Home At Last

Over the past few weeks I have described my journey towards Christianity. I haven't included everything, particularly those events which were recounted to me by third parties. Members of my extended family have had many spiritual encounters ranging from "sensing" a presence in a room to actual physical contact. I don't want to scare anyone, but it is vital that we understand that the spiritual realm is a real place. The Bible makes it very clear that we "wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high [places]." Ephesians 6:12.

Beyond Enlightenment

My route to Christianity was a little bit like the commute to my last job: slow and full of detours with occasional moments of hair-raising excitement. I used to work and live on opposite ends of a popular holiday resort on the English coast and there were only two viable routes. Getting to work and back again could be tricky, especially during the holiday season. Add to that the constant road works. . .well, you get the picture.

During high school I got involved in the New Age via meditation and not for the reasons you might think. I suffered terribly from bad skin during my teens. It wasn't your normal spotty skin. According to my doctor I have a medical condition that causes my skin to scar in an odd way. So, whereas your normal teenager would get a small red pimple, I developed these huge red sores. They were quite painful at times. It felt as if someone was digging a needle into my skull. I looked everywhere for a remedy, trying all sorts of weird and wonderful treatments. Everyone I spoke to seemed to have "the cure". They would take one look at my skin and say: "You should try....".

Someone told me that sugar was probably the cause and that I should eradicate it from my diet. I put this to the test by eating a large slab of cooking chocolate every day for a week. I gained five pounds but my skin stayed unchanged. I tried the most powerful cleansers on the market, but the angry welts remained, sometimes growing so large it looked as if someone had punched me in the eye. What I did notice was that my acne would flare up during times of stress and so I decided to look for ways to keep my emotions under control.

I tried meditation and it seemed to help, making me feel quite calm. If anything upset me, my mantra was "it doesn't matter". Before long, my stress levels started to fall. People began commenting on how peaceful I was. My acne even started to fade. Spurred on by this initial success, I began to explore deeper meditation techniques. I learned to focus my thoughts and would practise meditating whenever possible, even while going about my normal daily activities. Then, one night, I had an experience that made me think that perhaps I had gone a little too far in my quest for peace-of-mind.

I remember walking to the shops one evening, meditating deeply on a particular concept, when the world just seemed to go blank. It is hard to describe, but it was as if all the lights in the universe had gone out all at once, or as if someone had hit a universal "pause" button. I stopped in my tracks and thought: "Oh no. Now I've done it. I've lost my mind". But I was fine, if a little dazed. I continued to the shops and bought bread and milk, and returned home.

I described my experience in a letter to a school friend who had recently moved to Australia. He was as mystified by it as I was. Within two weeks, however, I discovered an almost word-for-word copy of my description of that night's event in a book I was reading. The topic of the book? Buddhism.

From what I can gather, my deep meditation had caused me to stumble across what the Zen Buddhists call a "kensho" or "satori" experience. It's a little bit like seeing a familiar object from a profoundly different perspective. The idea of satori is to gain a deeper insight into existence. On the road to what the Buddhists call "enlightenment" or "nirvana", students must learn to experience satori over and over again. To be honest, the whole thing unnerved me a little and I was reluctant to pursue it, although I can see the appeal. It was a powerful experience--possibly even life-changing. At that time I was dabbling in all things New Age, but I did start to think of myself as a Buddhist, not by choice, but by accident.

It was another five or six years (and more spiritual detours) before I walked into a Christian service and immediately knew I was home. I think, deep down inside, I had always known Jesus was the way. I just couldn't seem to find the path to Him. I sometimes wonder why I took the long way around, seemingly taking every route except the straight one. Perhaps I needed to see the lies before being convinced of the truth. In my pre-Christian days, I was drawn to Buddhism because it is such a peaceful religion. Having experienced the religion first-hand, however, I can tell you now that the peace it offers is empty compared to the peace and understanding you gain as a Christian. My mantra of "it doesn't matter" was way off because things do matter.

Perhaps I needed to experience Buddhism for a reason. I don't know. All I do know is, God created the universe, He put the rules in place, and there is no true peace without Him. Everything else is counterfeit.

The Global Village

They say the world is shrinking. Sometimes it certainly seems that way. Technology has reached the point where it allows us to communicate across time and space like never before. For example, in the Firefox browser you can use an add-on called FoxClocks. It sits in a bar along the bottom of your browser window and can display the current date and time of as many time zones as you like. I have US Pacific, US Mountain, US Central, US Eastern, the UK, the Netherlands, New Zealand, and Victoria Australia. The reason I have so many clocks is because I have to communicate regularly with people in all these places. I also have a watch on my wrist for emergencies.

Communication technology has come a long way since the smoke signals of North America, the bullroarer of the Australian Aborigines, and the talking drums of Africa. We can now hold simultaneous conversations with multiple people from all corners of the earth, the only obstacle being the need for sleep. Just this weekend I helped Grace do a final check of Splashdown's upcoming short story anthology. We were able to exchange documents back and forth almost instantaneously. Up until not so long ago, that sort of thing would have been impossible.

The Internet has created the "Global Village" which sounds cozy from the inside. Unfortunately, it is a village to which not everyone has access. While we enjoy chatting, texting, and tweeting, there are people out there whose only concern is finding their next meal. Sometimes it is easy to forget just how privileged we are. This weekend I read the news headlines and my heart almost broke. The main story was about how East Africa is being ravaged by the worst drought in sixty years. Somalia is worst-hit and the UN estimates there are ten million people in that region at risk of starvation. Another story covered the shooting in Norway in which an estimated ninety-six people lost their lives. A third story was about a talented British singer who was found dead at her home on Saturday after a long battle with drug and alcohol addiction.

All of which brought home to me how much the world desperately needs the healing power of Jesus. Without Him, we are at the mercy of all that is bad in the world. Without Him, we are doomed. Scientists may try to tell us that we can build a perfect world, but they are deluded. In one weekend, a woman with everything the world has to offer lost her battle with addiction, an apparently ordinary man decided to kill as many people as he could, and the Horn of Africa stands on the brink of starvation. If this is the best we can do, then we are in deep trouble.

As Christian writers spread across the globe, we are perfectly positioned to help spread the word that there is a solution to this world's problems; that there is a peace that fame and fortune cannot bring; that there is a love that can make the angriest man lay down his guns; and that God's mercy makes us all brothers and sisters in Him and that no-one should go hungry.

We have the technology at our fingertips to see our stories reach the farthest corners of the globe. My prayer is that we write for God's glory, and that our words might help nudge the world a little closer to Christ. Because there is no higher calling.