At uni today, our group of occupational therapy girls had a picnic. It rained during our break, so we booked the biggest 'study' room in the library and rearranged all the tables and chairs to make room for the picnic mat and food, with everyone to sit on. We were all just laughing, talking, sharing our thoughts on the mutual disdain we have for certain annoying lecturers, and passing food around, when one of our friends decided to tell us a bit more about her life and give us her testimony.

So briefly summing up what she said, she started off by describing the type of person she was before she really committed to her religion. She was raised up as a Christian, though she never thought much about it and Sunday church were for her, her weekly chance to visit the chocolate store next door to the church and snack up. It all changed when she was forced to go on a bible (I think it was) camp during year 9. She hated it at first, but through their inspirational discussions and readings from sections of the bible, it got her thinking about what she was living for. She realised that she couldn't live only for herself anymore, for many reasons, including that she believes it won't guarantee her a life after death in heaven, and she now lives for God.

I really appreciate her sharing with us something that is so personal and meaningful to her. It's a great feeling to be able to find something that you strongly believe in and value so much - something that helps you define who you truly are.

Honestly speaking though, this has gotten me further away from God and from any belief that I had previously held in Christian values. I do believe there is a God up there, whether it's Jesus or Buddha, I don't know.

However, I don't think it's a sin if you don't worship and live for God. What's wrong with living for yourself and the people you love instead? Ultimately at the end of the day, you can only physically rely on yourself if you want things done. If there's still other options, you can't just sit there and wait for something to happen, for some sign telling you what to do. Also, how can surrendering yourself to Jesus and living for God guarantee you a place in heaven? What happens to people in other cultures who have another belief system? Do they, along with the people who don't live for God and don't surrender their life to Jesus, go to hell?

For the Christian readers of my blog, I'm not prompting discussion or debate, I just needed to write this out somewhere.

I'll stop for today. I'm tired and I have plenty of assignments to do and so little time.
Thanks for reading :) Goodnight yo.

Labels: life, religion