The Target

 Last night, I resumed leading Bible Study at the homeless shelter. It reminded me of the journey of my life with Jesus and God, as I shared what the Sermon on the Mount meant to me. I want to share a bit of it with you.

When I was a child, I had a lot to deal with in overcoming physical and emotional abuse. It seemed to me there must be a key to a better way to live. I read, and read and reread my little New Testament, underlining with colored pencils. Eventually, it was very colorful, rainbow like.

It developed in me that what I needed to do, in order to follow Jesus, was to aim to be like him, and so to listen carefully to what he was remembered to have said by those who wrote about him. It became my goal for my life. Being Christlike was my target When I caught myself straying off target, I did my best to bring myself back and aim again. I learned that, if you don't have a target goal, you wander around aimlessly. It is really imperative to focus our overall objective for our lives.

Back to the Shelter, I teach the Sermon on the Mount in 10 lessons. These things are what Jesus taught us for guidelines on how to behave to be his followers, and, if we succeed, we help create the Kngdom of Heaven here on earth. If everyone followed these things, then we would actually have a planet where there would be peace, plenty, kindness, and God's Kingdom manifest. But, so far humans have not done this.

I urge you to read deeply, listening with your whole being, Matthew 5, 6 & 7. Imagine you are there, hearing him speak these words as if to you. Let them penetrate to your core. 

Now decide what is the target goal for your life? Are you daring enough to actually follow Christ?

Out of the Blue

Out of the blue, all of a sudden, signs of restoration appear. Hopefully they are tidbits fortelling of more good to come. Perhaps around the next corner, more signs will find me. That's the way at least some things work. 

This week, I feel my mind and heart awakening out of the shock and being restored. It is such a relief to begin to feel like myself agin. I am so thankful. The shards are coming together, and it feels so very good. Thank You, God!

Then there was the sorrow of my sewing machines evaoporating from my life with his non-payment of storage and lies about all being absolutely up to date. Then a friend came to me, saying they were moving and downsizing. Would I like her semi-industrial, straight stitch, 1600 stitches a minute Pfaff? Would I!!!! It replaces my Juki 2010 and then some! It's a magnificent machine. I am sooooo very thankful.

Then yesterday, a couple of amazing friends helped me go through boxes in a friend's barn. We had gone through half a week or so ago. Much had to be thrown away due to critters getting in the boxes. They had been there since 2013. We found a few pieces of my Russian jewelry. I was tearful. Then awhile later I heard a shout, I found your jewelry!!! There in a hanging bag with zippered clear plastic pockets was some of my jewelry in the pockets, my real gold and silver jewelry. My heart was pounding. We piut it in the car to go through later, for we had so many boxes yet to go through.,

When we got back to the house, I started to go through it. There were pieces I was cetain had been in the local storage, but there they were. Not all of my jewelry, but a lot. And then from a pocket, I pulled out THE bracelet I had been mourning. The 1905 hand-made, hand hammered links, hand engraved heart, pictures of my grandmother and grandfather inside, and the dent on the heart made by my father's first tooth. Tears filled my eyes. Gratitude swirled in me. This precious artifact was restored to me. It can stay in our family.

Around the next bend, I wonder what the next restoration surprise there will be. As an old friend used to say, I wonder what God has up His sleeve today. My heart is filled with thanksgiving.

So I say to you and to me, never give up. Have faith. Good may be around the next corner. 

Thank You, God, for being here with me, and for reminding me of that very thing. Thank you for the beginnings of restoration. May this be the part of the Book of Job where all is restored and more. Guide me, lead me, help me walk in Your Way always. Thank You is a pale word for what I am feeling. You know my heart and know the joy and rejoicing going on in me. I seal this with the ancient seal of integrity and faith, Amen, Amen, and Amen

The Insights Pile Up

Labor assures not only individual survival, but the life of the species. Work and its product, the human artifact, bestow a measure of permanence and durability upon the futility of mortal life and the fleeting character of human time. Action, in so far as it engages in founding and preserving political bodies, creates the condition for remembrance, that is, for history. - Hannah Arendt, The Human Condition

 I heard someone on YouTube mention this book. It sounded fascinating,  so I downloaded a sample. This morning I came to the above quote  it struck me as if lightening. 

It spoke to me of apiece of the puzzle that nuzzled me on the edges, but that had not been fully seen. I was upset about the treasures of my life being on their own, without their stories, without their meaning, in the hands of strangers.  This morning it all came together -  HE STOLE MY HISTORY!

The things I had told the story of my life, of my family's life. The artifacts were living history. People often said that being in my home was like being in a museum.  He threw it away by not paying storage, but weaving a web of lies and vowing to the end all fees were paid. He threw it away by somehow stealing my house payment, so getting it foreclosed, and weaving a web of lies, so that I didn't find out until a few weeks ago. He took my money and lied lied lied. He threw everything of value to me on a trash heap. 

He threw my life away with no remorse. 

So now, with my history gone, I begin again. 

God,  glorious and  eternal, also my companion, my guide, show me the highest way for me to walk the remaining portion of earth life that You grant me. Lead me, lift me, restore me. Fill this hole in my heart with Your Light. Help me release the past to You. Grant me strength and courage to move forward. I am so incredibly thankful that I know You are always with me. 

The Game of Life

 No matter the religion or denomination in which we are raised, our spirituality still comes through the first filter of our own life experience. 

—Richard Rohr 

And, I might add, how we interpret it; how we represent it to ourselves. In other words, our self-talk. 

This morning, I had a vision of the arc of my life, and one of my filters installed in me deeply early in my life. It has been a split underlying premise - one for others, one for my relationship with my self. It goes something like this - 1.) You are a bother; your feelings are irrelevant to me; you matter only insofar as you are useful to me. 2) I matter to me, I can keep going no matter what, God loves me. So, I didn't let the monsters of my life stop me. I kept on going, sometimes with great sorrow, but nevertheless, I kept on going.

The vision I saw this morning was very different from my usual visions. I saw a sort of video game or maybe a video pinball machine. Flippers sprang up to obstruct me, and I twisted and turned to avoid them or at least only get a minor hit. The flippers didn't care about me, they just did what flippers do. I happened to come upon them, and they sprang into action. I kept going past flipper after flipper. My path was a moving obstacle course.

Ever since birth, I have been under attack, so I somehow created an inner and outer strategy for my life. Another betrayer/attacker, veer to the side, keep going. Inside, I was comfortable with who I am, and I had a direct relationship with God to guide and sustain me.

So this whole thing with my deceased husband was the pièce de résistance, the attack/betrayal of monstrous proportions. Is it the final blow? Is this part of the game of my life complete? Maybe. I do hear the message, "The past is done," as in it's a wrap. 

It's been an interesting game, this life of mine. I've never understood boredom. I know it's all about developing my soul. I know I can only honestly answer the questions on the other side... Did I walk as I was called? Was I faithful? Was I able to be kind and tender no excuses? Did I love, forgive, show generosity? Not perfectly, but mostly, always striving that way. God knows my heart, but I know I have to answer the questions over there anyway. 

Plato, Socrates, and Critias

 I am enjoying rereading Plato.  I needed mind exercise to help me climb out of shock, maybe even PTSD. I just read a dialogue between Socrates and Critias basically on temperance, wisdom, and science.

It is fascinating mental gymnastics.  And I was drawn to muse over how few people of whom I am aware engage in such mental exercise and discussion nowadays. Most conversations I hear are about mundane things, other people, hurt feelings, business, etc. It seems, if people engage in discussion about ideas, it is mostly adversarial and not in pursuit if that illusive thing called truth.

I see shouting,  name calling, the Marxist thing called cancelling, shunning, falsehood to try to win an argument, and a lot of childish behavior. Maybe we should encourage the spread of debate societies and debate groups in schools with the rules they have always used. Each person is given a side to present and stand for, even if it's not their personal stand. It's sort of like walking in the other shoes to come to understand. Its eye and heart opening.

I ask, is civil, deep, searching, meaningful, respectful conversation gone from our "modern" world?  Can we bring it back? I yearn for it. Can we even maintain high civilization without it?

I often think of my Dad. One of his sayings to me was, "You can disagree without being disagreeable."

It's All About Now

 This morning I awoke with insights flooding my thoughts. One of the flows is about that illusive concept of the now. As many have said, including me, now is all we have, the only moment we can live and breathe and tnink and learn and love and be. The past is written and gone. The future is only there in our imaginations. This moment is it. 

All else is temporary blips in so many ways. I've been mourning all of my treasres stolen from me by my duplicitous husband. But it was all on temporary loan. When I leave the planet it all stays here. I've mourned my things out and about the planet without their stories. Now they are just interesting things adrift from their meaning. 

For examole - The painting I did in a fit of inspiration after my previous husband died; the painting that was about souls going back and forth from the spiritual realm to here; the painting that I later discovered was also a vision to Suzuki so that his description of his vision was as if he were looking at my painting; yes that painting is now just a pretty yellow painting sonewhere without me and without its meaning. Everything I had also had a story. I grieve for that.

 And then I saw my many family antiques. I knew a tiny bit about their stories. The little rocking chair my grandfather bought my mother when she was born, or the hand made braclet my other grandfather had made for my grandmother with their initials on either side, their pictures inside,  and the dent from my father's first tooth on the heart, etc.  

But each item had a rich story to the people who first had them in their lives, stories now lost. In fact, the vast, vast majority of the stories of people now gone are lost, even their very existence, except for a tiny few of the billions upon billions who have graced this planet, are unknown. Nobody even knows they were here, let alone their joys and sorrows, their accomplishments and failures. 

I realized this morning that my things, everyone's things, were always going to go without the story about them, for we were always going to leave this planet one day. Our very existence will be forgotten somewhere in the passing of time.

Yet I also saw that all we do is important, and we will be asked about it all, when we drop our bodies and our souls go forth.  We will not be asked about our things. We will be asked about our soul development and participation. Did we love? Did we forgive? Were we generoius? What did we do with the gift of life?

So we come full circle back to the now. Each moment of now we have some control over, at least over our input into it. Each moment we can choose love over hate or judgementalness. Each now we can choose forgiveness over resentment. Each moment we can choose generosity over selfishness or stinginess, Just as we can only breathe in this moment for this moment (we cannot breathe for any other time), we can choose to be lights, to shine our Christ nature, to be more than we knew we could be, now and then now and then the next now. We can take charge of who we are one moment at a time.

I know that is what really matters. I know that is what we will be asked about. I know each and every person is a sacred life, and is called to live each sacred moment in the highest and most lght-filled way possible. Life on earth is both a challenge and a gift. Life on earth is a school to develop our spiritual muscle, so to speak, and to rise up and be the light. I urge you to turn your light on the bright setting.

A Thought from Socrates

... a man who is good for anything ought not to calculate the chance of living or dying; he ought only to consider whether in doing anything he is doing right or wrong — acting the part of a good man [woman] or of a bad. -- Socrates during his trial

He wrapped up ideal human behavior in these few words, words that travel across the many centuries to us today and to countless others along the way.

 He places it in our hands to judge ourselves, to examine our choices moment by moment. 

As I look around, I sadly see a significant number of people who do not ask this of themselves. Or it seems highly unlikely they do by the results in their lives and the prob!ems we see and hear about daily.

To use Shakespeare's metaphor, all the world is a stage, we ask Socrates' question - what part are we playing? Are we playing a good part or a bad part? Are we a hero or a villain? Are we a bystander? Do we show courage and faith? 

Ask yourself Socrates' question, and answer honestly.