But the last 24 hours has certainly not been one of those mundane days.
Yes, I DID take back my house from the crazy, junked-up mania that began before the IF:Gathering happened. That was a big deal. I cleaned Hannah's room. I cleaned MY room. I cleaned the kitchen. I sort of cleaned the guest room. And I took back the living room. My brain cells are starting to settle back down as my surroundings do the same.
But what has my last day looked like?
1) For the past two days, Hannah and I have indulged in having tea parties. With milk and king cake instead of tea and crumpets, but I will tell you that king cake does JUST FINE as a stand-in. It has been her favorite thing during the past couple of days. She sits perched on her knees in her daddy's chair at the table, trying her hardest to daintily sip milk from her teeny tiny cup. It is so beyond precious. (And when she spills, she says, "Uh oh, Mommy! Ah made a mess!" and waits expectantly for me to clean it up. Gets that from both of her parents, I suppose. Legend has it that her daddy refused to eat dinner as a child until his FEET were clean. And I supposedly woke up in the morning, turned on my music, and started cleaning my bedroom every single morning. Just call me Snow White. Not sure exactly what has happened since.) But the tea parties have been divine. Hannah asked for tea parties three times yesterday. 2) After church last night, Greg, Hannah, and I needed to make a grocery run, so we stopped by WalMart for a quick grab-and-go. Well, that's what we thought it was going to be. I took my cart and ran for the grocery section, Greg took Hannah in his cart and ran off in the opposite direction to look at movies and bicycles and probably fishing equipment or something like that. He and Hannah love WalMart waaaaaay more than I do. After I finished my rounds and had picked up all the makings for meatball subs, salad, and cheese soup, I was trotting through the baby clothes section on my way to find Greg and Hannah, when I came across them suddenly, and Greg was deep in conversation with 3 very nicely dressed young men, one of whom was very earnestly presenting something. He was holding what looked to be a Bible and I heard the words "last great mystery" and "I bet you've never heard anything like that in your church before."
Now, my interest was super peaked because, in my past life, I taught high-school world religions, so I love learning about different religions and beliefs, and I truly enjoy dialoguing with people about why they believe what they believe. Often, many people haven't really thought that part through -- they just believe things because they grew up that way and their parents or church told them to believe that way. Other times, they know exactly why they think the way they do. Either way it's an interesting conversation. Anyway, I came in on the tail end of the conversation, so I missed most of what Jeff was talking about, but he was very passionate about a few things according to Greg: to be a follower of the TRUE church, one must follow the Sabbath on Saturday, God is both God the Father AND God the Mother (yes, there are at least 2 gods), most of the churches today have fallen away from true Christianity, one must not follow communion/the Lord's Supper, but must observe Passover on a regular basis instead, and in fact, there are several feasts of the New Covenant that we should be following regularly. I also researched their view of who God is afterwards, and they believe that Jesus Christ has already returned a second time with the name Christ Ahnsahnghong to start the World Mission Society Church of God in 1964 in South Korea. So the founder of this group claims to be the Second Coming of Christ.
So...Greg and I had stumbled upon some members of a cult. Anytime a group claims to be members of a major world religion but then follows essential beliefs that are strikingly different from that major world religion, they would technically qualify as a cult. (There are some other definitions too, but this is a pretty basic one.) This one was just a mix of Christianity, Judaism, New Age teaching, and Gnosticism. Whenever I come across people like this, I find that my reaction tends to be a mix of interest, amusement, deep sadness, and frustration. Interest because I truly want to know why a person believes the things that they do, no matter what those things might be. Amusement because, while I know that Christianity also sounds SO far-fetched to so many, in studying the historical evidence (both internal and external) for Biblical teachings, as well as a multitude of other extrabiblical backing, as well as testimony from my own life and those around me, I find that Christianity is in fact SO believable compared to other religions. It seems to be in such stark contrast to a group who started in 1964, believe that their modern-day founder is Jesus Christ, the Second Coming and Savior of the World, and that they have so many "new" secrets for the world that thousands of years of civilization never stumbled upon until now. There is just something to be said for the wisdom of the ages passed down throughout history. And then, I am saddened, because while it would be easy to make a joke about what Jeff was presenting to us, he REALLY BELIEVES IT. He believes in that as surely as I believe in Jesus Christ and His perfect, sacrificial, saving grace. And I know that what he believes is in direct contradiction to the Holy Scripture (and Jeff uses the NIV translation), when it says, "The Lord our God; the Lord is one" as well as so many other things. It just made me so sad to see someone so devoted to something so obviously false when there IS true saving grace to be had in the biblical Jesus Christ. Then, I get frustrated because I am just ticked at this Ahnsahnghong guy for lying to everyone about being the Savior of the World. What in the world makes someone DO that?
Greg very kindly listened, tried to discuss a couple of obvious twists of Scripture with him, but Jeff was so bent on finishing his spiel, I don't think he heard a word. After a few minutes, we parted ways, shaking hands and later, shaking heads, wondering if the right things had been said, wondering if more should have been said. There is always so much to think about in those discussions -- but I never want to be closed off from them. And I never want to stop seeing people as people. Because they are. Created in God's image just like the rest of us. It's so tempting to stuff others in the "them" box in an "us vs. them" world and forget that they are human. But we can't do that. We have to share truth in love.
3) On a lighter note, we then stood in line at WalMart with all of humanity. There were 3 lines open, and as always, we made a beeline for self-checkout. There were only 2 other lines open, and they each had about 15 carts in each of them, so self-checkout seemed like a prudent choice. Well, as we waited in our line, the self-checkout counters started dropping like flies, going offline, computers breaking, and red lights a-blinkin'. Until we were down to 1 self-checkout line. We were a colorful group -- nothing desegregates every division of humanity like a trip to WalMart. And nothing can bond said group like a super-long line, crashing check-out lanes, and thankfully, lots and lots of humor. People were sharing carts with each other, Greg was teaching Hannah what all of the medicines were on the counter next to us ("Daddy, what's dis?" "That medicine is for when you are sneezing. That medicine is for when you aren't pooping enough. That medicine is for when you are pooping too much."). A lady in front of us was wearing a head scarf, a mask, and two ports of some type coming out of her chest and arm -- she and her husband both had armfuls of shopping goods, presumably because they, like us, thought they were taking a quick trip to the store. If I was her husband, I would have been SO grumpy. But those two were cracking us up, being sweet in general, and just saying, "Everyone just needs to calm down. We're all in line. We're not going anywhere. What's the big deal? We can wait for a few minutes!" And that seemed to become the attitude of the others surrounding us. We waited in line for 30 minutes. But Greg and I agreed that we would totally do that again because it really WAS so much fun. :)
4) Hannah just became a backseat driver. Yes, she's two. But she told the puppy groomer today that she was 6. That explains why she knows how to drive all of a sudden. Her new thing is to say, "Be careful, Mommy! Be careful!" and in the same breath, "Mommy, go faster! Go faster!" And she did it in the car with Greg last night too. Oh yeah -- and she also told me, "I need music, Mommy!" And then, "Dance, Mommy, dance!" So we did.
5) Last of all, I did take the dogs to get groomed today. Both my Pomeranian, Chooch, and my Shih Tzu, Pippa, looked...well, terrible. They tell you to brush everyday, but I just forget to. So something needed to be done, and off to the groomers I went. Well, I went to pick them up, and I had recruited Hannah to be "in charge" of Pippa, while I was in charge of taking care of Chooch after they got back into the car.I'm a bad doggie mom. I didn't buckle my dogs in. I never have. I don't even really know what protocol is there. Hannah did great because Pippa sat in her lap in her carseat for the entire ride home -- Pippa licked her, Hannah giggled, but Hannah held on.
I'm afraid the same can't be said about poor Chooch. He was free to roam about the cabin. And boy, did he. We were driving on the Beltway about to exit, when all of a sudden, the truck in front of me decided to slam on their brakes. So of course, I had to do the same. The last thing I remember is a little, red, fox-like creature flying through the air over the console, bouncing off of the gear shift, SHIFTING the gear shift into neutral, and me having a near heart-attack. Like me, he was freaked out (but otherwise okay), so he starts trying to climb on top of me immediately. I, in the mean time, can't figure out why my car ISN'T MOVING, but is making growling noises every time I hit the accelerator. And there are a few impatient cars right on my tail. Oh. The gear shift. Oh, that should probably be in "drive." (Did I mention that Hannah is giggling hysterically as all of this is taking place?) I finally got situated, calmed Chooch down enough to where he wasn't trying to sit on my head, but he still insisted on being in my lap with his head under my left armpit. Which meant his little butt was in my face. Favorite ride home EVER.
So, all that to say, life is indeed an adventure! We just got home, and I am one tired mama. Maybe I will take a nap. Hannah is supposed to be asleep, but I just sneezed, and she yelled, "BESS YOU, MOMMY!" from her room. So I guess she's not asleep.
If all else fails, I'm eating meatball subs and cheese soup tonight for dinner.
1 comment:
Thanks for the laughs! This was a great post!
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