the daughter of a skeptical scientist I had no faith in anything invisible, believing only in chemistry and biology and the unconscious mind, and my husband was born and bread in the American Bible Belt. Our sort of faith came to us, we did not go looking for it. But now I beleive because the accuracy of my Tarot cards is enormus - scientifically, statistically impossible. As for my husband seeing auras, why not believe him? It is some sort of strange gift that surprises him as much as my cards surprise me.
As for me being a shrew, take this warning. If your girl is really sad and frightened, she kinda likes it when you are sad and frightened too.
Oh, and the Monday test was negative. The hospital never called, so I called them. They said that they only call when there is something wrong. So, since I'm healthy, I'll get the test result in several weeks along with the bill.
Stand
4:40am thursday, 2nd march
On the contrary, I like stories like that. Here's a funny one: Once, Bertrand Russell was in a jail, and a jailer asked him what religion he was. Russell said, "Well, I guess I'm agnostic." To which the jailer replied, "Never heard of it, but I suppose we all worship the same God." And Russell couldn't stop smiling for a week.
felician
11:53am sunday, 24th december
Thanks for the welcome
Christmas Day falls on December 25. It is preceded by Christmas Eve on December 24, and in some countries is followed by Boxing Day on December 26. Some Eastern Orthodox Churches celebrate Christmas on January 7, which corresponds to December 25 on the Julian calendar. December 25 as a birthdate for Jesus is merely traditional, and is not thought to be his actual date of birth.Good luck!
reflection
Stand