Saturday, February 20, 2010

God's Garden

In following Tonka replied to his invitation to visit the Church, Donald replied with additional comment:

Dear Tonka,

I respect your decision. I have heard people who also worship both Buddha and Jesus Christ equally. I called those people - skillful traders. They are facing 2 Deities and not sure whom to believe in and decided to deal with both of them and hoping one of the 2 Deities is real and saving them when they leave this world. Those people don't have real faith in any of the Deities.

Lord Jesus said: "No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other." Matthew 6:24

Faith is trusting in what you can't see because of what you can see. Here's my zillion dollar question to you: Have you ever accepted Jesus Christ as your personal Savior?

V/r

Donald
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Tonka responded:

Dear Donald,

Thank you for additional comment and I read it with great interest. The first interest is my admiration of your development in spirituality. It reflects in your personal character as a charming, confident, nice, peaceful, and smart man. This personality attracts to me which is the basis of our friendship. Regardless their religion, faith or belief, people who develop well in spirituality are equally great. They contribute to a peaceful and friendly world.

Second, I can see your loving kindness towards me. This loving kindness develops only in people with good progress in spirituality. You care and concern about me. This is a lovely sentiment and I thank you again. With care, parents concern about the safety of their child, the same as you do to me (Satan, personal Savior). I am being moved along the line of your care and concern. I surrender myself to God guidance (again this is God Father as I mean). The road ahead will be from within. I don't have to rush, but ready to accept the flow. Resistance and denial are sin.

This world is the God's Garden. It is so beautiful with the variety of flowers that God plants all of them. As a son of God, I admire and appreciate them equally. I can not love rose and hate tulip. Right now, I am standing on the part of the Garden where God plants lotus. Is it my choice? No, I was brought in to that place by God. Despite the location I am standing, I do admire the rest of flowers equally. Next when God moves me to the part where there is Jasmine, I will move accordingly and keep admiring the rest of the flowers equally. Who knows? one day I might move to the part where you are standing now, if God brings me there. Again, even I will be there, I still look back and enjoy the rest of the flowers equally. All flowers are flowers of my God Father.

I do see your question, and your comments (Trader, Deities, Master, Devotion, Personal Savior, Faith, Trust) and I am sorry that I have no direct answer to it. Generally, I refrain myself from discussing about God, Deities, and the holy scriptures, but accept all fully.

Again thank you for the opportunity to share my internal life that I never did it before.

Have a good weekend,

Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Invitation to visit the Church

Dear Tonka,

Honestly, I truly believe the Upward land was sold by the work of Jesus Christ whom I prayed to. Because at this moment, I believe very few people would want to buy any real estate. I am not saying this to discourage you, but what I believe in what happened. I have a personal story that I'd like to share with you.

Back in summer of 2006, my wife and I went out to look for any good deal on houses, we found a house with a very good deal and signed a contract on the house. Our current house was not even put up for sale yet. We started to contact realtor and listed the house with in weeks. We knew the selling market was bad, but we didn't know it was that bad. The more we did research on the market the more we found more bad news about selling houses at the time. We knew we were in trouble and could end up with 2 mortgages. My wife was crying and we were on our knees and asked the Lord Jesus Christ for forgiveness of our past transgressions. We had to confess all of our wrongdoings to Him. One Sunday and out of nowhere a buyer came by and agreed to sign a contract. It was a buyer market, but she agreed to pay the full listing price which we expected her to bargain $30K-$40K lower. The average number of days that the house would sit on market back then was 75 days, our house was sold in 39 days. We knew our Lord Jesus Christ is the One working on this. I totally give Him all credits for selling our house and also the Upward land.

As you noticed, I mention in this email that I prayed to Jesus Christ not to God. I know Jesus Christ is God - the creator of the universe, but I want to clarify that when I say God, I meant Jesus Christ. Because you would say you also have your God but you may mean another deity.

Mr. Tonka, I know I asked you to visit my church before, but you refused. I respect your decision, this may be another work of Jesus Christ that made me testifying to you my personal experience with the Lord Jesus. I know you are a good man and also a good friend, I hate to see losing you to Satan when you leave this world.

Please give some thought about this and if you'd like to visit my church, please let me know.
V/r
Donald
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Dear Donald,

I found your appeal very compassionate and I thank you so much for your kind regards. However, I want to continue to be liberal. Standing on Buddhism and embrace the rest of the faiths equally. In this respect, I do not plan to visit your church anytime soon since I do not have specific purpose at this time. As I told you so far that in 1990 I have participated in the worship in a church at the suburb of Rome. I joined with people for praying there and receiving all the bread and wine like everyone as I am also son of God. That attendance had specific purpose for worship, unlike the access many times to Vatican was for the visit during my stay in Rome. I do worship Lord Buddha and Lord Jesus Christ equally. Each time, I pray God, I mean God Father, our common source. Acknowledging that I am son of God is outside the boundary of Buddhism. It is my personal belief.

Again thank you so much for care of me,

Kind regards,/ Tonka

Saturday, February 13, 2010

The book 'L'ART DE VIVRE"

Cher Monsieur,

J'ai reçu ce matin le livre "L'ART DE VIVRE" et je vous en remercie infiniment. Je vais m'empresser de le lire et de mettre en pratique la méditation Vissapana enseignée par S.N. Goenka.

La première phrase qui figure sur la première page du livre est extraite de la Bible, Proverbes IV, 7* :

"Voici le commencent de la sagesse ; Acquiers la sagesse, et avec tout ce que tu possèdes, acquiers l'intelligence."

Je vous remercie beaucoup du beau cadeau que vous me faîtes.

J'espère que bientôt la neige qui a envahi votre ville fondra au soleil et que vous pourrez retrouver un rythme de vie normal.

Avec l'expression de mes sentiments les meilleurs.

Marie-Antoinette REVEIL
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Chère Madame,

Je suis heureux que vous ayez reçu le livre et je vous remercie beaucoup pour votre confirmation. J'espère que vous la trouverez intéressante.

Le livre nous donne une différente manière de voir le monde. En changant la perception du monde, notre vie se changera en conséquence. Il nous encurage d'appliquer une pensée critique et la recherche de la vérité universelle dont nous puissions jouir de notre vie, vivre en paix et réduire d'attente.

Dans ce livre, l'auteur reproduit discours par Goenka pour les 10 jours de cours de méditation Vipassana. Ce cours vise à former les gens sur la technique de méditation découvert par Gautama le Budha, comme un moyen de l'amener à trouver la vérité universelle ou l'illumination. Une fois qu'il est universel, la vérité est pour tous et pas seulement pour Gautama seul. Les gens de tous horizons de vies viennent d'apprendre les techniques et les appliquer dans leur vie sans sacrifiant leur croyance initiale. Ils n'ont rien à perdre, mais à ajouter plus de valeur à leur vie. Enfin, ce livre n'est ni à propos du Budhism, ni aucune autre religion. Il presente seulement la solution de la vie humaine quotidienne. Elle apporte toute la sagesse dont voici la citation de la Bible comme vous l'avez mentionné.

Bonne lecture et bonne chance à vous,

Votre étudiant TA HANG

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Dear Madam,

I am pleased that you have received the book and I thank you so much for your kind confirmation.

I hope you will find it interesting. The book challenges us with different way of viewing the world. The change of perception about the world, our life would change accordingly. It encurage us to have critical thinking and searching for universal truth from which we could enjoy our life, live peacefully and reduce sufferance.

In this book the author reproduces Goenka speeches for the 10-day Vipassana Meditation Course. This course trains people about the meditation technique dicovered by Gautama the Budha, as a mean to bring him to find the universal truth or the enlightenment. Once it is universal the truth is for everyone and not just for Gautama alone. People from every walk of lifes comes to learn the technical and apply it in their life without sacrifying thier original belief. They have nothing to lose but to add more value to thier lives.

Finally, this book is neither about Budhism nor any other religion. It discusses about the human daily life. It brings all the wisdom in here including the quote from the Bible as you have mentioned.

Enjoy your reading and all the best to you,

Your student TA HANG