REFORMATION

The evenning sky promises another beautiful clear day.

Reform means to take a new shape or to form again.  Reform happens in religion when there is reinterpretation and renewed inspiration. This keeps it alive and revelavant to our day as it  goes through reformation that helps us understand words and stories written so many ages ago with certain goals and attitudes and beliefs in their God.  A god of war that stood on their side because they were right and their religion gave them superiority over others. 

I am hoping for another nice day to go out to do some shopping.

It has been brought to my attention that my lamp shades in my funny T.V. room do not match.

  I am changing all my lamps around but maybe I should just change the lamp shades

 but they are very expensive.

 

I am hoping for another warm and sunny day as I want to first go out and take some pictures. 

Reformation has been a power force for change in the Christian faith and as we read the Bible we will come across controversies and contradictions.  Either you have a religion that is black and white or you have a religion that is built on diversity.  Religious diversity that has ethical standards and that is open to change can be like a pathway toward what is the complete picture.  Our goal is to live all of life to a higher plane and allow the spirit of God to reveal to us the light that is hidden in the very human words written ages ago. 

Reformation started way back in the time of Ezra, at the beginning of the fourth century, when he was sent by the Persian King as the minister of Jewish affairs with a mandate to make the miscellaneous teachings that were credited to Moses into what became the Torah.  The Persians were reviewing the legal systems of all their subjects to make sure they were compatible with the security of the empire.  Ezra would then work out a satisfactory reformation between Mosaic law and Persian jurisprudence.  At this time the Jews were in complete malaise and under the influence of foreign standards even though they had rebuilt their second temple at Mount Zion.  They need spiritual discipline that was based on the "law of Moses".  Ezra was a scholar who would interpret the scriptures.

"Torah study was not an academic exercise but a spiritual quest"  This quest would be open to reinterpretation.  Revelation had not happened once and for all time, but it was an on going process"

This is from the book :The Bible" by Karen Armstrong.

Jews had started in the third century to translate their scriptures into Greek, the project probably initiated by the Alexandrian Jews themselves but over the years it acquired a mythical aura.  The Greek King of Egypt so impressed by the Jewish scriptures that he, Ptolemy Philately's, that he wanted a translation for his library.  So six elders from the twelve tribes worked on the text to preserve it forever :imperishable and unchanged".  It was believed that the translators were inspired.

Until Philo [70 BCE to 45BCE] a Jew who came from a wealthy family in Alexandria changed the word into allegories of divine logos [reason] that carried over the essence of the Semitic tales  They were questing after wisdom and would base their on allegory on numerology and etymology; transform their Homeric stories into moral philosophy.  Names took on deeper symbolic meanings.  Adam, became nous [natural reason] and even though the literal meaning was still taken seriously there was deeper meanings that changed the physical or dimensional dimension and were transformed into myths.  Real happenings that had a spiritual dimension that transcended time.  "Unless they were liberated from their historical content and became a spiritual reality they could have no religious function."  There would be a central thread that ran through all the readings.  Philo wrote four theses on Cain and Abel coming to the conclusion that the main theme was the battle between love of self and love of God.  Cain wanted to keep everything for himself while Abel was willing to submit and honor God; this resulting in anger in Cain and he destroyed his brother but was really destroying the love of God in his own heart.

GOALS

Ben and grandpa Larry had a goal to make a bird house and they did.  It is good to have goals that challenge us at times.  Yesterday was one of those days that I did not make my goal of a complete walk but after coming home and resting felt much better and was able to do my visiting at the Nursing Home.  I am getting to know the smokers who are sitting outside the front door when I arrive.  They are a cheerful group.

One of my goals is to stop and appreciate each moment of the day.  Often I find my mind full of worries about the past or about the future.  Prayer can help me to achieve moments of timelessness when a verse of scripture like this one "As thy days, so shall thy strength be" help me to relax and be content.  Also as you pray for others you become aware of how small your problems are compared to others.  I have so much to be thankful for and all I have to do is to be more trusting.

Every morning I am awake when it is still dark but I am amazed how quickly the light appears.  I am amazed also how  the time flies by as I sit at my computer.  The only sound is the soft hum of the computer and the occasional car starting up outside.

I glance at the paper as I pick it up and see the grieving picture of a mom and dad pleading for help to find the one who murdered their daughter.  Is human cruelty an acquired trait?  Good and evil will always be a part of the human existence.  I believe that a good thing about Christianity is the goal of being ethical.  We use reason and faith to help us choose and act upon what we believe.

Science and religion need not be incompatible but two different ways of looking at life.  Science wants to know and gather facts while faith that flows from the religious soul is open to trusting there is a connection between us and the presence of goodness.

 Like the gentle wind that blows freshness into a stuffy room God is real.
 Children take delight in every small bug and stone, puddles of water and all the things of nature that we         soon  take for granted.  I am reminded to nurture this wonder and connectedness to the natural.

This helps us to reconnect to the spiritual life.
And to disconnect to the "circling thoughts", the unremitting flow of thoughts that distract us. 

We are a part of the natural world and have a responsibility to try to preserve it.  It has become so easy to waste and throw good things away because it is just apart of our lifestyle.  We always want bigger and better,A pre-Columbian myth holds that two peoples inhabit the North and the South of our continent.  The people of the eagle, in the north are very cerebral, inventive, and materialistic; while to the south, the people of the Condor live on the level of the spirit and the heart.  I think that we all battle these two opposites within us and maybe the goal is to strengthen the side of you that is weaker. 

DELIGHTFUL

This time of year seeing the sun brighten up the morning walk makes it delightful.  Then it was off to Vera Faders for lunch with the Jetlag Bible group.  She had made several phone calls to check on the ingredients that she put into the hearty soup she made.  We were all talking about the miracle of the minners being resced.  We are starting a study of the whole Bible but although we have a study guide we wander off the topic a lot.

There always things that come out of the readings that stir up a response within me.  Reading about the history of the past and all the discoveries that are being dug up and examined in the earth has strengthened my faith in the scripture.  How the world was created is beyond our comprehension but believing that God created man with his own hands out of the dust of the earth as his final act that was completed with Eve; gives humanity a dignity and a purpose as the very life of God has been breathed into their souls.  We have been given minds to discover the truth and the ability to make choices and the awareness of our vulnerability.

We talked about some of the beautiful places that awaken in us delight in the beauty that surrounds us.  We laugh a lot which helps us not get stuck in being dogmatic and rigid.  I am so thankful for Luther who failed to find God's love in a monastery with fasting and prayer and denial of comforts.  He left to begin a critical study of the Bible and to find out what the church had kept hidden.

Reading the scripture for it's transforming power that was to be applied to our everyday walk with God allows the creative spirit within each one of us to emerge.  We are stirred to keep thinking about what we are reading and find what opens the spirit within us.

Words are powerful tools and the scriptures create a love and appreciation for language that can be poetic and full of imagination if we can discover what inspired the writers but also realizing they had their own interpretations of life as it was being lived around them.  Stories of the past would be added to  until it became written down. 

The gift of faith helps us unwrap what we are reading.

I came home and dad and I had an early supper on our front porch in the sunlight. The beginning of the end of the delightful day.

God in Genesis 1 was delighted with all of creation and desired to share his delight with us.

BRAVERY

My last roses continue to bloom as the days grow darker and colder.  One of the things I love best about the fall is all the colours and the stillness as nature takes time to rest.

When I went to bed last night the first three miners had been rescued.  After 69 days underground in the humid darkness these brave men are being brought to the surface in a specially-made steel cage.  Their families had been praying faithfully and waited anxiously for their loved ones to be reunited to them.  I cannot imagine how those miners endured being in that torture chamber but I believe that their faith in God's presence with them helped them. It was a miracle that they had been found and also that they would be able to communicate with their loved ones in the days to come.  They were told the rescue would take months.

In the meantime they would face death together.

This reminded me of how in the past i had read about a young woman who faced death and indeed did die in the concentration camp of Auschwitz.  Her name is Etty  Hillsman.   She would be sent to Auschwitz in a packed railway car sitting on a rucksack with her mother and father and brother.  She scribbled a few words on a postcard and released it out a crack not knowing if it would ever be found or reach the person it was addressed to.  The words that she wrote before her journey there and her words that have been saved from her writings are truly inspiring   She had during the years previous kept a diary not knowing what her fate would be in the uncertain times as a Jew living in the harsh and fearful world of the Third Reich.  She wanted with all her being not to hate as she saw it as a soul sickness.  She was a Jew living in Holland in 1941.  In the fall of 1940 the first series of laws were passed designed to set Jews apart.  All Jewish-owed enterprises were to be registered as were all Dutch Jews.  This caused poverty to become the first stage to their distruction.  She would see her favorite professors arrested or harassed into excile or suicide.

She has to face the reality of death and decides not to waste her energies fearing or denying or evading it.  This is how she discovers freedom even though there is great desolation all around her.  She was pressed by friends to go into hiding but refused.

  These were published in English in 1984 as "An Interrupted Life".  The words she wrote were a therapeutic tool that changed her life from one of playfulness to one of prayerfulness,  to find strength for herself and for the other lives she impacted. 

"Slowly but inexorably while the world around her was falling to pieces, Etty moved into a state of grace.  She had been at odds with organized religion bu through inspirational literature and spiritual practices she would experience "the inward tug of God"  This was before she was sent to Auschwitz and when she was sent there her faith strengthened her and she was able to feel God's presence even there.

 She lived out the belief that is true to my heart that religion is a tool that can help us live with compassion; aware of our humanness but also aware of our need for holiness.
Etty had struggled with depression and mood swings that would cause her to experience writer's block.

Although she had in her past used the word God she thought it was primitive and primordial, "a makeshift construction".  I feel that way too but one uses the words that express the mystery of life in a term that people can identify in some way.  We all may view God in different ways and in different forms but there is an energy that fills the emptiness and feeds the soul that nothing else can do. 

Etty wrote: "I try to look things straight in the face, even the worst crimes, and to discover the small, naked human being amide the wreckage caused by man's senseless deeds. . . . .I am no fanciful visionary, God. .
I try to face up to your world, God, not to escape from reality into beautiful dreams."

This woman of sharp intelligence and irreverence whose greatest desire was to touch the world through her writing.  She had experience relationships and viewed sexuality with matter-of-fact humour.  She was not searching for God but for freedom in her life as a woman who could make her own choices.  She hoped to be one of a group she called emancipated women.

She learned in one of her relationships with a Jewish divorced man, father of two daughter, a successful business man as  he tried to help others find courage in the face of suffering and he viewed his gifts as a sacred trust.  She was able to turn, with difficulty, from a critical, rational atheist, to one who believed and it was her faith in the end that gave her the courage to live.

This is a picture from the T.V.  showing them surrounding the 32nd miner being rescued from the mine in Chile.
{I am writing this very quickly after a late start because I know Sandra will look on her computer as soon as she gets to work and I want to have this posted.}

OPINIONS

This is Carol and Morgan talking on Skype to Ken, Melina ,Matt and Jassy

We all came hungry and happy to be together at the home of Sandra and Randy.  Randy was the happiest because his son Mich was here for a few days visiting.  Dinner was absolutely perfect and everything tasted so good.  But it was not long before we all started airing our opinions about the state of the world and then about what type of school one should send your child to.
Theresa has chosen a school for Ben that she drives to each day because the teachers and the parents are committed to education.  Dad see the disadvantage is that he does not know the children in his own area which because they live close to down-town there are not as many as if they lived in a sub-divsion and a cul-de-sack.  As parents we all want the best for our children.  Times have changed very much since we were free to place outside for hours and roam far and wide; especially when we were able to ride bikes.  I was taught not to talk to strangers, maybe I should remember that more on my walks, but there was not a big concern about this.

Over the years words have been used to articulate our beliefs and our traditions.  A lot of communication is done by the writen word, like the newspaper, magazines, books etc.  Even the words we hear in our songs stay in our minds at times. 

We express our feelings and our needs in words as we strive to articulate our inner life with our outward action.  I am what I have observed and been taught and have absorbed especially from the books I read.
What does it really mean when the Bible describes Jesus as the living word?  Living means that it is alive and his words have the power to transform the soul.  Living words inspire us and embody the spirit.  I am not alone in wanting to find authenticity.

There is a current belief that we cannot trust those in authority in govnerment and in religion and this is causing erosion in many of our churches.  We want to be able to express our mind in all matters and this can cause hurt feelings at times.  At least I admit that my feelings have been hurt by what people have said to me.  Like many other things I need to let it go and get over it.

Universities I believe were started to teach theology but have branched out into history, science, philosoply, human behavior, the law and rights of individuals and society.  We have been encouraged to learn from the past but be open to a new future.

I think I grew up in a wonderful time and at times I wish my grandchildren could have the same freedom and joy of being a child that I experienced.  I feel that they are growing up too fast and they know so much more about life than I did.  Reading has the potential for them as it did for me to broaden my life.  I especially enjoyed reading to my children and my grand-children.  I find it impossible to walk by a book store and I am so thankful for libraries where I can take out twenty or more books.

Right now I have a pile of books and I know I cannot possibly read them all.  The book I got about Thankfulness was far to wordy and complicated.

Errors in Holy Scripture?  The word "metanoette" in Mathew 3:2 was translated as do penance which lead to confession of sin but when we read it to me repent we see that it means an inner change of action that will bring us salvation.  This was the whole debate that Luther started in 1517 as he challenged the church of his day.

Words are spiritual and political and there are politics in all our churches and this is why there are problems.
At times I think I have the answer to solve some one else's problems but I really do not if I have no idea of their experiences and the woundedness of their souls.

BEING THANKFUL

I was not thankful, in fact I was miserable.  Our second thanksgiving was a can of beans and maybe an apple.  The day was cold damp and dreary and I was missing my family a lot.  I had been learning to make our  money stretched but this holiday came just before payday and there just was no extra.  Our precious little dog Dusty had also been run over and he had been such good company for me.

I had things to be thankful for, our healthy baby boy, a car, your dad had a job and we had a place to live.  We went for a drive after our dinner of beans and I remember gazing at the houses I saw with the windows all steamed up and groups of happy people inside.

One thing I have learned if you want to be unhappy compare yourself with others.

I knew that I could trust that life would improve not only because of faith in God
 "a personality that peaks behind the mystery of the unknown"
but also trusting that with hard work and using the skills we had been given our lives would improve.  I do not know where I got that quote from but I trust that there is meaning in it for others as well as myself.  Learning to trust is something I am doing.

Years later our son Rick would cook dinner for us and we throughly enjoyed it!

I am thankful for all the good things we have in our life now.  Just to be with family today will be a blessing.
Good health, good friends and the ability to give to others whether it is a small gift to the food bank or being able to cheer some one else's life up with a visit and receiving their appreciation.

Yes, that was our worst thanksgiving and the one I remember so strongly.  It has been replaced by ones of great joy, like when Sandra and Randy surprised us by getting married on Thanksgiving Day.  What a surprise!  We were in their home in Fort Saskatchewan and who should arrive to join our family group but a lady marriage person.  Perfect timing because all the family was there.  Randy's parents and children and Sandra's children.  I was so happy that these two had found each other and would now share the rest of their lives committed to each other.

Being thankful for what one has is good for the soul.  As a Christian I thank to .  God for each day, a gift of grace. 

The parable of the good samaritan is one that teaches us to see those less fortunate than ourselves and not be so busy with our activities that we forget those less fortunate.  I admire those who will be making dinner for the homeless and I am reminded that it is the little acts of kindness that people ofen remember.

I miss the grandchildren and my children who will not be with us today but I am happy that their lives are going well.  Dad and I are thankful to have each other.  I am trying to take my cell phone with me so he won't worry when he does not know where I am.  So in Chapters he phones to find me in the store and I am right behind him. 

The other lesson that I am learning is to give up trying to control.  I always have an ides or a plan for my day but if it does not work out I am still grateful especially for the unexpected surprises.

An open heart, a generous spirit, a little extra in my purse to give away, being thoughtful and kind make gratitude much easier. 

I am thankful that as a Christian I walk in grace, which is unmerited and abundant and flows continually into our lives and all I need to do is receive it..
I am truly thankfun for all the prayers that have been answered!
Happy Thanksgiving all!

DOG DAYS

We

We are a family that loves our animals and Sandra, in this picture, is coaching the dogs to get into the bath on the truck.  Susan, has come to wash the dogs and Randy and I and dad are standing by watching the fun.

Over the years we have had all sorts of pets big and small.  We do not have any animals right now and we are content to feed the neighbors dog and welcome a visit from the cat next door.

I am hoping for a better day today.  I have had a rash of shingles that are extremely itchy break out on my back.  I think that was why I was feeling so chilled.  Fortunately I have some pills from when I had it before which stops the spread and eases the discomfort.

I had poor judgement yesterday when I kept dad waiting and worrying at Zellers.  I thought I had time to walk down and over to the bank and still be there to meet him in time.  It took longer than I thought and was very upsetting for dear old dad!

Dad is trying to tape a program on a disk for a friend and now the T.V. does not work.  Very frustrating.

Today is a new day with new possibilities.  We will go to church and enjoy the music, the teaching and our friends. 

I am continuing to read the history of religion and finding it helpful to my understanding of the Bible.  There came a time when tilling the fields became a ritual that replaced the hunt and this is the setting for the story of Cain and Abel.  Change is not easy especially when we are sure that we know what God wants. We see the power of jealousy so strong it destroys.  This theme is carried out in many of our modern novels even today.

We want to be free of our negative emotions and experience healing that lifts us and frees us momentarily beyond ourselves.  Today we are more aware of the need for our interior world to feel the powerful presence of holiness; but this is not an easy thing to accomplish.  We may have moments of awe and wonder but most of the time we are more aware of our own humanness.

Yesterday as I was walking I met a lady covered in black with only two little eyes showing.  Usually I just kinda look away but I decided to smile and say hello.  She not only said hello but asked and how are you in the kindest voice.  I do not know if she chooses to dress this way or if it is a religious obligation or if it is of her own free will or forced upon her. 

As long as we are unwilling to learn from one another and see a person as a wife and mother, sister or daughter just like me; we continue to breed fear and anxiety.