The Light in the Woods

1/31/09 Reflections        I’ve pressed over 125 different species of wildflowers native to this area, and carefully journaled them by consulting my extensive library of books on identifying wildflowers. Now that it’s winter and I have time to do it, I’ve been mounting the samples on card stock, labeling them, and covering them with clear contact paper to give my collection permanency.

Some of the wildflower samples weren’t collected or pressed all that carefully, and some don’t come out of the process with the vibrancy that they had when I picked them. But no matter how I mess them up, as I mount each of them on the card stock I’m awed that these are actual samples of God’s work that I’m displaying, and that they are perfect because they exist as God wanted them to exist, whether alive growing in the woods or dried and displayed in my collection.

When you think of it, every flower, every rock, every scoop of water, every handful of soil is a tangible sample of the work of God. You can actually pick up God’s loving care and hold it in your hand. A leaf, a mittenful of snow, a pine cone, an insect – all are evidence that not only was our world created, it was created with purpose. Each thing does what it’s supposed to do. Each thing has attributes special to it that helps it endure so that it can function the way it was created to function.

We who seek God don’t need to know the Grand Design. We don’t have to have any knowledge of Him other than His personal care for us. From there, we function as any other creation – with a purpose we don’t need to understand in order to fulfill. But we are special in that we know there is knowledge of God to be had. And we are special because God has created us in His image so that we can be co-conspirators in the workings of life.

I think that like the flowers, we were all created together in a moment in Reality, and come on the scene at the perfect moment; perfect because it’s God who makes the decision. He runs the master plan but, unlike the flowers, we have choices within that plan as to how we will conduct ourselves. Sometimes that seems like a dubious gift; often we wish God would just take over. But the greatest gift of all is the active ability to love God.

I am reminded of this ability each time I hold one of His creations – if it’s an honor to know the depth of love that went in to these things, it’s with great awe that I reflect on the loving care behind His love for each of us personally. I’ve heard that this is the secret behind our great commission to love each other – to understand how carefully created and desperately loved by God the other person is. If we love God and want to please Him, we will treat His children as the miracles they are.

1/26/09 Insights from Prayer        What am I giving up when I turn my free will over to God? I’m giving up my human weaknesses, my fears, my doubts, my shyness, my defeatism, my insecurities, my introverted personality, my sinfulness, my ignorance, my confusion, my inattention. I would certainly be better equipped without these hindrances, but consider what’s put in my hands instead when I abandon my will. I get to use God’s strength, His knowledge, His compassion, His creativity, His patience, His mercy, His wisdom, and His love. It sounds to me like a good trade – my faults in return for God’s power. And yet there are many, maybe even the majority, who bristle indignantly at the thought of giving themselves up to God’s authority. How insidiously human pride worms its way into the psyche, when in fact if all were left up to us there would be nothing good in the world. And still God gives us a chance to work through Him. The prayer of abandonment is a simple one. “Here I am, Lord.” God will know what you mean, because He is all-powerful, all-present, and all-knowing, and poised to give you powers you’ve never dreamed of yet.

1/25/09 Insights from Prayer           Most people, when they think of the vastness of the universe, come away with a feeling of smallness – smallness in our individual impact on creation and smallness in how little the universe impacts us. Our importance suddenly seems trivial, but so also the effect of the universe around us is negligible.

We here on Earth may just be a tiny example of intelligent beings compared to the total population of the universe. On the other hand, a Creator powerful enough to control such vastness is also powerful enough to deny life to all the universe except Earth. I shake my head in wonder when scientists talk about the “odds” of life elsewhere in the universe, because life is a decision by life’s Creator; having nothing to do with how it should appear as logical to us.

I contemplate the universe with the same feeling as everyone else, but after I reflect on the smallness of the individual I instantly recall my designation as a child of God.  This God, so powerful that He understands the vastness of unlimited space and time, nevertheless agonizes over my pain, delights in my joy, winces at my sins and appreciates my adoration.  No matter how small I am in the universe, I’m great in God’s eyes.

The other thing I take away from a contemplation of the universe is a recognition, given the awe of the unknown such a contemplation brings, of the wonderful familiarity of the part of God’s creation I can relate to. Under the huge canopy of stars, I reach down to scoop up a handful of fresh, clean snow. I’ll never grasp the make-up of the universe, but I can feel the snow cold against my face; I can taste its freshness and know that the snow, just as inconsequential in the universe as I am, is a gift to me from God. So is everything else I see and experience.

It’s because I’m valuable to God, no matter how small a space I take up in the universe, that I am the most important thing of all. Other planets in other galaxies may have snow, but this snow is important because it’s made for me, and I’m God’s child. Even if there are uncountable universes, uncountable planets, and uncountable people, no one is as important to God as I am, because God’s love is unlimited and fully offered.

1/24/09 Insights from Study        What is it with us believers that we have to take a faith that’s simple and pure and good and holy, then add so much ritual and dogma to it that it sets us all apart through its complications?

Why can’t we just love our Creator? If we would honestly do that, everything else would fall in place. But most of us can’t just wrap ourselves in God and carry Him around with us in our hearts all day. We always seem to have to define Him and limit Him by what we devise to set us apart from the way others define and limit Him. That way we can hold ourselves higher than others, content that our way is the right way and because of that we have God’s love and the others haven’t.

Does anyone honestly think God appreciates all this separation of faiths? Here we spend untold time and treasure setting ourselves apart according to religions, and then have to work at coming together to accept each others beliefs; feeling oh so sanctimonious about the sacrifice we must make. Maybe it would please God more if we weren’t so exclusive in the first place.

To me, it isn’t about how believers worship God, but the fact that He worships us enough that He creates us and calls us His children. Beyond that, a relationship with God is a personal thing and ought to be celebrated however God inspires within each of us. If we limit what we do to the thing God puts in our hearts, we can’t fail to do right. If we force ourselves to follow all the ceremonies and doctrines human beings tell us we need, then we’re not listening close enough to God for our guidance.

Devotional Mysticism is the worship from within, where God puts His inspiration as to what He wants and we respond by saying “Yes” to His desires.  What ritual can top God’s working through our spirits to reach us? What doctrine is better than God’s enlightenment? What ceremony worships God more than our personal abandonment to His will? What dictated dogma is needed when God protects His interests through our free will voluntarily set before Him for His direction? 

God doesn’t ask from us what we’ve been told He asks – humans, no matter how pious, have their own agenda in that regard. Instead, mystics quietly look inside our spirits to find out what God means to teach us, in trust that the answer will be there because God loves us and knows what’s best for us. Anything beyond that is just plain human interference and degradation of faith.

1/23/09 Reflections          There is one great error from which all others evolve – the foolishness of loving something more than we love God. It’s no wonder we are all sinners, for opportunities to put something worldly ahead of God are plentiful and alluring. God knows this, and He forgives. But do we know it?

When do we ever stop what we’re doing and ask ourselves if this thing we do is honoring God? The good things we do are in effect pleasing to God, but do we do them for God’s sake or ours? The bad things we do may produce guilt, sorrow, shame, fear, and a feeling of helplessness, but do we regret them for what they do to God or for what they do to us?

If only we would put as much enthusiasm into loving God as we put into adulating worldly people and things! People of God have been called delusional for giving glory to the Creator by the same people who swoon over a celebrity at a rock concert, Hollywood awards ceremony, political rally, or basketball game. People of God have been quietly giving and volunteering for ages and have been sneered at by the same people who swell with pride over a new car, gourmet dinner, house with a pool, or big bank balance.

You can enjoy nice things and still put God first. There’s nothing inherently wrong with worldly matters, but when the pursuit of them makes us demote the Creator of all of this to irrelevancy, it’s just plain wrong. Maybe to you God isn’t as entertaining, charismatic, pleasurable, or glittery as these Earthly wonders, but Earthly life doesn’t last long and God lasts forever. So do you – long after the things you pursue now no longer exist. What is important then is as important now in God’s eyes. He’s been telling you what’s good and right and joyful since you were born – haven’t you been listening?

1/18/09 Inspirations          I feel like I’ve been lightly drugged; I’m walking through a fog only half-aware of the world around me, and I’m loving it. If I have to pull myself back into life, I’m distracted and out of my element. I can’t wait to get back to where it’s just God and me. The closer to home I get, the more things begin to come back into focus and the more I relax.

This isn’t something I’ve chosen, and it’s nothing like the pragmatic, organized way I used to be. But I’m glad for this dramatic change in personality because it tells me what I need to know – that there is no doubt that there is a force at play that’s not of my making. And because I’m now a better, more loving person, this is a force for good that’s worth following without fear.

I’m now prepared to follow this path without hesitation, and go where it leads me next. I’m getting to the point where I don’t need a sign to tell me I’m doing the right thing. Lately my whole existence has been the sign I’ve needed in order to allow, voluntarily and with confidence, my takeover by God.

1/18/09 Insights from Prayer          Today during my devotions I realized that, as I was inspired to put it, I notice I’m willing to go the extra mile any time someone gives just an inch. This made me start to think of one of the very first theological principles that was given to me at my divine awakening. It’s that all God wants from us is that we hand over the precious free-will we were created with, and let Him use it the way He wants instead of the way we want.

That’s a big step but one that’s easily taken. We just go out by ourselves into the quiet and tell God we know we’re helpless, but we’re willing to accept His plan and whatever is given us in carrying it out. It’s not that God needs our cooperation, but that He appreciates it because it means we’ve tuned in to His love and want to participate in it. That’s the ultimate adoration. From that point all will be well no matter how inadequately we are able to perceive life.

If the checkout girl just sighs tiredly when I put my purchases up to be scanned, that doesn’t harm me. When a man in a hurry bumps into me without apology, that’s not a big deal. Yet when a saleswoman smiles or a customer holds a door open for me, my reaction is disproportionate – I would suffer harm for this person. A small random good act has the power to uplift a life, but it can do something else just as important – it creates a “good vibe” in the recipient that triggers a loving reaction.

This kind of interchange also happens between the self-abandoned spirit and its Creator. By just our willingness to accept God’s desires we welcome a love exchange totally out of proportion to our free will offering. That goodness in turn spins off onto others, triggering a new opportunity for connection.

Unexpected kind acts done for us trigger affinitive love, which sparks a joy of spirit from which we’re moved to share unexpected kind acts of our own. Nobody caught up in this cycle can fail to see the effects of God’s love woven throughout the lives of His children.

1/17/09 Insights from Prayer          History has been filled with brave hearts who can go against convention in order to gather God’s children to the place God wants them to be. Convention changes; societies change. But God does not change, and those that follow Him without fail are always in demand – never so much so than when they must be martyred to a popular thinking that goes against God’s wishes.

Many have learned God’s truth from God’s Spirit, but most of these, while taking God’s will into their own hearts, fall short of passing along this mystery to others. But there are those few who are so humble, so obedient, so willing, that they can go against the prevailing powers of man, speaking the truth as God gives it to them.  It takes great humility to bring this about, because persons willing to do this cannot concern themselves with anyone’s opinion but God’s. Their mission is bigger than their reputation.  To be this way requires great personal insight in the first place, followed by that special grace of compassion that makes one care very much about the rest of God’s people so as to urge them to seek this same divine favor.

It’s getting increasingly difficult to be heard through the barrier of humanism and the ostracizing of spirituality. But God’s will always wins, and He never fails to instill in us all the need for spiritual awakening. This need, no matter how buried by worldliness, always lies tantalizingly close to the surface, calling to the spirit for recognition. All it takes is a glance toward the person who isn’t content to let their spirituality be hidden and yet holds it close to themselves like a treasure.

We want you to want the peace we have. We want you to envy our joy. Be jealous enough to seek what we have for yourself. And when you have it, don’t be afraid to wear your love for God in public. You will instruct without saying a word, because all you need to convey is a desire to hear the Real Teacher.

In response to the ravages of group politics, I want to belong to the counterculture of individual spirituality. If society must collapse in order for the choice of Godliness to shine through the ashes, then I’m willing to suffer fools gladly. People are sheep and will follow where it’s easiest to go. I’m willing to be the black sheep that wanders away, but wanders away in order to seek the True Shepherd. I don’t mind being an outcast alone with my God – in fact I cherish that above all else. I may be on the outside of society, but I’m not looking in longingly. I’m comfortable out here because what seems cold and boring to others is warm and inviting to me. But I do care about you on the inside, and if you should look out and see I’m happy and in peace, you might want to turn around and look from my perspective at the party you’re enjoying. If that seed of doubt is planted in your spirit, my work is done and you can expect God to take over completely.

1/16/09 Reflections                    We are often warned of the dire consequences of mistaking our own thoughts for those of God. Much more spiritually devastating is to dismiss, as our own, the thoughts infused by God for His purposes.

In trying to not be deceived, we are in danger of missing what God is telling us. Our very thoughts would logically be the medium God would use to impart knowledge, for we turn our thought into words in order to express feeling. It’s for this reason that besides placing ourselves in a position to recognize God’s desires, we would also profit from listening to what others say of God, then analyzing that in the light of what’s already in our spirits.

We give deference to what seems right, but we can still value all thoughts as either affirmation or denial of our inner intuition. This isn’t allowing ourselves to be talked out of what we know of right and wrong; it’s protection against false teaching that may have already taken place, and a way of clarifying the myriad nooks and crannies of discernment that is only gradually being formed within us.

Our spiritual knowledge is never complete; there is progression which doesn’t end in this life. You may argue that further instruction isn’t necessary; that the Bible contains all we need to know. But we’ve all experienced dramatic clarification of Bible passages – sometimes as inspiration during our own reading, and sometimes through the words of others. We nurture the seeds of inspiration, see what comes up, and pick out the weeds. If it doesn’t appear right to us, we know it and reject it. This is what we all encourage, as personal understanding is a progression. We know this is how spiritual education takes place.

To mystics, these seeds of enlightenment are everywhere, not just in the Bible. We can catch the flavor of Godliness in just about everything we experience, because we see God’s design in all His creations. We may not understand it, but we see that the master plan exists, and we trust that it exists for our good. The point is that we don’t turn our back on God’s help just because we are prideful and we don’t see that this guidance is really coming from God.

1/15/09 Insights from Study            I frustrate myself before I give myself a chance. Why give what little I can give to a beggar? Even if he didn’t use it for something self-destructive, my contribution does very little for that person’s welfare and is a drop in the ocean in the great scheme of things.

Maybe I’m not going to turn the beggar’s life around, but maybe my contribution added to those of others just might. And beyond that, even if I brighten just a minute or two of someone’s day, it’s a sign of God working through me. If I stop to reflect on the enormity of what this really means, we are both receiving an awesome gift in an awesome way.

I never liked that Bible verse: “Him that taketh away thy cloke forbid not to take thy coat also.” What are we supposed to be – doormats for anyone to wipe their feet on? Yet if I turn this around it suddenly strikes a chord. If I think about this verse in the light of what I do for others voluntarily instead of about the bad others do to me, it makes perfect sense.

I think about my stint in the tourist industry, and I remember how I used to tell myself about forbearance when I was in a bad mood, or in a hurry, or just exhausted; many times I was all three at once. I used to remind myself internally: This person and this transaction are insignificant for you because you will handle this kind of thing over and over all day and every day. But to this person, you are a big part of his vacation – don’t let your hang-ups ruin it for him when with a little effort you can make his experience even better.

Any of us can find ways to not only deal with people or situations without rancor, but consciously go the extra mile to make the casual contact special by allowing God’s light to shine through. There are many ways to do this – the situation will lend itself and God’s spirit will show the way – and giving not only the cloak but also the coat as well becomes a habit that fosters peace and contentment of spirit.

What starts out as an experiment could turn into a way of life. This is what mystics mean by practicing the presence of God – living in such a way that no task is mundane because it’s an opportunity to honor God through His creations.