UPDATE! We have both finished reading A New Earth so we wanted to update this post. Our goal is to connect with people who want the deep sense of spirituality shown in A New Earth and who relate to the idea of automatic reactions and a lack of personal awareness. However, while we believe we were created by God and that we can bring glory to God - we do not believe we are God. We do not subscribe to the theory of evolution because we believe our value comes from the love that fashioned us as we were created. We do not think thought and expression are peripheral; our individuality, thoughts, feelings, and opinions can be sinful when they are born of our sinful desires - but when they come from our abundant life in Christ, they are essential to express our life to the world. As followers of Christ, we look forward to spending eternity with God, not absorbed into the "One Life."
The Apple You Were Fed is positioned uniquely between the two halves of the message of Jesus. When fragmented they fall to either side as extreme versions of truth. To the right, we find strict, rule following believers who protect their interpretation of the Gospel to the detriment of themselves and others. To the left, we see human beings struggling without an anchor as the depth of their spirituality is not rooted in God, but in their own awareness and desire to do good.
When united, the whole message reflects what we see as faith and works in harmony. Faith is dead if it is in God but severed from the acts of awareness and desire to do good that are found in the left side of truth. The awareness and desire to do good are dead if they attempt to stand alone as God instead of in Him.
The Apple You Were Fed shows how the two of us each came from opposite sides. Through our friendship, we saw how our own personal belief system was incomplete. Together, we moved toward the center to find the union of sides - a complete message of forgiveness, grace, love and acceptance that freed us to live our lives as originally intended!
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