Heaven, Salvation ,Eternal life

I have always been discouraged about the evangelism format that stresses the most important element and motivation  of  the  Christian Salvation story and accepting Christ into your life  is getting to heaven. If all we care about is the after life then what meaning  does  accepting Christ have for us while still here on earth?? Are we just accepting out of fear of going to Hell or are we just not understanding the real benefits of accepting Christ's love for our time here on earth? Also  there is the confusion of equating Heaven with Eternal life, as if they are one in the same.

I just finished reading the book: "Dinner with a Perfect Stranger by David Gregory (2005). I like his discussion and  definition of "Eternal life". "Heaven is simply a place where God is. You can have 'Eternal life' right now. Eternal life isn't something that starts when you die. It's something that starts the minute you receive Christ, you are not only completely forgiven, but Christ joins himself to your spirit. He comes to live within you."

Isn't that what we should be seeking and sharing with others vs. the prize of a "golden ticket" to heaven??

It is kind of like the difference between someone thinking they are Christian because they attend church, are obedient and do good works.  My understanding of  "being a Christian" is  accepting Christ ,asking to be forgiven of our sins and  inviting him into our lives to have a LIVING daily relationship with him. Many of us in my generation were never taught this in the churches we attended as youth. The issues of obedience and good works were emphasized in  defining you as a Christian. It would be such a sad existence with few  Christ-centered purposeful goals if we did not seek out this real relationship with Christ and simply tried to be obedient and love others to wait for our day in heaven. There is no golden ticket from this type of Christianity. For many in my generation and even at existing churches today, it is not until we experience a real trial in our lives where we learn to trust fully and depend totally on Christ,  that we will  find this level of our faith and this daily relationship with Christ.

 But the good news is, when we cross that threshold, it brings such unbelievable peace and joy and we are changed forever!! We view the world , life and death, material possesssions and wealth, and our ultimate role here on earth differently.We are forever reminded to reflect the love of Christ in every day! It will not be a perfect life without human fault and  trouble however.Yes we are still human and will continue to fall and get up again and again but we will have new strength and perspective to face each challenge and trial in life.   It will however give us  a daily goal to pass along the love of Christ in every day we live here on earth, not just on Sundays or when doing a few planned service projects. Life  becomes about human kindness and generosity and  seeking constant growth in growing deeper in our understanding of  and relationship with  Christ. It is a constant state of awareness of who we are, what we do and how God wants us to listen.Sometimes this is called being "born again", a throw back term from years ago, but indeed it is a rebirth of our daily walk  with Christ while here on earth. We become new and renewed in   Jesus Christ.

It can be  our heaven ON earth. So if you are just waiting for the golden ticket to heaven above and chalking up your good deeds to get there,rather than just loving Christ so much it flows out of you, i invite you to invite Jesus into your life in this full and abundant way. I hope you seek that heaven here on earth by a deep and loving daily  relationship with Jesus Christ and God the father.It is a gift freely given, we just have to ask for it and become humble and grateful for the privilege of accepting it.  

Christ be with you in the coming week(s) and may you carry HIM with you in every word you say , every deed you do  and with  every person  Jesus puts in your path. And may you begin and end each day with thankfulness and gratitude for the oh so many blessings He gives to you while still on this earth and beyond. 

Trouble Sleeping??

Well I officially felt old when i embarked on the  age of 55 with the  threshold of menopause and the reality that my  body changes would now effect my sleeping, but don't stop reading if you are young, as anyone ,any age, can have trouble sleeping-right?? But the good news is... I have found some universal  simple remedies for the sleep issue that  i wanted to share with you all.

It's really just a few simple things with no  sleeping pills or gadgets  involved.

The first is trying not to eat after 7pm.

The second being going to bed around the same time each night. Recently I read about  this in a few articles on "sleep problems" and they were right!! I sleep much better when I go to bed about  the same time each night( not too early and not too late- which will be different for everybody I suspect).

The third thing I am now doing is trying not to go online, watch tv or make  or take phone calls right before bed.  I read a bit instead at the end of my day as the other activities get my head in too many different directions and does not allow me to  pace myself down  for sleep.

 And  lastly, when I am in bed  and cannot sleep (or wake up periodically  from unsettling dreams) I have learned to recite(to myself obviously not out loud) a favorite verse of scripture( I use the 23rd Psalm) or words to a favorite hymn( I use "This is my Fathers World")  over and over until I fall asleep  as this  focuses my thoughts on a simple and specific dialogue that is calming and overriding of any other thoughts.

If you pick two of these, try the same time bedtime and reciting to yourself as they really work for me!!

 All of a sudden I am a asleep! Of course it would be God centered living to help me again in a life issue.

 God is good and always on hand to help if we just ask him for it! 

FINDING YOUR SOFT PLACE TO FALL

I guess for some holiday "family time" can be a nightmare of negatives and stress..... for me at 57 it is a delight.

The older I get the more I treasure the relationships I have with my family. When we are young I think we often take it for granted it if it is good or  just resent it if it is bad. I see as my girls   now in their mid twenties and living away from home in their own lives and vocations are really this  cherishing family time as well. Everybody needs "a soft place to fall" whether with family or friends. I guess it is just finding that place that is important. By the time we are in our twenties we need to find that place.

That is not to say we give up on bad family relationships, as  we all need to forgive and forget and move on in our lives. All we can do is project the positive and if it is not returned, given some time for change, we need to rest elsewhere.

We don't need alot of friends just a few good ones, ones who we can open up to and relax with and ones that accept us for who we are. But if we put a negative or needy vibe out  there and dominate the conversation with "ME and my needs", relationships with friends and family will be difficult. We really need to learn to listen first and talk second ( that is hard for me)and  have to try to find the positive in our day for our own mental health and for the sake of  creating new  friendships and  nurturing existing relationships. 

I guess it is easy to say but  harder to live. The good news is that Jesus is there to turn to in times of woe and loneliness( and JOY for that matter), when we can't seem to find it with friends or family.

I read somewhere that the best prescription for depression is service work and I heartily agree. If all else fails turn to" helping others" and your day will be brightened.Just the smallest kindness given in love, even just a nice hello can change your world as well as others. Perhaps your first safe place to fall will be in service work, then friends and then family. However the route  you may  take....may your 2010 be filled with "loving others" to find the love you seek!! 

Thanksgiving and Historical Misconceptions....

In my heart of hearts, I wish we could move from just gratitude  for the things and people in our lives on Thanksgiving to  the spirit of generosity and graciousness toward others.

I think the problem stems from  the historical misconceptions about "the First Thanksgiving".  Years ago I was writing a Multicultural Curriculum for a Head Start  early childhood education program I worked for ,and came across this wonderful book: Through Indian Eyes by  B. Slapin and D Seale. To better explain ,these are some quotes from the book that began to make me look deeper at the Ethnocentric American  holiday traditions we call Columbus Day, Halloween and Thanksgiving.  Be prepared...it  is not what we learned as school children or adults for that matter, and it may SHOCK you as it did me! How could history be  taught so distorted and ethnocentric!

"When Christopher Columbus landed here, he found the Arawak and Taino peoples he encountered remarkable for their  gentleness,hospitality,generosity, and belief in sharing.Columbus called thee people "Indios", not because he thought he found India, but because he felt them to be "people of God". 'They are gentle and comely people' he wrote.They are so naive and so free with their possessions that no one has not witnessed them would believe it.When you ask for something they never say no.To the contrary, they offer to share with anyone...They brought us parrots and balls of cotton and spears and many other things, which they exchanged for the glass beads and hawk bells. They willingly traded everything they owned'. "

"Columbus however did not let his admiration for these 'gentle and comely people' prevent him from taking many of them back to Spain in chains. 'With fifty men, he wrote, we could subjugate them all and make them do whatever we want.' He set in motion what a friar named Bartolome de las Casas , who fought for half a century to save the people from the conquistadors, called 'the bloody trail of conquest across the Americas'.Columbus wasn't the first to land here, but the first to exploit the land and its people.  He built the first military base in Haiti and Columbus' men roamed the island in gangs looking for gold and committing brutalities of every sort, taking women and children as slaves for sex and labor. In 1495 he took 1500 Arawak women , men and children, the fittest 500 loaded onto ships with 200 died en route to Spain and the other 300 put up for sale when arriving and most of them died in captivity.The island rose up in revolt but all prisoners were hung or burned to death.Any that survived this ,died of germ warfare of European diseases.One by one  all the indigenous leaders were tortured,impaled,hanged,or burned at the stake. Then the mass suicides began.The conquest of the islands-Haiti,Cuba, Puerto Rico,the Antilles and the Bahamas- and the slaughter of their people raged on.Millions of good people died like flies from exhaustion,torture,famine and disease."

"Native Americans have more than one thing NOT to be thankful about on Thanksgiving, and its antecedent feast Halloween, represent the annual twin peaks of Indian stereotyping. Consider that virtually none of the standard fare surrounding either Halloween or Thanksgiving contain an ounce of authenticity, historical accuracy or cross cultural perception.A year ago my older son brought home a program printed by his school, with an illustration of the 'First Thanksgiving' with a caption which read in part:'They served pumpkins and turkeys and corn and squash. The Indians had never seen such a feast!' On the contrary! The Pilgrims had literally never seen' such a feast', since all the food mentioned are exclusively indigenous foods to the Americas and had been provided by the local tribe.If there was really a Plymouth Thanksgiving dinner, with Native Americans  in attendance as either the guests or hosts, then the event was rare indeed. Pilgrims generally considered Indians to be devils in disguise and treated them as such.Knowing the truth about Thanksgiving , both its proud and its shameful motivations and history, might well benefit contemporary children. But the glib retelling of an ethnocentric and self serving falsehood does not do  anyone  good."

The learned untruths of our  countries real history of settlement and the misconceptions and  portrayal of Native Americans is shameful and I for one am embarrassed once again about American history.It reeks of  racism and white supremacy which is still present today in the number of hate groups of white supremacists present in the US- you see them all the time in the border disputes and immigration issues. Let's strive to  tell the real story on Thanksgiving , Halloween and Columbus day, so our children and our  grandchildren do NOT continue to perpetuate the historical myths we learned as young school children ourselves.

Today the many  American Indians that have been given worthless wastelands for reservations are truly the poorest of the poor. "American Indian unemployment is higher than 70% with the average annual  income of an American Indian family less than $2,000( while in a country whose poverty level is $6,000/yr), 30% of all Indian women have been sterilized  (most without their consent or knowledge), 3 out of 5 Indian children die in the first year of birth,70% of all Indian people suffer from malnutrition,Indian people are imprisoned 10 times more than whites,  Indian people are losing their land base at a rate of 45,000 acres a year every year in this century,more than on third of all Indian children are removed from their families and cultures,average education of an Indian is    5yrs, and most Indian people who live on reservations  have little to no electricity,plumbing or adequate housing."*

I have seen first hand on reservations in the Dakotas, the extreme poverty, health issues, unemployment and lack of educational resources that the American Indian is currently living with. The rate of alcholoism due to no employment possible and unfarmable wastelands is a depressing sight and sad state of how many many American Indian people  currenlty live in "our America".

"Native peoples are fighting for the right to live on their land , to speak their languages,to practice their religions,to govern themselves, to live with dignity and in harmony with nature. They are fighting a bloodline that runs from Columbus all the way to Arco, Exxon, Peabody, General Electric, and all the other conquistadors that continue to pillage and plunder the people and the land."

WOW....how can we look the other way. This should be a lesson to us all when the US chooses to invade another county for its riches. What is the real reason for our wars, military actions, even humanitarian aid? Are there hidden agendas and wealth the motivation  vs human life ? Let us pray to not remain ignorant about these issues and to treat other cultures with respect and dignity. I pray to God for full understanding of this and for the energy to pursue helping efforts on behalf of the American Indian.

Two of my favorite American Indian charities that i would invite you to consider donating to are:

American Indian Relief Council PO BOx 6200 Rapid City SD 57709( provides meals , food  and help with  shelter and utilities for poor families)

American Indian Education Foundation PO BOX 27491 Albuquerque NM 87125( college scholarships)

Perhaps GENEROSITY instead of mere GRATITUDE at Thanksgiving  (or Christmas)  in the way of  financial contribution to the poor ( no matter how big or  small) is WHAT we ALL can do to help.It will never erase our horrible heritage and the agony of the American Indian but it is a way to say "I am not  of that mind or heart and I care about all Americans"!We need to talk the talk AND walk the walk of the Christians we think we are. Let's fight racism where ever it comes into our lives and keep the American Indian in our prayers around our Thanksgiving tables this year and every year!

*the  above statistics are from the  book  noted which was published in 1992 so are not fully current but i believe them to be accurate in terms of the living conditions that still exist for the Ameican Indian. 

American Idols...

No i am not talking about the singing show.

I ran across this passage in Rick Stearns book-The Hole in the Gospel and i though it was a powerful statement for all of us to deal with as living  American  affluent lives (even if we are middle income)!

They say that if you have  loose change anywhere in your house and have access to a computer in your community you are living in  one of the wealthiest countries in the world."Citizens of the ten wealthiest countries are now seventy-five times richer than those that live in the ten poorest ones.."

"One of the most powerful reasons we don't totally surrender our lives to Christ is that we don't want to sacrifice the things we possess:they have begun to possess us."

"These things  can include  our jobs, our material assets, our money, our communities,our friends and even our families.We cling to them often out of a desire for security, comfort and happiness,even though we know in our hearts that we can only find real happiness by serving the Lord.Consequently our things become  idols. In fact, anything we put ahead of God in our lives becomes an idol."

What do we have as  idols? Anything we obsess about is an idol.

What do we spend the most time and money on?? That should define our idols if we are not sure what they are.

Help us Lord to keep perspective in this economic crisis ..that we Americans still live wealthy lives in term of the  world's poor and needy. Help us to  better assess what we NEED to live vs what we WANT and to know the difference and to  still give generously to those who have nothing.