25th August 2006

episode 4 from Marty's past.

Salutations my dear friends!


My thoughts this morning were about the days when I worked in Shipping and Forwarding back in the 80's. In those days, most communication was by telex machine. In some ways it was a preview to email today. Its generated some thought of another blog for the future... so I digress at this point.

I woke the morning feeling pretty ok but with a very slight element of anxiety that I would have given no more thought to other that the fact that Christine said I was having nightmares last night and crying out in my sleep. Can't remember any of it. I guess thats the way sometimes and its the minds natural way of emptying the (Mary goes into American mode) trash can inside the head

Now for episode 4...... Note... this is the last episode from my scribblings from 2001. For some reason I got distracted and stopped writing after this. Fear not ppl. This experience has inspired me to wite some more about my past experiences in recent days.. so there is more to come. This last episode is from my pre Christian commitment days, but at a time when God was closing in on me.. LOL

GOD,

Now I do believe in the big G (guy with the beard as my pal Alan used to sometimes refer to him). He has helped me out on more than one occasion. There are those who claim to be atheists. However, this indicates that they don’t believe, that that believe in God, which in my book is a belief itself. These people are under the misconception that they are being non conformist whereas they are in fact conforming to their own version of a religion. In my humble layman opinion, God is followed in many different guises throughout the world dependant upon the religion. It is only when people because fanatical to the point of instability that a long history of wars have broken out. I like to hope that most people retain their beliefs relatively moderately, because it makes them happy. Staying on the side of God is usually a sign of compassion towards ones fellow man, however, just because somebody is a “Non believer”, this does not make them bad. I used to think that there were only two types of people in the world. Good and bad. During a particularly stressful time in my life, I was corrected on this fact, by a pastor at my local church. He told me that we are all capable of being amazingly good and terribly bad. This convinced me that moderation is the best approach to take. I attend church once a month for a family service and do my best to be compassionate to everyone where possible, provided they don’t give me a hard time! God and Jesus does not fill me particularly with passion (at least they haven’t done up to now), but music does. This has always been my crutch when times are either good or bad. Myself and my wife have some very good friends who are passionate about Jesus, however, they tell me they are not religious. Now that says a lot about real belief. They don’t feel it necessary to categorize themselves.

Comments

(3 total)

I understand your musings on belief, while I don't attend a church, pray or anything in the conformist way, I do like to treat people as I would like to be treated, as thats what the bible tells us to do. I try to be kind, understanding, not suffer pride, not commit adultery,not steal etc etc and live an honest life. I spend a lot of time helping other people I was in prison with, so some would say, I was a Christian for doing what I do, but do I class myself as a Christian? I don't know the answer to that one.
However, many years ago, I was baptized into Christianity, at an Elim Pentecostal church, I went regularly, the children went to the Sunday Church, and I diligently listened to the Pastor and studied the bible, yet it all came crashing down, the Pastor had done a series of teachings on the seven deadly sins, the most powerful one being the one about not committing adultery, and just a few weeks later, I received a telephone call from one of the heads within the church, asking me to attend for our family, a special meeting. That meeting was to tell us all, that the following Sunday, the Pastor (married with two pre school children) would be splashed all across the Low life tabloids, as he'd just run off with one of the singers from the church. It was at that point I left the church, formally handing in a letter to them, I could not stay where I had been subjected to such hypocrisy, how could I ever listen and believe what any of them were teaching me? I couldn't, so left. I lost faith in the church as a representation of Christ, and lost faith that such a man of god who had been ordained to lead us in the right pathways, could do this to us. But I suppose, the lasting thing is that in many ways, I have kept a lot of what I learned, I do what I can for others, often to my own detriment, as you will see one example of when I post my next blog over the weekend. But dont get me wrong, I'm not bitter or anything, just telling how it is.........

Friday 25 August 2006 - 01:21PM (BST)

Hello Marty ! how are you ?hope you are feeling better from your nightmares .sometimes nightmares show you might have stresses about something .just take it easy . I dont believe in God .I dont have a religion . its just depends on . some person need something to comfort their pain ，the spirit they could rely on . I saw the website of the brass band . thats really cool ! hope you will have much more nice time there ! and wish you and your family a wonderful weekend !

Saturday 26 August 2006 - 03:08AM (CST)

I have to say I don't believe in God per say but I guess I do believe that there is some spirit of sort out there, but I don't believe I have to decide what exactly I believe in or put myself into a catergory, I try to live my life as a decent person and don't inflict pain or bad feelings onto others and I believe that's what is important. I did turn to the church as a young girl at the age of 13 when I had lost what life was about and was very depressed. I'm afraid I found nothing but hypocrisy. I found this very hard to understand at such an age but then also decided I did not have to go to church to find my way, it took me many years but my kids were eventually my saviour and my lifeline...no matter how hard life gets now or how depressed I get, I carry on for them because they are so precious. Anyway I'm rambling now, so I'll stop..lol!
Loved the blog, it was good to have some insight to your beliefs as a christian and what that means to you personally.
Loved the vid...short but funny I could watch it over and over all night long and still fall off my chair laughing!!
Looking forward to the new pieces my friend, take care. xx