Stuck in the darkest of hallways and how mindless documentaries and binge-watching old shows taught me to sit it out.

When you’ve lived in a pitch-black hallway for thirteen years, sometimes you find yourself on the floor sucking whatever light you can get coming from doorways in front of you or air from the vents to just keep going. You know the walls are there to guide you and keep you on the straight and narrow, so you reach your hand up to feel them. The floor is there to keep you from free falling into an abyss, and the ceiling is there to protect you from the harsh environment outside, but it’s still just too darn dark there for you to know whether to move or sit still. You know there are doors ahead with lights underneath, but you don’t know which will open or when. I was binge-watching a show from the 90’s, because sometimes the light from the Word of GOD is too bright for our eyes, and the darkness of the world is easier on the eyes and the heart in the waiting. I was watching as this doctor was describing a scenario of a man stuck in a room with two doors: One said “Do Not Enter” the other said “Do Not Exit,” so he just sat there holding his hat. Boy, can I relate to that. I’m in transition by the Hand of GOD, but I’m not sure what He is transitioning me into, so I just sit here in the dark hall with my laptop on and my keyboard in my hand.

I've been camped here, against my will, for a very long time. After over a decade of this dark hallway, I did lose all hope of getting out until this year. Now, I can see the light at the end, I just don’t know when the end of it comes. In this dark hallway there are three doors to my left, slightly behind me, and three doors to my right, slightly before me. The doors have titles on them. On the left behind me are the doors that say, OCTOMOM, WIFE, and CHURCH. The doorway that says OCTOMOM is closing very slowly, and it’s the heaviest door. It will be permanently shut in two years, something I dread more than death itself. The doorway entitled WIFE was slammed closed on me by two men on the other side, one holding a gavel and the other holding a signed piece of paper that said Divorce Decree, one not signed by me or GOD, by the way. The CHURCH door closed some seven years ago. Some say the CHURCH doors never close. That is until you learn the truth about the history of it, and you know you just can’t stay anymore. Sometimes, GOD will drag you out of that room.

The doors on my right also have titles, WIFE, AUTHOR, and PARADISE. I’m not sure if the first two doors are going to open, but I know eventually the third one will. They all have light beaming through from under the door, a really bright light, enough to light up the hallway for me to see ever so slightly in this darkened hallway that GOD dropped me in some time ago. Because I serve GOD and my calling so faithfully, He is obligated to get me out of this dark hallway. I started to fear that the furthest door away, the one that said PARADISE, was the only door that was going to open, and it was years away.

During one of my nights wasting time watching documentaries, because the Light of the Word was too bright, I was drawn to a story about a man who left a religion commonly known as a cult in some circles. He laid testimony to searching diligently for GOD while serving in this false religious temple, trying to work his way up to celestial exaltation. He kept waiting to hear the voice of GOD in this false religion and never heard it. After GOD freed him, he realized that every wrong doorway he entered, the whole time, GOD was still there with him silently as he sought, labored, and traversed adversity, even in the solitude and darkness. When GOD’s perfect time came, GOD led him through the correct door straight to the feet of Jesus, and it was then that He realized he was doing it wrong all that time. Yet, in every mistake, GOD was still with him the whole time even though he never truly felt GOD’s presence. Sometimes, in our darkest times we can’t feel the cool soothing oxygen GOD is supplying us or His presence in the darkness, but He is definitely the breath in our lungs and the light that keeps us going.

GOD is in this dark hallway with me, especially on some of my worst days, and I know beyond a shadow of a doubt, pun not intended, well, maybe intended a little, He hasn't left for even a nano-second. Maybe I can't see which door will open, but whichever door He opens, I'll be happy with it. I'm not sure if I still believe in fairy tale-endings, but whatever He chooses I know will be best for me, but more importantly, what’s best for the Kingdom of GOD and those I’m called to serve. That’s bliss for me, even if it’s not the human definition of deliriously happy. GOD sees the end of our hallways, and He knows which door to open for us, and sometimes, we just need to sit still in the darkness, on the floor, enjoying what little light comes from underneath the doors ahead, and be quiet enough to hear His whispers.

 

   

 The Very First Sin: It’s Not What You Think! 

 

I grew up in an area of the country where Roman Catholic teaching has such a stronghold that even the public school system obeyed its teachings.  I remember as a young girl, our school lunches every Friday were either pizza or fish sandwiches.  In our home, our Italian Roman catholic stay-at-home mother never served any kind of meat (beef, pork, or chicken) on Fridays.  (Fish was okay, somehow that’s not considered meat.)  When that is engrained in you from childhood, even after having left that erroneous teaching some thirty years ago, some habits just stick.  What erroneous teaching is that? 

   I’d love to get into why Good Friday isn’t really Good Friday, but rather good Wednesday, but that will have to be for another post.  Right now, my point is even though I have not been a Yankee Roman Catholic since I was twenty-six years old, when I took out the left over London Broil to put it in the mini-crock pot for tonight’s dinner, I could sense my Italian grandmother rolling over in her grave, and I could hear my mother’s voice telling me not to make that for dinner tonight.  Even though she left the Roman Catholic church long before I did, her tradition stayed with her until she passed from this life  five years ago.  

We are told by Jesus that the Jewish teachers of the Law were forsaking GOD’s commands for man’s tradition, and here we are over 2,000 years later and our religious leaders are doing it again, but you could never convince them of that.  Once tradition takes that kind of stranglehold on a sect, it becomes as sacred to them as Scripture.  The practice of Christianity today has become such a cut and paste religion that one can hardly recognize the actual true teachings of Jesus.  I’m going to venture a guess that he ate meat on Fridays, in fact, I’m quite certain he did.  Friday evening meal during the first century sabbath was called the Shabbat.  So, why aren’t we doing exactly as Jesus did when we are supposed to live as he lived?  I’ll tell you; it goes all the way back to the very first sin, somewhere between Genesis 2 and Genesis 3, and we are not privy to having heard or seen it, but it is surely implied. 

When the woman was approached by the serpent, she was questioned about GOD’s Word to them about what they were really allowed to partake in as far as eating in the Garden, and like a true child of GOD, when taught wrong, she did what she was told up to a certain degree.  What was she taught?  What did she believe and who taught her that “truth?”  No man alive today witnessed it, but we can assume from her answer that the man changed the Word of GOD to the woman who was not even created when it was given.  She was taught to not even touch the fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil or she would die, so when she did touch it and she did not die, well, she assumed that the man lied.  He didn’t lie, he only added to the Word of GOD.  So, there, my friends, is the very first sin.  It wasn’t touching it, it wasn’t eating it, or even being tempted by it, but it was lying about the Word of GOD.  

This is why religious practice became so warped in the days Jesus walked the earth. Long gone were the strict commands of the 613 Mosaic Laws, but alive and well was Halacha, a combination of Rabbinical teachings with a spattering of the Torah mixed in, creating thousands of laws and rules that no man could keep track.  Does it sound vaguely familiar?  That is man and government today, creating so many laws, regulations and rules that it’s easy to break them, because there are too many to know.  GOD made it so easy for us. He gave us the Torah, which means instructions. Yet, for some reason, we seem to feel that is not sufficient, and we have to add to that, if not with additional laws and restrictions, but with man’s traditions also.  Judaism became a cut and paste religion in Jesus’s day, just as much as Christianity has become today.  Scripture is clear, what has been will be again, there is nothing new under the sun. (Ecclesiastes 1:9).   

Following the Torah to the letter of the law is impossible, it always has been, hence Grace, but a grace that came long before Jesus did.  Even Jesus could not follow it exactly as written, as he was not a woman, nor was he married, hence he could not perform the duties of a woman or a husband.  The Levitical priests had to offer sacrifices daily, hence even on the Sabbath, they had to do their duties.  Do you see what I am getting at?  Grace and Truth came long before John 1, it started in Genesis 3.  Adam lied about what GOD told him to the woman.  He added to the Word of GOD, hence GOD set a plan in motion to give grace to the first man who broke His Law and it extends all the way to the last man born on earth, if he wants it.  The problem with mankind is, he doesn’t really want the whole truth and nothing but the truth, but what he adds to it because it makes sense to him.  Anything that  makes logical sense to sinful man is usually what takes precedence over what GOD says. 

Some of us want the whole truth and nothing but the truth, but in order to find it, we have to search and search and search every breathing day we have on this planet.  We are rare, those of us who are not satisfied with man’s truth.  For some, C’s get degrees, and that’s good enough.  For others, nothing but Summa Cum Laude is considered a true accomplishment.  I’ve never been a mediocre kind of person, hence why my circle of friends is about the size of a period (.).   I’ll never achieve perfection, I’ll always search for the whole truth and nothing but the truth, and how blessed I am that Grace is there as a safety net for when as a flawed human being, I mess up.  Having the net there is good for all of us, but I’d rather  just keep climbing until I reach the prize for which the Apostle Paul tells us to keep pursuing.