For Wednesday

I'm going to get ahead of myself and write this on Sunday for Wednesday, just because things have been a little nuts.  My class reunion meeting was last night, and I took my guitar so I could team up with one of my classmates for part of the entertainment we have planned.  He plays the guitar.  I hope someone sings with me.

So what can we talk about today?

I think maybe the nugget of the understanding of faith, how's that?

Over the years, I have noticed that people who are simple folk, people who aren't overly scientific, tend to believe more deeply in the matters of faith.  Things like miracles, for example.  When I went to the Rhoda Wise house and saw the video that they show to everyone new to the place, I heard about various happenings in the house.  I heard about lights inside the house before it had electricity.  I heard about the baby Jesus statue coming to life.  I saw the host in the bottom of a large jar still intact after more than 40 years.  I saw Rhoda's cast from when her leg was healed. 

For me, letting my "knowledge" go to the side for a little while helps me to open up and believe that something extraordinary happened in that house.  Enough that after all these years that Rhoda has been gone, people still go there seeking help and assistance, just like they did when Rhoda Wise was alive.

The one thing we don't want to have happen to us or anyone we love is that the education we obtain leads us away from the most important thing in our entire lives -- our faith. 

When you tell a child a story about Santa Claus or the Easter bunny, and their eyes widen with excitement and belief, you see that simplicity in action.  And we are told to believe as the little child believes.  We need not over-analyze anything, such as why would a piece of wheat still be on the bottom of a jar with water after 40+ years?  We don't need to have the answer for that.  We just need to trust God and believe.

There are a number of books out right now that deal with miraculous things -- like near death experiences, for example.  One of them is "Heaven if for Real," and I recommend it.  It is written simply and without a lot of flourish.  You can finish it in a day or so without much trouble if you read fast.  The other is an account of a near death experience that a doctor tells about -- he gained faith through this incident.  There are some others.  Someone recommended a book in a posting the other day as she was requesting prayers for a man with Stage 4 prostate cancer.  I'll find it and write about that book in the next blog posting, okay?

One of the true gifts of education is that we can READ the materials that deepen our faith.  Sometimes we need to hear an account of something so amazing as a near death experience, of someone who glimpsed the heaven that we so hope to gain.

Personally, I never tire of the personal accounts and wish there were more of them.  I'd watch a TV show about that kind of thing any day of the week, rather than some of the junk we've seen advertised for the new season of shows that's coming. 

Well, time to close now.  So I wish you many blessings and a good day today.

Karen