Tag: love

Contemplation is no pain-killer

Contemplation is no pain-killer

The following is a passage of Thomas Merton’s in “New Seeds of Contemplation” (2003, pgs. 13-15) that was very meaningful to me today:

Let no one hope to find in contemplation an escape from conflict, from anguish or from doubt. On the contrary, the deep, inexpressible certitude of the contemplative experience awakens a tragic anguish and opens many questions in the depths of the heart like wounds that cannot stop bleeding.

For every gain in deep certitude there is a corresponding growth of superficial “doubt.” This doubt is by no means opposed to genuine faith, but it mercilessly examines and questions the spurious “faith” of everyday life, the human faith which is nothing but the passive acceptance of conventional opinion. This false “faith” which is what we often live by and which we even come to confuse with our “religion” is subjected to inexorable questioning. This torment is a kind of trial by fie in which we are compelled, by the very light of invisible truth which has reached us in the dark ray of contemplation, to examine, to doubt and finally to reject all the prejudices and conventions that we have hitherto accepted as if they were dogmas. Hence it is clear that genuine contemplation is incompatible with complacency and with smug acceptance of prejudiced opinions. It is not mere passive acquiescence in the status quo, as some would like to believe-for this would reduce it to the level of spiritual anesthesia.

Contemplation is no pain-killer. What a holocaust takes place in this steady burning to ashes of old worn-out words, clichés, slogans, rationalizations! The worst of it is that even apparently holy conceptions are consumed along with all the rest. It is a terrible breaking and burning of idols, a purification of the sanctuary, so that no graven thing may occupy the place that God has commanded to be left empty: the center, the existential lather which simply “is.”

In the end the contemplative suffers the anguish of realizing that he no longer knows what God is. He may or may not mercifully realize that, after all, this is a great gain, because “God is not a what,” not a “thing.” That is precisely one of the essential characteristics of contemplative experience. It sees that there is no “what” that can be called God. There is “no such thing” as God because God is neither a “what” nor a “thing” but a pure “Who.” He is the “Thou” before whom our inmost “I” springs into awareness. He is the I Am before whom with our own most personal and inalienable voice we echo “I am.”

Walmart as Environment for Spiritual Practice

So, I go to take the milk back yesterday and was able to get a refund on an in-store credit card. Cool. That made-up for it… I thought…

Last week, I purchased a gallon of milk from Walmart in Jackson, Michigan, where I live. While doing so, I noticed that the supercenter has been undergoing some major renovations. In the midst of them, there seems to be a few things neglected, I am afraid.

You see, the milk that I purchased was nearly expired and smelled like cheese as soon as I brought it home and opened it.

Why didn’t I look at the expiration date when I purchased it, you ask? Well, that is easy.

I was probably half asleep when I purchased it, as I usually am when I get around to picking up grub from the grocery store. It is usually a last minute endeavor.

So, I go to take the milk back yesterday and was able to get a refund on an in-store credit card. Cool. That made-up for it… I thought…

—

I then went to pick up 4 things:

  1. milk
  2. extension cord
  3. garbage bags
  4. hedge trimmer

All was fine and dandy until I got to number 4.

You see, there wasn’t a corresponding box for the trimmer I was interested in. So, I resorted to finding somebody to help me.

About 7 hours later, I found somebody who looked through all the boxes that I had just sorted through myself. Apparently, my eyes work too, but I understand.

After about another 7 hours of “checking in the back” they were unable to find a box for the product I needed.

Did I mention this isle was next to the fish tanks that were half empty and smelled like a mix between sweaty gym socks and rotten earthworms?

After I finally convinced them to sell me the floor model, they then had to find the price for the product (another 7 hours) and the packed away manual.

Finally, I was at the check-out! Did, I mention I came to pick up 4 items?

I needed to use the gift card from the returned milk and then pay the rest on my debit card.

Not too much to ask right?

Wrong.

14 hours later (sarcasm font) and with the help of four different employees at seemingly all different rankings, I was able to purchase the four items.

—

You could say that my inner-Jesus was being a bit suffocated in my high blood pressure and internal boiling in an attempt to stay calm and peaceful while the line began to grow to about a mile in length behind me.

Why so uptight, David? It is all good! Roll with it. You have all the time in the world to get to your lawn care which has been neglected for weeks on end before you move onto your nine-million other tasks for the day.

Not really, but I did walk away from that thinking that I could be more graceful to people who are simply trying to do their job in the midst of renovation and change themselves. This is especially after the employee who was helping me thanked me for my patience.

Now, if I can only get better of having internal patience like I apparently did on the outside. I think that is where it really counts.

My psychological health would probably concur.

a prayer for my community

a prayer for my community

This image was uploaded by n1colas to sxc.hu with a royalty free license. Abba in undetectable dimensions,

You are the one that we long to know and learn from.

Please make yourself known to us today in new and fresh ways.

And when we know you in these new and fresh ways, may that knowledge perculate into our new hearts and become radiant by the demonstrable love of our external lives.

May you give us eyes to see your provision in our lives. May you, in your grace, provide what we need, no more, and no less, so that we never forget our daily dependence on this grace.

Help us forgive as you do and so save us from ourselves, the world, and the evil forces that seek to destroy what you are doing and creating in and through us, even today.

Do all this for the sake of your reputation in the world, we plead.

Interview with Shane Hipps – The OAT Podcast

Check out my interview with Shane Hipps for the OAT Podcast!

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UCh68gAOOBY&w=480&h=300]

Oh, how easy it is to miss the point.

If I have learned anything about the God of the Bible from my study of it over my few years of life, it is that this God has a consistent historical tendency to side with the underdog, the weak, the oppressed, the persecuted, the beat down, the immigrant, the outcast, & loser. If I have learned anything about the successful, rich (I especially include myself in this category), strong, affluent, high and mighty, arrogant, entitled, native, winners, it is that there is a consistent historical tendency to be convinced that God is siding with them.

One of the larger misconceptions we have about God is that God is insecure like we are. I am just so thankful that God does not stoop to treat it’s enemy like we have a tendancy to treat ours and even goes so far as to ultimately demonstrate and instruct humanity to love them.

Everywhere I look around me, I see examples of people trying with all their might to make life a living hell for their enemies, if not right out condemning them to hell with the presumed authority of God.

God, forgive us. We have no idea what we are doing most of the time. Don’t give up on us. Turn us to your “crazy” ways and us from our “wise” ones. Help us to use our hearts and heads and to hear you and see your ways as brilliant and as subversive as they are.