Religion

Dead: Maharishi Mahesh Yogi

TM’s “founder” crossed the final bridge in this life:

Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, a guru to the Beatles who introduced the West to transcendental meditation, died Tuesday at his home in the Dutch town of Vlodrop, a spokesman said. He was thought to be 91 years old.

“He died peacefully at about 7 p.m.,” said Bob Roth, a spokesman for the Transcendental Meditation movement that the Maharishi founded. He said his death appeared to be due to “natural causes, his age.”

Once dismissed as hippie mysticism, the Hindu practice of mind control known as transcendental meditation gradually gained medical respectability.

He began teaching TM in 1955 and brought the technique to the United States in 1959. But the movement really took off after the Beatles attended one of his lectures in 1967 and visited his ashram in India in 1968, bringing along such famous friends as Donovan.

I wonder what he’s doing now.

Some 5 million people devoted 20 minutes every morning and evening reciting a simple sound, or mantra, and delving into their consciousness.

“Don’t fight darkness. Bring the light, and darkness will disappear,” Maharishi said in a 2006 interview, repeating one of his own mantras.

“Resist the devil and he will flee from you,” says the Bible.

“No one leaves Islam”

That’s what he said:

No one ever leaves Islam, according to a judge in Egypt who has cited Islamic religious law in rejecting a request from a Muslim convert to Christianity to be allowed to change his religious affiliation on his national identification card.

In a decision that forecasts more and more decisions being based on Shari’a, Islam’s religious law, Judge Muhammad Husseini has concluded it violates the law for a Muslim to leave Islam.

According to a report from Compass Direct News, the judge found that the convert, Muhammad Hegazy, “can believe whatever he wants in his heart, but on paper he can’t convert.”

After reading that, I wondered: “So what? Does it even matter?”

Then I read this:

The website, which said it took its name from Quranic descriptions of Christians and Jews, said Westerners don’t realize the significance of having a national ID card listing the carrier as Muslim.

“If you get caught going to a church while your religion on your ID is Muslim, that could get you arrested, questioned and tortured,” the commentary said. “The latest victim was a 27-year-old woman, Mrs. Sherreen, mother of two children from Alexandria, Egypt. She died at the police station on Jan. 3, 2008, after five hours of torture for refusing to renounce her Christian faith and come back to Islam.”

The website noted in Egypt, children of parents with Muslim IDs automatically are Muslims, and they are required to follow mandatory Islamic indoctrination classes, and Muslims cannot marry non-Muslims.

Overcoming Worry

I posted this earlier this morning at Anabaptists and just now got done referencing it at Panting Hart. (Yes, I rarely crosspost like that.)

Overcoming Worry

Do you believe what God says? I mean, can you — do you — accept at face value what He has to say…and believe it, and live it? Or are you like most humans — selective, doubtful, logical?

I believe one of the “good” reasons we struggle with covetousness is our need for security for the future. We don’t want some calamity to catch us totally unawares and unprepared. Neither do we wish to have holes in our roofs, clothes and stomachs. The problem is, we tend to anchor our security in stuff instead of in the Stuff Giver. And when our stuff is in short supply, we worry.

God orders us to give sacrificially, that is, of our sustenance. In return, He says He will never leave us nor forsake us. He assures us He is aware of our need for the basic things of life. He promises to provide all we need if we will give our lives to His kingdom and righteousness. He tells us not to worry about tomorrow.

To read the rest, click the Panting Hart link above.

(Written originally in August 1994)

[If then God so clothe the grass... (Luke 12:28)]

from Luke 12:28

Pakistani Christian Murdered

I just read this via WordlMagBlog:

Pakistani Christian Murdered in Peshawar

A Pakistani Christian working for the relief and development agency Shelter Now has been murdered in Peshawar.

29-year old Sajeed Williams was on his way home January 17, when a masked man opened fire and killed him. The gunman is at large ; his motives are unknown, as the director of the German Shelter Now branch, Udo Stolte, told the evangelical news agency “idea”.

Williams was married ; the couple has an 18-month old daughter. He was office manager for Shelter Now in Peshawar.

The organization runs two projects in the country – a fish farm and a building project for 105 schools, which were ruined during the earthquake that shook Pakistan in 2005.

He has his reward. May God bless and comfort and shield and hold near his wife and daughter.

You Reap What You Sow

Over the last two or three months, I’ve had reason to think about that.

And how easily we forget it. Or purposefully ignore it. Even when we know it. And maybe even believe it.

Oh the foolishness (stupidity, if you will) of planting something that will bring us a heart-breaking harvest later!
        • contempt and scorn
        • mockery and disrespect
        • deceit and hypocrisy
        • pride and cockiness
        • ungodliness and impurity
        • wrong example and unwise counsel

So stop and think and analyze and look to the future.

(Yes, this applies to you, believe it or not!)

Elsewhere you can find more I wrote on this subject: here and here.

Well, I ask you right now — do you want to harvest what you planted earlier today?

If not, maybe it’s too late. (Though it certainly isn’t too late to confess and abandon the wrong planting.)

And for sure it isn’t too late to start planting something better — something that you can look forward to harvesting.

For myself, my harvesting continues to this very day. Too much of it is quite wretched. (Yes, I’ve been in some kind of a downer of late.)

Now, having written all that, I urge you to hope! You reap what you sow works for the good harvests just as well as it does for the bad ones.

Anyway, eventually it dawned on me that this might make an interesting search term: you reap what you sow.

So I tried it and among the top 10 (of 208,000) Web-search results are these:

What You Do Comes Back To You

The words “What you do comes back to you” are an excellent paraphrase of the Biblical truth, “You reap what you sow.” You plant the seeds (sow), and then later you gather the resulting harvest (reap). The harvest that you reap depends on the kind of seeds you sow. If you sow corn, you will not reap olives.

1 Way Only–You Reap What You Sow

…what you sow in life has a direct relationship to what you’ll receive in your life. In other words, your actions all have consequences. Good actions result in good consequences, and bad actions result in bad consequences.

…But don’t ever be fooled into thinking that your actions don’t have consequences. Don’t think you can get away with bad choices even if you don’t seem to get caught. Remember verse seven tells us that God cannot be mocked. He sees it all. You reap what you sow.

You Reap What You Sow

Another so-called exception to the rule is the belief that time alters the reap-and-sow principle. That is, if the penalty or reward for an act doesn’t come quickly, it isn’t coming at all, and hence the law of cause and effect is broken.

And among the top 10 (of about 35) news-search results are:

Frost Illustrated: Morality in Media leader offers explanation for mass killings

“There is a saying, ‘You reap what you sow,’ and the American people are reaping what the entertainment media have sowed and we have bought for more than forty years.”

allAfrica.com: Zimbabwe: Govt Distributes 535 Ploughs to Farmers

“Let us take heed of the saying ‘you reap what you sow’ and make use of the ploughs given to you today. Sow the seed that will give us a bumper harvest,” he said.

Moultrie Observer – Rants and Raves for Dec 11

“If we are not careful, nobody will want to come here to coach. No true support, no participation, and we expect to win. After what happened to Coach Singletary, you reap what you sow boys! Football is not king anymore! Queen at best!

And among the top 10 (of about 14,440) blog-search results are:

Everyday Woman Radio Show with Vicki Hinze: Stealing Religion

But first it’ll be a long look into a harsh mirror in which nothing is hidden and all that is true is exposed. Then the thief will learn the penalty of his/her actions, and then s/he will suffer the utmost consequences. Because in the very symbols stolen are promises that remain intact: you reap what you sow. And from that, the thief cannot hide.

I wonder. When the thief sows, feels the full weight of the consequences of his/her actions, how will s/he feel about stealing then? Because the truth is, the thief(s) might have stolen and damaged and destroyed that family’s property. But s/he did far more lasting damage to him/herself. The kind self-inflicted that requires far more than mere repayment to be satisfied. It requires forgiveness, and that requires divine grace.

You reap what you sow

It is said that we reap what we sow.

In fact, it could be argued that even the most fertile soil throughout the world is barren unless time and effort is expended to take seeds and have them properly planted, cultivated and nurtured.

Eritrea: What of It?

Eritrea : An “Open-Air Prison”

Eritrean government aggression against its own people continues unabated. It ranges from deliberate mass starvation to imprisonment without trial, torture, murder and disappearances. The aim is to crush any minimal claims or hopes for liberty and rule of law. The international media rights watchdog, Reporters Sans Frontiers, describes the country as an “open-air prison” under the most brutal dictatorship the African continent has ever seen.

The dictator, Isaias Afeworki, justifies his regime’s actions as a requirement until his border dispute with Ethiopia is resolved. No one is impressed by such an irresponsible ploy. Isaias’s core motive is to cling to power by all means possible. The fact remains Eritreans do not need tyranny and mass imprisonment to do what is right in defense of their homeland.

Two thirds of the population needs external food aid, according to the UN. But the regime continues to refuse aid under bogus self-reliance pretexts. The people are daily terrorized, intimidated and starved as a means of controlling them and preempting any popular uprising. The tyrannical regime treats every Eritrean as a potential enemy that must be controlled or liquidated.

Aggression is at its worst once an individual is arrested and imprisoned incommunicado for an indefinite period of time because of his/her political views or faith. Thousands – perhaps tens of thousands – of prisoners of conscience are rotting in gruesome conditions in prisons throughout the country.

Many are kept in dungeons and metal shipping containers under smoldering heat during the day and freezing temperatures at night. Many die as a result, or become partially or fully paralyzed; one of the victims is the renowned Gospel singer, Helen Berhane. Sanitation is said to be mostly non-existent. There is no medical treatment for injured torture victims.

So?

Clarification: Wednesday, December 5 @ 7:29 am

My “So?” above, along with the post title, is intended to ask if the world cares. I posted in a hurry and neglected to make sure that was clear. It wasn’t.

I don’t think I have a careless attitude about the suffering around me and in other parts of the world. But do I have a caring heart?

Peephole into My Heart

This week we’re having revival meetings at our home congregation. Our visiting preacher is my cousin AH from Georgia. His message last night was on individualism. Wow! What an excellent message! I’ve got to talk to my friend LM about getting it in MP3 format so I can post it online.

Anyway, about the meat of this post. In his devotional before the message, one of our local ministers (PT) read from and commented on Psalm 26.

These two verses spoke to my heart in particular:

“Judge me, O LORD; for I have walked in mine integrity: I have trusted also in the LORD; therefore I shall not slide” (1).

“For thy lovingkindness is before mine eyes: and I have walked in thy truth” (3).

That’s how I want to walk!

Well, that seemed like a good “Search of the Day” candidate, but I opted to use my computer Bible instead of Google.

Not many results. Here are two in the Outstanding to Me category:

“If I have walked with vanity, or if my foot hath hasted to deceit; Let me be weighed in an even balance, that God may know mine integrity” (Job 31:5,6).

“And said, Remember now, O LORD, I beseech thee, how I have walked before thee in truth and with a perfect heart, and have done that which is good in thy sight. And Hezekiah wept sore.” (Isaiah 38:3).

I need to work on that. The talk part of Christianity is important; much more the walk part. If my faith in Jesus doesn’t direct my walk (that is, my life in every dimension), that faith is suspect. Like I said, I especially need to work on the walk part.

Thankfully, it’s not just me at work on me. God Himself is the Master Craftsman!

These days His work has me struggling in deep waters that seem to crash over my head and surge into my nose too often.

So these two songs presented by Voice of Praise in their Reunion release have made new connections with me:
      • No, Not One
      • Leaning on the Everlasting Arms

God is greatest and John the Baptist was His prophet!

Above all, love God!