|
A SELECTED "NORTHERN
LIGHTS" MAGAZINE ARTICLE
(from Issue #493)
My Vision Quest
by Conrad Flett
I was born and raised in Garden Hill (Island Lake), a
remote community in northern Manitoba. Due to my dad's illness we moved to
the city of Winnipeg when I was seven years old.
We were taught good morals in our family, but it was not
easy to find respect in the city. By age 15 I was in a gang. After getting
in trouble with the law, I was placed in a detention centre. Later I was
sent to a residential school.
I graduated from school and moved back to my Reserve. Soon
after, I had a motorcycle accident that broke my collar bone and cracked
my ribs. I thought I was going to die. I called to God to spare me. When I
started breathing again I knew that God had heard me.
I started to live a clean life. I met a beautiful girl who
I really loved. I asked her to marry me and she agreed. I was so happy!
But our first years of married life in Winnipeg were hard. Alcohol nearly
broke our marriage.
One day a family asked me to drive them to church. They
said they'd be there an hour. I thought that was not a long time to wait,
so I went into the church to wait, and I heard the Gospel. I heard that I
could be forgiven of my sins. I remembered the time when God helped me to
breathe again. I accepted Christ and went home and told my wife. I started
reading the Bible and looking for guidance in spiritual things.
I started volunteering in a Native community centre where
I was introduced to Native spirituality. The people there respected my
Bible and told me I could use my Bible "and" traditional
spirituality. I started attending the ceremonies. The sound of the drum
was exciting. There was a sense of spiritual life that I had not felt
before. I felt as if I belonged and that my identity was being fulfilled
as a Native person.
I began a job at a theological centre. Even though I was
just working in maintenance, I was welcomed to get involved in their
training sessions. I was interested in knowing more about spiritual
things. They told me that it is okay to worship God "our way."
In using the sweet-grass, they said, the smoke carries our prayers to God
and cleanses us to be pure for worship. They told me that it's the same
as in the Old Testament when people burned incense.
When you go into the sweat-lodge, I was told, you are
being regenerated, like in the womb of Mother Earth. They said it is just
like what the Bible says about being born again. Also, like going through
the fire, it purifies you. I was told that the drum is the sound of our
heart's cry to the Creator.
I still had some doubts, but I simply believed these
ministers and teachers. "If this is of God," I said, "who
am I to doubt or judge? These people are training Native ministers to use
the Bible."
So I dedicated my life to be more spiritual and to follow
my original roots. I walked the "sweet-grass road" -- like a
braid with the strands intertwined. In the sharing circles I heard that
the two ways of worship were really one. It's like railroad tracks. You
see the two rails becoming one and heading to the same place.
I went to church and to the Native ceremonies. Working on
the campus I looked after all the people's needs to keep them comfortable.
In the ceremonies I received the name "Care Keeper." To me this
was a great honour.
I got to know the four spiritual laws of the medicine
wheel. Tobacco is one "medicine" that is used for worship. You
offer it to the Creator and throw it into the fire. You can smoke it to
purify your body. And I would go to the sweat-lodge. I would feel the
spirits and feel refreshed and clean from the heat of the rocks.
I wanted to go on a vision quest, one of the greatest
things you can do in Native spirituality. In this you receive guidance,
honor and respect because of what you see. There are spiritual
responsibilities you receive after your quest. You may receive a spiritual
name. You may also receive a pipe, and be a "carrier." Or you
may be given the responsibility of warrior or elder, or as fire-keeper,
the person who looks after the ceremonial fires.
All this time I wanted to be more spiritual, and wanted to
be more fulfilled with my identity as a Native person. So that summer I
went on a vision quest. It was three days of fasting and being alone with
"Mother Earth." The quest started with a sweat-lodge ceremony.
Then I went into the woods by myself.
I did what I had been taught by my elder. I looked for a
place to make my camp. I came to a river. It was beautiful and I prayed to
the Lord the Creator. I looked for four small cedar trees to make my
lodge. The four trees were to represent the four spiritual laws. I tied
them together with a vine to make a dome. Then I made a fire which would
burn until I was done my vision quest.
Each morning and evening my elder would come and have a
pipe ceremony with me. We drank some herbal tea, which kept my throat from
getting sore.
The third morning I was sitting and praying by the river.
I started to hear voices, as if a crowd of people were coming. Around the
corner of the river I saw the spirits of people coming right past me, then
turning and circling my dome. I noticed that the spirits were people of
all races, and excited about where they were going. After they circled my
dome they went straight up to the blue sky. One of the spirits looked down
toward me as I watched and said, "Follow us."
I was fascinated by the vision and said to myself,
"We're going to heaven, too." I truly believed I had been given
a sign that Native spirituality was real. I had my Bible with me and truly
felt that what happened was as written in John 4:23,24 ("Yet a time
is coming ... when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit
and truth").
When I finished my vision quest I felt renewed life. I
received a ceremonial pipe. I started sharing my experiences in ceremonies
and with people who didn't understand this way of worshiping. I had
respect for all religions and encouraged people to find their own way.
"No one has the right to say you are wrong," I would say. I
believed I had fellowship with God. In this I found my identity as a
Native person.
Later I moved back to my Reserve to work and to get back
to my family roots. However, there I was challenged by a fellow worker
concerning the truth about God and His Word. This fellow showed me John
14:6. I had read it before, but this time it seemed different: "Jesus
answered, 'I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the
Father except through Me.'"
My heart burned as if God was talking directly to me! I
had been praying to God all along, but this was something I hadn't felt
for a long time. I had felt it when I first gave my life to God back at
the church in Winnipeg.
I started to read more of the Bible and started to look at
what it really said. But I was puzzled and confused, as if the
foundation of my beliefs were threatened. I read Deut. 12:1-4. I started
to cry in my soul because I realized that something would have to die. The
Word of God was convicting me of sin. Vs. 2 was what I was doing --
worshiping in my vision quest, under the green tree. I had not destroyed
the ways we worshiped. As in Vs. 3, I was using my ceremonial pipe as a
sacred pillar and carved image for worship. Like Vs. 4, I was combining my
way and God's.
Was it wrong to worship God with my culture? Are we wrong
to follow our ancestors’ beliefs? I didn’t want to believe it was
wrong.
I read Ezekiel. I realized that Ezekiel's vision was from
God but, on my vision quest, I didn't really know where my vision had come
from. God was showing me that any image we worship together with God is
wrong. I also looked at Jeremiah 11:10a: "They have followed other
gods to serve them." This was the breaking point.
I cried to the Lord to forgive me for my sin of idolatry.
I gave everything to God, who is the great I AM. I burned all the
ceremonial things I used for worship. I realized that my "vision
quest" was over when I met my Savior and Redeemer Jesus Christ! I
have found true spirituality in Jesus Christ alone. My true identity as a
Native person is found in Jesus Christ alone. He fills me with all I was
meant to be.
In my vision quest I saw everyone going to heaven. I was
blinded to the truth about God’s judgment (Heb. 4:12,13; Rev. 20:11-15).
Those who have received the Lord Jesus are those in Revelation 7:
"... a great multitude ... from every nation, tribe, people and
language ... [who cry] 'Salvation belongs to our God, who sits on the
throne, and to the Lamb.'"
My desire for my Native people is in Deut. 11:16: "Be
careful, or you will be enticed to turn away and worship other gods and
bow down to them."
 Condensed
from a tract by Conrad Flett with the same title. To order, please contact
our Bookstore.
Conrad & Florence Flett and their four
children live in Prince Albert where they have served with NCEM's Tribal
Trails television ministry since 1998.
Back to Northern Lights magazine
index
Back to SELECTED Northern Lights Magazine
Articles INDEX
|
