"Hi there Mr. Lifeguard," the roundish woman began, "I'm just a minister for Minneapolis, and I have a question for you."
"Sure, fire away," I responded, leaning forward on my railing.
"Do you think you are going to heaven?"
If you have been a lifeguard long enough you come to readily accept that you will never see it all. In your rookie year you can't see enough although often times a day can easily overwhelm you. Should you survive, and many do not as the daily stress of being responsible for so many lives does take its toll, your sophomore year leads to a false confidence and the belief that you have seen it all, and certainly know it all. Year three brings the corrective face slap that was needed after year two's hubris. For the swift learners, graduation comes at year three's close. For those a bit behind in the game one, two, maybe even five more years may be needed to matriculate, although, unfortunately, some never do. (They're never pleasant to work with.) Those who do graduate from lifeguarding's direct, demanding, and sometimes brutal school of on the job training learn one certifiable truism: when you think you have seen it all, heard it all, and/or done it all, you haven't and your next contact may very well prove that point.
"Do you think you are going to heaven?" she asked. From a transient violently arguing with his shoes to a couple who nearly drowned as they determinedly had sex in the ocean, I've dealt with my share of unique experiences, but I had never been questioned with respect to my salvation. Yet when the portly, blonde bobbed-topped Minne Min separated herself from her group and asked, "Do you think you are going to heaven?" my answer came naturally.
"Yes." I replied.
"How do you know?" she challenged.
"Because I am a good person."
"I'm sure you are, but my question is, 'How do you know?'"
"I just do."
She paused, sized me up with a look and then asked, "Do you believe in the Bible?"
"As the word of God, no." was my matter-of-fact response.
"Why?"
"Because the Bible is nothing more than a collection of stories written by men, edited by men, and published by men. If I want the the genuine word of God then I need not look any further than this planet. This planet is God's Bible. Earth is his creation. How we treat her says a lot about how well we are willing to listen to him."
My longest response was met with another pause and another size up. She was on the sand below and I on my deck above. She raised her hand in an evangelical fashion and asked, "Mr. lifeguard, will you come down and say a prayer with me?"
"No, thank you."
"Why not?"
"I respect and support your right to celebrate God's word in the fashion that you do. I hope that you will respect and support me in the same way."
She paused for a moment, cocked her head as though thinking and then returned to her group. It was a beautiful day. One that deserved to be celebrated. A post shift body surf session did exactly that.
Note: While I am spiritual, I am not a fan of proselytizing. I feel the more someone tries to force their experience of God (or anything for that matter) down another's throat, the less willing that individual will be to digest it. So then, what is the most effective means to achieve transformation? Just live your life according to the belief system you embrace. If it is real, if it is genuine (read: without hypocrisy), if it is effective people will come to you. They will come to you because you are happy. They will come to you because you are fulfilled. They will come to you because they want the same for themselves. And if they don't, if they don't, let 'em be. Chances are, they are happy. Chances are they are fulfilled. And, chances are, quite possibly, they're the ones who actually got it right.
There are a lot of ways to eat a raw apple. Regardless of the approach the nourishment is the same.
© Copyright 2012 David S. Carpenter. All Rights Reserved
