spiritual discussionsThis is the place at AW for mamas to learn about all different religions and beliefs, to ask questions, to give answers- all done with respect! if you don't have anything nice to say here- don't say anything at all.
I was thinking while going through the motions of cleaning....how could God condemn a person who may not believe in Jesus as messiah. I hear all of the time about secular people who are self centered and think only of themselves. But, if this board is any indication of the mindset of these people, then there is nothing selfish about them. I have "met" some of the most genuine and caring, unselfish moms here, and I cannot wrap my tiny brain around the concept of ****ation for these people. Now, maybe I'm incorrect in assuming that they do not believe in Jesus as the messiah, but I don't think so...ugh! I don't think I'll ever get it....
I'm a Christian and I don't totally get it either. Especially when you take into consideration the fact that many people in the world have never even heard of Jesus. Someone once said that he keeps a file in his brain entitled "Things too high for me" and in it he has put issues like this, children who die, suicide, etc, etc. I decided a file like that in my brain would be handy so I have one too. lol! I believe God has that all figured out and He has a totally fair solution but right here right now I have *no* idea what that solution is. Glad I'm not God. lol!
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~*~Tiffany~*~
"Receive the children with reverence.
Educate them in love.
Send them forth in freedom."
~Rudolf Steiner
I guess the problem is that someone will always come along and disagree with an argument. there is no way to know for sure who is interpreting things correctly, you just have to follow your gut. I was definitely told at my old church that unless you accept jesus you are not going to heaven...that is something I cannot accept. I am just going to have to go to Hell, I guess.
I guess the problem is that someone will always come along and disagree with an argument. there is no way to know for sure who is interpreting things correctly, you just have to follow your gut. I was definitely told at my old church that unless you accept jesus you are not going to heaven...that is something I cannot accept. I am just going to have to go to Hell, I guess.
I don't think you're going to hell! I don't believe that either and I'm certainly not going to hell.
Hang in there. I'm sure you can figure out a way to balance your believe in Jesus, and your disbelief in some of the religious dogma which mankind has built up around his name/teachings.
Thanks..I don't know why i'm always thinking about this stuff...I just found a book I used to have Earth Medicine. I used to love it, then my Christian friends told me it was against the teachings of Jesus, so I got rid of it. (I was going to the SBC then.) I recently started thinking about it again and found it suoer cheap on Amazon. I started re-reading it and *still* love it! It's based on Native American ideas.
Thanks..I don't know why i'm always thinking about this stuff...I just found a book I used to have Earth Medicine. I used to love it, then my Christian friends told me it was against the teachings of Jesus, so I got rid of it. (I was going to the SBC then.) I recently started thinking about it again and found it suoer cheap on Amazon. I started re-reading it and *still* love it! It's based on Native American ideas.
Good for you for getting that book again. There is absolutely nothing I can think of that would conflict between something like that and a belief in Jesus as messiah. I just don't.
You Listen to your Heart -- and your God will lead you correctly.
Thanks..I don't know why i'm always thinking about this stuff...I just found a book I used to have Earth Medicine. I used to love it, then my Christian friends told me it was against the teachings of Jesus, so I got rid of it. (I was going to the SBC then.) I recently started thinking about it again and found it suoer cheap on Amazon. I started re-reading it and *still* love it! It's based on Native American ideas.
Were there specific things they had a problem with in it? I haven't read it or heard of it. My POV is that God made the earth for our benefit. The reason there are medicinal plants is because He has provided them for us to heal us when we're sick. I don't get why some have a problem with that but think doctors are the cat's meow when *their* methods often harm as well as heal. Baffles me really.
Were there specific things they had a problem with in it? I haven't read it or heard of it. My POV is that God made the earth for our benefit. The reason there are medicinal plants is because He has provided them for us to heal us when we're sick. I don't get why some have a problem with that but think doctors are the cat's meow when *their* methods often harm as well as heal. Baffles me really.
The problem was with Jesus not being the focus of the book. I want to explain it clearly, but I'm finding it hard to do so. An example of what was disapproved of would be anything that dealt with spirits or prayers to anything/anyone other than God/Jesus. My church was very much against anything like Psychics because they said they dealt with Satanic realms. Unless you are glorifying God/Jesus you are worshipping false idols...not well written, but maybe you get what I'm trying to say.
I found this about a year ago in an online newsletter from an Orthodox Christian parish. Now, some of the Christianity may not apply to your beliefs, but it does show that there are other thoughts on this matter from people who are Christian.
"Perhaps there are many pathways to the Giver of Life, Who is Everywhere Present, Who Fills All Things.
But the question remains, can one reject Christ and still achieve spiritual wholeness? The famous medicine man Black Elk believed the Indian tradition had been given by God to prepare the Indians for the revelation of Christ. (Michael Streltenkamp's Black Elk, Holy Man of the Oglala, University of Oklahoma Press.) In comparing the various Native American Traditions to the mystic heart of the ancient Orthodox Christian Tradition (the original persecuted Christian Church of Christ,) we can find several corresponding links supporting this very idea. In both traditions we begin prayers by offering sweet fragrance to our Father in Heaven, or in the Native American tradition, to "Sky Father." The Native Americans honor The Great Mystery in all the directions, and pray facing east, just as we Orthodox face east in prayer. The Bishops of the Orthodox church face east, south, west and north - to honor the Sun, Jesus Christ, rising in all the directions.
The traditional American Indian idea of the Creator is expressed as The Great Mystery, and The Great Spirit. The Orthodox Church also shares the notion of God as Mystery, expressed beautifully by Bishop Kallistos Ware in his book, The Orthodox Way. He writes how the Greek Fathers "liken man's encounter with God to the experience of someone walking over the mountains in the mist: he takes a step forward and suddenly finds that he is on the edge of a precipice, with no solid ground beneath his foot but only a bottomless abyss...our normal assumptions are shattered... And so it proves to be for each one who follows the spiritual Way. We go out from the known to the unknown, we advance from light into darkness. We do not simply proceed from the darkness of ignorance into the light of knowledge, but we go forward into greater knowledge which is so much more profound."
And if the Holy Spirit, as the dynamic, as opposed to the still, aspect of God, in Orthodoxy, can be equated to the Native American concept of The Great Spirit, then perhaps we have reached the point where Christianity can be presented as the fulfillment of Indian tradition - in a new aspect of God. God as Person. A God who came to us to show his humble love for us. . A God who experienced manhood out of his deep sympathy. "In his ecstatic love, God unites himself to his creation in the closest of all possible unions, by himself becoming that which he has created." (Bishop Kallistos Ware) "Behold, I make all things new." (Rev. 21:5) This does not mean we replace or destroy the old. Many aspects of the Orthodox tradition correspond directly to the ancient beliefs of Native Americans, and perhaps this ancient window can also provide us with a greater scope of the deep Christ Heart.
One of our old, old holy men said,"Every step you take on earth should be a prayer. The power of a pure and good soul is in every person's heart and will grow as a seed as you walk in a sacred manner. And if every step you take is a prayer, then you will always be walking in a sacred manner."CharmaineWhiteFaceOglala Lakota
I believe God has that all figured out and He has a totally fair solution but right here right now I have *no* idea what that solution is. Glad I'm not God. lol! 
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