Understanding the Spiritual Puzzle

By Bob Bernet

This book was written to provide Spiritual Insights into Real World Problems.

 

For most people thinking about spirituality is like putting a puzzlle together without seeing the picture on the box.  The goal of this book is to help you understand the "Big Picture"  or "the picture on the box" of The Spiritual Puzzle so you can understnd how your piece fits in the puzzle. The book does not try to tell you what to believe, it explains many different worldviews so you can make up your own mind.  If you already have a storong understanding of religion or spirituality it will help you relate better to people who believe something different than you do.

 

The author did not write the book to entertain you, he wrote it to help you live a better life.  

• Language: English
• Publisher: SpiritualPuzzle LLC
• Release date: May 20, 2020
• ISBN: 9781393825883

Book preview

Understanding the Spiritual Puzzle

Spiritual Insights for Real World Problems

by Bob Bernet

Copyright © 2020 by SpiritualPuzzle LLC. All rights reserved.

This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a scholarly work or book review. For permissions or further information contact Bob Bernet at [e-mail].

Edited by: Pat Leedy

Illustrated by: Kat M. Perez

Printed in the United States of America

First Printing, 2020

Why Read This Book?

Most of the people in the world believe in some sort of spiritual component to existence. There are over two billion Christians throughout the world. There are one billion Hindus in India where the religion is so pervasive it is hard to separate the culture from the religion. There are over one billion Muslims in the world, many of them pray multiple times a day. Throughout South America, Africa and Asia there are hundreds of millions of spiritual folks: Christians, Muslims, Buddhists and many other religions. As important as spirituality and religion are to most people throughout the world it is rather unusual that the education system in the Western World tries to avoid any real discourse, or ongoing education about these different spiritual beliefs. In Western culture, it is not politically correct to discuss religion. It is hard to believe something so important and something that is such a major part of so many people's lives is generally considered something we should not talk about.

I believe that most people have their own concept of spirituality, and that these ideas can affect everything they do. The goal of this book is to help you understand the big picture of spirituality, so you can use that understanding to help you activate your spiritual life in the physical world and apply spiritual insights to all real-world situations. This book was written to help you understand and think about many different opinions of what spirituality is and how it affects everyday life. It is my hope that by understanding more about spirituality you will better understand how reality works and how you can have more control over your physical life through a better understanding of your spiritual life. 

Trying to understand reality without a big picture understanding of spirituality is like trying to put together a puzzle without seeing the picture on the box.  If you do not have the picture on the box you are trying to put the puzzle of your spiritual life together by matching colors and shapes and sizes without an overall understanding of how everything fits together.

The topic of spirituality, and the big picture of spirituality seems so big most people never even try to get a true understanding of the full dimensions of spirituality. By breaking down the big concept of spirituality into four basic categories it becomes much easier to understand the different types of spirituality, and how the spiritual and the physical worlds fit together.

This study starts by dividing all types of thoughts, or world views, into the spiritual and non-spiritual. We will discuss non-spiritual thought first, followed by spiritual worldviews and religions. Spiritual thought is divided into three categories. 1. Historical based religions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. 2. Eastern religions like Hinduism and Buddhism. 3. Non-secular spirituality of all forms such as secular humanism and naturalism.

By dividing the big concept of spirituality into four smaller topics, and by discussing each set of ideas in easy to understand chunks, we can compare and contrast the different world religions, worldviews, and spiritual thought systems. Hopefully this review will help each individual come to a better understanding of their own thoughts on spirituality, worldviews, and religions.

This author believes that your understanding of spirituality or non-spirituality influences your thoughts and actions much more than most of us realize, so it is important for everyone to try and better understand the big picture of spirituality and how it affects every one of us in our daily lives.

How To Read This Book

There are many deep and probably new spiritual ideas presented in this book, so I recommend reading the book twice.  Rather than try to understand every idea thoroughly before going on to the next concept it may work best to just power through the first reading and get the big picture.  If you get stuck on an idea don’t stop for too long, just skip it and go on.  After you have been through the book once you can go back and re-read and re-consider any of the details or concepts you may not totally understand the first time through.  Study questions are provided at the end of each chapter to help you digest and understand each section before going on to the next. Anything in bold is the author’s way of showing emphasis or importance. Bold words in quotes or scriptures are added by the author. If you get stuck or bored on one chapter skip it and move on. If all else fails skip to the chapters at the end of the book and read those first.

This book is not written to entertain you it is written to help you live a better life.  This book takes you on a journey of ideas into the world of spiritual understanding.  Each chapter is a stop along the way that helps expand your perspective and understanding. You do NOT have to understand every idea to understand ideas presented later.  Enjoy the journey.

To the reader:  there are a number of places in this book that have long quotes or descriptions about a particular religion that come from other sources.  I feel rather than have me interpret these ideas it is best to let you the reader see what the other sources actually say in their own words.

Most Bible verses that are quoted come from the King James version of the Bible.

Author’s Note

The journey that lead me to write this book started in the fall of 1970 in my Senior year of High School at Culver Academy when I took an Ethics class from Chaplain Jerrod Foster. It was unusual for a secular private school to offer such a class, but I was at the right place at the right time.  At the age of 17, it was good to be taught, and to experience the discussion and study of ideas about what was right and wrong, good or bad, and to understand there was something called the history of philosophy which really tracked the history of Man’s ideas about spirituality and the nature of man.  When I entered Miami University the next year, because of my experience with the Ethics class my advisor encouraged me to jump in and take three courses in Philosophy my first quarter of college.  Ultimately classes from the Philosophy and Political Science Departments kept my mind thinking and questioning about the nature of reality in a way that would never stop. 

The next step on my journey to understanding the spiritual puzzle was encouragement from Pastor Shirley Cadle who quietly helped me understand the difference between philosophy, spirituality, religion and relationship.

My first lessons on Faith and how the spiritual and physical world relate came from many hours of listening to Dr. Frederick K.C. Price of Ever Increasing Faith Ministries.  More recently my spiritual thirst has been quenched by reading and listening to Dr. Ravi Zacharias, a well-known author.  Having absorbed as much as I could from Dr. Price and Dr. Zacharias and many others, I decided it was time to write what I could to help the average person understand what I called The Spiritual Puzzle.

My story is that there is nothing I would rather do than sit and talk to someone about what is really important. Although I enjoy watching and playing sports, given the option I would rather sit at a table with a nice beverage and discuss whatever is on your mind and close to your heart.

I was once told that wisdom is being able to understand the difference between the trivial and the significant.  I have always tried to focus on understanding the significant.

When I graduated from college I felt moved to save the world so I became a social worker and a group parent and counselor for local teenage boys who were living at an orphanage. I soon realized that saving the world and helping people who are struggling for survival physically, and emotionally was very difficult work that does not pay very well.  After two years at the orphanage I decided the best thing for my future was to get a job in private business and do charitable work as an avocation.  Today, after 35 years in the business world I am blessed to have reached the position where helping children and helping people understand the idea of spiritual literacy occupies most of my time.

My interest in foreign cultures and world religions began when I was a single 32 old salesman who, through a set of unusual but fortunate circumstances, fell in love with a woman who was born and raised in India and had come to the US a few years earlier.  I was a young baby boomer who was one of the first to grow up in the fast growing lily white suburban USA. After High School I was blessed to have met a number of black friends who enjoyed watching my amazement as I was introduced to America’s other popular culture of the 70’s and 80’s, or as they often called it life in the projects.  At the time I met my Indian girlfriend I felt I was fairly knowledgeable about what were two obviously different American cultures. My first trip to my wife’s small town home in India in 1987 blew my mind.

As I struggled to understand a new culture the words of my Political Science Professor Dr. Bill Campbell kept repeating in my mind. All education is a result of comparing what you know to what you don’t know, and you have to constantly be exposed to people and things that are different than you to continue to grow. These words came to life when I was suddenly exposed to a world that was nothing like what I had ever seen or even imagined before. 

As I became familiar with Indian culture I was once again amazed at how different their beliefs were from mine.  I was also stunned to realize that in the late 1980’s half the world didn’t have showers, or hot water, or toilet paper or HVAC equipment in their homes, and most people had never even ridden in a car much less owned a car. Part of my amazement was that even though India had not progressed materially as fast as the USA, there was an overwhelming sense of spirituality that does not exist in the US.

By the time I was thirty I had been exposed to many intercultural experiences such as:  showing up in the projects late at night and hearing friends say boy, did you come here by yourself?, or finding myself in a precarious situation where a black friend told his buddies, I know he looks like a narc but he isn’t, don’t bother him, or getting lost by myself on the streets of India where most people had never met a white person.  I could cite many other situations where I found myself in places that according to the culture I grew up in, I did not belong.  In all these situations I always had a deep feeling that there was some greater power watching over me. I always had a strange peaceful feeling that no matter how strange or scary it was at the time, it would all turn out OK. After spending four plus years in the intellectual tradition of a college philosophy department, I had to be able to understand this feeling intellectually from a logical perspective not just as intuition.

About twenty years ago I set out to understand in my mind what I felt in my spirit.  I had been exposed to so many different ideas and cultures I felt I had to intellectually understand which ideas really made the most sense. This book is the result.

Acknowledgements

This book is a product of inspiration, love, and support from many people who made an indelible impact on my life.  I dedicate this book to Dorothy Leedy and the Leedy Family.  First of all, thank you Dorothy for all you and your family did to help bring my wife half-way around the world to the USA, which allowed her to become the beautiful loving and amazing lady she is today. I would not be the well-rounded person I am today without all the love and generosity you gave to her.

To Pat Leedy, thank you for all you have done to edit and help me develop the ideas in this book.  Without your help I would still be thrashing ideas around in my computer in a form no one could ever read. You were my sole encourager, coach, and editor for the first two years as this book came into existence.  Without your help and encouragement this book would not have made it this far. 

A big thank you also goes out to my niece Saumya Sharma who was born, raised and highly educated in India. Saumya’s perspective of someone who was raised in an Eastern religion was priceless in helping me write several parts of this book. Also thank you to Kat M. Perez of Charlotte, N.C. who helped me through the early stages of design for the cover and website, and to David Braughler of Braughler Books who was critically helpful with the final edit.

Thank you to my wife Upasna who was the first person to get me to travel outside my comfort zone outside the USA, to see other parts of the world which helped me understand how different and diverse the world really is.  You helped me realize that the best way to grow and learn more about yourself is to talk to someone who is very different and has different ideas than you do.  We can only grow by comparing what we know to what we do not know. 

Also, with a grateful heart I dedicate this book to my deceased parents Bob and Trudy Bernet who taught me about the joy you receive when you step outside your comfort zone and you give of yourself to help others.

Giving Back

A portion of the proceeds of this book will be donated to the Greater Project charity.  Greater Project helps create generational change for vulnerable, abused, and forgotten children in Cincinnati, Ohio, Kerala, India, and Kenya, Africa. 

For more information or to help out please check out: Greaterproject.org.

Contents

Introduction

Chapter 1 What is your worldview?   

Chapter 2 Understanding the non-spiritual worldview 

Chapter 3 Darwinism     

Chapter 4 Secular Humanism    

Chapter 5 Difficulties of non-spiritual belief  

Chapter 6 The spiritual worldviews   

Chapter 7 Hinduism     

Chapter 8 Buddhism     

Chapter 9 New Age Spirituality    

Chapter 10 Islam      

Chapter 11 Judaism     

Chapter 12 Christianity     

Chapter 13 Jesus      

Chapter 14 Forgiveness     

Chapter 15 Free Will, Good/Evil, Salvation  

Chapter 16 Faith, Prayer, Resurrection   

Chapter 17  Activate your spirit    

Questions and Answers     

Introduction

As modern culture becomes more and more removed from ideas about Spirituality, and a relationship with nature, and we become more and more isolated from family and friends  due to job transfers, large impersonal corporations, two worker households, political rhetoric, online trolling, and the growing cultural demands of material success, we feel an emptiness. The media is full of images of beautiful and sexy people that we are supposed to emulate, but we can never measure up to the comparison of such perfect physical beauty and opulent lifestyles. When we see the terror of 9/11, natural disasters like the Coronavirus or hurricanes in New Orleans or Haiti, fires in Australia and the Western US, or terrorist and random shootings and wars, it heightens our feelings of fear, emptiness, and our sense of loneliness, helplessness and confusion.

We have seen the largest buildings in our country collapse due to terrorism. We watch many parts of the world struggle with natural disasters and diseases. We see people in The Middle East, Asia, South America, Africa and Eastern Europe, resist dictators and terrorists. Killings are being committed in the name of religion, politics or government. We watch the news and realize politicians, major company executives, once trusted financial institutions, and news organizations are boldly and unashamedly lying to us with a straight face. We need some sort of reassurance. We struggle for solid ground to stand on. We watch as politicians, corporate institutions and famous people we once respected fall apart in a web of greed, lies, deception, sexual perversion and abuse. It is obvious that our culture and what we call The real world is a mess. The only place to look for reassurance or understanding is to the spiritual world.

Ravi Zacharias writes "Of the twenty-one civilizations that English historian Arnold Toynbee mentioned in his many books on history, the current Western Culture we live in is the first culture that does not teach a moral law or educate our young in moral instruction". I.¹ Never before has a culture tried to raise its young without a moral code or any kind of spiritual or religious laws.  Many in our culture feel a great deal of conflict as the media and the education system try to minimalize the concept, and even the discussion of religion or spirituality.

Many people search for spiritual meaning because they have a gut feeling the materialism, we worship just cannot