Category: Spiritual Disciplines

Whom Do We Thank?

~ MD Harris Institute ~ Leave a comment

Thanking people for their contributions to our lives is good, but thanking God, from whom all blessings flow, is indispensable. And that is the part that we neglect.

By Mark D, Harris

The word “thanks” is found 73 times in 71 verses in the King James Version of the Bible. In Hebrew, four words (two same stems) are used to describe it:[1]

  1. הֻיְּדוֹת (huyyᵊḏôṯ) – thanksgiving
  2. יֶדָא (yeḏā’) – thank, give thanks
  3. יָדָה (yāḏâ) – praise, give thanks, confess, thank, make confession, thanksgiving, cast, cast out, shoot, thankful
  4. תּוֹדָה (tôḏâ) – thanksgiving, praise, thanks, thank offerings, confession

The Greeks, on the other hand, used five words (two same stems):

  1. ἀνθομολογέομαι (anthomologeomai ) – give thanks
  2. εὐχαριστέω (eucharisteō) – give thanks, thank, be thankful
  3. εὐχαριστία (eucharistia) – thanksgiving, giving of thanks, thanks, thankfulness
  4. ὁμολογέω (homologeō) – confess, profess, promise, give thanks, confession is made, acknowledgeth
  5. χάρις (charis) – grace, favour, thanks, thank, thank, pleasure

In every instance of the use of one of those words, the context refers to giving thanks to the God, the Lord of all.

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The Supremacy of Scriptures

~ MD Harris Institute ~ 1 Comment

The Holy Bible is the supreme authority in Christianity, as it reflects the person and power of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. Most Christians take it far too lightly, and suffer confusion and powerlessness in life as a result.

By Mark D, Harris

The founder of the Hindu religion is unknown, but he bequeathed a political and cultural system entrenched in thousands of lives and dozens of cities to the residents in the Indian subcontinent. Moses granted his heirs a religio-legal system and a powerful nation on the brink of conquering its Promised Land. On his death, the Buddha left behind an oral tradition of teachings as well as a network of thousands of monks and lay followers, and many monasteries in northeastern India. Muhammad left a religion, a political system, and an empire for Muslims. Hindu, Jewish, Buddhist, and Muslim religious and political leaders ended their earthly lives with books, songs, people, cities, armies, land, money, and everything else befitting a mighty character in history.

Jesus Christ left behind little, at least by conventional historical standards. He wrote no book and sired no offspring. He controlled no lands, no cities, and no armies. He developed no political structure and did not establish a religious order. The Rabbi from Galilee did not even leave a building in His name. What did Jesus pass on to history? 120 followers (Acts 1:15), a little money, and His words and actions as recorded by others. With such a slim posterity, why is He the central figure in human history and the faith that He taught, Christianity, the largest religion on earth?

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Can You Feel It? Sensing the Spiritual in Life

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How to sense the spiritual aspects of life

By Mark D. Harris

Recently a team of inspectors visited our hospital. After the meeting, two team members, one older white woman and one middle aged African American woman, came into my office. They admired my models of the War of 1812 frigate USS Constitution and the 1990s US Space Shuttle Endeavor. We talked for a moment, but as they turned to leave, the older woman glimpsed a replica of the ancient Celtic worship and burial site Stonehenge on my table.

“Have you been there?” she inquired, with more than a little excitement in her voice.

“Yes, with my wife and our infant daughter in 1994. How about you?”

“Never, but I would love to go” she replied, both excited and plaintive. She took a deep breath, paused, and looked directly at me. Her face was earnest and anxious, like a novitiate approaching an Archbishop with a question of vital importance.

“Can you feel it? Can you feel the spirituality in that place?”

“Yes,” I replied, instantly knowing what she meant. “You can sense the spirituality at Stonehenge. But there are four things that you have to do in order to feel it.”

Her face lit up, waiting for what would come next.

***

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Spiritual Power

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What is spiritual power? How do you get it? How do you use it? How do you give the glory to God?

By Mark D. Harris

A patient came to me in tears. As a child she had suffered abuse, alcoholism, and even rape. The Christianity she had known was stern and foreboding. Images of the past were hard to overcome, much less erase. Now she was in a good marriage, had a healthy boy, and was in a solid church. Nevertheless, she was fearful and depressed, feeling unable to face most days. Completing the basic tasks of life, such as caring for her infant son and keeping the house, was nearly impossible. In her dark moments, this woman was afraid that she would lose everything she had ever dreamed of, and now had.

She is not alone. One professionally successful acquaintance is going through a divorce, a job change, and struggling with alcohol abuse.  Another young woman told me of her troubles with anxiety and perfectionism while she was cleaning my teeth. A middle-aged friend struggles with his self-worth after being without a job for nearly two years. A woman jumped off the roof of her 17-story apartment building.

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Spiritual Warfare

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Every event in the universe is the result of a chain of causes, some known and some not. Our forebears and third world contemporaries generally see spiritual forces as ultimate, though not proximate, causes, of happenings. Westerners generally do not. Who is right?

Our church recently sent a mission team to Eastern Europe to work with local churches in music, outreach, and Vacation Bible School. As they were returning to the airport, the driver nodded off and the van ran off the road, rolling several times before coming to a stop. Thankfully the injuries were limited to skin lacerations and concussions. As the story of the accident was recounted in church the following Sunday, everyone was shocked, many prayed, and others asked what else they could do to help.

Our family has a young woman from Iran living with us, our “adopted daughter (AD)”, who attends a class of international Christians with many Muslim background believers. On hearing the news, one of the women in that class announced that the accident was caused by spiritual warfare. AD, trained in science, was puzzled. This incident was clearly an accident, caused by a purely natural phenomenon, fatigue. Could this be interpreted as spiritual warfare, or was that interpretation an example of sincere but misguided faith? Driving home that day, AD asked me what I thought.

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