“When each day is the same as the next, it’s because people fail to
recognize the good things that happen in their lives every day that the sun
rises.”
Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist
One of these
days I will hopefully come up with a simple topic to write about. The trouble
is when “simple” pops into my mind, I don’t feel like writing. First allow me to define my terms.
In my opinion depression is the sickness of
the soul. It is dragging your feet day in and day out through your own life,
with sadness and tiredness as you companions, and not remembering the last time
something made you smile.
Overspiritualising is the thinking process and mental attitude by which you deliver
Bible verses and Christian concepts to anything and anyone, without even
understanding what they mean or having had applied them at any stage of your
life in a practical way. It is providing standard phrases you heard from the
pulpit without having spent 5 minutes of your time questioning them, checking
your Bible about them or trying to see what their application is in your life.
It ultimately is an attitude of striking back to anything that makes you
uncomfortable by using Bible verses, without stopping for one second to assess
whether the other party has anything good to say, or something you could learn
from. Been there done that.
Choosing a
good attitude? Well that is a school I am still attending and in what follows I
will describe how I decided to enrol in this school and one of my most
important lessons.
In an era
when our lives revolve around Facebook and Youtube, we keep coming across more
and more videos, pictures and quotes about being positive, successful,
re-inventing ourselves, being happy, content and joyful. Some people might find
these concepts “new agey” (allow me the copyright of this word) and run a
thousand miles. I personally find the majority of them useful and inspiring.
And after twelve years and a bit of reading the Bible and searching, I came to
understand that in their essence all these life concepts are very much found in
the Bible as well. The only MAJOR difference is that the “new agey” stuff
focuses on the human element as being the source and the strength in this
lifestyle, and we believe it is God who prompts us into action and sustains us
along the way in our decisions.
I once heard
Joyce Meyer say “I can’t stand to be around miserable Christians.” Being a
miserable Christian myself at the time, I found her words very harsh. I felt
like shouting at her “You have no idea what it means to be me. You do not know
how hard I am trying.” But in reality all my objections were just excuses.
Furthermore, I would come across verses in the Bible such as John
10:10 “A thief come to steal, kill and destroy. But I (Jesus) came to give
life- life in all its fullness.” Or the Apostle Paul telling me “Always be
happy. Never stop praying. Give thanks whatever happens. That is what God wants
for you in Christ Jesus.” 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18. All these would not help
matters at all.
Again, I felt
tempted to shout at Paul “You have no idea…” The trouble was though, he did,
because this man suffered immensely for what he believed and still kept a good
attitude.
I do not want
to point the finger at anyone, but although I grew up in a church and then made
a conscious commitment as an adult to choose God, the focus always appeared to
be on me making that commitment and once I was part of a church, with a very
few exceptions, there wasn’t much attention paid to mentoring me. I now consider
that a blessing, although I had to pay a price in tears and pain. I consider it
a blessing because I was not grown and developed by a man, but by God.
“I haven’t
stopped obeying Your laws because You Yourself are my teacher.” Psalm 119:102
In those times when I felt lost, depressed and
I would not understand what was happening, I would refuse to give up on what I
found in God and God certainly did not give up on me. I had nobody to go to for
“counselling”, so I would pray and ask my questions and read my Bible and
search in the history of the church and the lives of those who went before me.
You see, I
always approached my Christianity in a very fatalist manner “What if I would be
arrested or could not go to church, what then?” I tried to learn from everyone
and everything and take what was good, but I made a conscious decision not to
depend on anyone for my inner life. Yes, not even my pastor. Now I am glad I did, because as a result my
thinking process and the whole way in which I approach Christianity is not the
product of any man’s thinking, but my own. And that is good considering that I am the only one who will answer to God for what I do. I am not afraid to ask audacious
questions and search for the answers and trust God with all my heart He will
teach me what I need to know. Men might be offended or feel threaten by what
they cannot explain or understand. God never feels that way because He is the
source of all the answers I could ever possibly have.
As a result of this all my spiritual life, this home I built inside myself, has its foundation
solely on my desire to grasp God and discover Him on my own and learn to love
and follow Him because I want to, not because there is some sort of a peer
pressure put on me. In His amazing love
and patience, God taught me things at my own pace, at the right time and in the
right way. No one put any pressures on me to do something that I was not ready
to do, or think something I did not own within me, or act based on something I
did not believe with my heart. God took His time with me and made my roots
strong. Because of that I do not accept anything without questioning and I do
not care who says it. My roots make me feel safe and at home within myself and
whether I belong to a group or not, whether in a church building or in an
office or in an environment which challenges me, I feel secure in what I know. I also learnt to open my mind and my eyes to
the world around me and take what is good because on many occasions, just as
Jesus said, “the children of this world are in
their generation wiser than the children of light.” (Luke 16:8)
By observing,
I learnt a lot from them about a good attitude and guarding my mind and my
heart from thoughts that bring me down. I noticed that for them it seems to be
a natural process that springs from inside of them (when they want to), because
they do not feel this is a way of life they must live, but a way of live they
choose to live. You see, whilst I was trying to force myself into that
lifestyle and failing miserably, they would succeed because they would choose
and then act, rather than hear a sermon and think they must. Yes, I probably
could have learnt all that from the church as well, but in my case all that I was able to find was either
an almost defeated attitude of “here we go, another day. I must pick up my
cross and follow”, or the opposite whereby I would try to almost force myself
to be joyful in an attempt of “fake it till you make it”, which would
completely fail to involve my mind or my heart.
I will stop
at this stage before anyone panics or rushes to the comments box to tell me
how I am a backslider (one who abandons his faith). I believe in the power and
unity of the Church (or a synagogue). At no point in time will I ever profess
that one should abandon the Church and go on their own, not unless they are
prepared to pay a heavy price for it (not the kind of price you want to pay).
What I am talking about here, is a process I see less and less these days-
church goers thinking on their own, telling me something real that comes from
their tested experience rather than some preacher. If we are meant to be
witnesses of Jesus then witness Him, for God’s sake, not the pastor’s last
sermon.
Ok, I’ll admit I am ranting at imaginary people who will probably not
even read this, but bear with me I am getting somewhere J
So yeah, I
learnt to be positive and re-invent myself, be joyful and happy and content
from people, who in the majority of cases, had nothing to do with church, and I have faith in The One who took me on this journey, because time and time again I would
find pretty much the same principles in the Bible.
One such examples, is Psalm
19. I started reading Psalm 19 one day with an attitude of “let’s skip the
first few verses, because I read them countless times and they talk about the
creation.” I then realised that those exact verses told me how to live with a
good positive attitude. Here’s what I
learnt:
“The heavens declare the glory of God,
and the skies announce what his hands
have made.
2 Day after day they tell the story;
night after night they tell it again.
3 They have no speech or words;
they have no voice to be heard.
4 But their message goes out through all the world;
their words go everywhere on earth.
The sky is like a home for the
sun.
5 The sun comes out like a bridegroom from his bedroom.
It rejoices like an athlete eager to
run a race.
6 The sun rises at one end of the sky
and follows its path to the other
end.
Nothing hides from its heat.” Psalm
19:1-6
The sun is at
home in the sky. You too can feel at home within yourself but first you must make
peace with yourself. Be thankful for what you have so that you may
find contentment. That is your foundation before you even start. Without this,
you will either never begin or quit half way, which equals failure. Gratefulness was never a default setting for me. I always acted as if the world owed me something because of what I've been through in my first few years of life. But gratefulness is something you can learn. I personally bought a notebook in which I thank God for everything that means something to me in a day. And trust me there were rainy cold days, when I could not stop thanking Him for allowing me to have a hot shower.
If you ever
paid attention to a sunrise, you might have noticed that it is pretty much a
spectacle. Make a big fuss of your life. Make a big fuss of every moment, every
morning, every experience. If you don’t make a big fuss of your life, who else
will? Every morning take ownership of your day. Tell yourself “This day is mine
and nothing will steal it from me.” If you don’t, routine and boredom and
ungratefulness will sneak in, and your life will pass you by. Soon enough you
will become part of that crowd you keep hearing say “I have no idea where this
week, month or year has gone.” The sun turns every rise and fall into a
celebration. It makes a big fuss of every day. What’s stopping you?
Some people
seem to shine every step of the way. You know who I am talking about because we
all meet them at some point. I call them people with a plan. They expect
something of themselves and that “something”, massive or small, creates in them
eagerness, joy, and determination. They don’t stop until they get to that “something”.
Nothing compares with that satisfaction of reaching your goal, of challenging
yourself time and time again and demonstrate that “limits like fear are just an
illusion.” If you learn just one thing from the sun learn how to rise again and
again and again and keep moving forward until you get to where you’re meant to
get.
You want to
shine? You want to leave your mark on something? You want to know that your
life was not in vain, that you were more than a face in an ocean of people?
Learn from the sun. If you are not already doing this, try and live this way
and it is impossible not to touch your world. You will leave your mark on
people the same way the sun heats everything it shines on. Do you know why?
Because only a few are willing to do this and care enough to stick to it. And
everyone is attracted to light and warmth.
If the
concept of being positive sits uncomfortable with you let me use another one.
Let’s talk about your light and mine. Everyone I ever come across who try to “be
positive” tell me they are looking for “the light”. Let me tell you something
that empowered me like nothing else other than knowing God loves me with
everything He’s got. These people are looking for “the light” and one their
journey they seem content, determined and even joyful. If they can do it, I can
do it and so can you. Do you know why? We have God. We are the children of the
Light. We already have His light inside us and all around us. But if what I am
saying to you right now, goes over your head it is as if someone would have all
the water there is and still die of thirst.
“I have come as Light into the world. I came
so that whoever believes in Me would not stay in darkness.” Jesus, John 12:46 I
mean how much more clearer than this, does He have to be?
“I am not
worried about a bullet with my name on it…just the thousands out there marked
“occupant”” Unknown
“When each day is the same as the next, it’s because people fail to
recognize the good things that happen in their lives every day that the sun
rises.”
Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist
