We are overwhelmed by many of your thoughts, your encouragement, and best wishes as we blog. We also recognize the help asked for. For those who want to contact us, our website has contact information, event schedules, our story, etc. We can also be found on Facebook. Many of you have asked about using our articles. Please feel free to do so as long as you reference the link from our website.
We started this ministry to help people, as we have been helped. We have life experiences to share – let’s just say we are over 40, somewhere over 40. As we write we come from two main perspectives. The first some would call a Biblical perspective. We see life through the grid of a loving Creator God who is intimately involved with us and wants the best for His people. We also have the perspective that you all are intelligent. So as we write we share our thoughts in a way to try and stimulate your own thinking. You look at the world around you every day. You see the news. You notice events in our country and around the world. How do you make sense out of it all?
As an example of why we want to stimulate thinking let’s look at our education system. Children now are taught many ‘facts’, but they aren’t taught how to think through an issue. Political correctness and other propaganda is passed off as knowledge and the young are not encouraged to question those ideas. Ideas have consequences because what we come to believe affects our choices and behavior. For example: we lived through the ’60s’. Free love and breaking with ‘tradition’ and ‘authority’ were the calls of the day. Yet we as a nation are reaping the consequences of the wild oats sown then. What happens to the person who has no father? What do they feel down deep? What hurts are never healed? And when they come to the point of wanting a loving relationship, what walls have they built to protect their hearts which keep them from knowing real love and acceptance and being able to give real love and acceptance? When we don’t think through issues we will find it hard to connect the dots: that ideas lead to choices that reap consequences. The Good News is that God can bring healing and wholeness to these areas. We have experienced this and have helped others to also. This is just one example. What have you wondered about or struggled with?
Now for the technology questions out there. We didn’t grow up with this amazing technology. At this time we don’t have any tech savvy staff. I (Doyle) didn’t even have TV until I was in 6th grade. We still had crank phones and a party line! Many of you won’t even know what I’m talking about. So our son-in-law helped us set up the original Harbor Shalom website. He and our children have helped us to learn to navigate, at least to some extent. There is so much more to learn. As we launched Harbor Shalom we knew we would need to learn to use e-mail, Facebook and websites since that is the way so many communicate today. So we are learning along with many of you. We also have to find others to help us with questions that we have. As we have time and get answers we will try to post them.
Our time to write here is limited, with all the classes and workshops plus the preparation time for each. So we apologize for not being able to answer each comment. As we share what we are doing at Harbor Shalom through events and classes, please join us, if you are close enough and can come. If you want to be involved, and aren’t close enough to come here, there are other ways for this to happen. Praying for Harbor Shalom would be first. There are ways to help financially and we are a nonprofit. We are starting fund raising so that Harbor Shalom can purchase a property. There are also many tools/equipment that would be helpful in running and maintaining the grounds outside as well as inside the house. We accept non-cash donations as well as direct money gifts through paypal or checks. When we get some of the class materials printed, there will be opportunity to purchase those materials as well. In the meantime we will periodically blog about things on our hearts for you. Blessings to each of you.