I Hate To Break It To You...

So yesterday a friend that I thought was fairly evolved posted a comment on twitter (that is now, hysterically, removed) about how he used to tell the Lord that he alot to do on earth before He (yes, the capital He) came back, but now hoped that He would come sooner than later--or something to that effect.

Before I could help myself, I tweeted back "He ain't comin'".

As a former church kid, I grew up frightened to death of the return of Jesus. I saw the "Thief In The Night" movies and had nightmares for years of being 'left behind' when the emminent rapture would take place. I was literally traumatized. I would wake up having night terrors as a child and run through the house to make sure everyone was still there. I was frightened of being left alone...on and on and on. Because let's be real...one could never really be sure if their name was written on the Lamb's Book of Life (Yes, there is a BOOK)...or if it had been erased if you had unrepented sin in your life. It's all very confusing.

So years later, after some transitions out of organized religion, yet still maintaining a connection with the Christian community, a co-worker asked me what on earth the rapture was. She had no clue. As I began to tell her: "They say that one day a trumpet will sound...dead people will rise from their graves and begin flying through the air...people will be taken out of their cars and ascend into heaven", I errupted into what I think is the most hysterical laughter I have ever uttered. The ridiculousness that at any stage in my life--even at a one digit age--is preposterous to me!!! Really? People read this in the Bible and take it literally? For real? Well, I did.

Maybe that day was my own personal rapture.

My godmother used to end every conversation with "Jesus is soon to come". One day, I just couldn't take it anymore and exclaimed "He's NOT coming"...just like I did yesterday. I hate to be like the kid who tells everyone there is no Santa Claus, but I just find it a shame, that people spend so much of their lives waiting to escape the opportunity to be here by dreaming of being rescused from our existance--complicated it may be--by White Jesus.

I know that I believe we each have our own individual moments of rapture. That moment that we come into a new consciousness...the moment we see 'the real' us...the moment we allow ourselves to unfold into our greatest gifts and watch them manifest in our lives.

People have called me faithless. People have even asked me if I'm an athiest. Absolutely not. My sense of Spirit is strong and with me all the time...even if I believe that there will be no trumpet sounding, dead raising or disappearing acts by the chosen few.