A Test Of Faith… And Adaptation

TUES., MAR. 3, 1998, 1:05 PM
OFFICE, PULLIAM

Here you are again, with a present and potential loss of function that’s greater than with your leg and back. I have tried to prepare you for such losses, but I realize you, particularly, can’t truly feel the effects until you have the condition. Remember My basic message: you have had quite an unimpaired life into your mid-60’s; always remember this as you deal with losses, one by one. You are still quite blessed. Keep your focus on the positive… on what you still have.

Perhaps this loss of strength and function in your left arm and hand is temporary and that you’ll get back enough to type and play your guitar. Continue to hold that thought, being true to your (Our) positive perspective on health. At the same time consider and try various adaptations for losses that you now experience. The smaller chain saw is a good example. You don’t like it as well as your “faithful Stihl”, but adaptations are rarely as completely good as what they have to replace. You hate to think of yourself as handicapped… as a cripple… but if you are, be a positive, happy one. Yes, do keep in mind Lee Smith, realizing how minimal your losses are as compared with his… and how late in life yours have come.

You know I offer this as a test of your faith, whether I caused it or just allowed it to develop. In some ways you may become a better “role model” than when you were completely functional. Some humans who are quite sound physically, as they move into the older years, feel less need to trust in and call on Me. Some also feel little appreciation for imperfections in others.

Yes, it can be the physical analog to the “story” in Luke, contrasting the righteous Pharisee telling of all his “desirable” actions with the sinner who acknowledged his sin and need for forgiveness. As Jesus I noted that the one who had sinned was closer to my Kingdom than the righteous one. You are now physically less healthy than you have been… in terms of functioning. But you can be more healthy, socially, emotionally, and spiritually, as you are now among the “imperfect” and can “feel for” such others as you couldn’t before. And, true, it is quite similar to how you were, and still are, with Peter’s death… able to relate more truly with those who have suffered similar losses of young loved ones.

How about another, yet another reminder: you are on a much longer life journey than that of these 70 some years as Bob Russell. Your spirit, created out of Me, outside of time, has had many experiences, making it an eternal soul. Life is about love, appreciation, compassion, faith, integrity… and enjoyment. These losses now may be karmic. You’ll know for sure when you come on over, yet again. I say it is “better” to consider them as such… not to puzzle over why you might have to suffer these, but in acceptance and in creative adaptation to the losses. If they aren’t actually karmic, and you do well what I suggest, you’ll build good karma for “lives” ahead. And the more you do such, the closer you get to true enlightenment… knowing that you, as an individual soul, need not be any more, returning to Me.

All of this isn’t truly “real” to you yet, but you’re much closer than are most Christians, particularly in your generation and denomination. I love you Christians, but too much of your doctrine is “bi-polar”… either/or. This doesn’t trouble Me, for I am quite in favor of diversity… and it is fun to greet some fundamental Christians as they come across and realize the incompleteness of their “sacred doctrines”. Some are initially disturbed, as the Pharisee was, that their righteousness does not separate them, for eternity, from others who haven’t been “as good” as they were.