come blow your own horn

[brainfixed]

i'm putting this discussion here because it has a lot to do with the way international in my life because the way international made fun of charities and giving to charities or doing charitable work so much that i saw a lot of people being very hard hearted about giving and would tithe and give offerings only if they were "operating believing" to get something back from god like he was a geenie in the magic lamp to command or something, not like giving was a gift to the giver more than it was a gift to the receiver, but anyway this also has a lot to do with being asked "where is the compassion" and feeling like i was in the way international again and being cornered and badgered into making myself accountable to somebody else's definition of acceptability and that somebody else had no clue about me and my life whatsoever, and i had the feeling that some others felt the same way, so i thought about what if people had the chance to blow their own horns a little bit?

so even though i don't get on here or anywhere else and shout it from the prayer forums or any other forum or anything, i go to hospice and i also go to the "welfare" hospitals and sit with "unclaimed" people that have no visitors or support outside of the hospital staff and stuff like that. it's something i started doing when i grew up after experiencing up close and personal all my life how the way international abandoned sick and dying people after having isolated them from friends and family for decades. and it's hard work a whole lot of the time because people are dying and are very sick and when i'm the only person they have to talk to or am the last person to hear their last words, well that's hard a lot, but it's also a place of honor in their lives that they will let me in like that, and it's like very holy and i get to see glimpses of what i can only imagine might be the closest thing to a supreme being i'll ever get and it's scary and it's holy and it's moving and it's draining and it's hard and it's intimate and it's beyond the sum total of them and me every single time. so that's my horn to blow. what's yours?

[WOG]

i'm putting this discussion here because it has a lot to do with the way international in my life because the way international made fun of charities and giving to charities or doing charitable work so much that i saw a lot of people being very hard hearted about giving and would tithe and give offerings only if they were "operating believing" to get something back from god like he was a geenie in the magic lamp to command or something, not like giving was a gift to the giver more than it was a gift to the receiver, but anyway this also has a lot to do with being asked "where is the compassion" and feeling like i was in the way international again and being cornered and badgered into making myself accountable to somebody else's definition of acceptability and that somebody else had no clue about me and my life whatsoever, and i had the feeling that some others felt the same way, so i thought about what if people had the chance to blow their own horns a little bit?

so even though i don't get on here or anywhere else and shout it from the prayer forums or any other forum or anything, i go to hospice and i also go to the "welfare" hospitals and sit with "unclaimed" people that have no visitors or support outside of the hospital staff and stuff like that. it's something i started doing when i grew up after experiencing up close and personal all my life how the way international abandoned sick and dying people after having isolated them from friends and family for decades. and it's hard work a whole lot of the time because people are dying and are very sick and when i'm the only person they have to talk to or am the last person to hear their last words, well that's hard a lot, but it's also a place of honor in their lives that they will let me in like that, and it's like very holy and i get to see glimpses of what i can only imagine might be the closest thing to a supreme being i'll ever get and it's scary and it's holy and it's moving and it's draining and it's hard and it's intimate and it's beyond the sum total of them and me every single time. so that's my horn to blow. what's yours?

I think what you are doing is admirable and I'm sure you are doing it for completely altruistic reasons. I applaud you! For me, I have spent some time taking care of myself in recent years. At some point, I'm sure I will get back into volunteer work of some sort and find a way to give back to the universe. Your experiences remind me of an incredible book I picked up at the library about a month ago that got me thinking. It's Stan Goldberg's Lessons for the Living: Stories of Forgiveness, Gratitude, and Courage at the End of Life. It was in the new book section. I pretty much devored it. Being a companion to the dying has got to be tough work, but Goldberg said it was probably the most revealing and enlightening window into his own soul that he had ever experienced. Good for you for discovering a way to give that also gives back and enriches your own inner wholeness.

[excathedra]

what you do is so holy

i stop and help people

[sirguessalot]

brainfixed, if i may say...as a student of dying and hospice history, when i read your post and the way you describe your experience, i cant help but feel that your interests are somewhere at or near the flames of "original religion" as i currently understand it.

i feel kinda lucky to have you with us...and i really hope you post more of your story somewhere as you see fit.

thanks for showing up...and for blowing the trumpet.

[waysider]

I let some guy cut in front of me on the freeway today.

(I'm sorta easing into this "giving" stuff slowly.)

Edited March 17, 2010 by waysider

[Broken Arrow]

I let some guy cut in front of me on the freeway today.

(I'm sorta easing into this "giving" stuff slowly.)

You can get shot for doing that in Cleveland! That person owes you their life! :B)

Edited March 17, 2010 by erkjohn

[outandabout]

I found five bucks on the sidewalk and I gave it to a homeless person.

[Tzaia]

I wish I were more missional, but all I can muster right now is serving the flock.

[JeffSjo]

Hi Brainy,

I thought about responding right away but don't feel like I had much of anything to toot my own horn about right now.

But I'm glad you did because IMO what you do is awesome on a very real and basic level to me and I think you are right, it's just the kind of thing that The Way International would end up putting you down for in order to maintain their dominance.

But they won't do it now, not here Brainy, not today!!!!

[brainfixed]

it freaked me out to start this discussion because i was thinking how totally self-centered and self-righteous i might come off as being and how i was probably going to be ripped apart about doing things "in the closet" or whatever that bible verse says, and how maybe even people wouldn't even try to take pride in themselves and their own goodness but might even be thinking some of the same things i was thinking about when i started this discussion. but even if people didn't think they had anything to blow their own horns about, look at how differently everybody treated me than anybody would have if we had all been still in the way international, and that's something to blow our horns about, at least i think so. but i didn't start this discussion to be about me, but to be about how each of us have found the real truth about "and these three remain, faith, hope and charity, and the greatest of these is charity", and how charity has no boundaries and cannot be defined by religion or societal standards/expectations or even by moral expectations. and charity lives here on this discussion. thank you.

brainfixed, if i may say...as a student of dying and hospice history, when i read your post and the way you describe your experience, i cant help but feel that your interests are somewhere at or near the flames of "original religion" as i currently understand it.

i feel kinda lucky to have you with us...and i really hope you post more of your story somewhere as you see fit.

thanks for showing up...and for blowing the trumpet.

i don't even know what to say except thank you.

But they won't do it now, not here Brainy, not today!!!!

i needed to hear this. thank you.

[TrustAndObey]

...i didn't start this discussion to be about me, but to be about how each of us have found the real truth about "and these three remain, faith, hope and charity, and the greatest of these is charity", and how charity has no boundaries and cannot be defined by religion or societal standards/expectations or even by moral expectations. and charity lives here on this discussion. thank you.

And what a great feeling it is to not be subjected to such religiosity that puts charity down.

Even to be free to say "charity" instead of love... or umm, "love of/for gawd in da restrung mind in maddenation in der hertzville.".

I always felt the word charity was a much better translation anyways..

[brainfixed]

And what a great feeling it is to not be subjected to such religiosity that puts charity down.

Even to be free to say "charity" instead of love... or umm, "love of/for gawd in da restrung mind in maddenation in der hertzville.".

I always felt the word charity was a much better translation anyways..

really, i mean isn't charity the action that comes from the love? all the gobbledy gook that victor paul wierwille came up with to replace the word "love" just to shut down the simple action that comes from loving people, all that so that the followers of the way international would shut their hearts to everybody/every organization except victor paul wierwille and the way international. i mean it got so bad that he even distorted the bible to say "if you don't work, you don't eat" when jesus said "i know you not because i came to you hungry and you fed me not." so charity is the word that belongs there if you look at what jesus said and did.

Edited March 21, 2010 by brainfixed