Home for the Holidays – The Journey

Serendipity – A happy accident or surprise not searched for.

Have you ever experienced what seemed to be an unfortunate event and found that God worked out the circumstances for good?

In September, when I booked my flight home to Seattle, I wanted to go through Dallas to avoid potential problems with winter weather. So when I downloaded my itinerary last week, I was surprised to notice that, although my return flight goes through Dallas, I was to make connections in Chicago on the way out. Evidently when I was checking the time schedule for the various options, I clicked a good time – by way of Chicago! I didn’t try to rebook so late in this busy season, but just took my chances.

When I was packing, I pulled out a couple of “Four Spiritual Laws” booklets to put in my purse “just in case.” I spotted a mini-CD called “Who is He?” and felt the urge to grab that as well. Often I follow such hints just to see what surprise God might have in store.

On the flight from Orlando to Chicago, I sat next to an IT professional from India. He asked me if I was a Christian, and when I said yes, he wanted to know if I could answer some questions for him. He was of the Brahmin priestly caste but was not very religious. Recently his father-in-law challenged him to learn more about spirituality, so he thought he would find out what Christians believe.

We spent the next hour comparing and contrasting the different ways each religion views the world, which are just about polar opposites of each other. In Brahman Hinduism, only one divine thing exists, so god (Brahman) is identical to the universe and everything in it (an impersonal force). Anything outside of Brahman is an illusion. So people are divine and need to give up their individual selves and their illusions to become at one with Brahman. A person will be reincarnated until they fully realize this ‘truth’ and become one with the universe. According to the idea of karma, one’s past behavior affects future lives – if you do good, your reward in the next life will be pleasant; if evil, then you will be reincarnated into an unpleasant situation.

In contrast, the God of the Bible created the universe; He is NOT an impersonal force who IS the universe. God created us to have a personal relationship with Him, but our first parents rebelled and so, like children with a genetic defect (called a sin nature), we all are separated spiritually from God at birth. Our behavior also affects our future, but we only have one life to set things right. Unfortunately, we are incapable of doing this. We cannot restore a relationship with God on our own, but God became Man through His Son Jesus, who died in our place to pay the price for our evil actions. We now have a choice: accept this gift and be with God forever, or reject His offer and be separated from Him forever. Where we live for eternity depends on the choice we make in this life now.

This information was a lot to absorb. But he thanked me for the interesting conversation and gratefully accepted the “Four Spiritual Laws” and the CD which had much more information than just the tract (in many languages) and was very appropriate for a computer guy. Thanks for the hint, God! Jesus gave me the privilege of planting some seeds and He will make them grow.

We landed in Chicago and parted ways. The flight to Seattle was delayed and by the time the passengers loaded, the snow started to fall. The plane was held at the gate until it was sprayed with de-icer, but then we did get to take off. Later I heard about 600 flights there were cancelled. I arrived safely in Seattle, a little late, tired, but happy.

Have you ever tried to explain your faith to someone of another faith? What happened?

For some resources on sharing with Hindus, go to http://www.GotQuestions.org and search under Hinduism.
To find the “Four Spiritual Laws” in many languages, go to http://www.4laws.com/laws/languages.html

Do you want to show The Jesus film on your smart phone in Hindi? Or how about Magdalena in Haitian Creole? The Jesus Film Team has a new FREE app for the iPhone to do just that, and the Android app will be out soon. With this system you can find out what films are available in a particular language and then watch them on your smart phone.
Just think — you are waiting in the airport to go on vacation in Mexico and you show The Story of Jesus for Children in Spanish to the kid sitting next to you. How cool is that??!!!
For more information, go to — http://jesusfilmmedia.org/