I imagine we’re all aware of the image of the prizefighter sitting on his stool in the corner of the ring between rounds. I expect he’s at least a little bloodied, perhaps quite a lot. He’s attended to by people who are there to care for him but there are a whole lot of people on the immediate periphery who are there just for the show. And, maybe, there’s a broad TV audience of millions who are fascinating or are betting or who just like to be around when the carnage is laid bare.

So, with encouragement and the interventions that help him shake off the pain and physical limitations, he awaits the sound, knowing that he must try to stand again and greet what inevitably comes.

He awaits the simple sound of the bell and he arises to answer it.

All other noise fades into the background. All of his attention is focused on the thing that is right in front of him. This is a thing that will, inevitably, involve pain but just may involve triumph. If only he can persevere.

And so it goes.

We all know this drill. We’ve known it for as long as memory serves. I’ve known it in many forms. We seek rest and sleep at the end of the day, knowing full well that the morrow will bring many things, some of which may be kind and some of which may be a threat.

We stand up at the bell, with an innate sense that the next few moments may bring death or they may bring life. The next few moments may bring great joy or they may bring sorrow. Am I wrong?

Or, perhaps, we arise without a sense of either. We awaken to complacency which is another way of describing a kind of cocoon. We go about our business as if the business of life is the only thing we know. It’s just profit and loss. Nothing else.

Returning to the ring, what is victory and what is defeat? The prizefighter is not complacent or at least that’s not a good reason to enter the ring in the first place.

Rewind the tape and we see a whole lot of conditioning. A whole lot of hard preparation. We don’t get to adulthood without facing all sorts of challenges, the more fortunate perhaps skating to this level without great suffering or tragedy while others face it from Day 1. The prizefighter knows that victory comes at a cost. He recognizes that there is no gain without a whole lot of pain. He does not push back the pain but lives into it, recognizing that steel is forged from fire, not from softness and security. The warrior knows this, too, and we stand up in admiration and thanks when he walks by.

Of course, all of this is metaphor. We are, none of us reading this, in the ring or on the field of battle. But we answer the same bell.

To us, what is victory or defeat? What does the conditioning look like? The preparation of both body and spirit? Is the dreaded knockout blow the final moment, after which we cease to exist at all? Is all of our preparation and conditioning merely the attempt to get to some finish line that we call death and then there is a void that is actually worse than a void because a void can be the absence of something but we may not have even known the something in the first place. It was all a great deceit? Random particles and energy coalescing with no purpose that just happened to make a thing called Me?

The scientific materialists and atheists can’t help but ultimately reduce the goal of life to simple replication of DNA. If there is no purpose to creation, then any imagination that there is purpose to life is just that: imagination. Answering the bell is a function of birth, foraging for food and the means to sustain life, procreation and preparing to die. That’s the nature of the ring that is cordoned off from a non-existent audience. Sound bleak? Of course it is, despite all we do to dress it up with experience along the way.

Instead, when we raise our somewhat battered but still viable and hopeful eyes to the adversary across the ring, what is it that we see? To what do we aspire? For what do we endure the inevitable pain that comes only seconds after the bell?

Is it the hoped-for acclimation of hundreds or thousands or millions of fans who really don’t know us but see us as a symbol of something they long for? Is it money and fame and the material goods that we seek that will give us value and make it worth it?

Who or what is our adversary when you get right down to it? Isn’t it a desire not to be meaningless? Isn’t it that we will count as something? But, to whom or what do we go for that affirmation and how will that sustain us?

The enemy whispers that we are our own Lord and Savior. We are the ultimate conqueror. We deserve the acclimation and our moment in the bright spotlight of ardor, no matter how transitory, how fleeting. But, of course, the reality is that we will ultimately be beaten. Defeat always lurks around the corner. Death is inevitable.

But, let’s change the viewpoint. Let’s raise our beaten eyes or troubled hearts towards a bright light that is warm and beckoning. A presence so compelling that we must arise as if not of our own accord at the ringing of the bell. The acclaim of the fickle crowd disappears, to be replaced by the majestic voices of the heavenly host, each one of them focused intently on our own selves, as flawed as we are, recognizing that we are the reason for all of creation in the first place. The sound is that of Love, unbound, infinite, beyond human comprehension, resonating through every particle in existence.

And, so, we can slowly rise up on stiff and weakened limbs at the sound of the bell. But, without effort, our arms are raised high and extended, hands opened, faces devoid of pain but radiating light and tears of joy.

At the trumpet’s sound, we sing Glory Hallelujah! That is the sound of victory and we have arrived.

I expect that some of these essays can be tedious but I feel compelled to write them, even if they’re to an audience of one. 🙂

No two of us are wired exactly the same, although our wires are all made of basically the same stuff. The way I meet the world each day is not necessarily how many others meet the world, including some who are closest to me. Even when we share a common set of fundamental values, we can each organize them differently. I am fascinated by this for all sorts of reasons.

We can rightfully ask questions like, “What brings us joy? What saddens us? In what do we find the most fulfillment? What occupies our minds and attention when we are at rest? What does a life well-lived look like? Is there anything about me that I would change, if I could?”

These, and many more, are the conscious and subconscious considerations of how we can examine what it means to be alive here and now.

I spoke a couple of weeks ago on how much I enjoyed to read and, especially, to discover new authors who are exceptional in many ways.

Good writing is like looking at a beautiful piece of art or listening to an exquisite piece of music. To me, it’s a matter of absorption. One does not meet these things and allow them to remain on the surface. Instead, should we be so motivated, we can allow them to bore deeply inside of us, touching places that reliably help us to understand who we are.

An obvious touchstone for this kind of thing is to be found nearly everywhere in nature. From the unique and never-replicated symmetry of snowflakes and the miniscule perfections of budding flowers to majestic redwoods and mountains, vast landscapes and seascapes, and on and on … we can marvel and feel joy at being alive to witness such beauty.

I have written before about a thing called wonder. I think our first inclination on considering the nature of wonder is to categorize it as a thought, such as “I wonder what caused that?” Or, perhaps, something like “Wow, that is really beautiful!”

But, I think wonder might also be partially a feeling, a kind of gut-level apprehension of a thing. A sense, perhaps not completely intelligible, that the thing is of some ultimate significance. In other words, its meaning resonates more deeply than words will allow us to go.

Regardless, I am regularly amazed by wonder, both through thought and feeling. There are times when I’ve felt my heart seemingly overflow from the most wondrous things. And, there are times when my mind comes across ideas that seemingly open up whole new vistas of understanding.

Mind you, these are not regular occurrences! Perhaps, that’s one of the reasons I find them so notable when they arrive, nearly always unbidden.

(I read once, I think from C.S. Lewis, who said something to the effect that the longing for a thing can be more compelling than the thing itself. He was speaking, of course, about the ways that we try to fill places in our lives with things that are transitory, not permanent, and the nature of permanency can only be found in God.)

No, the stuff I’m talking about often arrives as a surprise. In writing this, I’m reminded of emerging from the Wawona Tunnel on California’s Highway 41, being stunned by the vista of Yosemite Valley laid out below. Even if the tunnel is familiar, it always comes as kind of a surprise. Which is only natural when we emerge from darkness into beauty. Or, when with friends, high up in the Colorado Rockies in the dead of winter, we come out of a rather steep climb on our snowshoes, through a forest and onto a mountaintop meadow at 10,000 feet, with virgin snow glistening in the sunlight, faced with the panorama of alpine peaks all around. Pure wonderment.

I’ve read some fiction recently that has cause me to weep. Not just tear-up but weep. OK, I have an emotional streak and am known to be passionate about some things. (I confess that I can cry at a Hallmark movie!) But, when the literature expresses a combination of deep meaning and beautifully-crafted language, I find myself in a place not that much unlike what I just described in Yosemite. But more so. The author’s voice being read is one that can neatly cut through the mundane and touch the sacred.

My response to certain books is not exclusive to fiction, of course. I have more than a few bookshelves full of books that have amazed me. As I recently wrote, another amazement is that I continue to find new sources of amazement!

I’m reading one such book right now. This one from an author who, before a week ago, did not exist as far as I was concerned. I have seen several of his lectures on YouTube that have completely captivated me. A small, prideful, part of me is a little jealous that my levels of wisdom are grossly underdeveloped compared to his! Fortunately, though, this tinge of pride is pretty well eclipsed by the joy of learning from him. The joy of this makes me smile and even laugh. New vistas of knowledge that bring wonder while also helping me to tap into deeper understandings of the way things are.

And this particular person, a world-renowned mathematician and scientist at Oxford University (who is also an extremely accomplished philosopher and commentator on the intersection of science and faith) is just one of three that have so struck me in the last week. Go figure!

I am grateful that God gave me both a mind and a heart. Knowledge is a wondrous thing of itself. Knowledge assists us in navigating the simplest things of life but also opens up doors to comprehend the most significant things. The pursuit of knowledge has always been one of the grandest expressions of humans throughout our history. We alone in the universe, so far as we know, are equipped with this ability. Of course, while other animals have their own and more limited scopes of knowledge, they do not possess the sense of it. They do not pursue it.

But, knowledge for knowledge sake is to me, a heartless pursuit because it circumvents the most important purpose for its existence.

At this, I’ll go briefly to the famous biblical account of the Garden and Adam and Eve. (I know that some confront this story literally as an historical thing,  while others take it as metaphor (which, interestingly is also a form of literal interpretation), and still others as mythology. Regardless, the story is a fascinating one and appropriate to our purposes here.)

Very briefly, what is described as the Garden of Eden, is the piece of God’s perfect creation wherein he put his first man and first woman. As the story unfolds, they walk with God in the Garden. They are surrounded by wonderment and unparalleled beauty. They see this and they are fulfilled, just as God intended. But, the voice of the anti-God, embodied in the serpent, whispers that this knowledge is not enough. The voice says that God has not given them the full knowledge that he possesses and that this is wrong, a thought that had not struck them previously. The serpent advised that God was basically hurting them through this limitation and all they had to do was to disobey the one commandment that God had issued. A very small one, they were told. Just eat from the fruit of the special tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil. Then they would know the mind of God. In essence, become God’s equal. The seduction worked and mankind was, thereafter separated from God.

I bring this up because it’s not knowledge, itself, which is the point or the objective. It’s knowledge that is in concert with God’s plan that should concern us. Just to know things is not necessarily good. Knowledge can just as easily be used for bad as for good. Zyklon B was a German pesticide which was then used to exterminate millions of Jews, who were, in the thinking at the time, merely pests themselves. The “knowledge” or belief in a truth called dialectic materialism served as the justification for killing many tens of millions in the communist Soviet and Chinese utopian experiments. The serpent is assuredly well-pleased.

On the other hand, we have the kinds of knowledge that celebrate what’s best about being human, including both our physical and spiritual flourishing. This kind of knowledge is often received with wonder. The kind of knowledge that arrives when we hear of the selfless act of strangers to risk all to help another. The kind of knowledge that arrives when we hear a community forgive the man who assassinated their children. The kind of knowledge that arrives when we see a broken life made whole or the battered body walking again, its owner with a broad smile on his or her face. The kind of knowledge like that in the Garden, when we are filled with wonder at the beauty of creation.

Yes, when I find a book that opens up doors to new possibilities, to deeper levels of understanding a thing I hold as important, it is like discovering a reflection of beauty. I find this in music and art … the objective of which is not to deconstruct but to construct. Not to lay waste to that which is good but to point to that which is good.

There’s this remarkable thing about little children. Their world is a place of wonderment. They are like magnets for acquiring new knowledge. They become fascinated as their minds grow at phenomenal rates. Their faces light up with joy to the surprises that seemingly unfold in rapid succession. They are trusting in their lack of worldly exposure. Yes, of course, they can be intensely selfish and driven to behaving poorly but they crave new knowledge and we adults rejoice when that is accomplished. We rejoice when we witness the wonder in their eyes. Is this a whisper of the Garden?

For, Jesus said, “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.” Matthew 18:3-4.

Knowledge and wonder. Hand in hand. For that, I am truly thankful.

If you’re still with me, we’re on the home stretch.

Jesus’ introduction to his most famous set of teachings is,

Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

In this elongated examination, we’ve been focusing on what “poor in spirit” means, especially in the context of which Jesus is speaking. It is not synonymous with “being poor” as many will think. And, while Jesus pays particular attention to poor people, he does so because his key message is about the fundamental brokenness of the human heart and so many who know the physical privations of life can find their hearts and spirits broken. But, as we’ve seen, he is speaking much more broadly.

Momentarily, we should at least ask what the first word, blessed, means. It’s probable that we have some intuitive sense of its meaning and that’s good but let’s make sure. Again, all we have to do is look it up. (We don’t have to open up some dense theological work to get the basics).

Blessed can mean “Holy. Consecrated. Endowed with divine favor.”

(I don’t remember off-hand but I think I may have written about the concept of Holy before. I’ll have to go back. If I haven’t, perhaps I’ll do so at some point.)

So, God looks with favor upon the poor in spirit from his vantage point of perfect holiness, which, in our context, basically means perfect love, truth and justice.

But then, lest we forget, there’s something that directly follows. There’s a logical consequence or result. There’s an “if/then” to what Jesus is intending for us to know.

And, it runs like this: Because I (God) look at you (us) with great favor, due to your humble and contrite spirit that is expressed lovingly towards me and many others, I give you the greatest gift of all, which is life in close relationship with me.

Yes. Life in close relationship with God has always been the point and this is the main reason Jesus showed up on the scene. It’s really because we’d lost all sense of what that truly looks like and, honestly, still do.

One source I checked says the Kingdom of God is mentioned 147 times in the New Testament and 56 times in the Gospel of Matthew alone. We might get the impression that this is important stuff.

One might also reasonably ask here if there’s a difference between the Kingdom of God and the Kingdom of Heaven.

It’s a very good question, actually, but can open up all sorts of distinctions and interpretations that will end up taking us pretty far afield. But, again to defer to Dallas Willard, the place we’re talking about actually fits with “kingdom” language. It’s where we live within “God’s reign and rule.”

This might disappoint a lot of folks who are enamored with a thing called democracy. After all, what modern western person can reliably stand up and contest a thing like democracy? From such a vantage point, things like kings, who we understand are vested with all power and authority, are anathema. Kings are viewed as tyrants and tyrants by definition oppose our freedom. So, is God a tyrant who opposes our freedom?

Well, yes and no. Let’s stay with this line of thinking.

If perfect democracy is akin to an equal distribution of power amongst all people, giving practical equality to everyone, then it’s actually a rather short hop to anarchy, which means that there are no rules. After all, both the theory and our human experience has always been that power abhors a vacuum. Utopian visionaries have regularly sought to create ideal places where human beings never pursue selfish ends but have always failed, for which there are some pretty sound reasons.

Let’s see if we can put it this way. Jesus presents us with an all-powerful, all-knowing, fully creative God who is also perfectly just and perfectly loving. So, does that mean he is a loving tyrant? One reason I don’t like the word tyrant when it comes to the Christian portrayal (or even the Old Testament portrayal which seems to include a lot more about wrath and the such), is this:

• His love for us is unconditional. In other words, his love for us has nothing to do with how we feel about him, including ignoring him and even doing really bad stuff. He loves us all without condition.
• If the Christian framework is to be believed, God, the father, sent God the Son (Jesus) to earth for a set of very specific reasons, among them to be both man and God at the same time, and to sacrificially “atone” for all of the sins of mankind, while also heralding the ultimate defeat of evil. (Theologically speaking, this was a big sacrifice and even bigger if one looks into what really happened on the cross, even far beyond the brutality of the scourging and crucifixion.)

Tyrants don’t do either of these things. Servant Kings do. Kings who are both lions and lambs.

So, to our question regarding the “If/Then” of the whole passage: Those who are poor in spirit shall belong in and to the Kingdom of Heaven, which is really just a way of describing this place where God rules.

And, the really revolutionary thing that Jesus kept telling anyone who’d listen was and is that “the Kingdom of God/Heaven is at hand.”

Which, when you get right down to it, means that it’s available here and now.

In actuality, Jesus said we can walk with God here on earth in this life and that doesn’t just mean following a bunch of institutionalized rules. It means we can participate with God as real partners  in his creative work. Does that sound tyrannical?

Yes, we are promised an eternal life, the where of which has filled countless volumes written by theologians and to which we won’t go now other than to say this:

A popular conception of heaven is that it’s an amazingly beautiful place where some or all people (depending upon your viewpoint) get to go to spend eternity. For Christians, presumably it’s where God “resides.” One of many problems with this supposition is that God is “there” and we are “here.” This is actually one reason that Jesus arrived on the scene and that is to show us who God really is and why he (to use that pronoun) is, in fact, fully present here and now. From this perspective, the “Heavens” have broken through to the earth and, therefore, the “Kingdom” (or place) of God is “at hand.” It isn’t just for some future point. Instead, it is perfectly present to us.

For us, this means that we can at least get a taste of what the purest form of heaven is like. All we have to do is open our eyes and our hearts, surrender to God’s authority, which is expressed lovingly, and we get to live in his “kingdom,” which is of the “heavens.” Make sense? 🙂

Now, to bring this whole thing to a close: To the degree that we possess a spirit as described thus far, especially through the grace of God, we are invited into close relationship with him and that’s a most wonderful thing.

And, that’s at the foundation of Jesus’ teaching and at the core of his introduction to the Sermon on the Mount.

Arrogance, unchecked pride, selfishness and a judgmental spirit (haughtiness?), are contrary to what God intends for us and seeks from us. No, instead, a servant’s heart, sacrificial love, and complete surrender to the God who loves us both unconditionally and for all of eternity, is the point of it all.

I, for one, need to try to remember this. Thanks for listening.

We’ll continue by asking what being “poor in spirit” has to do with loving God with everything we have. And, let’s remember that Jesus didn’t leave us wiggle room. He said everything by actually listing everything so as to leave no doubt.

So, in order to answer this, we actually have to go on an even deeper dive. Let’s take it slowly so as not to overload the circuits. A reminder of where we are:

Jesus is talking to what is probably a fairly good-sized group of people, including his loyal followers (disciples), on a hillside overlooking the Sea of Galilee. He’s undoubtedly of a mind to give them a survey lecture on things he considers as fundamental to his life and ministry. After getting their attention, he starts off with a bang.

In order to understand this starting point to his most famous set of teachings, we’ve needed to consider (1) what he’s talking about, (2) the meaning behind the words, and (3) the context for why he chose this topic.

This brings us to his crystal-clear direction regarding the top priorities for our attention and behavior.

Now, the deeper dive is to try to understand why Jesus gave us those two commandments. There has to be a reason, even though on the surface, adhering to them seems practically impossible.

There has to be a purpose.

In fact, this goes to the heart of why God even wants us around in the first place. After all, being God (if you believe in him), he actually doesn’t need us! So, what gives?

Drumroll …

It’s because God created us to love. Because he created us for love. Because he is love.

Dallas Willard is one of my all-time favorite Christian thinkers and he defines love as “willing the good of another.”

Willing. As in making it happen.

(I could go off here on a related tangent about how God is love and what that has to do with the Christian God, conceived as three persons in one: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. But, I’ll spare everyone that detour!)

Let’s just stick with the “God is love and, so, created us in his image, which means to love,” among other things. (This can reasonably raise all sorts of other questions like “what is free will?” and “why is there evil in the world?” but we’re not going there today and we don’t need to. I have no intention, here, of examining all of the elements of the Christian faith. I’m just trying to address where this one phrase came from.)

Why does God want us to love him?

Because to the degree that we do, we will understand him and the nature of ultimate reality.

If we live within a deeply loving relationship with God, then we are immersed in the thing and that ripples out everywhere. I have written a lot about grace before, which I kind of casually claim is the most powerful force in the universe. Well, grace is one manifestation of love. You get the point.

We’ve all heard the story of Moses going up the mountain and bringing down God’s law, having spoken to God. The people wanted to know the rules for their new journey, having fled slavery in Egypt. They believed God had looked upon them with favor … they were somehow chosen and they looked to Moses as their leader and human deliverer. Moses ended up telling them the basic conditions for staying in favor with God. By living this way, they’d be focusing on the right stuff and staying away from the wrong stuff.

If sin can be defined (which I do) as that which separates us from God, this was a major source of prescriptions to avoid such an outcome.

And, the very first prescription was : “You shall have no other gods before me.” Exodus 20:3

Now, what is God trying to tell us, whether through Moses or Jesus?

What is meant by loving God with all we have and by putting no other gods before God? Why is this Ground Rule #1?

It’s because we are always putting other gods before God and we are always focusing on things we consider more important than loving God. God, being God, knows this but he’s still holding firm. We’re heading down the wrong path when we choose to ignore or try to diminish the authority of his foundational commandments. On the contrary, to the extent we follow these primary commandments from both the Old Testament (Hebrew scriptures) and New Testament (Christian scriptures), we come close to God, which is really the point of the whole thing.

This can be better understood if we bring the word idol into our examination. The dictionary definition of idol is both “an image or representation of a god used as an object of worship”and “a person or thing that is greatly loved, admired or revered such as a movie idol.”

In fact, in our context, idols are those things we elevate in importance so much that, in actuality, we end up worshipping them (treating them with reverence and devotion). Actual idols can be things like money, fame, power, jobs, our children, certain possessions or pastimes. These are things that can, eventually, get control over us and skew us away from things that are more important for our well-being, especially when you toss God into the equation. I have been guilty of this and continue to be guilty of this. Creating idols is a full-time activity for nearly all human beings. (There is a big reason for this, by the way.)

An easy way to test ourselves here is to ask if we love thinking about something or doing something rather than giving ourselves fully to God. Show of hands?

This, then, is at the core of what it means to be “poor in spirit.” It is the understanding that God’s love is key and a model for how we should love. And, if a huge component of God’s love is grace (unmerited favor towards another), then we need to always be “other focused.”

I ended up the last post by implying that keeping the two main commandments is basically impossible. So, why did Jesus issue them? No matter how hard we try, we find out we can’t keep them.

This causes all sorts of problems. Here are three of them.

1. Some people who are Christians will keep trying and get very frustrated. This can turn them bitter and resentful, achieving the opposite result. They can believe they are failures.
2. Some people who are Christians will give lip service to the commandments and end up living their lives without them as a true guide.
3. Some people who are not Christians will point to these as idealistic and unrealistic demands which prove there either isn’t a God or, if there is, he’s not a good one.

A person who is truly “poor in spirit” and who also understands the nature of the first two commandments is the opposite of the narcissist, who screams, ME! ME! ME!

Instead, Jesus is calling for blessing on he or she who wakes up each day and inquires of God, “who can I love anew today? Can you please help me to consider my specific needs less and fill that gap by considering the needs of others? Please forgive my trespasses (wrongs against others) as you forgive mine and I know I’ve done a lot of trespassing. I realize I don’t deserve favor because I’ve forgotten you, not recognized you, and acted against what I know you tell me is best for me. God, I realize that you are the air I breathe but I don’t always act that way and I’m sorry. I realize I don’t pay enough attention to the suffering around me. Help me never to forget those in need and also please help me to bless them. Please help me to turn my attention away from things that matter little to you in the end and that actually keep me from focusing on you. To be honest, God, I am on my knees, humbled in the face of who you are and what you have done for me, for which I am eternally grateful. Amen.”

I’d say this is getting us closer to understanding Jesus’ opening statement. In fact, we still have to look at the second part of his sentence but we’re already part way there.

We’re in the middle of looking at the first half of a phrase that Jesus used to introduce his most famous set of teachings.

Now, you don’t have to be a committed Christian in order to examine its meaning and significance, but you probably should be somewhat familiar with his intent and the context behind why he chose such words. In doing so, I’d suggest it becomes easier to get a grasp on what this unique individual, Jesus, was all about.

We left off by identifying a set of contrasts to a thing we can call humility, which itself is a thing that is contained in our selected phrase. If pride is setting one’s self apart from others as a means of feeling pleasure, and narcissism is unchecked pride taken to an extreme, then humility is setting the needs of others before one’s self and deflecting attention from one’s self and, instead, towards other people or things. (There is, we know, a thing called false humility, which is merely the appearance of humility as a means of acquiring admiration.)

Of course, concepts such as humility, pride, haughtiness and narcissism don’t have to have any transcendent meaning. They’re perfectly acceptable to describe human attitudes and behaviors without bringing God into the picture. But to understand what Jesus meant, you really have to do just that: Bring God into the picture. Without God, there is no specific reference point to understand how and why “pride goeth before the fall.”

Which brings us to a very big deal. Perhaps the biggest of all. As I’ve been saying for a long time in these posts (including most recently), in order to really understand something, we need to peel away the layers to get to the ultimate source of the thing.

And, this fundamental teaching of “blessed are the poor in spirit …” is, itself, contingent on an even more fundamental teaching.

We are right to ask,“why is being poor in spirit (humble if you will) so important that it’s called out for special blessing (in this sense meaning something akin to God’s favor)?”

We don’t have to travel far from the opening salvo to his most famous teaching in order to find a line drawn firmly in the sand. Jesus is saying, in essence, If you peel away all of the layers of the important things I have to tell you about God and why I am here and why I’m telling you this stuff, it comes down to this …

Note the answer to the question asked to Jesus by a learned man, “Teacher, what must I do to earn eternal life?”

To which, Jesus replied: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and with all your strength and all your mind; and love your neighbor as yourself.” Luke 10:27.

A slightly different recollection of this is contained in Matthew 22:36-39. The question is asked, “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment?” (A commandment is not an equivocal thing. It’s a must-do, not a may-do). To which Matthew recounts the reply: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it, ‘love your neighbor as yourself.’”

Ok. Stop the presses. Whether you accept Jesus as God or consider him merely a moral teacher, this stuff is dynamite. It’s not something any of us can ignore; sort of shunt aside and think, “I’m not into playing with dynamite so I’m going to just head on over to some other less extreme stuff that better fits my world.”

For the record, I really struggle with what he’s saying here. He seems to leave no room for nuance … no exit strategy short of buying into it hook, line and sinker which, I admit, seems basically impossible.

After all, all of our strength, hearts, minds, and soul? All? Everything? How does that work in reality?

And, then, let’s turn our attention briefly to commandment #2, close on the heels of #1: Love our neighbors as ourselves (which basically means to treat them with love as we hope, in all of our dreams and deep desires, that we could be loved.)

Maybe I can get away with throwing up my hands to the first commandment by saying something like, “How am I supposed to love with everything I have, someone or something I can’t even see, feel or have a normal conversation with? But, when it comes to the second commandment, I can’t say that. In this case, at least I know who my neighbors are (or maybe I actually don’t, in terms of my house, but I do know the fellow in the adjacent cubicle at work) and I have to tell you that they are anything but lovable. In fact, I have one or two who are mean-spirited or worse. Jesus is asking the impossible. I can’t help but ignore this stuff. Either he’s setting the bar way too high or his advice really doesn’t have any relevance to real life, therefore I can sideline him as either not-God or a kind of misguided prophet of sorts.”

Where does this leave us? Am I only pulling away layers to find answers which don’t make any real sense?

“What does God want from me, anyway?”

If the “blessed are the poor in spirit” statement is a derivation from the “Love God and neighbors with all you have” statement and the latter is seemingly impossible, aren’t we being set up for failure?

The short answer, of course, is yes.

The longer answer is fascinating and we’ll try to tackle that next time.

(Note to Reader: I inadvertently published Part III before this one yesterday. So, here’s Part II, in order. Will put Part III in its proper place after this one.)

To recap: We’re now looking at the first part of a very short phrase that Jesus used to start his most famous set of teachings.

Blessed are the poor in spirit.

We left off by beginning to dive into this concept of what it means to be “poor in spirit,” by generally equating it with both humility and brokenness. Or, as Chesterton so succinctly put it: If I want to honestly address what I see as real problems in the world, be they small or close by on the one hand or vast and global on the other, all I have to do is look in the mirror.

Humility, then, can be an honest look in the mirror and recognizing that there are places in my mind and heart of which I am not proud, despite the way I carry myself in public or present myself to others. It is the recognition that the world does not revolve around me, my wants and desires, my particular judgments, my need to be elevated for my achievements, my demand for attention.

Brokenness, in the Christian sense, is the understanding that we fall far short of being the kind of people God designed us to be.

Of course, if one’s worldview (which I recently addressed) does not hold that there is a place for a God, specifically a God who had us in mind when he started the whole shebang, then there is no such standard. In other words, the concept of brokenness is more probably viewed in terms of “functionality.” “So and so isn’t functioning at all well in society. Just look at him or her. Can’t manage the basics. Therefore, he or she is for all practical purposes, broken.”

As I am used to saying, one way to examine a thing is to look for its opposite. Doing so can bring the examined thing into greater clarity.

The opposite of humility is pride. The opposite of brokenness is being whole.

Put as a kind of simple theological equation, we can look at Proverbs 16:18,

“Pride goeth before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall.”This is frequently compressed into the aphorism,“Pride goeth before the fall.”

(Look up “haughty” in your handy dictionary and you might see this definition: arrogantly superior and disdainful.)

To be poor in spirit is, at best, recognizing that “I’m not really any better than anyone else when you get down to it.” Put a bit differently, though, it’s not really a competition. It’s no good looking at Mother Theresa (a common example of “goodness”) on the one hand and Adolph Hitler (a common example of “badness”) on the other hand and thinking, “Well, I’m certainly not as good as her but I’m certainly not as bad as him.”In the Christian framework, this is just not the point.

At this point, let’s take a minor detour as we continue to try to unpack what is meant by being “poor in spirit.”

Let’s get back to seeking opposites in order to better perceive something. This is called contrast. For instance, if we’re looking at a picture of, say, a majestic mountain that is at least partially covered with snow, we don’t photograph it while looking directly into the sun. Light on light is a tough thing to process. We look for shadows and nuances in order to discern the detail in the landscape. It’s like that with what we’re talking about. (I always had my students do “compare and contrast” when it came to discerning the significance of an historical event or a philosophical theory.)

With this in mind, I think it’s valuable to look at this thing called pride as a contrast to our scriptural phrase in order to better discern what Jesus was talking about.

A quick search in the dictionary renders this: A deep pleasure or satisfaction derived from one’s own achievements … or from qualities or possessions that are widely admired.

Ok. A deep pleasure that comes from one’s own achievements. A deep pleasure that comes when there is widespread admiration from others regarding us and our stuff.

Put simply in that context: I’m deeply touched by the viewpoints of others on how successful I am at being a certain way, achieving certain things and/or possessing a lot of stuff.

This is a self-centric perspective.

Of course, at one level, this does not seem to be at all alarming. One might get the impression that we’re leading in the direction that any sense of pride is a bad thing. “You mean, it’s wrong for me to be proud when my child works and struggles really hard to achieve something … say in a difficult course in which she had previously not done well, and now received an A? What the heck is wrong with that?”

“Do you mean, it’s wrong for me to be proud of my country, my school, or my sports teams?” Good and fair questions.

The wisdom contained in the proverb is not that pride is inherently wrong (at least that’s my interpretation) but that, left unchecked, it can grab ahold with some terrible consequences.

With respect to things outside of us, about which we are proud, such as family, country, etc., … it’s really about tribal identity which is, anthropologically, a defining feature of all human societies from the beginning. It’s more a feature of being in community and recognizing that the bonds of community help foster such values as love, as well as functional abilities such as language and custom that help give richness to life. If this is an aspect of pride, then it isn’t necessarilydestructive.

What makes it destructive is when it breeds behaviors such as intense judgmentalism and, even, cruelty towards those outside our tribe. Or, when it becomes an obsession, occupying our attention to such a degree that we lose the balance of perspective, thereby creating an artificial sense of such superiority that all else is dismissed, without appreciation, as truly inferior. Thusly, natural inclinations towards patriotism, in extreme circumstances, may morph into a drive towards conquest and the subjugation of others (To whit: Nazism and Communism).

When we are, instead, looking at ourselves as individuals, when you take this pathway out to the fringes, you arrive at a psychological state we know as narcissism, which the dictionary defines as an excessive interest in one’s self and one’s appearance … extreme selfishness with a grandiose view of one’s talents … and a craving for admiration.

Narcissism is pride on steroids. Pride left unchecked. A compulsion that elevates one’s self-worth to such lofty heights that it can only be sustained by the pursuitof admiration and, even, featly from others. It shouts “Look at me in all of my finery! My authority! My beauty! My successes! My acquisitions! Aren’t I truly great?!” It’s really an addiction to the glories of self and, as the proverb implies, it leads to (goes before) destruction (which is not a good thing).

But, you might say, “while I can probably name more than a handful of narcissists fitting that description in politics, entertainment, professional sports and maybe even of my own acquaintance, I’m clearly not a narcissist. After all, I know a lot of people more powerful than I, richer, better looking, higher achieving and so forth. I’m under no misconception about my relative place in that regard. Yes, I am proud of some things, is that so bad?”

In order to answer that, we need to turn our attention so something else Jesus said.

Next time.

I had the occasion the other day to come across a passage in the Christian scriptures, namely a brief phrase from one of the four Gospels, which are pronounced by many to be direct accounts of Jesus’ life and ministry … that is, what he said and did during an approximately three year time period.

The phrase comes from one of the most familiar sections in all of the Christian literature, a lengthy passage with a title that many people will recognize: The Sermon on the Mount. In fact, many modern people who don’t actually believe Jesus was and is God, point to this famous speech as remarkable teaching and the basis for all sorts of things, including social justice. “Well, I don’t buy that he was actually God but he really nailed that one!”

In any event, let’s set the stage for what I’d like to share and offer up for extended thought.

In the north of what is now present-day Israel, not far from the southern border of Lebanon and the southwestern border of Syria, lies a large freshwater lake. The occupying Romans called it Tiberias after one of their emperors. The Jews and later Christians called it Galilee, among other names, and termed it a sea. It lies in a bowl, largely surrounded by hillsides and it was on one of those hillsides, overlooking this Sea of Galilee, that Jesus spoke to a group of people who had gathered to hear from a somewhat strange new entrant onto their stage. Some called him Teacher. Some called him Prophet. He was saying some pretty remarkable things they’d never heard before, things seemingly out of context for a very learned Jew … especially for a Rabbi such as Jesus who, by all measures, was well versed in everything Jewish.

I’ve stood on that hillside and I’ve sailed on that inland sea, imagining what actually took place. I don’t think there’s any way around the fact that what transpired there truly changed history.

The first spoken or written words in a thing of great import … think The Declaration of Independence (“When in the course of human events…”), The U.S. Constitution (“We the people…”), the Gettysburg Address (“Four score and seven years ago…”) … usually sink in and are remembered. They set the tone.

The Sermon on the Mount was actually a teaching on things Jesus believed are really important for us to understand and believe. And so he began,

“Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

Now, it’s quite a simple thing to nod our heads and go, “Ok, sounds interesting. What’s next?”

But that would be a mistake.

Instead, let’s pause and ask a couple of questions before we just leap ahead. After all, as I said above, this is his opening salvo.

To the casual observer, especially in a modern and secular society without a deeper understanding of his context, it’s quite common to think that what Jesus was saying is that poor people are blessed. And, by presumption rich people are not similarly blessed. After all, he didn’t start the ball rolling with “Blessed are the rich people …”

But, in order to really understand his point (and it’s a big one … even foundational for understanding who Jesus was and why he came), we need to hit the pause button, backtrack and try to understand this new thing Jesus was introducing, namely the concept of being “poor in spirit.”And, and in that same vein, how does that relate to a thing we’re uncertain about which he called “the kingdom of heaven?”

I’m aware that many modern readers interpret this important passage to mean that poor people get the FastPass to heaven. From such a perspective, therefore, God looks much more favorably upon poor people than non-poor people. Kind of like St. Peter, at the pearly gates with that cartoon-drawn line of just-deceased people seeking entry, looking out over the long queue and shouting to some poor soul way back and saying, “hey there, you in the rags, just don’t stand there, come right up here. Now the rest of you, stand aside.”

Is this where Jesus was going with his introductory statement? I think not.

So, let’s look at these two interesting and (at that time) somewhat uncommon phrases.

First, what does he mean by “poor in spirit?”

To answer that, I’m going to give a very rough summary of a bunch of theological mumbo jumbo. But, I believe it cuts to the very essence of the Christian belief system and frames a great deal of how and why Jesus lived and spoke the way he did.

In essence, to be poor in spirit is to be humble and to be humble does not mean to think less of yourself but to think of yourself less.

That deserves repeating: To be humble does not mean to think less of yourself but to think of yourself less. (Tip of the hat to the great Christian pastor and writer, Tim Keller.)

To be humble is to recognize that I am a kind of broken vessel. Whether or not I work hard to mask any semblance of brokenness, I’m not whole. I have problems, fears, anxieties, regrets, shame, guilt.

Now, many modern people glance at this and will automatically think, “you’re talking about other people because I’m basically just fine. Sure I have problems but so does everyone. I manage ok. I work pretty hard and am not abusive to others. I guess, to be honest, I could probably be a better person when you think about it but I’m not a bad person and the term “broken” just doesn’t apply. Broken people are like addicts, alcoholics or drug abusers, or they’ve succumbed to terrible life circumstances. A good example would be some of the people you see begging on street corners or sleeping on the sidewalks of cities. You’re not describing me.”

In contrast to that, take the well-known response of the great late 19^thand early 20^thcentury English journalist, writer, philosopher and literary critic, G.K. Chesterton, when asked by The Times of London not long before the advent of the First World War to address the question of “What’s wrong with the world today?”

He sent in his reply, as the story goes,

“Dear Sirs:

I am.

Sincerely Yours, G.K. Chesterton.”

“I am.” Chesterton was an extremely gifted observer of the larger human condition and of his place in it. He was also a prolific Christian writer, in this instance concisely capturing a crucial element of the Christian framework, while also speaking to the very phrase and concept we’re now examining.

So, what, really, is humility? What does it mean to be “broken?” Why is any of this important or relevant to us today? What was Jesus getting at 2000 years ago and why should we pay attention?

I’ll try to address that next time.

There’s this concept in the Judeo-Christian tradition called anointing. To generalize, it means that God has chosen someone to perform a specific task or set of tasks and has provided that person with remarkable talents to succeed.

Put simply, it’s like God reaches into our finite reality, taps one of us on the shoulder (well, more realistically, in the head and heart) and, wham-o, we’re granted some special insights and abilities to work hand-in-hand with him.

Some anointments are earthshaking, literally turning us upside down or inside out, after which we set out on a pathway that would have been considered impossible a short time before.

A vivid example of this is the story of the apostle Paul (known to some as St. Paul) who was about as anti-Christian as you can get, admittedly set upon destroying this blasphemous new sect and killing many of its adherents. When he met Jesus on a trip from Jerusalem to Damascus, his “anointment” was probably the most profound in Christian history.

There are other examples from scripture, especially from the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament). For instance, Abram was anointed by God and renamed Abraham, henceforth recognized as the grand patriarch of the Jewish people. The shepherd boy David was anointed and, later, became the great king who God refers to as being “a man after my own heart.”

I have often felt that George Friedrich Handel was anointed by God, the result of which was the nearly miraculous scoring of The Messiah in just three weeks (close to three hours long and one of the great masterpieces of artistic expression).

When I read A.W. Tozer’s The Pursuit of God, an absolutely astonishing work that I believe he mostly wrote on a train ride, I thought, “this man is anointed.”

I felt the same way when I listened to contemporary singer and songwriter, Lauren Daigle’s first album. What makes all of these examples unique in my mind is that their very humanity is used to point millions of people directly to God.

So, it is to Daigle that I turn now.

As is my practice off and on these days, I was awake early. To me, it’s a time of peace and quiet, with the front shades open, our picture window looking out upon a world before sunrise, dim porch lights keeping total darkness at bay. Sometimes I read, sometimes I pray, sometimes I just sit, contemplating without distraction. Today, at something like 4:30 a.m., I put on my headphones and queued up Daigle’s album, How Can it Be? Although I haven’t listened to it in awhile now, I know it well and the lyrics and music connect with me deeply. They bring me quickly to a place of worship. And, while I think all twelve songs are excellent, several stand out especially, none more than “Here’s My Heart.”

I have listened to this song in the car, on the trail, and in our home. I never tire of it because the words so clearly express what is deeply in my head and heart, even when I find those two places seemingly overwhelmed by the stuff of this life. The instruments and Ms. Daigle’s voice bring these truths to full life, blasting away the obfuscating outer layers as if a lump of coal sheds carbon to bring forth a diamond.

The first stanza:

Here’s my heart, Lord

Here’s my heart, Lord

Here’s my heart, Lord

Speak what is true

Here’s my heart, Lord

Here’s my heart, Lord

Here’s my heart, Lord

Speak what is true

Simple. Methodical. Meditative. She leads with this most personal and powerful of offerings. “I surrender my heart to you, Lord.” As the heart is the metaphorical center of love and all other feelings; of the things we both hope for and fear, of joys and suffering, when we turn it over to the omnipotent God, we are giving him the center of our being. In return, all we ask is that he shares with us the truth of all things.

The next stanza:

I am found, I am Yours

I am loved, I’m made pure

I have life, I can breathe

I am healed, I am free

I might say that Ms. Daigle has captured the heart of the entire Gospel in four simple lines. What is she saying?

“I am found. I am Yours.” Diving in, the truth is that God is always seeking us, through thick and thin. I should know. When my eyes were finally opened, I saw this clearly as if I’d been in the thickest of fogs for most of my life, not really knowing that but perhaps aware at the deepest subconscious level. Daigle’s declaration is that that process is over. “I am found.” And, once found by God, there is no decision to be made but to surrender. This truth blasted into my fully conscious self in less time than it takes to write this paragraph.

But, then, we move immediately to the consequences of these two things; that is being found and surrendering. And, what consequences they are!

Four things. I have life. I can breathe. I am healed. I am free.

To one who does not believe in this whole Jesus or Christian thing, such declarations must seem very strange, even ridiculous. To say that “I have life” presumably means that a moment ago, I was either dead or only partially alive … and what does that mean? To me, it means that the true essence of life is found in a relationship with God. It’s basically a binary thing, although I imagine there are probably shades. The popular reference (although we hear it less and less these days) is to being “born again,” a thing Jesus actually spoke about in John 3:3.

So, what happens when a person obtains the fullness of life after surrendering to God? “I can breathe.”

Here we go again. What does this mean and does it imply one did not “breathe” before surrendering? Well, yes.

As a lifelong asthmatic who has fairly regular episodes of struggling for oxygen, I’m quite the fan of full breaths. It’s truly an amazing thing, probably not understood by someone who is unaware of what struggling for air consistently through life can be like. I know of other songs with lyrics such as “You are the air I breathe” and those that include the phrase, “breath of God.” They each describe the supernatural force that is similar to the one that gives us life in this world. I do not hesitate at all to say that breathing after surrender is a whole different kettle of fish. From my experience, it’s the difference between having partially diseased lungs which battle to provide my body with life and how it is when the lungs are fully healthy and sweet air is filling every pore.

“I am healed.” Yes, this is a healing. With full breath and life-giving force flowing, the disease is gone. We are made to be in union with God and when we are not, we suffer a disease, again a very, very difficult thing to countenance from a secular perspective. But, if there really is an all-powerful God who is behind the whole thing and he loves us fully and unconditionally and seeks for us to be in deep relationship with him, then the absence of that is not that dissimilar from being diseased. I accept that this will be alienating to some but I can only say what I believe to be true.

Finally, “I am free.”

I am reminded of the image I’ve seen several times and I know exists perpetually and that is of a room full of some 30-40 men, all dressed in denim blue shirts and pants. They are prisoners in our regional state penitentiary, serving different amounts of time for doing very bad things, among them things that require they spend the rest of their lives behind bars in the most awful of places. These particular groups of men, after encountering Jesus for the first time or maybe decades ago, raise their hands in the air and shout out how free they are. In prison. With joy on their faces.

We are all in bondage to things of this world but when that bondage is transferred to God, the other bonds lose their hold (or at least begin to) and we are offered freedom.

* * * * *

“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” Matthew 11:28-30

* * * * *

As the song continues, Daigle repeats the first and second stanzas and then follows with this.

You are strong, You are sure

You are life, You endure

You are good, always true

You are light breaking through

From statements about us, she moves to describing the character of God, his essence so to speak. This is not a weak or distant God. This is not just one god among many or a passive character observing from the sidelines. No, this is a majestic figure, purposeful and reliable, always there regardless. He is life itself. And, make no mistake, he is also Good and True. There is such a thing as actual objective good. And, there is such a thing as wrong, neither of which are merely functions of our own wishes and feelings. While it’s hard to explain what she means by “light breaking through,” it’s pretty much another way of portraying an emergence from a fog or the opening of eyes previously clouded, images that I used to reject as fanciful until they actually happened.

There is more repetition of previous stanzas until she includes this last one and brings it all together:

You are more than enough

You are here, You are love

You are hope, You are grace

You’re all I have, You’re everything

When I sing along in my mind these special words (or if alone in my car I actually sing aloud), I am deeply moved because they cut to my very core and define who I am. My heart wants to burst, which some Christians will recognize as “Deep calling to Deep,” the indwelling of the Spirit reaching out in love to the Father and Son.

“You are more than enough.” What does that mean? I receive it as a truth that even when we think we are full … we’ve had enough… that “enough” does not approach what God has in store. And that is that he is fully present here and now. “You are here.” And that presence is manifested as perfect Love, Hope and Grace, perhaps the most powerful and compelling forces in all of reality.

The final line can seem a bit peculiar. “You’re all I have, You’re everything.” Does this mean that I truly have nothing else and that neither other people nor other things are important? At first glance it may seem that way but that’s not what the words really mean.

No, it means that when we are in a vibrant relationship with God, everything is manifested through him. We still deeply love our spouses, children, and friends and that is very good but through God, those attachments are given a special meaning that is hard to explain. The really, really tough thing to explain is that without God, there is no ultimate meaning to our existence and, therefore, no firm ground on which to trust in and build a life of complete flourishing.

As I naturally do, I can recall my former life, the one I built on shifting sands. I know that, should someone have said this to me twenty years ago, I would have had all sorts of responses, including the argument that I felt my life was on firm foundations, giving all sorts of good reasons. But, here’s the deal. I would have been telling a lie. Because it wasn’t.

I know some wonderful people who are atheists and agnostics. They are good people and I love them. They will have their own take on these kinds of things. However, I can only testify to what I now know and to the way that God has burst into my life as if I see the dawn for the first time and it is glorious. The light and warmth greets the darkness and fog, which dissipates before its power and glory.

To live within the space defined in this song is to, for all practical purposes, live in a different reality. A different dimension. Or, as I always say, to have one foot firmly planted in two worlds. Yes, You are the air that I breathe, for which I am eternally thankful. Amen.

I feel that we left off with kind of a mess. It’s certainly a lot to think about. I imagine a reasonable response might look something like, “Sigh. So, what you’re saying is that I have to do all of these things in order to make it possible for me to get a message from a God who is entirely invisible?” Or, perhaps, “I still don’t understand what “hearing” God is actually like. How am I supposed to go about all of this in a practical sense?”

To this, I can only testify what I’ve come to believe. And, as I’ve said many times, my belief is built on what I’d consider to be quite a firm foundation of both reason and experience.

With this in mind, the first step is quite a conscious one. It’s an act of will. It’s an act of resolve. “I am here, Lord, waiting upon you.”

It can involve a detour from prayerful requests for assistance, and towards merely seeking his presence. The actual plea is really to solve just one problem (which I’d argue is our most important one) and that is to know and love God. We can begin that by simply reaching out. This reaching out doesn’t have to be all dressed up in fine clothing either. In fact, it’s best if it isn’t! “God, to be honest, I don’t even know if you’re there. If you are, I don’t have any idea of what it would be like to hear you but I’d like it if I could.” Or, let’s say you’re a believing Christian but have had little experience of hearing God. You might say, “God, you know I believe in you. Jesus, I’ve surrendered to you. But I don’t actually feel your presence and I certainly don’t seem to be getting many messages from you. Please help me.”

So, let’s say something like this has taken place or will at some point. What’s next?

Well, we need to admit that we don’t actually have to go anywhere specifically. Far more important is to cut out the noise. Neutralize the distractions. (Mind you, this is only one way of beginning. After all, as I mentioned in the first piece in this series, I heard God in a large crowded room with a ton of distractions. But, we’ll get to that in a little bit.)

It could be a room in the house. It could be a place outside with one’s eyes closed. As my friend Ken has repeatedly testified, it could be while driving in one’s car with no radio or music. Or, it could be taking a small break from whatever task is at hand and just centering one’s self.

Psalm 46:10. “Be still and know that I am God.”

One of the ways I began learning how to do this was when I was a high school principal. I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone who thought I wasn’t busy in that job. I’ve made the statement many times that I don’t think I had five minutes of boredom in all of those years. There were many, many days that seemingly had no breaks. And some of those days lasted twelve hours or longer, each minute seemingly dealing with another challenge. What to do?

So, I developed several habits, one of which was resolving that when I walked across or around the campus, which happened all of the time, that I would just have a conversation with God, even if it was a brief one. I’d lay some of my thoughts (not necessarily concerns) before him and imagine him kind of like walking alongside. (Brother Lawrence helped me with this!) I also silently expressed my joy when I noticed something particularly beautiful such as a regular ed student assisting a severely disabled one, both of them alit with broad smiles. I’d give thanks for all of the beauty I saw, whether it was in people, circumstances or nature. As busy as I was, I tried to make space to see small things … birds, plants, clouds. I’d think of what I could do, with whatever influence I had, to help make this large campus a more loving and caring space for all who entered.

Having said this, let me be clear that this did not happen all of the time. I was told on many an occasion that I appeared so intently focused on a thing (usually some specific objective) that I failed to notice people right in front of me. My ADD and low-grade OCD bring their challenges. 🙂

But, a funny thing happened amidst all of this. I began hearing from God.

I remember one time, having a meeting in my office with one of our counselors. She was fairly late in her career and wanted to see me about a personal issue that was affecting her work. I had some knowledge that she was a practicing Christian but that didn’t enter my mind at the time. (I’d regularly meet with all sorts of people who were encountering all sorts of problems.) Anyway, after what has been probably a dozen years, I don’t remember everything about the conversation but I do remember that she was having trouble getting to the source of the problem, about which I had no direct knowledge. Then, all of a sudden, the whole thing entered my head as if I was reading it in on a piece of paper and this “message” also included specific advice. I was immediately compelled to share it, which deeply shocked her. She was basically speechless and asked me where I’d come up with the information and perspective on what to do. I remember plainly saying, I think God just told me. We both sat in amazement for more than a few seconds, reveling in what had just happened.

This particular incident brings up an important point. God not only speaks directly into our minds and hearts, he also speaks to us through others. All of the time. He speaks to us when we notice others and we are led into relationship with them, however brief. He speaks to us when we suddenly recognize that we are beginning to head down a path that is not healthy. He speaks to us in the midst of our struggles, which doesn’t mean that he always gives us a clear answer but he does let us know that he’s with us all of the way. He speaks to us through our eyes as well as our ears. We can both hear and see God at the same time. We just need to know how and where to look.

Within Christianity, there is the term called “the still small voice.” As my first articulate message from God was that rare audible one, I was unaware of such a term until later, after I’d had subsequent experiences described by this term.

I’m not sure of the origin of the term but I know it’s meant to relate the experience of a kind of thought that interrupts the normal flow of our mind’s activity. Often (although not always), it emerges into our consciousness with crystal clarity, akin to actual spoken or written words. It’s a message that can be completely unrelated to whatever else is going on in our minds at that time. I described this in the first piece of this series, when I related my story of meeting Hoan. This is also what happened in the discussion I just described with my counselor. It’s happened quite a few times over the years.

But, these kinds of clear messages are not the only way God speaks to us. It can also happen through a sudden onset of a specific feeling that, like the still small voice, appears unbidden. Perhaps the word, feeling, is not completely accurate for, in my experience, such events are also accompanied by a realization about something of importance.

One of the most common categories, here, is that of our conscience.

Our conscience is a check on our behavior. It’s a direct pathway between our thoughts and actions on the one hand and our fundamental values, grounded in our accepted truths, on the other hand. It is a message that recalls a moral code, from whatever source that code derives. All conscience is an expression of morality. For those of us who place our trust in God, his nudges are often explicit reminders for us to check our fundamental values and to behave accordingly.

From my experience, there is still another way that God speaks and that is through a kind of accumulation of perceptions and insights over time that ultimately coalesce into a very specific direction. One of my own examples of this is when, a couple of years before I retired, I began to ask God to show me the priorities for living my life after leaving my profession. In essence, this would be the last third of my life. Yes, this was a kind of “arrow” prayer but I wasn’t seeking quick responses. Instead, I was content to just live my existing life within that overall prayer framework, while waiting to see what would unfold. Without going into a lot of detail, I’d say it took the better part of a year (when this was a regular part of my prayer life) until his “answer” became completely clear. And, clear it eventually was. I clearly received three distinct priorities that continue to guide my life six years later.

A final word on this before we move on. It’s reasonable to ask how we know these so-called messages are actually from God, rather than from our own physically and socially constructed imaginations?

It’s a very fair question and I believe I’ve answered it to some degree already, especially in reference to how these messages often arrive out of nowhere and are unbidden. But, I have found there are other very practical ways. A kind of system of checks and balances. One of them is by examining the message in light of the truths that I rely upon. Does the message correspond with my guiding principles, built upon foundational truths which I accept as coming from the Truth that guides me in all things. (A simple test is for me to imagine the Jesus I know as having said the thing, in light of everything I know about Jesus.) Of course, scripture is a good place to go, although I’m not one to cherry pick scripture to get it to correspond with something I’d like to happen! Still another one is to run the message by someone whom I trust has a similar relationship to God as I do and who knows me intimately. All of these become means by which we can attest to the validity that the message is from God and personally directed to me.

I’m not presenting any of this as a perfect formula. I wish I was far better at practicing the presence of God than I really am. I’ve come across people who astonish me in this sense but, fortunately, their example is both beautiful and inspirational. Perhaps in time.

* * * * *

As I’m writing these thoughts down, I’m sitting in a comfortable armchair in a room in our house we call our “office.” There are five very large prints on the wall. The one directly across from me, overhanging the L-shaped desk, is a stunning landscape photograph of Denali Mountain in Alaska. To my right is a print of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, a time and place with special meaning for me. On the long wall to my left are two large framed prints. Both quite famous. The one is Leonardo da Vinci’s The Last Supper and the other is an expanded view of the piece from Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel work depicting the hand and finger of God nearly touching the hand and finger of Man. And just behind me, above my bookcase filled with books on faith is one of my two Rembrandt prints. This one is his Storm on the Sea of Galilee, to which we will shortly go. There are a few other Christian symbols and other elements that help remind me of some of the things that really ground me. All together, they are my anti-noise. This is the space I inhabit when I normally write, the subjects of which are largely unknown to me until the instant they are, after which my fingers just seem to follow as the thoughts flow out. Collectively, I refer to these writings as “A Pilgrim’s Journey: Love Letters to God.”

And, now we turn to the story so beautifully related in the Gospel of Mark. Specifically, Mark 4:35-41.

That day when evening came, he said to his disciples, “Let us go over to the other side.” Leaving the crowd behind, they took him along, just as he was, in the boat. There were also other boats with him. A furious squall came up, and the waves broke over the boat, so that it was nearly swamped. Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. The disciples woke him and said to him, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?”

He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Quiet! Be still!” Then the wind died down and it was completely calm.

 He said to his disciples, “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?”

They were terrified and asked each other, “Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!”

Please just take a moment to look up this beautiful Rembrandt painting.

The print is on our wall for two main reasons, the most obvious of which is a reminder that our lives are constantly battered by storms. Things which rock our boats when it’s our boats that are supposed to keep us safe. Storms can arise from almost nowhere, unbidden, perhaps merely troubling but, sometimes, terrifying. The second reason is more subtle but, to me, more powerful and worth never forgetting.

You see, as we read this short passage, the disciples (those who have been called to follow Jesus and who have put their trust in him) are suddenly confronted by overwhelming danger. The calm waters that they’ve traversed countless times, some as career fishermen, have quickly boiled up and threaten to swamp their small craft and drown them. They are exceedingly frightened as all of us would be.

By this point, they have mostly become convinced that Jesus is not just a normal prophet. They have witnessed him performing miracles and teaching the most amazing things. While they don’t yet have a full understanding of who he is or why he came, they recognize his power and authority.

But, where is he?

In fact, he is calmly asleep in the rear of the boat, resting comfortably on a cushion. Juxtapose these two images which can be a metaphor for our lives.

We stand in one place, living our lives with combinations of happiness and sorrow, success and failure. And, sometimes, the seas threaten to completely topple us. We are at an end as to how to cope. Yet, where is God?

In our mind, he is not present. We can’t see or hear him. For all practical purposes, he’s asleep on his nice cushion. Oblivious and uncaring.

And, so they awake him. Can you picture it? “Teacher!”, they yell. “Don’t you care about us?”

I love this part. It’s as if they’d seen his love but had forgotten it because he wasn’t fixing their problem. Kind of like saying, “We really thought you loved us but, honestly, it doesn’t seem so because you’re not fixing our suffering! You’re not solving our immediate problem!”

(Sound familiar?)

If not, go back a few postings and remember the thing about genies and wishes. 🙂

So, let’s picture in our mind’s eye the next moment. Jesus, now awakened, probably sat up, maybe stretched his arms a bit as we do when we are awoken and have to stand. And, then he told the wind and waves to be quiet. Settle down. The word that Mark uses is translated as “rebuke,” which means “to disapprove or sharply criticize.” In other words, “Hey wind and waves, cut it out!” To which they immediately obeyed.

With what was probably no hesitation, Jesus then turned to the men (I imagine calmly) and basically asked them, “Why are you afraid? Don’t you trust me?”

Talk about cognitive dissonance and a world changer. “What just happened? Who is this guy?”

In my mind, this is one of the most wonderful stories in all of scripture and it speaks to a truth that I hold dear. God is present whether we recognize it or not. He is not asleep, nor uncaring. He is perfectly able to calm the wind and the seas, however they may be the winds and seas that batter our hearts rather than the ones we think we’re encountering.

To the degree that we recognize that presence and accept who he is in the greatest sense, is the degree to which we can foster the most rewarding of all relationships. And, like all great relationships, the communication can tend to flow easily.

Lord, please forgive me for how much and how frequently I treat you like you’re invisible … out of sight and out of mind. Asleep in the stern while I go about my life. Help me to open my ears to what you have to say. Help me to open my eyes to what you’d like me to see. Help me to open my heart to what you’d have me feel. And help me to use my abilities to do your work while I have breath in my lungs. For you are that breath. Thank you and Amen.

So far, we’ve been toying with this idea that we, as regular people, can actually hear the God of the universe and all things. To this, atheists will scoff and cry “delusion.” Perennial skeptics will raise all sorts of objections, many of which are completely understandable. But, as I’ve mentioned consistently ever since I began to write these things, it all comes down to two worldviews. For those who cannot accept that there is a God, then discussions like this are over before they begin. But, for those who either believe in, or are willing to consider the possibility of, a personal and loving God, it must be intriguing to wonder if and how we can actually communicate.

So, let’s say we at least partially agree that if there is such a God, we need to cut away at the layers of noise that can drown out any possible real communication. Where does that bring us? How do we tune the dial (as if it were kind of an AM or FM signal) in order to hit the right frequency?.

We then need to ask,“where is he?”

To that, I’d suggest the first thing is to remember that he’s actually right here. We actually exist in a space where God is permanently and completely present. We don’t have to go anywhere!

I was in a discussion recently about a thing called “sacred” space. This was with respect to a belief (which I believe is mistaken) that there are some places in our reality … like our homes, towns, workspaces, natural parks, and so on… where God is more present than in other places.

I know lovely people, with whom I respectfully disagree, who believe that some places are naturally more “spiritual” than other places. In America, I’ve frequently heard that the towns of Sedona, Arizona or Santa Fe, New Mexico are especially spiritual. I’ve heard that traditional Native American burial grounds are actually more spiritual than other places. I’m not completely sure what is being asserted here other than the belief that one is closer to the “transcendent reality” in these specific locations.

There are all sorts of reasons that people subscribe to this belief and one of them is that there really is no God in the Christian sense but that this more amorphous kind of god or God actually resonates specifically more in (for instance) places of natural beauty, which definitely makes some sense. I understand this because I absolutely agree that beauty is a sign that points to God. But, an all-powerful, omni-present and creative God who loves us unconditionally (the Christian version of God) is certainly not bound by a piece of dirt in a specific location.

This may come across as hard to believe for many reasons, but I believe God was as absolutely present in Auschwitz as he is in Sedona.

God was completely present at the crucifixion, despite his unwillingness to intervene.

This is a tough thing to wrap one’s head around but I believe it to be true for many, many reasons. Including experience.

Maybe ten years or so ago, I decided to accept my friend’s invitation to go to prison. Mind you, this was not the county jail but a California State Penitentiary. The place where they house the worst offenders. You may not have to have a keen imagination to think about the crimes they’ve committed. Many of them would never get out.

To make a long story short, some several dozen prisoners would volunteer to attend a three day retreat of sorts put on by a ministry called Kairos. Some guests, who are pre-screened, are permitted to attend what was called a closing ceremony. I’ve been to these events a number of times, as well as participating in some of their regular prayer meetings. The first time I went to a closing ceremony, in an obscure white-washed large room behind layers of fencing, barbed wire, guard towers, on the edge of that typical yard filled with wandering prisoners we’ve all seen in the movies, I was instantly struck with the presence of God in a manner that almost completely overpowered me. It was physical and stunning to a degree that I can’t find words to describe.

I’ve heard prisons referred to as “the devil’s playground,” for good reason. It’s hard to imagine an environment in our free society more infused with violence, hatred, brokenness, and degradation. Many of the men here have done some really bad things. It’s about as far from Sedona as you can get.

And, yet, it was just here that God showed up in a big way.

In other words, God is equally as present when we drive in our cars, work in our jobs, sit at home, walk on the beach, climb a mountaintop, go to church and literally every other place we physically find ourselves. There just is no such thing as a “sacred” place in and of itself. It is sacred (meaning reflective of the presence of God) because of how we apprehend it. Of course, some places seem particularly well suited to bring us to a suitable frame of mind but that’s not because of God. It’s because of us.

* * * * *

I’d like to take a small detour here to bring up something that will be at least somewhat familiar to Jews and Christians. It speaks to this issue of “where” God is, in the historical and biblical context. (It may be new to some of you who are reading this.)

My very brief and very simplistic summary is this:

After Moses led some millions of Jews out of captivity in Egypt, he felt called to go up a mountain (believed to be Mt. Sinai), where he “met” God and received the ten commandments, etched on two stone tablets. This is certainly not the first evidence in scripture of a mortal hearing God but it’s probably the most famous.

These tablets were considered so sacred that God also “instructed” the Israelites to build a chest of sorts to contain them. This was referred to as The Ark of the Covenant. (A covenant is a legal term that binds both parties to one another. The ten commandments were basically an ancient form of what we’d refer to as a contract, binding both parties with an expectation that each would perform certain functions.) This ark was to be carried by priests called Levites inside of a large transportable tent called The Tabernacle. This tent was then, obviously, also considered a sacred place. In fact, it was believed this is where God actually resided.

Fast forward many, many centuries to the time of Jesus and the existence of the Second Temple (Solomon, son of King David, built the first temple which was later destroyed), wherein there was a very inner room called the Holy of Holies. Once a year, the high priest of the Jews would enter this most sacred of all locations, beseeching God to forgive all of he people for their sins. This was the Day of Atonement, which we now call Yom Kippur. In other words, the “holiest” man went alone into the “holiest” place so as to be in the presence of God and seek his favor.

Jesus fundamentally disrupted this brand of theology when he said (and I paraphrase), “I am he. Come to me. I am given the power to forgive all sins.” Such a radical statement was a blatant refutation of the traditional Jewish belief that only God could forgive sins and that God was best found in the innermost part of the Temple. (As another aside, the Temple sat on the mountaintop of Jerusalem, where it was said that God spoke to the “father” of all Jews, Abraham, when he ordered the sacrifice of his son, Isaac. Talk about hearing from God! Of course, God remanded that directive in the nick of time.) So, and here is a very important point in the Christian worldview, Jesus said wherever I am, you will find God. You don’t have to go to a temple. In fact, I will dwell within you, through the Holy Spirit.

* * * * *

Thank you for your patience as I walked through this last piece. The preceding bit of biblical and historical record might not sit equally well with everyone. After all, there are those who take it as absolutely true and others who say it’s pure mythology. But, the point is that Jesus basically neutralized the argument that God is limited or more evident in one place rather than another. And, that is because God sets up residency in every human heart for those who trust him. This is the Christian conception.

Now, a lot has happened in the last two thousand years. In that time period, Christianity has passed through many phases, the most significant of which was its own internal revolution ignited by Martin Luther and his followers five hundred years ago. Today, there are many sects, each with their own separate take on this or that particular aspect of the faith. And, of course, in that same two thousand year time period, we’ve also seen the flourishing of other faiths, including Islam and Buddhism. (The polytheists such as Hinduism and the pantheists, such as is commonly found in pre-agrarian native cultures, have been around much longer. For a point of reference, pantheism has found some resurgence in modern “spiritual” non-monotheistic faiths.) It’s all quite overwhelming for those who are thinking of what it means to communicate with God!

I will leapfrog over another longwinded defense of the Christian worldview. Instead, in keeping with our theme of hearing God, I merely want to emphasize my deep-set belief (developed both rationally and as a fundamental aspect of experience) that we need go nowhere specifically in order to better receive what God has to offer us.

Instead, the “sacred” is to be found everywhere. I’ve been astonished at the times and places where God has made himself visible to me. Knowing that I don’t have to go somewhere to have this happen relieves a tremendous burden. I just need to open my eyes, my ears, my mind and my heart to him and await his presence.

I’ll conclude this segment by admitting that, while the theory is neat, the practice is far less so. It is one thing to (A) Be open to the idea that we can actually hear God, whatever that means, (B) Consider that a thing like prayer can actually be a two-way form of communication, (C) Recognize that all forms of noise exist in our lives and that this noise can easily mask our ability to be open to the presence of God and (D) Come to believe that we can connect with God equally well, despite our surroundings and circumstances.

It is another thing, entirely, to actually put all of these pieces together on a regular basis. So, what are we to do?