I’ve avoided this book my entire life. I never understood what the big deal was. Why do so many people quote it? How come so many stories relate back to some part of this book? I’m a Laotian and Vietnamese refugee baby that was raised both Catholic and Buddhist. As a Buddhist, I genuinely enjoyed going to the temple much more than going to church. At the temple, my Laotian side of the family sat me down and there was smiles, chanting, monks, and food. Lots of food. When everyone ate together it was this magic feeling that we were all sharing this love by simply enjoying eating together. It was something I felt. At the Catholic church, my Vietnamese side of the family had us dress in uncomfortable clothing, the rules were strict, and mass felt suffocating. There was a strange part of mass where you were supposed to shake hands with and bless people around you but it didn’t feel genuine to me. It was like these people were spreading their regret to others. Being there was supposed to absolve them of some sin they felt guilty about. I was just a child but I felt it. Pair that with a flavorless cracker and listening to the priest give a sermon in a language I didn’t understand, no wonder I didn’t resonate with the bible. Now that I’m grown, I still read many books with authors I admire that reference the bible and finally decided to read it. They obviously saw something I missed my first go around. Being an entrepreneur I wanted to keep trying. So I decided to read one page per day. That was about eight months ago and here are my thoughts so far.
I initially started with the Old Testament and all I got out of it was fear. My Kindle app allows me to highlight sections that made an impression on me and it felt like I was highlighting all the sins of my past. All the punishments associated with them. I felt as if I was meant to be damned for everything bad I’ve ever done. I felt as if a mirror was placed before me and all my of sins amplified. There were references that I had no context for. It felt like a rough draft of morality for humanity. That somehow we were failing at the time and were going to be wiped off the Earth to start over. There was a lot of talk of infidelity in the past and everyone seemed to be sleeping with everyone. I did get a lot of trying to keep your promises and being faithful was an important virtue during this dark part of humanity’s history. After several months of this, I gave up on the Old Testament and moved on the New Testament hoping for something better.
This part of the Bible feels more familiar. The stories connect dots leading all the back to my youth. Actually reading the original stories of Jesus directly from the bible had a different effect on me. I felt like I was reading it from the source. Everything else I’ve ever been exposed to was some diluted, interpreted version that fit the way that person wanted to express it. I finally am reading for the first time and can feel myself making my own judgement and interpretations of the story. I read of how devils were cast out of people and healing happening through touch. As a registered nurse having worked in an ER for a decade, I can’t help but feel the struggle of his journey through my own experience. I make this connection that perhaps the people of the past did not understand the effects of the mind, spirit, and body as a singular entity. When Jesus casts devils out I interpret as he is healing their minds and spirit. The mind is a direct feedback mechanism on the body. So I truly believe there are some physical ailments that can be cured through healing the mind through faith and prayer. Sometimes changing the input from fear, doubt, and worry to feeling gratitude and love and praise can mean all the difference to one’s overall health. I believe there are clues here in the bible about how to heal someone in this day and age. With social media spreading emotion in an exponential viral nature our connectedness has caused widespread anxiety and insecurity in forms we never expected. This is what I’m starting to get from the bible. That perhaps Jesus had an extrasensory awareness of what ailed people and never how to solve it simply by touch. In the same way petting cats can lower stress hormones and reduce blood pressure, I think humans are capable of changing the energy inside of other people by manipulating their own. There is a science here that we do not yet have the tools to measure but as we know through our discoveries in science, just because you can’t sense something with your five senses, it does not mean it doesn’t exist. We just lack the senses necessary to perceive it. There are some who may be developing an extrasensory perception but they will never be understood because how can you explain light to a creature who does not have eyes? I will keep going on with my one page a day and see what other thoughts stem from this great books. God bless.