baptised twice, saved...?
Apparently I got saved on the lower east side today. So I'm told.
A woman stopped us and handed me a pamphlet with a little cartoon of a guy (labeled "man") and a sparkly cloud (labeled "heaven"), and asked if I was going to heaven. I said, well, I'm in seminary? So of course she kept trying to make conversation about my school, and if I were actually saved (since clearly wanting to be a minister is not an indicator). (But actually it isn't, really, since we have entirely different concepts of these sorts of things.)
She walked me through the process of asking Jesus to come into my heart, which I'm fine with, and then she got to "because I'm a sinner," and I said, "well, that's where it gets theologically problematic." And she gave me a pamphlet about "studying" the gospel of John (which seems to be more like "memorizing"), and I tried desperately to escape across the street -- but it was Delancey street and we didn't have the light. Eventually we got away, after she exclaimed for several minutes about how young I looked.
Anyway. The pamphlet about John is pretty amazing, and by "amazing" i mean "ridiculous."
On the story of changing water to wine: "Now we know that the kind of wine which was used at this marriage was not the kind of wine which would make people drunk. It was not the same kind of wine which people make today. It was a delicious juice made from grapes. How embarassing to run out!"
On Jesus cleansing the temple: "Let us be sure our body-temples are places of prayer, where we talk with God each day and are aware of His presence. Never let them become a 'den of thieves,' where the cares and pleasures of this life dim the glory of God."
There's also a wonderful illustration of "I am the bread of life," featuring Jesus' head and shoulders emerging from a Bible, in front of a slice of toast.
A woman stopped us and handed me a pamphlet with a little cartoon of a guy (labeled "man") and a sparkly cloud (labeled "heaven"), and asked if I was going to heaven. I said, well, I'm in seminary? So of course she kept trying to make conversation about my school, and if I were actually saved (since clearly wanting to be a minister is not an indicator). (But actually it isn't, really, since we have entirely different concepts of these sorts of things.)
She walked me through the process of asking Jesus to come into my heart, which I'm fine with, and then she got to "because I'm a sinner," and I said, "well, that's where it gets theologically problematic." And she gave me a pamphlet about "studying" the gospel of John (which seems to be more like "memorizing"), and I tried desperately to escape across the street -- but it was Delancey street and we didn't have the light. Eventually we got away, after she exclaimed for several minutes about how young I looked.
Anyway. The pamphlet about John is pretty amazing, and by "amazing" i mean "ridiculous."
On the story of changing water to wine: "Now we know that the kind of wine which was used at this marriage was not the kind of wine which would make people drunk. It was not the same kind of wine which people make today. It was a delicious juice made from grapes. How embarassing to run out!"
On Jesus cleansing the temple: "Let us be sure our body-temples are places of prayer, where we talk with God each day and are aware of His presence. Never let them become a 'den of thieves,' where the cares and pleasures of this life dim the glory of God."
There's also a wonderful illustration of "I am the bread of life," featuring Jesus' head and shoulders emerging from a Bible, in front of a slice of toast.