Where I grew up as a kid back East, everyone lived in neighborhoods. The people who lived on your street were part of the neighborhood, almost like an extended family. In a strange way, we were all connected by our neighborhood – it defined us, shaped us, and supported us in ways that exceeded even our families.
I see Life in a similar way. We all live in a City of Life, and we have chosen to reside in certain social neighborhoods within that City. These neighborhoods are defined by their jobs and careers, their moral or immoral values, or by their hobbies and pastimes. Whatever it is in Life that drives our hearts is what determines our social neighborhood. It is not the physical streets of brick and pavement, but the avenues of the heart where we really reside, and our neighborhoods are populated by those whose life’s pursuits are the same as ours.
Just as in the physical world, there are a lot of reasons why we choose our spiritual neighborhoods. Some of us just settle for wherever we live, while most of us move around the City of Life until we find the group that we feel most comfortable in. And, of course, there are always the homeless that wander around with no home at all.
Throughout the City are many different precincts that overlap and share streets with other groups, some crisscrossing each other, some running parallel, and others merging for a short distance before diverging from one another. We see each other in the marketplace, waving hello to friends from the Political neighborhood, the Military compound, the Business precinct, and others, but at the end of the day, we always come home to the street that we live on.
The Spiritual neighborhood that I moved to many years ago is unique in that all the streets here point to the ocean. While other neighborhoods are focused on the present, the Spiritual neighborhood looks to an eternal land that lies over the Sea of Death. There are a few distinct major areas in this neighborhood each with their own main thoroughfares heading to the coast – Christian Blvd, Islam Blvd, Hindu Ave. and a few other less broad streets – but since the seacoast is very irregular, they all point in different directions.
If one was to look at the ocean to which these streets lead, you would see many bridges leading out to sea. Almost all of them extend over the horizon, but there is only one that that makes it all the way across to the land on other side of the ocean. From where you stand on the seashore, you can’t see the other side of this great ocean, so it is hard to see which one of these bridges is the true Bridge. Some people believe that all the bridges will join together somewhere out there over the ocean, so it really doesn’t matter which one you travel on, but most folks believe that there is only one that makes it all the way across. All the others fall short. Of course, everyone believes that their bridges is the only one that makes it all the way to the eternal life that awaits them on the other side.
Each of these neighborhoods have a myriad of side streets, all claiming to be the best street to lead directly to the true Bridge. Some people have spent a lot of time figuring out why their street is the correct one and offer reams of analytical scholasticisms to prove their point. Others just assume that theirs is the best and could care less why.
That would be fine if it wasn’t for all the friction that this causes. I have watched a lot of neighborhood rumbles take place, not only between the main Spiritual sections of town, but also between the smaller neighborhoods within each section. Turf wars can be bloody, or they can be calm dissertations of futility, but they all serve one purpose to identify which street you belong to.
Why are they so contentious? Well, one could say that it is because they don’t want the others to ignorantly fall off into the ocean by taking a long walk off a short pier. But then why do they get so angry and adamant? Maybe they are really just trying to prove to themselves that their neighborhood is the right neighborhood, and their street really is the best street – or at least it seems that way, especially to folks from other parts of the City who, from a distance, watch these skirmishes (or crusades, depending upon which side you are on).
I saw myself standing under a streetlamp looking at my roadmap. There are several Maps, one for each neighborhood with several different versions, each claiming to be better than the others. The funny thing is that, even with the same version of the same map, people from different streets see different directions. I’m not sure if that is a matter of perspective or choice, but it sure can seem confusing if you don’t know where you are going.
I’m not sure why they like those other streets. Some of them are very dark like Wicca St., some have artificial fluorescent lighting like Mormon Ave., and others are broad and easy streets that were built a long time ago like Presbyterian Blvd. I suppose that they like the look and feel of their own street because it appeals to the desires of their hearts. Some like dark streets so they can hide in the nooks and crannies there, others like to have their own lighting systems that they have made up themselves, while others could care less how bright it is as long as they don’t have to change the light bulbs.
I don’t know about everyone else, but I chose to live on my particular street in the Christian neighborhood because the streetlights are brighter here, and I can see better on this street than some of the dark alleyways chosen by some of my neighbors. Mine isn’t a broad avenue like some of the others – it is strait and narrow – but it is brightly lit.
There is no doubt in my mind that this street leads directly to that Bridge over the Sea of Death and will ultimately take me to my eternal home. The map I am holding points me in a simple and clear direction, so I don’t have to guess as long as I keep that map before me. I can feel the ocean breeze coming down the street and can hear the sounds of the seagulls, and down at the end of the street, I can see a faint glow that filters through the haze on the horizon. As I walk the length of this street, I can smell the scent of Beulah Land that lies over the ocean.
This is the way, not because I think so, or because my parents settled on this street, or because of my friends and neighbors live here, but because I can hear the sound that calls me over the sea to a land that is fairer than day.
… And that’s what leads me on.
