On the Spot

This morning at eight o’clock there was a dense fog shrouding the neighborhood, making everything look surreal and kind of spooky. Also it was very cold outside. Heather wore a black T-shirt with an H on the chest to advertise the house she used to live in. She’s a recovered meth addict and goes to AA meetings. During the week she has a job as a hair stylist. At around nine, Tim texted me to say he’d pick me up for church at nine fifty. We actually arrived at almost ten o’clock, but we weren’t late for service. I listened to the sermon and it sounded like something I could identify with. Maybe it hit home a little too much, because I felt pretty guilty after I got home. I thought about how I wasn’t doing enough for the church— not even tithing anymore. I can’t afford it right now. The best I can do is to show up on Sundays and take in the sermon, then think it over afterwards. In a few words, Pastor preached that we are not in control of our lives, though we like to feel autonomous and to make our own decisions. I wonder if he was saying that people don’t have free will? But usually, Lutherans believe that God gives us free will to act as we wish, and we can choose to do the right thing or something else. Oh well. This is a sermon that will sit with me for a long time, and for a long time I will struggle with it. Basically it was about surrender to Jesus Christ and letting him take care of things. Well, I know I don’t agree with his point of view. Hopefully I won’t resent it too much.

Tomorrow morning I have a virtual meeting with Rebecca. Tuesday morning I have a face to face visit with Misty. And then Wednesday at noon I’ll get a turkey dinner delivered to my house from the agency. On the holiday itself I’m not doing anything.

I think I need a little break from WordPress. The fact is that I don’t have any more ideas to put out there, and I don’t know what other people are thinking lately, except for one blogger who started out a born again Christian five years ago and now rejects religion wholesale. Well whatever, I don’t want to be a part of this dialogue anymore. People can believe in God or not; it doesn’t matter to me now. America is a peculiar place for putting you on the spot concerning your religious beliefs. In the UK it isn’t like that at all. Nobody really cares what you believe. I really wish the United States could get it together with the rest of the world and give up some of its old prejudices. But that’s just me, I guess.

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