As with any idea or any notion of ours, God is a human concept, an image we hold in the brain. Truth, the object of our spiritual search, is beyond our ability to know or to understand. The belief we have in God arises from a special grace we are given. The great reality, like love, comes to us by a special intuition and resides within our deepest emotional being, what we call our heart.
We had a small tree in our house that developed a disease which was incurable and to which I was having an allergic reaction, so I put the tree out in the woods, where I knew it couldn’t survive the oncoming winter. In effect I killed the tree, or at least hastened its death, for more or less selfish reasons. This caused me some emotional pain. But I am sure the tree does not resent me for my action because a tree cannot blame or condemn. A tree knows only the earth, water, sunlight. Only love. God help me to have love the way a tree does.
A person is at her or her best when they feel free of fear, free of distress, disease, or resentment. Freedom for the individual is an absence of negative emotions, of the thoughts that create or are created by these emotions . So health insurance for the spiritual student is a constant effort to rid oneself of this unhealthy negativity by prayer and contemplation, the daily exercise of a grateful mind.
Sorrow and disappointment are necessary in the upward journey of the soul; for only by experiencing loss and insecurity do we come to know the real saving power of Grace. Our faith is not strengthened by getting the things we want; it is increased and enlarged by the comfort and understanding we receive in our hours of greatest need. Strength in faith comes from reflection on the times when God has seen us through the darkness and loss, and the confidence that we will have that Grace in times of need.
Fear is a natural consequence of being alive. Our natural instincts for sustenance and self-preservation trigger emotional responses that are meant to spur us into action: protect ourselves, hunt for food, seek safety in companionship, reproduce. In our world most of these primitive needs are satisfied easily; yet the emotions remain. We transfer the urgency of our feelings to less vital concerns and we are afraid. At this point the mind has the responsibility to retrain itself. We can use our intelligence to gain perspective. “How important is it?” The proper use of our intellect leads us to the realization that life itself, the love of God that living exemplifies, is all we need. Our needs are fulfilled in the Grace of God. It is a miracle that we exist at all. The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.
True faith is the absence of holding back. True faith is the unconditional commitment of the soul and the mind to the love of God; it is the letting go of worldly concerns and attachments. Putting spiritual knowledge, the wisdom of the heart, foremost in life by the everyday practice of study, contemplation, prayer and meditation, the faithful person lives a life of contentment, compassion, confidence and a clear mind. True faith is letting God lead us through the wonder of living.
My soul is a slow-flowing river, deep, and the depth of it is unseen, hidden in the darkness, beneath the light as it flows and moves along its course, eventually to the infinite sea beyond. The nature of my soul, the quality of the water as it flows, the beauty it contains, is made up of words: the parables of Jesus, verses from Lao Tzu, the voices of loved-ones, the fragments of admonishments, exhortations from grandparents, loving words in memory, phrases, poetry, even words I have spoken myself. These words have fallen like leaves in autumn onto the surface of the river and have dissolved, have become the water; words have sweetened its taste and calmed its rage; words have made the water clear, right to the bottom of my soul.
And while we’re on the subject of science… Although I have no real understanding of physics I do understand that theoreticians say that matter, the stuff we’re made of, what we touch, see, feel, all of the physical world, is only energy in material form. Is this theory any different from the idea that all that exists is the manifestation of God on the physical plane? The difference is that if a scientist says this is the way to look at something, the idea is based on research, on mathematical calculations, and on acceptance by other scientists. If the spiritual “scientist” says that all matter is the manifestation of God, do we need “proof”?
The Kepler telescope has revealed thousands of planets with conditions similar to Earth where “life” may exist. This is a subversive idea, as powerful as Darwin’s theory of evolution; because it helps to demolish our conception of an earth-centered and thus human-centered universe and a “private God” unique to creatures of Earth. We are creatures of an unimaginably vast and complex cosmic work. Life is not unique to us. The entire cosmos is full of life, and God is not the God of one religion, one civilization, or even of one planet. Nevertheless do we strive to develop a personal relationship Him. We are his children, just members of a very big family.
Contentment is a choice. It is a way of seeing things, what some call a positive attitude. I am not content because I have what I want; I have what I want because I am happy. In a deep sense, contentment is the opposite of resentment or judgment, because if we do not sense failure or weakness or lack within ourselves, we will not recognize it in others. Contentment is a sense of peaceful acceptance we get from living consciously living in and with the Grace of God.
Nick Hilton - Reflections 