I found Jesus!

Sunday, November 13^th, 2011

      Jesus Saves! I'm not sure how many of you are aware of that. I found Jesus today in the Truck Stop Ministries. Every Sunday, one can find these makeshift chapels set up at truck stops across the nation (hence the name). From now on, I'll be singing the praises of our Lord Jesus Christ; they were kind enough to give me a Bible (with a capital “B”!) and some hymns to sing when I get lonely out here. I will be going to sermons every Sunday whenever possible and spread the word of God to all I encounter. My soul has been saved!

      Yeah, just kidding. I'll probably adhere more to Taoism and Buddhism thank you very much. Still, for all of that, I did sit in on a sermon, and there was a fairly ecstatic believer (named Hutch) attending today. There was this other guy Steve, myself, a guy from south Asia (presumably Indian, but he left after the songs) and the two gentlemen preaching the sermon. One of the “preachers” whose name eludes me, played guitar and sang all sorts of Jesus themed songs to open the session. Are they called sermons? Anyway, there were three songs . Then came the sermon. It endured for about an hour, and the preacher, named Josh was a fairly steadfast believer in what he was saying. He ended the sermon with a podcast featuring some firebrand preacher, going on about the King of Kings, which was quite entertaining. That's the nuts and bolts of the experience, but I came away with some insights which may be more relevant.

      The first major insight I found was simply noticing how resistant I was to the whole experience. I certainly did not want to sing along. Or share my toys. Simply noticing my resistance I became aware of how rigid I can be in defining who I am as a person. Granted, we will always have our own ideas of who we are as people, but I'm talking about the labels we apply to ourselves. Just because I prefer Eastern traditions does not mean that I need to shut myself off to a Western experience that may yield nuggets of wisdom, like this experience did. So for all intensive purposes, I dropped my guard and joined in, figuring, “what the hell. Immersion into a foreign culture is a good way to flow with the situation.”

      The second insight had to do with what Josh was preaching. I want to say Deuteronomy 17. Something about people asking for things and getting them. this simply reinforced a belief I've already had about the Universe being gracious and giving in general and leaving humans to experience the consequences of what we ask for. That will always hold true, across all religious traditions.

      Thirdly, it helped remind me that while the Universe will provide all we ask for, we have to believe that it will be so, and send our energies out into the world. This, tied in with Fabio's latest blog entry http://kundalinisurge.blogspot.com/2011/11/4-of-pentacles.html spoke of financial means. Essentially, we have to give with sincerity and belief knowing that it will come back to us many fold. This is true for all forms of energy, money, love, other emotions and so forth (I'm hard pressed to think of other energy forms right now).

      Apart form the insights, I did get a chance to speak with Josh about why he does this and what he believes. He is a public defender, and spends lots of time defending people who keep ending up in trouble. Right on. We certainly need someone to be compassionate and helpful to people who keep f*cking up. When asked why he preaches at this truck stop he went on to say that he was a bit of a rebel, and disliked authority of the church. Go figure.

      Far and away, the most lol-worthy/disturbing nugget from this whole undercover operation was his views of the future. In Deuteronomy 17, the bible lays down the laws for having kings. simple laws like do not multiply your horses, do not have more than one wife, do not multiply your gold and silver and write down the word of law. Simple enough. So Josh gets into this whole thing a bit deeper, and asks why god suggested we stick to only 1 wife, and the obvious answer is that it creates a sh*t storm of politics. As a ruler, you cannot manage a kingdom in an enlightened way when you've got all this other stuff distracting you. Fair enough. Bringing it somewhat to the present day, I asked him if he advocated 1 party rule. He responded saying that there will be a one party rule, a theocracy with Jesus at the fore, and his reign shall last 1000 years.

      My jaw dropped a little at that statement. He earnestly believes this, which of course he's entitled to. Perhaps my skepticism comes from the experience of all past theocracies, which involved persecuting of heretics. Or maybe it comes from the one party rule idea. Communism seems to work well for China, right? ( http://ejw.thisweekinblackness.com/blog/2011/11/13/bachmann-china/ ) While the fine details of one party rule and theocracy leave a bit of a bad taste in my mouth, I may be willing to consider what the world would be like if everyone lived as a buddha or with a christ consciousness. There would be peace, we'd all organize for the greater good, there would be healing for all who need it. Yeah, that would be cool, so long as nobody tried to tell me what was what.

     Overall, this adventure has taught me that I can be open to other view points without embracing them. I can learn to see the divine in everyday life. I will get what I ask for, so long as I know it to be true. Starting with the desired end in mind, I can co-create reality... but only with some help.