From: owner-eda-thoughts-digest@smoe.org (eda-thoughts-digest) To: eda-thoughts-digest@smoe.org Subject: eda-thoughts-digest V3 #135 Reply-To: eda-thoughts@smoe.org Sender: owner-eda-thoughts-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-eda-thoughts-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk eda-thoughts-digest Saturday, April 15 2000 Volume 03 : Number 135 * If you ever wish to unsubscribe, send an email to * eda-thoughts-digest-request@smoe.org with ONLY * the word unsubscribe in the body of the email * . * PLEASE :) when you reply to this digest to send a post TO the list, * change the subject to reflect what your post is about. A subject * of Re: eda-thoughts-digest V3 #xxx or the like gives readers no clue * as to what your message is about. Today's Subjects: ----------------- ET: mushy gooshy love [kara garbe ] ET: love [Katherine Alexandra ] ET: what is love? ["stephen" ] ET: another about love -read only if you wish to:) [BRONCOBAND@aol.com] ET: LovE aNd Such ["* windex *" ] ET: defining yourself [Katherine Alexandra ] ET: More on ~*Love*~ ["Janadell" ] ET: Religion has nothing to do with Jesus ["Janadell" Subject: ET: mushy gooshy love first of all, i loved joe's anecdotes of witnessing love in other people. that was great. but i do have a response to something else that he said: > Even > religion, which is so important to so many people, just plain can't even come > close to love. I want to change the word "religion" to be "spirituality," a sort of all-encompassing term. But anyway, along those lines, do you guys agree with that? Because I personally feel that the peace it's possible to achieve through spirituality can be deeper than love for other human beings. Or, at the very least, that love for human beings is a path into something spiritual, something even divine. There was a time when my love for one human being overshadowed everything else, when that gave me everything I needed... and now I look back on that like I had tunnel vision, that that kind of love came at the expense of so much else. I don't think that love for one person, or even a few individuals, can be the end-all be-all of life, which is what I interpreted Joe's post to mean... but I'm curious as to what other people have to say about that. and, in response to seth's post: > I define love in the most basic case as placing a value on > something. You value your life...You love life. You value your mother, > father, siblings, other family, pets...you love them. You value your > significant other(boyfriend or girlfriend, husband or wife)...you love > them. You value money, sex, affection, etc. hence you love them. I just couldn't overlook this -- I disagree so vehemently. Maybe I value money because it can buy me things that I need for survival, like food and shelter... that does NOT mean that I "love" money, and that certainly can't just be lumped in general with the way I "love" life or "love" my closest friends. It's appalling to me that all these different things could be lumped together as love. I think our language is very inadequate in this respect. When I say "I love fettuccine alfredo" it means something different than when I tell a person "I love you," and I've probably only said that to 10 people in my life. ~kara "still there's many who've turned out their porch lights just so i would think they were not home and hid in the dark of their windows til i passed and left them alone" ~ani d. ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 15 Apr 2000 01:50:27 -0700 (PDT) From: Katherine Alexandra Subject: ET: love i have found love as an underlining theme in life. there is the love from my parents, which is a story of both destiny and love.... you see, they met back when my mom was only 16 and my dad just turnd 20....my mother was a pretty, short, bubbly cheerleader from the "wrong" side of town. she lived in the south, in a shack. they had an outhouse. but she made all of her clothes and tried to put off an image that her family wasn't so poor. her father died when she was 6, and she is very detached from people. my father grew up all over the world, but spent most of the time in california. he came from a wealthy polish immigrant family. his father died when he was 16. my dad was the dorky, pseudo intellectual type with a tad bit of arrogance. he was in the military and stopped at a truck stop one day in a small town. thats when he met eyes with my mom. they eyed each other the whole time....then my mother went up to him and gave him her number. they were together for a year, completely and utterly in love. my dad ended it to drive through mexico and they went on new paths. my mother got pregnant at 20, named the boy after my dad...then she married another man and had a girl (my sister). my dad met another woman and had 2 kids with her. both my parents were in horrible marriages and divorced...my mother was in kansas while my dad was in cal. they hadn't spoken for 10 yrs when my mother searched for my fathers number..they got a hold of each other and a month later got married in las vegas from elvis. then they had me. this is the thing...they never forgot about each other. my dad still has the card that my mother wrote her number on. he carries a picture of my mom being 16 bc that's the way he still sees her. SHE NEVER AGED IN HIS EYES...thats the beautiful thing...they still see each other as being young. another sense of love that i have seen is the sort of love that hurts..the sort of love that is painful, filled with anger...but the root of it is hurt and wanting. my sister got into some trouble, ran away, snorted coke, lost it....we disowned her. but after 8 years of dealing with this, i found her number and called her. no one in my family wanted to ever speak to her again, but my dad decided to. we both went to her wedding....i didnt realize at the time just how hard it was for my dad to do this...to let go of pride. and for my sister, that smile in her eyes was amazing...she looked so tierd, so tierd of all of the secrets and lies. and my father looked tierd of pretending that she wasn't part of the family. mind you, she can still not come over for dinner...but my dad makes an effort to be part of her life. it's difficult for both of them, but you see love in this. and romantic love with me? well i have felt it, when i was 16 in england to a wonderful, beautiful man. it wasn't the truest of loves, but it was love. i skimmed love, i felt the beginning of it. and now, well i am feeling love again, except this time, completely not the way i would ever suspect....love sneaks up on you, in so many forms, it's sad bc so often we dont notice someone bc they aren't our "type". i believe with romantic love, destiny rolls out a red carpet to you. says, "HERE SHE IS! HERE HE IS!" but it is up to you, and the other, to do something about this. with family love...that is the toughest i believe. bc this is the unconditional love. and sometimes it becomes conditional...which it shouldnt. love is pacing back and forth at night due to a sister acting funny. love is those moments of brilliance when you know why you are with these people. love is the memory of the past when you rode bikes together. love having such a strong piece of someone in you, a fundomental part of who you are. and trying it with fragile hands. thanks kat __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Send online invitations with Yahoo! Invites. http://invites.yahoo.com ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 15 Apr 2000 06:39:59 -0400 From: "stephen" Subject: ET: what is love? Perhaps the question should be What is True Love? ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 15 Apr 2000 11:52:33 EDT From: BRONCOBAND@aol.com Subject: ET: another about love -read only if you wish to:) Well, first of all I'd like to say hat I really loved Kat's words about love... I take different perspectives on love every once in a while, but this is how I feel about it at this time in my life. The love that I have for my wonderful family is unbreakable, untouched, and unable to be matched, however, as I'm sure some would agree, love with people beyond the family unit provides a whole new dimension of fulfillment. I genuinely love and care for a few very close friends of mine, and it brings me so much peace...I don't know what I would do without something so wonderful. Of course, I've had boyfriends that I thought I loved and realized down the line that it was just infatuation, as well. But here's something that wasn't so obvious to me about love: I used to think that love was lost when the person was gone from my life. Now, I'm sure most of you know that love lasts beyond that. I have love for people that I don't have contact with, people that probably don't like me very much because of a bad relationship, and love for people who are in my life, but don't wish to have the kind of relationship I long for with them. (Sounds like a lot of people, I guess :)...really there's about one I can think of for each of these circumstances.) Regardless of all of his, I still cherish my love for them and find bits of happiness in it...even loves that "ended" sadly. I guess that's all the babbling I should do for now. Thanks for reading!!! Laura "Sam, let's grow old together...our spouses will understand" - --unknown ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 15 Apr 2000 12:23:02 MDT From: "* windex *" Subject: ET: LovE aNd Such Hey angels...Im coming out of my shadow again I see you all writing about love and it gets me thinking, gets me wondering. Love in all of its glory is quite simple in its wake. I have found a love true and enduring. It may hurt me and I may cry but in reality when it's comes down to the truth it is just love. How could you define it or out just the right words on how it makes you feel. How can it be just one thing when it is so many and it is so far reaching. There is no boundries, no limits, no stops and goes. When its starts you are forever lost in it's grasp. New loves may come and go but a spot in your heart will always be reserved. It can be people, places, things, feelings. Your heart knows no boundries when love comes into play. Maybe the problem is we are trying to define it when the best way to know what love is is just to feel it. Like a curse, a blessing, and amazing uplifting confusing feeling. It bears down on our hearts and lifts us to the highest of places. Love is just Love, no words could define the extravagance of the feeling. Its simple...Love Kerry ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 15 Apr 2000 13:42:56 -0700 (PDT) From: Katherine Alexandra Subject: ET: defining yourself How do you define yourself? someone very dear to me asked me that recently. took me by surprise. i told him that i wasn't sure. i was surprised to be asked such a pointed question. i know that i used to, well i once did, define myself by my family. each member. i defined myself by our horrible times when nothing seemed right, and those moments when things fell into place and i knew why i was somehow randomly put to live with these strange people. and there have been moments where i have, accidently, defined myself by accomplishments. yes, i will admit to this. i defined myself over straight A's on a report card one year, over a part in a play, even over my volunteer work. over my talents, over my defeats. yes, i have defined myself over my dyslexia, or how i got kicked out of that one play, the one year. or over those D's i made, how i was such a slacker. i have defined myself over drinking, how many drinks i could take. over men, how many men i could catch. i have defined myself over my travels, how many countries i have stepped foot in. over acceptance letters and words of praise. i have even simply defined myself as being Katherine Alexandra Winters. as being me. for my faults and my strengths. for being the whole person that i am. i have defined myself over nothing at all. for just well, being who i am. but now i know...and perhaps this is a part of growth, perhaps this is a part of seeing pain and happiness, i know i do define myself as being a part of this family, as being part of the human race...and i know that is incredibly corny....but it is true. we are a collective bunch. it is naive, shallow, selfish, self centered, to somehow think that we aren't all defined by each other. and i am not talking about the surface level, about the labels that we throw onto each other so that we dont have to think very hard, about the images that we put off, about the one diminsional personalities that we are all in fault for giving off, but about the complexities of who we are...about how we are all so intertwined together and it would be a shame not to see, how connected all of us are. how we are all part of this human experiance. when a child dies, we all feel a sharp pain, at a funeral we bond together to show that there is still life, we hold desperatly onto each other....a school shooting, a bombing, a war, we cling to one another. lovers hold hands, children depend on us, we are all part of a collective experiance. we all feel utter misery, we have all been hurt, beaton, left with nothing but emptiness inside...and we all have laughed so hard that it hurt, we have all caught a glance with some random stranger and smiled, and recieved a smile back. if you haven't, well, you will. somehow i define myself as being a part of all of this. the good, the bad and the ugly. how do you define yourself? kat sorry this was so long :( __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Send online invitations with Yahoo! Invites. http://invites.yahoo.com ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 16 Apr 2000 09:12:31 +1000 From: "Janadell" Subject: ET: More on ~*Love*~ I've fixed up the html thing now....sorry guys! Jesus speaks thus of love in John 15:9-17 "As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father's commands and remain in his love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no-one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command. I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master's business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everthing that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit - fruit that will last. Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in my name. This is my command: Love each other." Then there is Paul's well-known letter to the Corinthians.....I Corinthians 13:1-7 "And now I will show you the most excellent way. If I speak in the tongues of men and angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing. Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres." Sets a pretty high standard huh? Perfect love...something to aspire to. Janadell *^*^*^*the barefoot angel*^*^*^* ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 16 Apr 2000 09:19:27 +1000 From: "Janadell" Subject: ET: Religion has nothing to do with Jesus Since I accidently sent this last time in HTML code, I would like to re-post the text version in case it was illegible for anybody...if you have already read this then I apologise... G'day there everyone I have been lurking for 3 years now and this is the first time I have come out of the woodwork. I love some of the creativity I see here - the pure emotion and humanity. Thank you all! The reason I am posting is that I really wanted to respond to Windex's post. I am very behind on my email so here is an exerpt to refresh your memories.. > Okay Im not look to offend anyone...I got the first part in an email and > this is what I thought. I know you guys are openm to everything so I would > love to hear your thoughts. OK? Are you with me? I should probably read some more emails before I reply to this - maybe someone else has already said what I want to say...If that is the case then *shrug* that's life in virtual land :o) >I will say the > Bible is one of the greatest, if not the greatest books of all time Obviously then you are familiar with the Bible. Think back to some of the things Jesus said regarding the religious leaders of the day and their hipocrosy. Jesus wasn't about rules, he was about forgiveness. He condemned the 'pharisees' of the day (ie religious leaders) for their lack of compassion and pedantic law-making and law-keeping. >Parents are bowing down and leaving priests, bishops and other members of religions to teach their children right and wrong when parents are the ones that should be doing this. As a mother of three I agree with you here. >We have left this alone for to long and the results have become a bunch of people that are trying to runs or thoughts and our minds. Think about what you are saying here.."a bunch of people" yes EXACTLY! A bunch of people not GOD. The church isn't God. We can blame the church for alot - after all they are just "a bunch of people" - alot of the time what the church says has nothing whatsoever to do with what God says. Plus there are alot of different churches out there - which ones exactly are you condemning? I am a Christian - Jesus Christ is my Lord and saviour, but I think 'religion' is a dirty word. Honestly. Don't blame God for mistakes made by some of us mere mortals. > Why are we so afraid to give our children condoms and birth control? What is going to happen, since the school are giving them condoms they aren't going to get pregnant. Be proud of responsibility and the act of love, not scared of it. I don't believe that wanting our kids to make wise choices is about being afraid. It is about wanting what is best for them emotionally, physically, and spiritually. You speak highly of responsibility...but having sex involves more than just feeling good, and avoiding *"diseases and having more children", and certainly falls a long way short of your description of "the act of love" more often than not. In some ways by taking away these possibilities*, were are encouraging more promiscuity. When people have sex, there is a big possibility they will be hurt emotionally, especially if they are too immature to handle a sexual relationship. You may think it's a great thing for teenagers to be liberated sexually, free contraception and all that.. and that is your right. But don't take away from other peoples rights to want some input into big decisions their teenage kids make...I don't believe that encouraging kids to make decisions about sex and abortion behinds their parent's back is in their best interest. >We spend so much time blaming other people that it is inconceivable that it could be the people in their lives. On the contrary, feeling guilty is a big part of being a parent. I don't know if there are many parents out there who would try to blame their kid's mistakes on others - in my experience parents tend to take on 'too much' responsibility and guilt on their kids behalf, rather than not enough. But I agree with you that we should spend more time looking to ourselves for the answers, not blaming others. >Judge not lest ye be judged yourself. Jesus actually said this. >What have you done wrong? What are you doing that you shouldn't? The church leaders said kiss > the ground we walk on and we did it. They said come to church every day and do all these things but remember your family. May I suggest that if the leaders of the church you are referring to said you had to kiss the ground they walk on, they had things dreadfully wrong. You were going to the wrong church. But please don't hold that against God...it had nothing to do with Him. >But, didn't they say love thy neighbor as thyself? > They said do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Jesus was also the author of these comments. The church or whoever "they" are that you are referring to are simply quoting Him, perhaps we are all hypocrites? God knows we are only human - but He loves us anyway. When we start trying to boss each other around he must laugh :o) I challenge you that you have not met the real Jesus - the Jesus that is alive today. The Jesus that has already stood trial for our sins and taken the punishment upon Himself, even though he was sinless. Read the Gospels with an open mind - you may be surprised by the true character of the Jesus you meet there. The one who said "But go and learn what this means: 'I desire mercy, not sacrifice.' For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners." Mat 9:13 This same Jesus had authority to rebuke storms, heal the sick and raise the dead. (including himself). He made outrageous claims about himself.....he claimed to be without sin, he claimed to be the ONLY way to God, to be able to forgive sins, to be a heavenly king, to be able to give eternal life, he claimed that he would die and come back to life, that he would return again to judge the world (get that?). In his famous book Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis makes this statement, "A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic--on the level with a man who says he is a poached egg--or he would be the devil of hell. You must take your choice. Either this was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us." Jesus could only have been one of four things: a legend, a liar, a lunatic--or Lord and God. There is so much historical and archeological evidence to support his existence that every reputable historian agrees he was not just a legend. If he were a liar, why would he die for his claim, when he could easily have avoided such a cruel death with a few choice words? And, if he were a lunatic, how did he engage in intelligent debates with his opponents or handle the stress of his betrayal and crucifixion while continuing to show a deep love for his antagonists? He said he was Lord and God. The evidence supports that claim. He claimed to be God, which is why we killed him. Was he? If not then he was a liar...incredibly cunning and evil, or he was insane. He has not left us the option of believing he was just a teacher, or a wise prophet. He fullfilled every prophecy made about him in the Old Testament. The Old Testament (the part of the Bible written before Jesus' birth) was completed in 450BC, hundreds of years before Jesus was born. The prophecies were made in astonishing detail by many people throughout these books. For instance, the Old Testament indicated Jesus would be betrayed by someone he trusted, "Even my close friend whom I trusted, he who has shared my bread, has lifted up his heel against me" (Psalm 41:9). The New Testament, which records Jesus' life and resurrection, reveals that one of the 12 people Jesus chose to be part of his inner circle betrayed him, "Then Judas Iscariot, one of the Twelve, went to the chief priests to betray Jesus to them" (Mark 14:19). More than 300 prophecies like this were made in the Old Testament and then fulfilled through Jesus' life, death and resurrection. The chances of one person fulfilling a mere 8 of these prophecies are 1 in 100,000,000,000,000,000. For one person to fulfill 48 of these prophecies, the number becomes staggering--1 chance in 10 to the 157th power (1 with 157 zeros after it). Add to that the 250 other prophecies and it becomes impossible for any other person except Jesus to ever fit that particular sequence of time and events. If you have read this far CONGRATULATIONS you have an excellent concentration span LOL The power of Christ knows no boundary of time or space. In our own age, many skeptics have been convinced just as thoroughly their first-century counterparts. For example, Lew Wallace, a famous general and literary genius, was a known atheist. For two years, Wallace studied in the leading libraries of Europe and America, seeking information that would forever destroy Christianity. While writing the second chapter of a book outlining his arguments, he suddenly found himself on his knees crying out to Jesus, "My Lord and my God." When confronted by solid indisputable evidence, he could no longer deny that Jesus Christ was the Son of God. Later, Lew Wallace wrote the book Ben Hur, one of the greatest English novels ever written concerning the time of Christ. I realise I have taken this topic and totally run in my own direction (God's direction). I pray as I write this that the Holy Spirit might work in your heart and that you might feel or sense Christ knocking at the door of your heart. You can invite him in by faith right now. God knows your heart so it doesn't matter exactly what words you use. Here's a suggested prayer: Lord Jesus, I want to know you personally. Thank you for dying on the cross for my sins. I open the door of my life to you and ask you to come in as my Savior and Lord. Take control of my life. Thank you for forgiving my sins and giving me eternal life. Make me the kind of person you want me to be. If this prayer expresses the desire of your heart, pray it right now and Jesus Christ will come into your life just as he has promised. Once you invite Christ into your life, he promises to never leave you. Hebrews 13:5 "God has said, 'Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.'" To know God personally is the greatest decision you will ever make. Get yourself a bible and find some other christians - sometimes you can find them at a church, but not always. Ask God to guide you through his word and the Holy Spirit. And remember - your sins are forgiven! When God looks at you on judgement day all he is gonna see is the innocent blood of his only son. Jesus has payed the price - Praise God! Love in Christ Janadell *^*^*^*the barefoot angel*^*^*^* ------------------------------ End of eda-thoughts-digest V3 #135 **********************************