Thursday, March 12, 2009

Act of Conversion

Good evening, my friends. I hope all is well in your part
of the world. It's getting late, and I am weary, but I
wanted to write to you before I go to sleep. I want to talk
to you about conversion.

I'm not talking about sales conversions.

And while I am not talking about spiritual conversion, let
me use that as an analogy this evening.

I was born in the South Bronx, a borough of New York, in a
very traditional old-fashioned Jewish neighborhood back in
1958. My father had been an assistant cantor growing up in
the Jewish faith, and there was never any question that I
would be raised a Jew, educated in Hebrew School as a Jew,
and get bar-mitzvahed (transition to manhood at age 13) as
a Jew when I was of age.

My life was steeped in tradition.

And sometimes tradition gets questioned by a child.

I went through the process, got bar-mitzvahed at age 13,
and quietly came to the realization - as my parents
divorced - that I no longer believed in God.

Why do bad things happen to good people, I would ponder
many a wakeless night waiting for God to answer my
question.

It was not until I started going to church with my wife and
held my first new born child in my arms that I would begin
to understand that there were things far larger than I in the
universe. It wasn't all about me after all.

Imagine that.

Somewhere along the way of questioning the reason for
everything negative in my life, I suddenly became aware of
the goodness that surrounded every inch of my being.

I underwent the process of conversion and when my daughter
got baptized at three months of age, I got baptized with
her.

The entire event reminded me of the final scene from The
Godfather where Michael baptizes his child, and in the
background, as the poetic theme song plays, his minion
quietly kills off each of his adversaries.

Only in this case, I was kissing goodbye old beliefs,
haunting memories, and feelings of hopelessness.

But conversion does not come so easily as merely going
through the motions of change.

One needs to really, truly feel the conversion in their
gut -- in their soul.

And it took me many years to realize this.

Finally, at age 47, I was able to humble myself, drop to my
knees, and with tears in my eyes accept Jesus Christ as my
Lord and savior.

That's true conversion.

Realizing that there is something more powerful than you,
and that you're not really in control at all. That control
is actually the biggest and worst illusion of all.

What about you?

What traditions are you steeped in?

What belief systems are holding you back?

I'm not talking about religion now.

I'm talking about what feelings are deep in your gut that
you fear to question, what scares you about being
successful, what lies are you living based upon what your
parents and their generation taught you?

Because until you go through an act of conversion, I don't
think you can be free to accept and or change what your
future truly holds for you.

For me, the journey's just begun.

What about you?

Be blessed,



Steven Schneiderman

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home