Rather be happy ....

I watched a movie about Bill Maher's search for God - Religulous. It was rather interesting but his intentions seemed mixed between 1) simply wanting to make a comedy, 2) confirming his disbelief and needing the world's support, and 3) perhaps a deep sense of really wanting to know.

I see religion, in the sense of it being man's make-up of beliefs and rules about God, and God & His actual Word, can be quite disparate, and the spirit of the law compared to the letter of the law.

I think he would have found more if he had read the Bible before exploring the people (who are going to be imperfect anywhere - glad he didn't come my way :)) and also the historical facts of Jesus recorded by non-believing historians AT THAT PRECISE TIME, both of which, he seemed somewhat lacking in knowledge.

Upon thinking, I decided, that even if I was wrong in what I believe, I'd rather be happy believing that I have a plan and purpose, and experience the joy I feel when I trust I am doing God's will, and that He's taking care of me, to that of feeling my life is just here today and gone tomorrow, and therefore of little or no consequence.

I don't see how we can go wrong if we live by the precept of LOVING YOUR NEIGHBOUR AS YOURSELF, as Jesus summed up the law in relation to others. I think there is a sense of eternity in all of our hearts ...... ?

RELATIONSHIPS – LIKENED TO PLANTS

(This is true in many factors – but obviously not all)

When we embark on a relationship we should have a priority of being committed to making it work. If that basic factor is missing, we are not ready for one.

If we wish to have a plant in our garden, we may go to a nursery to procure a seedling. When we find one to our liking we then take it home to plant.

We then take the necessary steps to ensure the seedling has the best opportunity for growth and we invest our time and effort into doing so.

We then have to carefully tender the plant – watering it, ensuring the weather conditions are correct, fertilizing it and weeding around it to make sure our other plants don’t smother it or crowd it out completely.

If it shows signs of disease or weakness we then take the steps required to strengthen it or cure the disease.

All the time we are doing this – our focus remains and is constant on how lovely the plant will be when it is fully grown and what an asset it will be to our garden or what a harvest it will bring.

Now in many aspects relationships can be likened to this.

Firstly, most people easily take the first couple of steps. But then fall completely short of all the rest.

We expect our relationship to grow and flourish in the absence of all that is necessary to make it so – which in the light of our intelligence, is ironic.

After the initial planting, some people expect to reap an immediate harvest. They don’t expect to have to invest much more of themselves – if anything – but expect all to be well and good in the relationship. Or expect the plant to overnight be full grown and exactly how we envisioned it from the start.

If we see a sign of trouble (disease), instead of doing all necessary to correct the situation, we often thinking of uprooting our plant – and may actually keep doing so – and then replanting – until the plant (relationship) is completely dead.

Current contemporary focus is NOT on a constant commitment to carry it thru, or on a happy ending that takes any effort. We, too often, are easily side-tracked on escape, avoidance or some other negative focus. Even wondering if the right decision was made in the first place – usually putting a hold on all effort (eg watering and the rest) during those periods.
This would not generally happen with a plant and our intelligence should tell us that this is NOT the way to success – but uncannily we often think LESS of relationships than we do of plants, and then often constantly wonder “what’s going wrong?”

Unlike when a plant is planted, and thoughts are towards seeing the plant in full growth, people often go from nursery to nursery having a look in case there might be a BETTER plant so we can uproot the one we’ve got and replace it. Or one might not only look, but actually keep getting new plants and uprooting the old ones. Never ever finding the amazing joy, love and intimacy that a relationship can bring.