Shalom aleichem! Be not afraid! The biblical greeting phrases. And something about suffering and faith.
"Shalom aleichem!" is the most common greeting phrase of the Jews, in all history from Antiquity until today. It is the parallel of the "Salam aleikum" of the arabs. Both phrases mean "peace be upon you". The arabs use it very often, always when they greet each other, and always when they utter the names of prophet Muhammad and Jesus, they say "peace be upon him" afterwards. Jesus said this phrase very often (see this islamic article). This is one of the reasons why the muslims feel that Jesus was a real muslim.
The other greeting phrase that Jesus often used, was "be not afraid!". It is used very often in the Bible: "The phrases, “Fear not” or “Be not afraid”, occur 103 times in the King James Version of the Bible." (from this article) Jesus used this phrase 21 times in the New Testament (see this article).
Why do I write about this? Because it is so magnificent that the Son of God, our Messiah, greets us like that. He does not want us to be afraid, and there is a reason for that. What is this reason? It is that God is in control of what happens in the world, and that He/She and His/Her angels are watching over us, and will intervene if it is necessary, when we need it. This is so difficult to believe when we suffer, but this is the reason why Jesus always greet us with a "Be not afraid!". We need to hear it again and again.
In fact, it just take a belief in the Spirit World, in the supernatural, in a higher world than ours, to be able to believe that this is true.
Do we believe in a higher world also when we suffer? Or does this belief vanish every time we suffer? If it does not vanish, we should in earnest not be afraid.
But often when we suffer, we act and think and feel like the higher world does not exist. And this despite the fact that we often have countless prayer answers in our past, countless interventions from God. Isn't this strange?
I have had to read a lot about psychic phenomena, about Spiritism and parapsychology, to really be able to ground my faith in the supernatural (this I have done all the way since 2009). Read such spooky stuff, and meditate upon it, meditate upon their proofs for the supernatural, and let it sink in, slowly. I say that even the proofs of spiritism isn't always enough in order to be able to believe. Faith is a gift, an no proof is enough before we receive faith as a gift from heaven. But at least I have got something to meditate upon, something to remember and think about when I suffer.
