A Squashed Sandwich... Part 2 of "A Fork In The Road"

This post is a follow-up to "The Fork In the Road" Discussion.  If you haven't read it yet, you should probably read that first. :)

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There was a girl in my 4th, 5th, and 6th grade classes in elementary school who, every day at lunch, would reach over with her fist, hover over someone's sandwich or bag of chips, and then slam her fist down - crushing the food flat underneath.  Since each grade level at my small school only had 15 kids in it - half of them girls, you pretty much HAD to sit with this bully (let's call her "Hester*") or face sitting alone in the cafeteria.  At least, I was safe in the knowledge that Hester was an equal-opportunity squasher; by statistics alone, I had a 6-in-7 chance of keeping my sandwich intact.  But at least one day every couple of weeks, I knew that I'd be eating squashed peanut butter & jelly - or have to forgo lunch altogether.  :(

I was thinking about this as I talked to people about my last blog post on purity and forks.  That post was largely concentrated on people who CHOOSE to have sex in high school (or younger - *sigh*), but I was reminded by more than one person, that there are too many girls (and boys, even) who have had sexual behaviors forced upon them without their consent.  I remember hearing statistics in my junior high sex education class: that 1-in-4 girls would be sexually assaulted in their lifetime.  (That was the mid-1980's).  And I remember looking around at my classmates thinking, "Surely that can't be right? - That would mean that, statistically, 2 of my female classmates could face that sometime!"


The current statistics are even more sobering-- and have moved to 1-in-3 vs. 1-in-4.  According to RAINN, 44% of rape victims are under age 18.  Every 2 minutes, someone in the U.S. is sexually assaulted.  And there is an average of 207,753 victims of sexual assault each year, aged 12 and older.  Approximately 2/3 of all assaults are committed by someone known to the victim, and 38% of rapists are a "friend" or acquaintance.


That means YES - quite possibly, that girl you sit next to in chemistry class... might be dealing with a friend-of-the-family hurting her.  The withdrawn girl on the bus... could be being molested by her uncle.  That "promiscuous" girl that everybody "knows"... may just be acting out because she has been raped already - so she figures why bother "protecting her virtue."  The goth girl who pushes everybody away... she is trying to be as "ugly" as possible so she won't be raped again.


And it's even quite possible that one of your friends - someone to whom you share your secrets (the boy you are crushing on, the math test you failed, the normal everyday angst of high school) has been stuffing down her own horrible secrets of abuse so that she can forget... just for a minute... and feel "normal" by listening to your "problems."  It is quite possible that you'll never know what horrors your friend faces each evening when she gets home from school


These kids-with-secrets didn't ASK to be raped... or assaulted... or abused.  Like my lunchtime sandwich smashed by Hester's angry fist, they were attacked by ruthless bullies who get off on the "power" of hurting other people.   And I imagine it would be easy for them to think that God does not care about them.  Like Jenny in Forrest Gump who prayed "Dear God... make me a bird... make me a bird so I can fly far, far away (from her abusive father)," these kids might be wondering WHY God allows this pain and suffering to happen at all.


I don't want my next words to sound empty or condescending or out-of-touch, but I truly believe that while God may not have unleashed a bolt of lightening to smite your attacker, He was with you - each horrible minute - crying with you and helping you endure... and survive.  While He will not stop a human, one of His children, from making a free-will choice, He is heartbroken when one of His children commits such an evil and horrible act upon another.  At the same time, he feels every ounce of pain and suffering and shame you experience.  God, as Jesus, felt pain, hopelessness, embarrassment, heartache, sickness, suffering, and more at the hand of Pontius Pilate and his angry mob.  And every day, when people are cruel and inhumane to other people, I believe he feels double the pain - the pain of the victim as well as the pain and brokenness of the deranged or sick perpetrator of the attack(s).


While God won't interfere with anyone's free will, I believe, if you ask Him, he will gladly offer strength, healing, peace, and comfort - by placing other people in your life who will lift you up and support you as you deal with certain horrors and memories.  You were NOT alone then... and you are NOT alone now.   Surround yourself with kind and caring friends and family - you don't have to continue to stuff down these secrets... because the people who truly love you will support you and allow you to unburden your mind to them.


And while you may feel dirty or soiled like the Sharpie'd up forks from the last blog post, I believe that when you give your life to Jesus, and when you give your burdens and your secrets over to God - not only does He clean your fork... He gives you a whole new one.


To the people who read this who are holding horrors in their minds from their childhood or after, I pray that you will find strength and peace and healing.


Most sincerely,
Mags


PS - April is Sexual Assault and Awareness Month.  To find out how you can help, please visit RAINN and read about 7 easy ways you can support Survivors of Abuse.




*Not her real name... exactly.

Of God and Gardening...

My Mom forwarded me an email with this story:

A successful business man was growing old and knew it was time to choose a successor to take over the business. Instead of choosing one of his Directors or his children, he decided to do something different. He called all the young executives in his company together.

He said, "It is time for me to step down and choose the next CEO. I have decided to choose one of you. "The young executives were shocked, but the boss continued. "I am going to give each one of you a SEED today - one very special SEED. I want you to plant the seed, water it, and come back here one year from today with what you have grown from the seed I have given you. I will then judge the plants that you bring, and the one I choose will be the next CEO."

One man, named Jim, was there that day and he, like the others, received a seed. He went home and excitedly, told his wife the story. She helped him get a pot, soil and compost and he planted the seed. Everyday, he would water it and watch to see if it had grown. After about three weeks, some of the other executives began to talk about their seeds and the plants that were beginning to grow.

Jim kept checking his seed, but nothing ever grew.

Three weeks, four weeks, five weeks went by, still nothing.

By now, others were talking about their plants, but Jim didn't have a plant and he felt like a failure.

Six months went by -- still nothing in Jim's pot. He just knew he had killed his seed. Everyone else had trees and tall plants, but he had nothing. Jim didn't say anything to his colleagues, however, he just kept watering and fertilizing the soil - He so wanted the seed to grow.

A year finally went by and all the young executives of the company brought their plants to the CEO for inspection.

Jim told his wife that he wasn't going to take an empty pot. But she asked him to be honest about what happened. Jim felt sick to his stomach, it was going to be the most embarrassing moment of his life, but he knew his wife was right. He took his empty pot to the board room. When Jim arrived, he was amazed at the variety of plants grown by the other executives. They were beautiful -- in all shapes and sizes. Jim put his empty pot on the floor and many of his colleagues laughed, a few felt sorry for him!

When the CEO arrived, he surveyed the room and greeted his young executives.

Jim just tried to hide in the back. "My, what great plants, trees and flowers you have grown," said the CEO. "Today one of you will be appointed the next CEO!"

All of a sudden, the CEO spotted Jim at the back of the room with his empty pot. He ordered the Financial Director to bring him to the front. Jim was terrified. He thought, "The CEO knows I'm a failure! Maybe he will have me fired!"

When Jim got to the front, the CEO asked him what had happened to his seed - Jim told him the story.

The CEO asked everyone to sit down except Jim. He looked at Jim, and then announced to the young executives, "Behold your next Chief Executive Officer! His name is Jim!" Jim couldn't believe it. Jim couldn't even grow his seed.

"How could he be the new CEO?" the others said.

Then the CEO said, "One year ago today, I gave everyone in this room a seed. I told you to take the seed, plant it, water it,and bring it back to me today. But I gave you all boiled seeds; they were dead - it was not possible for them to grow.

All of you, except Jim, have brought me trees and plants and flowers. When you found that the seed would not grow, you substituted another seed for the one I gave you. Jim was the only one with the courage and honesty to bring me a pot with my seed in it. Therefore, he is the one who will be the new Chief Executive Officer!"

How often have we done something wrong and wanted desperately to hide the mistake? How often have we felt like Jim - head hanging in shame - thinking that we have screwed up beyond help? How often have we BEEN the other executives...? -- Trying to hide our mistakes and pretend we haven't messed up?

Unfortunately, while you can fool the world for a while... you can't hide from God.

That's part of what being omnipotent, omnipresent, and omniscient means...!

Whoever said "honestly is the best policy" is definitely referring to Jim. Honesty can be embarrassing, shaming, and hard, but it is what God expects from us. Off all the commandments God gave, LYING was one of the "Big 10."

Do not steal. Do not lie. Do not deceive one another.
Leviticus 19:11

Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life. Put away perversity from your mouth; keep corrupt talk far from your lips. Let your eyes look straight ahead, fix your gaze directly before you. Make level paths for your feet and take only ways that are firm Do not swerve to the right or the left; keep your foot from evil.
Proverbs 4:23-27

The LORD detests lying lips, but he delights in men who are truthful.
Proverbs 12:22

Courage and honesty is rewarded. If you plant honesty, you will reap trust. If you plant humility, you will reap greatness. And if you plant hard work, you will reap success.

And those plants will thrive.

I Found God in Directions...

WHY is it so hard for some people to just follow the directions? Somebody spent the time to set up the directions in the first place... yet no one really wants to follow them...

My oldest son, Jack, is the "KEEPER OF JUSTICE" in our family. First born kid - he wants to know the rules and he expects EVERYBODY in his sphere of influence to follow them... or risk certain peril!

Now my younger son, Luke - finds most rules to be cumbersome and unnecessary. He views them as loosely-designed guidelines that are meant for other people -- surely not him.

Personally, I like to know what the rules ARE... so that I can find loop-holes that allow me to go around or disregard them. :)

What's YOUR stance on rules?

When people break the rules, my son, Jack is incensed that they might not get "in trouble." This is a valid concern - we see people all the time, you and old, getting away with it while the rest of us do our best to be obedient.

When Luke breaks the rules, he is annoyed that he might be in trouble - because again, he sees others getting away with it, and he wonders why he is the one who is BUSTED.... and he figures that if the rule wasn't so stupid, so many people wouldn't be ignoring it, right?!

If I can't find a loophole to get around a guideline, I'm irked that I'm trapped in the same confines as everybody else in the general population. Why can't I just go past this line?

Now, when it comes to rules or guidelines for life, God is pretty clear on a lot of things - Do unto others as you would have them do unto you... Honor your Mother and Father... Do not lie, cheat, steal, covet, commit adultery... Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, body, and mind...

In His word, God covers a variety of "hot topics" - marriage, divorce, sexuality, premarital sex, abortion, capital punishment, discipline, parenting, friendship, cheating, over-indulgence, money management, self-control, etc. His Proverbs give us words-to-the-wise on all kinds of "little," everyday issues too:

Never walk away from someone who deserves help;
your hand is God's hand for that person. Proverbs 3:27

God hates cheating in the marketplace;
he loves it when business is aboveboard. Proverbs 11:1

Intelligent children listen to their parents;
foolish children do their own thing. Proverbs 13:1

Friends come and friends go,
but a true friend sticks by you like family. Proverbs 18:24

When you're given a box of candy, don't gulp it all down;
eat too much chocolate and you'll make yourself sick. Proverbs 25:16-17
(I admit, when I first read this one, I was tempted to cover my ears and say, "La! La! La! I can't hear You!")

Most of His instructions leave very little "wiggle room" for us to make our own interpretations. Yet we do - we ignore His word... or we look for loopholes... or we paraphrase His Instructions to get them into "OUR" language. We twist and mutate His guidelines into what will "work" for us or what our friends think, or what the newscasters tell us. The Bible may not always be easy to understand, but we are accountable to it - regardless as to whether we've read it or not!

And Jesus said to them: You have a fine way of setting aside the commands of God in order to observe your own traditions!
Mark 7:9 (NIV)

When I was in school, my mother always said that "a spelling test should be the easiest test you'll ever take... because you know all of the answers before hand!" Life is like that as well; we have been GIVEN all of the answers in God's Word - all we have to do is seize them.

Do you know God's stance on the big issues in your life?

Do you think your life might go easier if you actually followed the directions God has already set forth?

God has great plans for each and every one of us - but in order to make the most of this fabulous life, He asks that we pay attention to His teachings and follow His Word. The first step is to accept Him as your personal Lord and Savior. Then open His book - anywhere - you don't have to start at the beginning - just pick a spot, open it, and read. God has something great to tell you on ANY page of His Book. What don't you see what He has to say today?

:) Mags

I Found God In Iced Tea...

Second to coffee, I love ice tea. But, I'm very specific on how I like it - regular, UNsweetened iced tea, NO lemon, NO flavorings of any kind. :)

My Mom likes lemon in her unsweetened iced tea. I find this taints the basic flavor of tea - and I love just the flavor of regular tea. I really don't even want a slice of lemon on my glass lest it drips even a few drops of lemony-sourness into my drink.

My mother-in-law likes a bit of sweetener in her tea. Not a lot, just a few pink packets to flavor it up. Ugh - that changes the flavor too-too much for me. Perhaps a few drops of lemon I could stomach, but you add sweetener, and it's just not the same!

Then you have my good friend Stephanie - she's southern - hence she only drinks "Sweet Tea" - to me, a dreadful concoction of sugar and tea brewed together. One mouthful of this and my face puckers up into a foul expression. I can barely swallow it, and it's hard to believe that this, also, is considered "iced tea."

Four different people - four different ways to enjoy our iced tea. And even though it's still "TEA," it's presentation and flavor are completely unique to each of us.


This reminds me of church services. I happen to LOVE our grungy, garage-band kind-of service called "The Well." I love sitting my the speakers with my head and heart just filled up with the guitar and drum and low voice of our main singer. No robes on our pastor. No reciprical prayer. No "Creeds." No hymns. Just a great, honest message from our pastor, and song-after-song in that modern, grunge style.

Our church also offers a more "pop-contemporary" service. That Worship leader is great too - it just reminds me more of the pagentry of American Idol than the backyard, garage band. We have a lot of friends in that service, and I'm happy to pop in there once in a while, but I still prefer The Well.

My friend, Jackie, shies away from The Well and attends the Blended Service. A mixture of some pop-contemporary and some traditional hymns, this is way too "watered down" for me. But even though Jackie and I enjoy different services, we still meet up for the same Sunday School class and have become great friends over the last few years. It hasn't mattered that we don't sit side-by-side or see eye-to-eye on the style of worship we prefer.

Then there's Debbie, my best friend since 9th grade and Michelle, my roller-coaster friend. My garage band service is SO out of league with what they want in a church service! Both much prefer the traditional services - robes on the pastors, hymns from the hymnals, reciting the Lord's Prayer, bring on the organist, and keep those guitars and drums to yourself, thank you very much!! :) After 5 years of rockin' out at our current church, I can't even fathom going back to the traditional United Methodist service that my friends attend. And while Debbie has visited our rock-n-roll church service (and was so gracious about it!), she knows that she prefers quite a different style of worship than I.

Just like it does not matter whether we each prefer our tea "straight up" or "sickenly sweet," God does not care HOW we worship... just that we DO worship. You can use the organ OR the guitar. You can sing with the choir OR with the band. You can pray from a book OR speak the honest words in your heart. Whatever way, God is listening. And regardless of the methods, the purpose is the same: To Worship God. To sing praises to His name. To confess our sins. To thank Him for our blessings. To spread His Word. To share His love.

God designed each of us as unique human beings - complete with our own sets of likes and dislikes, talents, and quirks. So of course, we are going to experience styles of worship that "speak" to us more than others. I went to a traditional United Methodist church for 10 years and didn't feel one kernal of God there... ever. It was a hard and lonely time, faith-wise. And, though I made some wonderful friends there, I did not find God - and I was ever-searching... Yet, it only took TWO visits to our current church before I felt, mind, heart, and soul, that God was speaking to me. And every week for the last 5 years, I have looked forward to church and have left with a direct message in my heart from God.

Just like a person with dyslexia must find another way to read. I needed to find another way to God. And for me, my path includes drums and guitars.

JOHN 4:23 Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks.

So what's your style? How do you take your "tea?" And if your current "tea" isn't satisfying you, isn't it time you start shopping for a place where you find your perfect blend? God just wants you to find Him - so what's the best way for you to get there?

I Found God in the Movies: Dead Poet's Society

In college, I had a movie writing assignment - to write about the theme as it pertains to teaching (my major) in a movie of our choosing. One of my all-time favorites is Dead Poet's Society with Robin Williams, Robert Sean Leonard, Ethan Hawke, and Josh Charles; that was the film I chose for my essay.

How interesting that I would revisit this for The God Blog. It wasn't a "religious" movie, specifically - but the central theme revolved around discovering the beliefs and values you consider important... and then standing up for them. There was a quote from this movie that has always stuck with me... Not the "Carpe Diem" (Seize the day!) that Robin Williams' character, John Keating, was known to say... Not Captain, My Captain quoted by his students. This was just one more truism that Mr. Keating spoke - and it had a big impact on me.

He says...

You must strive to find your own voice,
because the longer you wait to begin...
the less likely you are to find it at all.

Your own voice. Do you have one?

Do you hold fast to your beliefs or do you cave under the pressure to fit in with those around you? Do you mimic the voices of others... never taking a stand for yourself? Are you silenced by the fear that people will make fun of you? Or are you just too lazy to take a stand on what you know is right?

Perhaps your voice is mumbled and muffled so that YOU won't be the one making waves or causing "discord?" Perhaps you don't have a voice at all. The platform of "no opinion" is certainly an easy and safe place on which to stand.

But the longer you wait to find what you believe in... the longer you stall on truly finding the lines you will not cross... the less likely you are to find your Voice at all. Your voice will become muted - dwarfed by the larger voices speaking out around you - and others will speak for you... instead of you speaking for yourself. When it comes to your faith... can you really afford to be silent?

Your own voice. Do you have one? And does your voice echo the voice of God?

God gave His people free will because He wants us to use it. He wants us to make choices and honor Him with our decisions. The tricky part for us is that often using our voice to glorify God brings condemnation from others. The Bible even tells us this:

"When people realize it is the living God you are presenting and not some idol that makes them feel good, they are going to turn on you, even people in your own family. There is a great irony here: proclaiming so much love, experiencing so much hate! But don't quit. Don't cave in. It is all well worth it in the end. It is not success you are after in such times but survival. Be survivors! Before you've run out of options, the Son of Man will have arrived. ~Matthew 10:21-23

If you haven't seen Dead Poet's Society, I HIGHLY recommend it. It's one that will stick with you - just as Mr. Keating's teachings did with his pupils. The boys in Mr. Keating's class found their Voice; they learned to think for themselves again... to stand up for their their beliefs - even in the face of disciplinary action, even in the face of great personal loss:

Can you imagine the changes in your life if the voice you find within yourself glorifies God? Mr. Keating climbs upon his classroom desk and says, "I stand upon my desk to remind myself that we must constantly look at things in a different way." Standing up for God, the Bible, and Christianity - even if others roll their eyes at you and say "That's crazy..." or even if the herd brays "That's baaaaaaad," - needs to be one of the components in the Voice you speak. God stood up for you when he allowed His Son to sacrifice Himself for all of mankind. Isn't using your voice to stand up for God the very least you can do?

Mr. Keating shouts to his students:

In my class, you will learn to think for yourselves again!...
And as the powerful play of life goes on, YOU will contribute a verse...!

In a sea of millions of people in this world - all contributing a verse to the overall play of life, what will your verse say? How will your verse stand out from all the rest?

Speak. I'd like to hear your voice... especially if you leave a comment on this blog! :)

♥Mags

Karaoke Tuesday: "This Is Your Life" by Switchfoot

What's on your iPod?
Mine is packed with everything from Christian contemporary to Rock... Techno to Broadway musicals... 70's to 2000's... some grunge... some heavy metal... some bubblegum pop. I know all of the words to Metalica's Nothing Else Matters, Paula Abdul's Cold-Hearted Snake AND the entire High School Musical soundtrack... And I've found in writing this blog, that you never know where you'll find Divine inspiration!

This week's song is This Is Your Life by Switchfoot. It asks a simple question:

This is your life. Are you who you want to be?

WOW... that actually makes me feel... uncomfortable...

It's not asking "Are you WHERE you want to be?" "Where" would imply some status or accomplishment that I could easily shrug off with a careless, "Yes, I want to publish a book one day, but I've got time, right?"-kind of answer. Or "Sure... I might go back to teaching.. Who knows?"

Asking me "WHO I want to be" is an entirely different matter altogether...

Who DO I want to be, anyway?
I want to be honest.
I want to be funny - I love to make people laugh.
I want to be free of worrying about what people think of me.
I want to be a good mother... no... a GREAT mother.
I want to be a loving wife and best friend to my husband.
I want to be caring. I want to think of others ahead of myself.
I want to do right by my family.
I want to be thought of as "Christian."

Am I all of those things? Wellllllll... sometimes? Some days, I'm lucky if I achieve even half that! And although each day I start fresh trying to be those things, I know that my own pride, or arrogance, or preoccupation with my own activites often gets in the way of just WHO I want to be.

And each "failed" day builds up on me... weighing me down with it's garbage. That pile of regrets, and apologies, and guilt just builds higher and higher until it knocks me off of the path I've been trying to follow.

Switchfoot reminds us that "Yesterday is dead and over" - implying an alternative: to let go of the baggage and garbage that clouds our minds and hearts. That's easier sung about than actually done, isn't it?! But it just so happens that there IS a way to dump that garbage out of our souls:

Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened,
and I will give you rest. ~Matthew 11:28

God knows that often we either come running to him shrieking "HELLLLPP MEEEE!" or come crawling to him crying in our exhaustion and despair. Fortunately, He scoops us right up and offers us comfort from the terrors or troubles that have knocked us down. With his ever-renewing Band-Aids of "forgiveness," He picks us back up and walks with us through our bumpy journey of life.
But he can't do our LIVING for us.
We are free to make our own decisions and our own mistakes. And it's those mistakes that sometimes have us looking back over our life wondering "What-in-the-Hades happened to me?! This is my life?!?! Are you serious?!" It is at that point where we must grab on to that free will God has provided us, and make some choices that put us back onto the path God intended for us to follow.
This IS your life: Are you who you want to be?
And if not, what are you going to do about it?
♥Mags

The Lyrics
Song: This Is Your Life
Artist: Switchfoot
Album: The Beautiful Letdown
Hear it on Last.FM!

Questions I Can't Answer... Pre-destination vs. Free Will

My mind was wandering, and I ended up with a question that I cannot answer. Perhaps you have a thought on this? Let me start with the beginning...

I had gotten an email (that usually circulates in September) about 9/11 and a poem about "Where Was God?" You can read the poem here - but in a nutshell the author pointed out all of the places that God WAS... calming the airplane passengers, discouraging people from heading in to work, holding up the Twin Towers an extra 1/2 hour to allow more people to escape, carrying 3000+ people to Heaven, trying to comfort those who had lost loved ones, etc...

Then my mind wandered to that little boy I wrote about a couple of months ago - Joey - who had died of cancer. He was only four years old. And my mind settled on my niece, Julia, who lived for only 6 days.

And then my mind started in on the idea of God knowing where we will be and what we will doing at any given point of our lives - and how this relates to the idea of "free will." I find it hard to reconcile the two ideas... that if God already knows what we will be doing, how can we have the free will to choose it?

All of that tied together with this question:

Is it possible that our life span has been pre-determined from the moment of our conception?
That the reason God knows where we will be is that our physical time on earth (years, months, days, minutes) is already set when we are born? Yet, within that time, we are free to make our own decisions - God just knows what all we need to accomplish in our lifetime?

As you can see, my mind was really busy this day!!

In Joey's case, was it already determined by God that Joey's life would be 4 short years - that that was the time needed for Joey to accomplish all of the things he needed to do in this life? And that even if cancer had not sent him to Heaven, some other end would have come around the same time?

In my case, was the reason that I did not die from a brain tumor (nope... haven't blogged about that yet... but never fear, it's coming!), was because it simply wasn't my time yet? That the time I rode in a car going 110 MPH on the back roads of Oxford, Ohio did not results in my death by a massive traffic accident because again, it wasn't my time? That the time when I rode my bike on a busy street (read: an almost-highway) when I was nine did not result in me being squished by a semi-truck because I still had more to do in this life?

That people can do all sorts of whacked-out, daredevil things and not be killed because dying at that particular moment would leave their life unfinished? That I could skydive, go bungee-jumping, or cliff-diving and I would be absolutely safe from dying... UNLESS it was my pre-determined time to go anyway?? That you physically cannot and will not end your life one second before "your time" - because God will intervene to push you on a different path.

When a child dies... or a young person, people always comment at their funeral that they "died too early." At other funerals, people shake their heads and say, "It was their time... what can you do?" What if the latter is true? What if it was exactly their time to go? And all of the treatments or alternate decisions would not have changed the outcome in the least?
And if this is true... does it matter?

Well... in terms of how you life your life? No. You still go on day after day, living life to the fullest, making the most of each day, living in as much of a Christ-like manner as you can. Because regardless, each of us does not know the exact day and time we will leave this Earth - and brooding about that fact will not do us any favors.

But, in terms of how you deal with the death of a loved one - perhaps it could make all the difference...?

Perhaps it could ease the mind of a person plagued with the "if only" laments...

IF ONLY I hadn't let them go on that trip alone...
IF ONLY I had warned them about that...
IF ONLY we had found another treatment option...
IF ONLY we'd gotten a third opinion...

If knowing that nothing they could have done would have changed the timeline of their loved one's life, maybe then, they could spare themselves from some of the blame and guilt.

Like I titled this post, I do not have any answers to these questions... just musings from an ordinary girl trying to eat from the Tree of Knowledge (and we all know where that got Eve!)... When I get to Heaven, I want to take all of the classes:

• The REAL Missing Link: Reconciling Creation and Evolution
• Cloud-Building 101,
• the Why Do Children Have to Suffer Anything elective,
• the Unicorns Never Made It Onto The Ark: Fact or Fiction class
• The Purpose of Mosquitos

I want to eat from the Tree of Knowledge until I am stuffed full... packed with all of the answers to the earthly questions that eluded me. I'm hoping that once we're in Heaven, that tree is part of the Heavenly Buffet!

Until then, I'm going to hope that my life is long, and full, and happy - and do my best to make it the best while I'm here. Thanks for reading this - and if you have any answers, PLEASE click on "post a comment" and leave me a note!

♥Mags