Be Kind Anyway

Both of my cats are getting on in years now. One is 13 (Mario) and the other is 16 (Toby). They have been best friends almost their entire lives. 

Mario

Toby

They are slowing down but getting more affectionate towards people…

NOT towards one another- Mario will sometimes hiss at Toby. In response, Toby will wait patiently for when Mario is in the mood to be nice, and then he will cuddle with him. Toby Always accepts a cuddle from Mario, no matter how cranky Mario has been acting.

Mario is asleep right now. He was hissing at Toby last night, but... Toby just walked quietly up to him and licked his head affectionately, then walked back to his spot.

Your Ministry

“Open my eyes and help me see: there’s a world outside of me.”

—

-Hawk Nelson, “Shaken” My pastor told us a story about an older woman, who was stiff and arthritic. She went to church every Sunday, and someone once asked her, “Why do you keep coming here if it’s hard for you to just get up the steps?”. And she told this man, “If I stop doing these things and just stay at home all day, I’m afraid I’ll die”. She would go to every service that the church would offer. One day the pastor told everyone that they have a gift to give to others,  that they just have to find out what their own personal ministry is. The old woman asked the pastor, “What is my gift?”, and he was stumped. So he told her, “I honestly don’t know, but I will pray on it and let you know what comes to mind in a week”. After a week of meditative prayer, the pastor was still coming up with nothing. Thankfully, the old woman came in the very next Sunday and told him, “Pastor, I’ve found my gift!”. He told her, “That’s wonderful! May I ask what it is?”. “I call people in my community who I know are shut-ins. I talk to each one of them over the phone, and then call them back the next day. But I only talk to them for 5 minutes a day.” The pastor was curious. “Why only 5 minutes?” She smiled up at him and replied, “Because after five minutes, I’m tempted to talk to them about my own problems. I don’t want to do that. I’m calling so that THEY can talk to someone.” _________________________________ “Lord use me, take me where you want me to go”, sings the chorus of "Shaken". Too often we are absorbed in our own problems, and we forget that there’s a whole world full of people out there. We all have a ministry to share with the world- we just have to figure out what that ministry is. When we all chip in with our own talents to make this world a more loving place, we bring ourselves closer to one another and to the One who made us so beautifully and wonderfully.

Judgement Day

I once read that death is the one thing promised in this life. We all will die- but no one knows what EXACTLY goes on when the soul leaves the body- maybe we can't ever know, or can't comprehend it yet. We also do not know how long we have left to live. Life is unpredictable, whimsical and mysterious. Hey, I could be killed in a freak accident tomorrow that involves a beaver, a large pepperoni pizza and a unicycle. You don't know, I don't know. As twitchy as the human mind is about dying and death, that may be for the best.

Twitchy, itchy brain... my thoughts wandered to the Afterlife at church this morning, and then roamed into The End, the Judgement Day. Both the Judgement and Death are considered an end (or just the beginning, based on your perspective). What if they are closer related than we dare to think?

Say when you are in the process of dying, you go through your own personal judgement day. The living can't see it happen. It's real to you and maybe it's real in the dimension your soul is tip-toeing towards. In that state of being, you see everyone else being judged for their sins as you are. And then, the elevator goes up or down, one more crowded than the other. What I'm saying is what if we die and there is no big wait to be sent to the afterlife?

I had been watching documented cases of near-death experiences on Youtube a month back. A lot of people that were interviewed reported that they were brought into a different state of being, and were shown (presumably by God) how every one of their actions affected other people. They were shown these things not to be made to feel guilty, but to understand.

If you have ever been around someone who is dying, they're not always mentally stable near the end of their lives. They sometimes mumble about memories and their past experiences, sometimes talking to anyone in the room as if they are there with them. Could that be their own personal "judgement" in progress?

It may follow that dementia is an extended state of Judgment. Too far a leap? Let me know what you're thinking!