The Door (4 of 8)
Series: I Am
Stephen Whitney
John 10:7-10
Rita McClain's spiritual journey began in Iowa, where she grew up in a fundamentalist Pentecostal church. What she remembers most about that time are tent meetings and an overwhelming feeling of guilt. By the age of 27 she had rejected all organized religion. For the next 18 years, she sought inner peace only through rock climbing in the mountains or hiking in the desert.
After an emotionally draining divorce she started looking inward. She started with Unity, a metaphysical church, then Native American spiritual practices. After that it was Buddhism, where she attended a retreat that required eight days of silence.
These experiences melded into a person religion, which she now, as a 50-year-old nurse, celebrates at an altar in her home. Her altar consists of an angel statue, a small bottle of ''sacred water'' blessed at a women's vigil, a crystal ball, a pyramid, a small brass image of Buddha, a consecrated candle, a Hebrew prayer, a tiny Native American basket from the 1850's and a picture of her ''most sacred place,'' a madrone tree near her home.
Millions of Americans have embarked on a search for the sacred in their lives without finding the answer they are looking for. Augustine (400 AD) - ''You have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless, until they can find rest in you.''
God made us to have a relationship with him, but sin ruined it. The only way for a person to restore that relationship is to believe that Jesus Christ died for their sins to be forgiven. Jesus said, ''I am the door'' that leads to a real relationship with God.
Background
In Israel when a shepherd took his sheep away from town into the hillside, they often could not return to the village at night. So, they would build a temporary sheepfold. These countryside sheepfolds were just open spaces enclosed by some kind of wall. There was no door, just an opening by which the sheep came in and went out. ...
Series: I Am
Stephen Whitney
John 10:7-10
Rita McClain's spiritual journey began in Iowa, where she grew up in a fundamentalist Pentecostal church. What she remembers most about that time are tent meetings and an overwhelming feeling of guilt. By the age of 27 she had rejected all organized religion. For the next 18 years, she sought inner peace only through rock climbing in the mountains or hiking in the desert.
After an emotionally draining divorce she started looking inward. She started with Unity, a metaphysical church, then Native American spiritual practices. After that it was Buddhism, where she attended a retreat that required eight days of silence.
These experiences melded into a person religion, which she now, as a 50-year-old nurse, celebrates at an altar in her home. Her altar consists of an angel statue, a small bottle of ''sacred water'' blessed at a women's vigil, a crystal ball, a pyramid, a small brass image of Buddha, a consecrated candle, a Hebrew prayer, a tiny Native American basket from the 1850's and a picture of her ''most sacred place,'' a madrone tree near her home.
Millions of Americans have embarked on a search for the sacred in their lives without finding the answer they are looking for. Augustine (400 AD) - ''You have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless, until they can find rest in you.''
God made us to have a relationship with him, but sin ruined it. The only way for a person to restore that relationship is to believe that Jesus Christ died for their sins to be forgiven. Jesus said, ''I am the door'' that leads to a real relationship with God.
Background
In Israel when a shepherd took his sheep away from town into the hillside, they often could not return to the village at night. So, they would build a temporary sheepfold. These countryside sheepfolds were just open spaces enclosed by some kind of wall. There was no door, just an opening by which the sheep came in and went out. ...
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