Divali in Felicity

Saturday I had the chance to attend a Divali celebration in a village that is known worldwide for it’s decorations and people. It is a village called Felicity- the same place I went last Saturday night for Bible study. I went with the Moores. We arrived early so that we could miss traffic coming in. We visited at the home of a pastor they know until after dark. Then we had a prayer and went to walk the streets and see the sights, not to celebrate but the help us understand the people and their beliefs. Like I said before, Divali is a religious Hindu celebration. They are celebrating the triumph of goodness over evil. The streets are decorated and at sunset they light candles or “deyas” to receive blessings upon their homes.

It was sad for us to see the magnitude of lostness in this village. Almost every home had lots of deyas or “Christmas” lights surrounding it. They had posted pictures of their gods and had offered sacrifices to them. On the outside, it was beautiful- the candles burning, the beautiful Indian outfits and all the people milling around. There were even quite a few tourists exploring the village. But as a Christian, I see these lights and know that they light them because they lack the one and only true light. They don’t have Jesus Christ in their lives. They are condemned because they haven’t accepted Him.

The people here take pride in how well the different religions accept each other and get along. But if you are “accepting” someone else’s religion are you not forfeiting your own? It is one thing to love. We are called to love above all else. But we are to love people, not religions. As a Christian I can love a Hindu lady- and should- but I can not accept their religion. I can’t NOT tell them about Jesus. As a Christian I know that if a Hindu dies they will go to hell because they haven’t accepted Jesus and the salvation He offers. Loving someone means that I can’t let them do that without doing everything that I can to know they have been given the chance to accept Him and to hear about Him.

Another thing that made me realize the lostness of Trinidad in the midst of all these religious people is something that I read in the paper last night. It was reported that 7 out of 10 men in T&T consume alcohol on a daily basis. 68% of road accidents (and there are a lot) are caused by alcohol and 47% of males admitted to the hospital are suffering from alcohol related problems. They have the highest number of AA groups per capita in the world. I didn’t see this problem much in Haiti because most of the people there were too poor to afford alcohol but apparently it is quite a problem here. I think that this is yet another sign that people are searching for something. They know that there has got to be more but they aren’t finding it in their religion or families or jobs so they turn to alcohol.

***Pictures to come- I am posting this from the airport using their wireless. We had a storm on Saturday and we no longer have internet. Someone is coming this week to look at it.