Questions which have never been satisfactorily answered

If you cannot answer these questions can you at least think about them and let me have your random thoughts? It might help you make your New Year resolutions and help answer some life questions for scholars.

Q1          Is there any record anywhere of someone who came back from the dead or a near-death experience to confirm there is an after-life? What evidence is there of an after-life and heaven and hell?

Q2          How does one reconcile free will and predestination? If your death is set for a certain hour of a certain day in a certain year, how is there free-will?

Q3          At the time of the Nicene Creed in 325 Constantine did not know what to make of Jesus and said he just called him the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost. If this is true, how do those words make Jesus God?

Q4          Why was the Gospel of Barnabas not included in the Bible? It is this writer’s understanding that there is mention of the last prophet Muhamad in those gospels – not by name but by such terms as the Comforter and so. Correct me with references if I am wrong. 

Q5          Were the two angels in white standing guard at the tomb not friends of Jesus who belonged to a religious group called the Essenes? In the Bible it states that there were two men in white standing at the mouth of the tomb. It makes sense as it was the Sabbath and Jesus’s wounds could not be immediately seen to. Appearing in public then after a few days when his wounds had been treated and after some rest, it would appear that he had risen when in fact he had never been dead in the first place.

Q6          In both the Bible and the Quran it states that heaven and hell are places of rivers and gardens and all things spiritual. How do we know this? Go online and contact me at http://www.raydajacobs.blogspot.com

What would you take with you into the New Year?

We have a week left before entering the year 2013. There is not one of us out there who has not had something bad, good, unusual, traumatic, ecstatic or unexpected happen in 2012 – whether it is the loss of a friendship, the death of a loved one, failing an important exam, losing your house, or receiving a bad diagnosis which can potentially change your life. How does one handle these things and how do you? What nugget of information for quality living would you take with you into the New Year?  

The diagnosis that changed everything

Nine months ago I was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease. Needless to say I was devastated and now take ten pills a day to keep me feeling normal. I was so angry at the diagnosis that I refused for six weeks to take any medication. I booked a ticket instead and went to the US to visit my daughter and grand kids. I returned to Cape Town six weeks later. I spent a lot of time thinking about my life. I had good times in between but when I wake up in the morning the first thing that hits me is that I have a degenerative brain disease. Yes, sometimes I feel sorry for myself. I cry when I roll around in pain on the bed massaging my legs which sometimes is so sore that all I can do is take pain pills and walk it out. My years of panic and anxiety have put me here. Not God, not my parents, just me. 

Acceptance and new beginnings

I never write with the radio on, but this morning I did. There was an inspirational speaker talking about New Year resolutions. Here is what he had to say: that one has to be aware of time and live in the present, not the past. To take a breath, to feel your feet on the ground and not dwell on things you cannot change. We have too many regrets and are too embedded in the past. Learn from your past and do not turn it into a monument of misery. Don’t say I am a divorcee and label yourself. You are an experiencer! Grow yourself into the next moment and into the future. Ask yourself what you have done and what you have not and set new goals for yourself for the New Year.

http://www.raydajacobs.blogspot.com