Well, I rarely find any believers amongst my work colleagues, at least not active ones. There are, of course, those who call out the name of some deity when in a crisis, or, sadly, use it as a curse word. However, there are few that are actually loud about it on a regular basis. So when I find one of these people, I am intrigued. The first day I worked with Chris, I walked in on him during his morning prayers. I had been warned about his volume, however, nothing could have adequately prepared me for it. Perhaps it is his naturally loud voice or the fact that he hails from a certain West African nation.
Interestingly [or not], I am not loud. My persuasion to adopt the Christian faith as my creed was a slow, quiet process. I was enticed by the order of nature and the gentleness of good, kind people. I have walked down the altar and been led in a "special" prayer but there were no fireworks or special sensations. I remember once walking forward to receive the Holy Ghost but when I opened my eyes at the end of the prayer, I was the only one standing. It seems I was the only one who had not been supernaturally touched. It is experiences like that that convinced me that perhaps my conversation with God was dissimilar to that which he [He] had with the others. Not in any way more or less special, just different.
University students are easy targets for all sorts of persuaders. I was already persuaded about Christ, but was persuaded to walk further down the path to try and persuade others. We learnt all sorts of nicks and tricks [the Roman road, something about 5 steps, elevator evangelism]. I was never comfortable with any of it. I concluded that my view of faith was that it was a personal decision that one should reach with a sound mind [not clouded with the opium of good music or the terror of the sight of demons in a well rehearsed drama]. I always wonder why the musicians play slow, ballad-like tunes when the preacher starts to talk about "committing your life to the Lord". If you need music and a show to stir up your faith, you might need a full time personal choir for life! I find that loud, dramatic preaching is a rather tiresome business. I like to dance and sing for the Lord, but if that is all that happens at every meeting, I begin to feel like the leaders are turning us into those toys with bobbing heads. I do not see the point in loud prayer. There is a difference between simply praying out loud and shouting at the top of your voice while attacking every piece of furniture in sight. I am referring to the latter. I have just recently read that bit in Matthew where Jesus tells us how to pray and how not to - he [oops] He says we should not pray as the hypocrites do, shouting out at the street corners.
One of the bits that I find most entertaining about the study of science is the dance that many people do to prove or disprove the existence of a supreme being using empirical evidence. I spend my days working on fluids at various pressures and temperatures, which are derived from data collected from the deepest parts of the earth. These numbers [pressures, temperatures, composition of the earth's core] and the quantities of oil discovered seem to support the notion that millions of years were required in order to convert organic matter into this combustible substance. Numbers do not deceive, neither does experience. Man has used the numbers to predict the earth's behaviour several times, and for the most part, we have been successful. The millions of years, however, seem to contradict most interpretations of the Prophet Moses' account of the creation of the world and the Hebrews' ancestry.
What is the point of all this blubber?
Rafa was playing Christian music in the lab today. It was honest, crystal clear music celebrating the magnificence of God the Father, of Jesus the Christ and of the Holy Spirit. This isn't the first time he's done it. The first time I heard it, we had just arrived for the day shift while he was packing to go and rest. I assumed that he had just let the music play all night to keep him company as he worked. Today, however, we worked later than usual [well for a Wednesday] and I noticed that as soon as he got in, he set up his computer and deliberately plugged it into the lab speakers. Before this, Papa bear had, unsuccessfully, tried to convince us to acclimatise to his favourite house, then Mima decided to switch to some of her favourite Spanish ballads.
Rafa is a quiet, hardworking, likeable guy, or so he seems. [Language barriers are such ugly things.]
I pray for faith as loud as a mountain [whose echoes never end] but as gentle as the feel of a new pair of fuzzy winter socks.
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