The Shack

Last Christmas my sister sent a 2007 novel by William P. Young entitled, The Shack. Fabulous book. Here are a few statements that God makes in his conversations with the main character Mack.

"Creation has been taken down a very different path than we desired. In your world the value of the individual is constantly weighed against the survival of the system, whether political, economic, social, or religious--any system actually. First one person, and then a few, and finally even many are easily sacrificed for the good and ongoing existence of the system. In one form or another this lies behind every struggle for power, every prejudice, every war, and every abuse of relationship. The 'will to power and independence' has become so ubiquitous that it is now considered normal."

"You humans, so little in your our eyes. You are truly blind to your own place in the Creation. Having chosen the ravaged path of independence, you don't even comprehend that you are dragging the entire Creation along with you." "So very sad, but it won't be this way forever."

"Nobody knows what horrors I have saved the world from 'cuz people can't see what never happened. All evil flows from independence, and independence is your choice. If I were to simply revoke all the choices of independence, the world as you know it would cease to exist and love would have no meaning. This world is not a playground where I keep all my children free from evil. Evil is the chaos of this age that you brought to me, but it will not have the final say. Now it touches everyone that I love, those who follow me and those who don't. If I take away the consequences of people's choices, I destroy the possibility of love. Love that is forced is no love at all."

"My purposes are always and only an expression of love. I purpose to work life out of death, to bring freedom out of brokenness and turn darkness into light. What you see is chaos, I see as a fractal. All things must unfold, even though it puts all those I love in the midst of a world of horrible tragedies--even the one closest to me." "Everything's about him, you know. One day you folk will understand what he gave up. There are just no words."

"You see broken humans center their lives around things that seem good to them, but that will neither fill them nor free them. They are addicted to power, or the illusion of security that power offers. When a disaster happens, those same people will turn against the false powers they trusted. In their disappointment, they either become softened toward me or they become bolder in their independence. If you could only see how all of this ends and what we will achieve without the violation of one human will--then you would understand. One day you will."

Comments on the Financial Situation - Power

As a kid spending summer vacation at the family cabin in northern Minnesota, my brother and sister and I very often played cards on rainy days. War, spades, cribbage, canasta, and whatever we could think up. Even as kids there were moves to be made, strategy to win the game. "You show me yours and I'll show you mine." Who had the most convincing bluff?

As with playing cards, governments in crisis are now planning their economic strategy, their next move. The question is no longer who has the highest card but who can bluff to win. Ilargi at The Automatic Earth blog writes,
I told you: this is not an economic crisis anymore, it’s a full-blown political emergency, and they’re all trying to hang on to "power".

"We see again that every crisis in the aging political-economic-military-cultural unity that now makes the infant globalist world-state is used to shore it up more firmly. Each crisis ties the system together more closely and more powerfully." John McCall, spiritual advisor

A couple days ago while standing in line at Rite-Aid the clerk told the woman in front of me that her debit card had no money. The customer, who could not communicate in English anyway, was confused. She pulled out her Rite-Aid discount card. While the clerk explained that the discount card was not a credit card, I wondered what the woman was trying to buy - it was already in a bag.
How much did it cost? Should I pay for it?

The customer walked out without her item. When I left the building, I saw her walking down the road. As I drove home, I decided to carry an extra twenty dollars that would always be available to whomever might need it.

LESSON: I can't control the international economy but I can respond with assistance to those around me.

What makes you care?

What makes you care about those around you? Your family, your friends, your community. What makes me mourn my father's death? What makes me burst with joy at the birth of a grandchild? Love you say. OK.
What is love then?

Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.

This definition comes from a Biblical letter written by Paul to the first century Corinthians in an effort to encourage them to live a life based on love.

For numerous decades we have chosen to narrow the range of this love to ourselves and those whose lives contribute directly to our own. Here we are today living the result of this selfish choice. More and more talks, blogs, interviews, articles, books, conferences, international summits, and innovative thinkers are addressing global crisis issues. Energy. Climate Change. Water. Food. Disease. How can we fix it? If we can't fix it, how can we make the transition? What will the transition look like?

What if in the beginning we were created as a perfect match? The Earth created for mankind to prosper and live on. Mankind created to live together as they managed and maintained the Earth. What if mankind decided to divorce this matchup and do his own thing? Eventually what made them a perfect match would disappear. The unmanaged Earth would lose its ability to prosper mankind. The self-absorbed mankind would lose his ability to manage the Earth. All this because mankind chose to deny their Creator and His purpose for them.

What makes you care today about the lifestyle transition that lies ahead of us? Love. If you didn't love, you would not ask, "How can we all transition together?" You would ask, "How much can I get for myself?" Let's choose to love.

DO OVER

Chile, I need a do over.

For the past ten days my performance in your Quit Now Challenge, quitting an addiction for the month of June, has been weak and pathetic. Oh, I have plenty of excuses - really good ones. In fact my excuses are so good that I had to ask myself where addictions come from.

What makes an addiction? A donut isn't an addiction. A television isn't an addiction. A beer isn't an addiction. These items are inanimate and insignificant. So what turns them into powerful addictions? My answer? Repeatedly choosing the same behavior until that behavior becomes habitual. That habit becomes automatic. That automatic, thoughtless behavior becomes a life style in which free choice is surrendered and the life is taken over. Can addiction be reversed once the addict yields to an automatic, thoughtless life style?

The new path to freedom and independence from the trail of addiction requires stopping, turning, and starting again. But, how can the addict make new decisions if the ability to choose is gone? I believe there is one choice no one can give up. That cannot be taken away. The choice to choose.

The theme of this blog, Choosing to Change, began with a desire to change my established suburban-type life style to an Earth friendly, eco-conscious, crunchy* life style. My husband and I expanded our vegetable garden, started educating ourselves about the environment, bought energy efficient light bulbs. But now I'm up against my addictions, my thoughtless behavior. Now I need to stop, turn, and start again. I choose to change.

*According to the Urban Dictionary, crunchy is an "adjective used to describe persons who have adjusted or altered their lifestyle for environmental reasons. Crunchy persons tend to be politically strongly left-leaning and may be additionally but not exclusively categorized as vegetarians, vegans, eco-tarians, conservationists, environmentalists, neo-hippies, tree huggers, nature enthusiasts, etc."

LESSON: Choosing to change begins at the very heart of who you are.

Day Two: Quitting It Today

DAY ONE: At 7:15pm I ran to the freezer and grabbed ice cream. I only had fifteen minutes to eat as much ice cream as I could hold. Cookies 'n Cream not my favorite flavor but better than no ice cream. I finished eating at about 7:40...passed my 7:30 deadline!! I chose 7:30pm as my cut off time for food, all food, each day because I arrive home from work around 7pm. Except for my coffee, breakfast is usually a healthy meal. For lunch I'll eat something at the hospital cafeteria or brown bag* it. (*Currently standing in for the brown bag is a lovely zipper topped reusable lunch bag.) My eating addiction occurs after work when comfort eating takes over.

DAY TWO: Not bad. I had the day off work today. Started the day with homemade whole grain toast with peanut butter and black raspberry jam, orange juice, and coffee. Lunch included a bean burrito, alfalfa sprouts, Bing cherries, and cheese. Then 6:30pm came. A bowl of popcorn and done by 7:30pm. YES! Of course it's only 9pm now and I have stuff to do before going to bed. Then back to work tomorrow...the stress routine... we'll see tomorrow how it goes. Bon Appetit.

Quit It Today

It took all morning, but finally I chose to join ChileChews challenge to quit an addiction for a month. Although we've begun to change some of our home environment, it's time to change some of our personal chemistry. Everyday no more eating after 7:30pm until breakfast the next morning. Developing an appetite for healthier, simplier food requires cutting out the old habits. Here we go.

"Alfalfa"

Advantages to believing in an Omnipotent, Omniscent, Omnipresent Creator God:

He always knows what's happening.
He always knows what to say.
He always knows what to do.
He can always fix it.
He can always make it better and intends to do so.
He will always respect free choice.

For example: He might ask you to sprout alfalfa for luncheon sandwiches. Then He might ask you to say "alfalfa" at an unlikely moment and watch lives change. (You really had to be there.)

LESSON: Prayer opens the door to problem solving.

Inspiration in Beauty

My work hours this past week fatigued me. A co-worker who works the evening shift took vacation and I filled in part of her time. Different sleep hours interrupted my spring gardening momentum but it did not render me totally unobservant.

This particular day I got off work as usual...about 6:45pm...in spring time that is almost sundown. I collapsed into my car and just sat making an effort to shake off the stress of the day before going home. The hospital is on a small hill with enough open space for a life-flight helicopter to land. Directly in front of my car stood an incredible flowering tree framed with dusty cumulus clouds. With the lowering sun behind me, the mauve flower petals almost sparkled with the light. One of those moments that a photographer watches for...the reason she carries her camera with her always. (Not today of course) As I sat trying to soak in all the beauty, I had what I call a revelation.

All my life, even as a child, I believed in God. I have never not believed. As I've grown so has the size of God. From that first visit to the confessional with my cheat sheet so I wouldn't forget a single sin; to high school discussions with a Jewish girl friend about death, life review, heaven, hell, a state of being; to college where I left the church of my childhood but discovered the miracle of conception and development in Embryology class. Through all this my understanding of heaven developed from harps and clouds to something like cruising the universe learning everything there is to know and more...until I saw that tree.

At that moment all the beauty I had appreciated in my life time came together. The moment of revelation when Creator, creature, and the perfection of habitat became a single thought. The Creator who will stop the destruction of His planet. The Creator who offers new live to those who will choose to accept it. The Creator who will restore His dying planet into its original state - a perfect match for His newly revived creatures. Suddenly I knew I could be totally satisfied living in a world created for me and I for it.

LESSON: See the beauty that lives around you and know it exists for you.

What if...

Today as we backed away from the trees to look at the forest, a side track presented itself. Of course a side track always comes from nowhere but it steals your attention away from all the other thoughts on your mind. David and I have been married for almost twenty years. In the last couple years we have often read aloud together. Today he read Sharon Astyk's May 12, 2008 post. She describes aspects of the rapid change taking place in the Earth not as single elements of carbon emissions or methane bubbles or ice melts, but as a accumulative snowball effect of all the factors. She emphasizes the need for marked life style change in order to ease the serious "fall from the tree" and thus preventing the fatal "fall".
This is where my side track jumped in.

What if everyone in the U.S. was asked to stop using all energy for 24 hours? That's no gasoline, no oil, no propane, no natural gas, no coal, no corn, no electricity. Everyone means all households, public transportation - air, sea, ground - industry, business, education, municipal, government, even medical. All stop.

What if everyone in the U.S. was asked to stop using all energy for one day a week every week?

What if other countries adopted the same policy?

What if the whole world quit energy use for one day a week, every week?

What if scientific data showed that when all, I mean every individual, complied, we could save the planet and a modified version of our life style?

What if some dissented and refused to comply?

What if sanctions were imposed to force the dissenters to comply in order to save the planet?

What if they continued to refuse? What then?

What if the real questions are who are we, where did we come from, and why are we here?