I have witnessed, during my christian walk, many things that caused me to question the sincerity of christians. I have seen people hurt others. I have seen christians gather together to oppose people, organizations, movies, and books that they know little to nothing about. Most of these actions that I see that would cause someone to say the church is ineffectual or hypocritical have been actions based in fear. But if what you believe is the truth I would think that you would not fear anything that questions said truth. Truth has no need to defend itself. If we look at the example of Jesus, he never defended himself when other were trying to condemn him to death. He knew his truth and did not feel the need to defend it. He lived it, loved others, and let that speak for itself. So when non-believers and other faiths have something to say we can listen to them without fear and judgement. We may even find that we agree with what they have to say.

As Christians and humans in general we have focused on our differences. The mere fact that I say we Christians shows that I have labeled me and them.  I do not want to give myself a label that will separate me from you. It is sufficient to say I follow in the footsteps of Christ to the best of my ability. Christians have created an art form of focusing on differences. Just look at the number of different denominations. Obviously, this is not exclusive to Christianity, they just happen to be the ones I know the most about. But we do focus on seemingly insignificant things such as hair length, gender appropriate dressing, whether we dance, etc. Instead of seeing the spirit of God in everyone and caring for them no matter what they look like or how they behave. Loving and caring is not condoning. But let’s face it, when someone shows true loving kindness in the face of torture and death. That kind of love changes even the most evil of perpetrators and even beyond. Jesus’ love in the face of his death and torture started a new religion and changed the world. That has happened on a smaller scale with others all over the world. To face pain and death with love in our eyes and not fear will change the world. But to do that we must see our enemy as us, as our brother, as our family.

There are people on this earth that have a desire to kill us. But they want to do this because they see us as separate from themselves. We have strengthened that vision by making them enemies. All of us have the same desires to bond with others. But we are trying to bond on a superficial level, this level of material things. But we are not material and neither are they. We are all made from the same stuff and have the same desires. We just need to stop bonding from our heads and bond from our hearts. Unselfish love is what changes the world. Nothing else.

I have come to a new realization that nature and biology speak to the mechanics of the spiritual world. If you look at different things in nature and biology you will see many parallels. In life most of us are looking for peace and joy and would prefer to stay in these states of being at all times. However we usually experience life as a wave of ups and downs, happiness and sadness, abundance and lack. This is because we are living life on the surface. What I mean by living life on the surface is that we look for satisfaction from the material world. We look for it in things and experiences that are temporary and therefore can only give us temporary happiness. Surface living is living in the world of physical experience of sight, sound, touch, taste, and smell. Although these things are to be enjoyed and there is nothing wrong with enjoying them, they are not to be desired as a source of joy. The source of joy and peace come from deep within. Jesus said “the kingdom of God is within you” and “my peace I give unto you, not as the world gives”. What I believe he is telling us is that his peace is within us. He can awaken our True Self, our spiritual self where we gain access to a wellspring of love, joy, and peace but we must ask Him. The problem we have today is that to go within ourselves we must be still and quiet our minds enough to hear God in his still, small voice.

The surface of the ocean is always moving and anything on the surface gets moved up and down with it but if you go below the surface the ups and downs disappear. Most veteran scuba divers have experienced going under the water when it was calm and returning to a storm on the surface. But there was no sense of the storm while within the ocean. Only by returning to the surface do you get moved about by the waves.

Another parallel is at the center of everything it is the same whether it is an atom, a cell, or Tootsie Pop. The nucleus of every atom has the same protons, neutrons, and quarks as every other atom only differing in numbers. Although cells can differ in function and appearance in an organism the nucleus contains the same DNA in every cell.  And of course no matter how many flavors you can find in a Tootsie Pop the center is always chocolaty goo.
The same holds true for us. No matter how we look or function on the surface at our core we are all the same. We all have the same life force, the same spirit within us. And in this center we find our being, our True Self. It is where we find our peace and joy apart from the circumstances of the world. How is it that a POW in solitary confinement, such as Senator John McCain, who was subject to torture and solitary confinement can come out of that experience and say he is closer to God than ever. In contrast  a rich, handsome, talented, young man, such as Kurt Cobain, can kill himself because he is so miserable? I believe Cobain must have attained all of his dreams and worldly desires and still felt that gnawing sense of discontent. Then he became hopeless because there was nothing left to strive for. But all that was necessary was to look beneath the surface. If a POW tortured in a prison camp or a Jewish person in a Nazi concentration camp can find a greater sense of peace and sense of self in the face of such horror there is no reason to think we are not capable of the same.
God wants us to find our true self, our spiritual self, deep within because that is where we meet and commune with Him. True peace and joy is found in the chocolaty gooey center of ourselves. Too bad you cannot get there in three licks.

I want to share with you a post from a blog I used to write. I wrote this blog during a time of spiritual turmoil. During this time I was wrestling with whether or not I wanted to be a part of the church anymore. I was struggling with whether or not I would continue believing everything I had been taught since my salvation. And although I made my way back to Jesus I have a new and very different view of God and the typical christian teaching.  The reaction of the church to the book described below and the reaction of close christian friends when they found out I had read the book started my journey away from the church. It took a long time and a lot of prayer and meditation to find my way back. I hope you find it revealing.

“I was shown a video called the church of Oprah today in which some christian organization made a video that criticized Oprah and Eckhart Tolle and made them seem quite different than they are. The video spent most of it’s time criticizing them and then asked for prayer for the deceived for a few seconds at the end. Isn’t this backward from what it should be? If they are truly concerned for the well being of the deceived would they not spend most of their time asking for prayer and praying? The church has so many positive messages to convey it seems silly that they would spend any time tearing down others. It rings of the pharisees and saducees calling Jesus the friend of sinners before they condemned him to die as a blasphemer.

I am for the church and want it to do well. I have read the book they are speaking of and watched these “services” they refer to and the message is nothing like they convey. It is not sinister and they do not conflict with what I read in the bible. Even if there are a few things I do not believe I have had the same experience listening to a pastor or a visiting minister where they have said something that is in direct conflict with the bible. But I do not throw out all of the truth because one truth is misinterpreted. I say the same for Oprah and Eckhart. You do not have do believe everything they say to experience what the truth is. You can experience it for yourself. They both state that they are not trying change anyone’s beliefs but rather trying to help others know God more intimately. That has been my experience so far. I have been more in tune with God and myself. Jesus said in Luke that “the kingdom of God is within you”. We christians say Jesus “lives in our hearts”. So when someone refers to going within yourself to find God I see no conflict with that whatsoever.

The sad thing is that the church that I love and that I know wants to help only hurts themselves when they do things like this. They come across as deceptive because they misinterpret a small part of what they hear and take it out of context. When someone reads the whole book or watches a whole show they will easily see that whoever authored the criticism either lied or did not bother to read what they are criticizing. The church’s criticism of everything that threatens them has lead to a new book and movie called “Jesus, save us from your followers!”

We are perceived as judgmental and critical trying to force others to believe what we believe. Instead of introducing them to Jesus and allowing them to develop their own relationship with him, we concern ourselves with what kind of sins they need to overcome. Let us pull out the planks in our eyes first. Anyone who goes to church or does any kind of study about the social issues within the church can easily discover we have plenty of planks to remove before we start trying to help others. Maybe we should consider letting Jesus do the helping and stick to the introducing.

Eckhart and Oprah may not be 100% biblically accurate but they seem to be doing a much better job of conveying Jesus’ words to the masses than we are. Perhaps we should take this critical eye inward and consider what kind of message we are conveying as followers of Jesus (aka Baptists, Methodists, Presbyterians, Catholics, Protestants, Church of Gods, Church of Christs, Pentacostals, Assembly of Gods, Church of God in Christs, Freewill Baptists, Southern Baptists, Episcopals, Lutherans, Evangelicals, Anglicans, Apostolics, Independent Baptists, Missionary Baptists, Christians, Seventh Day Adventisits, Latter Day Saints, Nazarenes, Holinesses, Interdenominationals, Lutheran Missouri Synoders, Lutheran ELCAs, Non-Denominationals, United Methodists, Congregational Methodists, Full Gospelers, etc). The previous list is from the yellow pages of one suburb in DFW.

I wonder why we have such a difficult time having an impact on society?”

It was shortly after this post that I quit attending church with no intention of ever returning. Fortunately God had other plans for me. I have since been introduced to a church that really embodies the teachings of Jesus and renewed my faith. I will spend some time introducing them to you in later posts.

I believe the message of Jesus offers the most complete and simple path to overcoming the struggles you experience in life. The church could play a significant role in helping people overcome. I think the struggle within the church is once you have been spiritually awakened or “saved” you are expected to behave in a specific manner. Unfortunately I have seen many times the violation of Jesus’ words “judge not”. I have been guilty of as much myself. The problem I see is that the church can be very accepting of the “sinner” and all their faults but once they are saved it is time to straighten up and fly right. So if someone asks for prayer the fifth time to overcome the gambling problem they are struggling with we no longer offer love, acceptance, and forgiveness but rather judgment and harsh words. I believe the church loses many wonderful people because of such attitudes. Jesus said we are to forgive 70 times 7. So if we take him literally then our minimum is 490 times. I personally believe there is no limit.

If we were to offer people love, acceptance, and forgiveness it would help them overcome their struggles in this life. When has criticism and judgment ever made you feel as if you could overcome? Our judgment is only a way of making ourselves feel superior to others. What other reason could there possible be for judgment? If, however, we continue to point them in the direction of connecting with God they will be able to rise above their problems.

I can hear some of you saying “but if we do not tell them what they are doing is wrong how will they know?” I say if they are able to feel that connection and commune with their creator they will not need to be told because they will rise above their worldly ego or flesh and act in accordance with the love God offers them so freely. Rules do not change people’s hearts. Love does.
Was that too mushy for a Texan?

What is the essence of life? It must be the spirit because without our spirit we become a corpse. The spiritual aspect of our existence is in reality the most important and powerful part of our existence yet it is the part the majority of humans give the least attention to. Even when we think we are in most cases we are actually fulfilling an ego based identity and a worldly idea of what spirituality is. I know this because I have done this and watched it being done for 15 years. There is so much to it our spiritual existence that is right in front of us but we do not recognize it because we are so used to seeing things with our eyes and defining them with our brain that we miss the true essence of everything we view and experience. Our mind is a very valuable tool in living this life but it is not the ultimate level of life to aspire to nor is it capable of defining many experiences and situations. Just think about a time where you had an experience and felt emotions that you could not put into words. I can remember a time when I was on a beach looking at a sunset that was so incredible it would be impossible for me to explain it to you. Witnessing the birth of my children is another example of an experience you cannot put into word. So much of life is experienced outside logic and the five senses yet so many of us rely on exactly that, exclusively, to choose how we intend to live life.

Let us all begin to notice the moments of life in a new way. Let’s not label and explain our experience but simply experience it and feel it to the fullest. Then we may begin to live life from a higher place within ourselves.