Down to Earth Christianity

By Sharon Young

There was a time in my life when I found Christianity a mystery. I listened to different preachers and teachers, but there was nothing real to any of it. When I was seven years old I joined a church that seemed very spiritual to me. But there came a time when I needed more. I didn’t know where to find more. When I learned I could ask Jesus into my heart, I realized what was missing. I have recorded what I discovered in the search for what was missing. I call it “Down to Earth Christianity.” This is practical, real life experience derived from a radical, growing change in me from knowing and understanding the Lord Jesus Christ; a more complete and real way to look at life beyond religion.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Dec 1, 2012
• ISBN: 9781300465614

Book preview

Down to Earth Christianity

Down to Earth Christianity

An invitation to ponder

By Sharon Young

Copyright c 2012 by Sharon Young

All rights reserved

This book or parts thereof may not reproduced in any form by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwise—without prior written permission of the publisher, except as provided by United States of America copyright law.

ISBN 978-1-300-46561-4

Cover design by Madison Kearney

Preface

I wrote this book because there was a time in my life when I found Christianity a mystery.  I listened to different preachers and teachers, but there was nothing real to any of it.

When I was seven years old, I was told that I had to pick a denomination.  My father gave me the right to join whatever church I felt comfortable with.  I settled on an Episcopal Church because I liked the vestments. I liked the stained glass windows.  I liked that I had to genuflect before I stepped into the pew.

I liked the hymns.  I liked the choir.

Everyone wore their nicest clothes.  Hats were colorful.

Then there came a time when I needed more.  I didn't know where to find more.  When I learned I could ask Jesus into my heart, I realized what was missing.

I have recorded what I discovered in the search for what was missing.

I call this Down to Earth Christianity.  I wanted to explain a more complete and simpler way to look at life beyond religion.

This is practical, real life experience derived from a radical, growing change in me from knowing and understanding the Lord Jesus Christ.

Others have said the same thing, but some of them say the same thing differently.

I enjoyed telling a story about the Garden of Eden.  I kept the Biblical account, but I embellished it a little to reach for the essence.  I thought it would be fun.

I definitely have opinions, and I hasten to mention that theology is not necessarily the main stream here.  Therefore, some of what I have learned and describe, though Biblical, may seem strange to the reader's experience.

That's why I invite the reader to ponder.

Many of the chapters are from my own experience.  I was on the staff of Campus Crusade for Christ (now called CRU) for ten years, and I was a Senior Woman during the time we were leading students in Missouri.  I was also a full time leader at Cornell University.  I graduated from CRU's Institute of Bible Studies and later completed the intensive training for going overseas.

The last chapter is autobiographical, and it is the account of our going to the Ivory Coast.  You might enjoy the story of our preparation time in training, and the almost slapstick details of going to Africa.

I devoted a chapter about some of Jesus' disciples because I was wondering if I could see the Lord speaking to them personally the way He has to me.

1  A Journey

Christianity is simple.

Christianity is fun.

Christianity is real.

Christianity is love.

Christianity is free.

Christianity is challenging.

Christianity is relationship.

Christianity is adventure.

Christianity is abundant life.

Christianity is exciting.

Christianity is forever.

Mom.  Can I come down?

Sure, Honey.  The coffee is ready, and I just opened a new package of donuts.

A few years ago, our daughter, Terrie, had some chronic physical problems, which were not easily diagnosed.

It was hard for me to see her so pitiful, but we turned to the Lord to find some answers.

Terrie's family lives across the street from Jeff and me.  She would call in the morning and want to come down to our house because she didn't want to be alone.

We sat together in my living-room and ate miniature doughnuts and talked.  Sometimes we would go shopping and have lunch although she wasn't eating very much.

I considered it a privilege to be involved in ministering to her.  I was pleased that she included the Lord in the process of healing.

While she was going through her difficulties, she asked me one day to write a book about what she called common sense Christianity.

You and Dad have a real but not weird way of looking at your relationship with the Lord.  It's so natural.

My husband and I had been in a campus ministry for several years, and we had moved many times with our children.

When we were asked to go to a campus is Missouri, I told my friend down the street that we were leaving Ithaca to take another assignment.

I don't think it is right for you to keep moving your children all over because of your ministry.  It's not fair to them.

I thought about what she'd said, and then I asked the Lord to show me what He thought.  Jeff and I had joined the staff of Campus Crusade because we wanted to see students come to the Lord.  We had only been in Ithaca for two years, but we were ready to have the chance to lead other staff and students as well on the campus of Southwest Missouri State.

There were sacrifices for our children especially, Dean, our oldest.  He was a rising senior, and he had a girl friend that he met in a youth group in Ithaca.  They didn't have texting or Smart phones back then, and he would be going to a new high school where he wouldn't know anybody.  It may have been unfair of us to make him go through such an adjustment in another high school in Springfield, Missouri.  I know it was a difficult change for him.  I had to believe that the Lord would bless Dean for his sacrifice, but was that fair?

When I asked the Lord about whether we should leave or not, I got the impression He was saying, If you tell your children how you love the Lord and want to serve Him, but you don't live it, what are you showing them?  If you want to be an example for your children, then you should live what you preach.

I remember when I was only eight years old when my great grandmother died.  I was mesmerized by this event.  I had never been faced with this strange concept.

It happened during a large family gathering.  Grandma Grace always said when she left to go home, Good-bye, I'll see you next time if I'm still alive.

When my uncle drove her home that night, she died on the way.  He brought her back to the party we were having, but my mother wouldn't let me go into the living-room where Grandma Grace was lying on the couch.

Although Grandma kept saying it for years, it never seemed real.  Now, she wouldn't see anybody the next time.

That was the first time I really thought about the impact of death, and I wondered about it for a long time.  Where did she go?  Would she spend eternity in her grave?  Was there an eternity?

My sister was born a little while after my grandmother died.  I remember looking at both my sister's picture and at my grandmother's picture, and I wondered if my sister had taken the place in the Universe to fill in for the loss of Grandma Grace.

My first memory of thinking about God was shortly after my father came home from the Navy, where he served in World War II.

I had a brother that was two years younger than I.  When I was seven years old, I had accidently stumbled on two new pairs of skis for Christmas.  I was suspicious because they were hidden in the back part of a long closet off of the living-room.

I was walking around the house saying there was no Santa Claus.  My father pulled me to his lap and said, "Santa isn't real, but he is part of the whole Christmas holiday that everyone loves.  It is part of the spirit of Christmas.

Don't tell your brother, he said.  Let him find out for himself.

I got down from his lap and walked outside.

As I felt tears running down my young face, I looked up at the sky, and I wondered if there really was a God.  After all, I considered that both Santa Claus and God were both supernatural or make believe.

I wondered again if there was a God when I was about ten.  I had a best girl friend who was Roman Catholic.  She told me a story about the Lady of Fatima that took place in Portugal.  She said there were three girls who were out in a field, and they saw the Virgin Mary standing above them in the air.  The girls fell on their knees and closed their eyes.  When they got up the nerve, they looked again.  She was still there.

They ran to their parents, and soon everyone in the village knew what had happened.

This was unsettling to me.  I didn't know if there really was a God let alone a Virgin Mary.

Many of the people from the village went to the location where the girls had seen this vision of the Virgin Mary, and some were healed.

When I think back, I realize that for the first time, I believed that there was a possibility that death might not be the end.  Perhaps, there was a supernatural world out there after all.  In a sense, it was a little spark of belief that I held inside.

I was already trying to figure out life.  I had experienced a lot of things when my mother, my brothers and I lived in a project in Elmira, New York.  Death was something we didn't want to think about because our father was fighting for our country.

At ten years old, I got very sick, and the doctor didn't know what was wrong with me.  Although I had a fever and couldn't keep food down, there was no sign that white corpuscles had multiplied in my body.  Finally, a week after I first got sick, the doctor sent me to the hospital.  After many doctors, interns and whoever examined me, one of them figured out that I had a ruptured appendix.

At that point, the doctors gave me a 50/50 chance of living.  I was given seventy-five shots of penicillin during a two week period.  Well, you can see that I didn't die.  But I was this weird little girl that didn't know if there was a God but decided that He saved my life, and He wanted me to grow up and be a social worker or a missionary in Africa.

I didn't like either of those choices.  I had dreamed of someday becoming a Broadway actress.

My father had taken over a photography studio across the street from where we lived in Mansfield, Pennsylvania.   He owned the whole building.  His studio covered half of the first floor, and a distant relative had a curio store on the other half.  I used to visit her sometimes, and she had this simple cross for sale that glowed in the dark.

I really wanted to own it.  I saved my allowance which meant giving up candy bars until I had the money I needed.  Eventually I bought it.  I put it on the little table next to my bed and fell asleep at night looking at that cross.

When my father had only been back from the Second World War for a little while, he decided our family should join a church.  He wanted the Lord to be part of our life after all that he had experienced during the war.  He considered the possibility of becoming a Roman Catholic.

As I've mentioned, he actually gave my brother and me a chance to visit different churches until we found one we liked.  This wasn't hard to do because we lived in a small town, and all the churches were nearby.

I did visit some, but I wasn't impressed with most of them.  Their basements smelled like mildew.  Their pastor's sermon went on too long.  I didn't know their songs.  There was always something that made feel like I didn't belong.

My father and mother and all of us settled on the Episcopal Church across the street.

For me, it was the richness of its color on stained glass windows.  The priest wore long robes.  The altar looked like it was something seriously spiritual.  The pews had cushions.

I had to learn the catechism and be anointed by the Bishop in order to take communion.  I also had to memorize the Book of Common Prayer.

I would come home from school on Wednesdays and go to church to study what I needed to learn.

My mother took me shopping to the one clothing store in Mansfield.  She bought me a white satin dress and matching shoes for the ceremony.  She also needed to learn the catechism and take her first communion on the same Sunday as I did.

As I'm writing this I realize for the first time ever that my father must have grown up in an Episcopalian church because he didn't have to go through catechism to take communion.

The pastor of this Episcopal Church was different than anyone I had ever known, and his daughter, Anne, seemed to have a glow inside her.

As I watched the pastor and his daughter, I believed that they knew something that I didn't about God.  I wanted to know what that was.

Anne was a classmate of mine, and we had play dates several times.  One time Anne came to our house for a sleep over.  I wanted her to have fun so I said, Let's be quiet and lie on the floor next to the heat register.  We can hear my parents talking.  Wouldn't that be fun?

It isn't very nice to spy on your parents.

Both of my parents smoked cigarettes, and smoke was coming up through the grate on the floor in my bedroom.  Anne chewed on her lip to keep from crying.  I didn't know what to do.  Finally between sobs, she said, I want to go home.

Don't you want to stay and see my cross that glows in the dark?

I want to go home.

She just lived across the street, and my father called the priest and told him that he was bringing Anne home.

When she left, I lay in my bed and cried.  I guess I thought our house wasn't good enough for her.  I was deeply hurt, and it made me feel ashamed of my parents.

After this, I tried to get the Lord interested in me so that He might give me what He had given Anne.  I went to the early church on purpose where I had to kneel through the whole service.  It hurt my knees and stressed my back.  I volunteered to sing in the choir for all three hours as part of Good Friday.  Ordinarily a person would participate during only one of the stations of the Lord's words on the cross while He was being crucified.

The cross on the altar was gold, but on Good Friday, the gold cross was covered with a black veil.

The comparison of the gold to the veil was astonishing.  I felt burdened as I sat in the choir loft.  I felt grief stronger than when my great grandmother died.  It was a visceral reaction that smelled like death.

These are the words that Jesus spoke when He was on the cross.

John 19:26

When Jesus saw His mother, and the disciple He loved standing near, he said, Woman, behold your son!

Then He said to the disciple, Behold your mother!

Luke 23:34

Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.

John 19:28

After this Jesus, knowing that all was now finished, said (to fulfill the Scripture), I Thirst.

John 19:30

When Jesus had received the vinegar, he said, It is finished.

Mark 15:34

My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?

In our town, Good Friday was an ecumenical service.  It was done every year and was considered sacramental in our Episcopal Church.

Different pastors from the town took turns giving a short sermon about each of these verses.  I suppose it was powerful, but it left me empty.

It was the last time that Anne's father would be in our pulpit.  They would be moving soon.

I didn't give up because I was sure the Lord would notice all my sacrifices.  He would help me to know Him in the way Anne and her father did.

Anne's family moved to a different parish in Pennsylvania soon after the smoking incident with my parents.

All of my friends loved Anne, and she would come to Mansfield to visit sometimes.  Years later, she was killed in an automobile accident while she was attending Penn State.

I was a student at Mansfield State Teachers College at the time, and I remember clearly walking up the hill to my class the day I heard that Anne had died.  When I reached my class, I sat there and listened to the teacher, but my mind was so full of sorrow, that I couldn't really focus on the teaching.

How could Anne have died so early when she was such a beautiful person?  Was God involved somehow?

I learned that when a person dies that way, it doesn't seem as though it was real.

Memories of her jumped around inside my head.  We used to play paper dolls.  We would dress them and pretend they were real.  We played dress up and wore my mother's shoes and walked up and down on an uneven pavement, parading and almost falling because the high heels of course were bigger than our feet.  My mother wore a size ten.

My friend, Marilyn, and I walked together after class, and we joined with some of our friends at the Dairy Bar.  We were all in shock, but we tried to help each other to understand.  We couldn't understand.  How could we?  How can you understand death?

The next morning when I woke up, I was hoping it wasn't real.  There was a sense that she just moved away to her father's church instead of dying.  Sometimes, I would imagine that, and it helped me to deal with the sadness.

Our gang gathered in Mansfield.  We were all in college or other pursuits, but we still had our base home in Mansfield.  We wept together in the park and remembered together.

At Anne's memorial service, her father said, Of course we miss her, but we thank the Lord that we had her for as long as we did.

Although that was some fifty years ago, I still have not gotten over it.

My attempt to find the Lord took a long time.  There were difficulties.  There were times when I was passive.  I had boyfriends and many girl friends.  We had fun.  We went on vacations together.  We went to proms.  We played canasta and made pizza from a box.  Pizza was something that we never had in our town until I was in middle school.  I used to debate with friends about whether there was a God or not.  I was against the death sentence.  I was against abortion.  I was against politics.

Twenty years later I was married to Jeff, and I was still against all those things.  I went to PTA meetings.  I was president of organizations.  I wrote terrible poems.  I was involved in the campaign for Lyndon Johnson.  I worked at a snack bar on the campus of Penn State.  Jeff and I had three children.

There was a time when Jeff and I looked at Christianity again.  I didn't realize it exactly, but I was looking for a personal relationship, not a religion where there were rules that were understood but not always spoken.  I imagined that hushed voices should be the normal conduct.  Hands should be folded in the church, and writing out a grocery list should never be allowed.

Jeff worked on his Master's degree, and eventually, he enrolled at Brown University in Rhode Island and studied for his PhD.  We all moved to Providence.

At some time, we agreed that we should take our children to church.  Even though we didn't really care, we thought our children should be able to make up their own minds about what they wanted to believe.  I remembered how my father had given my brother and me that freedom.

While we lived in Providence, I was on a bowling team.  I got to know one of the other women on the team.  We were having a cup of coffee together, and I told her that we were looking for a church.  She smiled, and said, I think you found it.  My husband is an Episcopal priest.  I'm sure he would like to visit you and Jeff and answer questions you might have.

Alden Besse came to visit us.  He didn't talk much about Christianity.  He talked to Jeff about hurricanes.  Not only was Jeff studying hurricanes, but Alden was interested.  As you can imagine Rhode Island was a place that was vulnerable when it came to hurricanes.  So, the two of them had a nice conversation, and we went to his church the next Sunday.

One Sunday Alden mentioned that he was going to have an adult confirmation class.

Jeff decided to go to those classes.  He was impressed by the fact that the apostles continued with the Lord's ministry after His death.  They continued to speak for the Lord, and went all around spreading the news that Jesus was the Messiah.  Some of them died martyrs' deaths.  Peter was crucified