Category: Wildman Journey (Page 82 of 87)

Judy and I are just back from a two week trip to Florida.  We spent two weeks in the car touring the South.  We are good traveling companions, but there where a few times when there was tension between us.  Where to go, but to do, and when to go.  We had to make decisions.  At times I did not like the tension.  I came to realize that I was wanting my own way.  It was hard for me to admit how selfish and controlling I still can be with my wife.  I was reminded of I Cor 13:4-5, “Love is patient and kind.  Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude.  It does not demand its own way.  It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged” (NLT).   As I read these words, I realize that I have failed to “love test” with my wife. 

But guess what.  I am learning to accept this reality.  In my mind I want so bad to be a “real spiritual” man.  But still in my heart and actions I am far from the ideal.  This only proves that I am still in the process of being changed.  In my growth as a man I will not be able to skip some the steps that God has for me.  I can easily pat myself on the back and think I am moving right along.  But God has his way of keeping me humble before him and before my wife.  But I am learning to take it as a man.  Yes, Al you have failed to be what you though you had become. But the reality is that you are not where you think you are.  That’s ok.  As long as I can admit my failure and humbly accept reality. 

I guess two things brought me down to earth these last two weeks.  The first is the way I handled our discussions on where to go, when to go and how to go.  I did not leave room for more imput from Judy.  When it did not go my way, I did not like it at times.  When Judy pointed that out to me, it made me defensive.  But I have grown in the sense that I can accept that in my life and move on.  The second factor as just a simply revelation that came to me one day while waiting in line at McDonald’s.  I was impatient and inwardly critical of what I thought was slow service.  I realized how judgment and critical I was.  So much for being really spiritually mature.  I accepted the insight with the prayer  that I can learn to yield more of my old patterns to the work of God in my heart

I mention these examples from my own life as an encouragement to the “wild men” who are reading this blog.  You are going to fail.  You are going to fall from the pedestal you have placed yourself on.  You will need to face reality.  This is a natural part of growth.  Like me, don’t be to hard on yourself.  Accept the grace of God in your life.  Yield those patterns of the false self to the work of the Holy Spirit in your life.  Don’t see each failure as an either/or situation.  Failure in one area does not mean defeat.  It only means that God is lovingly slowing you that you need to be dependant on him for any meaningful change in your life.  Again it comes to letting go rather then hanging on.

A “wild” man is a man who has a desire to break out of the conventional “box” of religion and culture, which assumes that men are in the business of creating their own self image.   When men allows themselves the space to listen to “the inner voice” of the Spirit they become aware that there is more to their spiritual life then they are either experiencing or even aware of.  In the process of going about creating a self image,  men have lost touch with their souls.  We spend our lives on the surface of reality.  As Parker Palmer observes, “The soul wants to keep us rooted in the ground of our own being, resisting the tendency of other faculties, like the intellect and ego, to uproot us from who we are.”  He quotes Mary Oliver as saying, “Nobody know what the soul is…it comes and goes/like the wind over the water.”  The soul can not be tamed by our effort and discipline.  There is a wildness to the soul that is frightening to us men.  When we come to the threshold, daring to move beyond our rational need for understanding and the ego’s need to control, we pull back from this untapped source that we knows lies deep in our “tank.”  

But this is where we need to venture if we are to move beyond trying so hard to be a “good Christian guy” (these are the guys that are reading this blog).  It is the journey of becoming more aware of what is already there.  It is a journey home.  Home is that place where we are united with Christ at the center of our being, where our “life is now hidden with Christ in God” (Col 3:3).  You don’t need to go digging around in depths of your soul.  The key is to allow yourself to become aware of what is already there.  We begin to do this by “sinking” with our mind into our hearts. Remember this occurs when we simple sit, becoming still and gaze upon the Lord.  We come to the realization that a lot of our religious activity really prevent us from hearing his voice.

 In this process of learning to listen and gazing upon the Lord, we will be brought to the point  of sincere repentance, when we acknowledge that we have to change.  The change is one that moves us from willfulness to willingness.  Willfulness says, “I will do it my way.”  It has been hard for me to admit that much of my spiritual life has been based on my will power and effort, rather receiving the grace and mercy of God. Willingness says, “I surrender.”  We learn to surrender to love.  When we can let go and  begin to surrender to love, we will be listening to and following the voice of the Father calling us home. At first it will seem a bit foreign, since many of us have lived so far from home.  But as we become more settled in the letting go, we become aware of our deepest desires.  These are the desires that God has put there for fellowship with him.  Here we encounter the energy and vitality of the Holy Spirit.  It can be compared to becoming aware of the light of His presence bringing vitality and life to the hidden parts of our soul.  New energy will be released as we learn to let go.

When a man moves beyond the threshold, where by faith he  begins to  move from that which is within his control, where he had some understanding, where he could rely on some familiar signposts, and now begins to sink into his heart, he will now be out of control, sometimes in darkness, and will not often understand.  It will be one of the most difficult aspects of the contemplative journey.  Our mind will rebel and sometimes almost flee from going into that which is unknown.   We have been conditioned by what Robert Mulholland calls a “objectivizing, informational-functional culture.”  He quotes Parker Palmer – “We are well-educated people who have been schooled in a way of knowing that treats the world as an object to be dissected and manipulated, a way of knowing that gives us power over the world….[We] have used [our] knowledge to rearrange the world to satisfy [our] drive for power, distorting and deranging life rather than loving it for the gift it is.”  We become “graspers,” “manipulators,” and “controllers.”  All of this dies a slow death on the contemplative path. 

Coming to the place of letting go and sinking into our hearts, will produce fear.  I can not say it too strongly, men.  We will have to face our fears.  Our mind which does so much analyzing, judging and labeling will have to come to rest in God.   But there is good news about this fear.   You are not your feelings or your thoughts about your feelings.  Fearful thoughts are all part of our false self.  The reaction of fear is based not on reality, but our subjective view of our circumstances.  Remember fear is a deep inner emotion that we would rather not face.  For me to realize that I could face my deepest fears and know that they were not part of my true self in Christ was truly freeing.  Thomas Keating reminds us, “Fear…as an emotion, is not us.  When we say, ‘I’m afraid,’ this is not true.  We should rather say, ‘I have feelings of fear.'”  It is vital to understand that we are able in the silence of “sinking” into our hearts to become disconnected from our  feelings.  We become observers of our emotions, rather then letting them define us. A key verse in this whole process of learning to deal with fear is I John.  “Such love has no fear, because perfect love expels all fear.  If we are afraid, it is for fear of punishment, and this shows that we have not fully experienced his perfect love”  ( I John 4:18).  When we sink into our hearts, we are sinking into the love of God that will bring us to peace and rest

What has helped me tremendously is to come to the understanding that when I am in Christ I am also in relationship to myself.  That is, I have the ability in Christ to observe myself through my relationship with Him.  I can see myself through a new set of eyes; my spiritual eyes. This means that from a spacious place provided by my union with Christ within my hearts, I am able to look objectively at all my diseased emotions and distorted thinking.  “Christ’s anointing teaches you the truth on everything you need to know about yourself and him, uncontaminated by a single lie.  Live deeply in what you were taught” ( I John 2:27 –  The Message).

So in regards to my fear of letting go and being in the darkness of not knowing,  I can learn to just rest in this state.  With the help and discernment of the Holy Spirit I can see  the reactions  of my false self  wanting to take over the spiritual agenda of my spiritual journey.  Remember the words of Paul when He tells us, “Those who trust God’s action in them find that God’s Spirit is in them – living and breathing God!  Obsession with self in these matters is a dead end; attention to God leads us out into the open, into a spacious, free life” (Romans 8:7 –  The Message).  Beyond the threshold, God is helping us to get beyond the obsession with ourselves.

So my encouragement to that one man who is struggling to go forth, being lead by the Spirit, following the desire and yearning to experience to love of God, remember that your mind wants to be in control.  It will put up a big fight.  Your mind will react in a number of negative ways, causing your emotions to bring you into a grip of fear and anxiety.  But this is not your true self in Christ.  You are being lead by the Spirit to move beyond the practice of simply thinking about God and practicing spiritual habits.  God want you to come to rest in his love, allowing you to experience a spacious place within where you can observe the patterns of your old nature, learning to let them go, and embrace the knowledge that comes through love.  Don’t give up, my friend!!!  Stay on the journey.  The darkness and the unknown needs to be a part of your experience.  God desires impart to you His life, that is beyond thinking and normal experience

I have been away from Canaan for the past two weeks.  We have been with family.  At present we are baby sitting our three grandchildren in Olathe, Ks. for a week.  So I feel a little out of the flow.  The posts I have been doing about a Father who delights in us, takes some reflection time for me.  I sense there is a message I need to get out (almost like  birthing).  For me it is hard work.  There is a part of me that wants to forget this birth processing.  But at this stage in my life, I sense this is the next step of obedience me.  I never in my wildest dreams ever imagined that I would be writing on a blog site.  But here I am, for any one out there in cyberspace to read what I have to say.  One thing I am convinced of  –  God isforming  a new message for our post-modern age that is taking many different expressions.  My burden is to help men grow spiritually.  God is calling forth a new generation of men, who are being shaped by a journey that is taking them deep into their hearts, having come to realize that they have lived on the surface, that is their head (the control tower), for too long.   

Since I have been away from what I call our semi-monastic, I will pick up on the Father’s delight in us men next weeek.  Today I would like to make some brief comments regarding the Super Bowl ads.  I just was amazed at all the material the ads presented  men to consider regarding the preception of the modern male in America.  Remember people watch the super bowl just for the ads.  There is a great deal of thought put into what will reach the psyche of men.  I would even suggest that if you belong to a group of men, that you would view some of the ads, discussing them from a biblical point of view.  These ads should demonstrate beyond a doubt that there is great confusion about the masculine in our culture.  Men desperately need to gather together to once again find their “masculine soul” as they cry out to their heavenly Father for clarity.

Here are comments that I gathered from the Internet chatter.  Believe me, there is plenty of it regarding these ads.  This is a golden opportunity for men to engage the culture to debunk the message that is presented.  Here are some of the comments:  “Portraits of men in embarrassing situations led to a larger theme in this year’s super bowl ads. – the emasculated male in tough economic times”   –   “Chrysler’s dodge charger ad.  featured shots of various men with voiceovers narrating promises to ther wives. ‘I will put the seat down’ or ‘ I will say yes when you want me to say yes.'”  -Flo-TV has an ad that portrayed an emasculated man in one of its spots.  A narrator introduced a character whose, “girlfriend has removed his spine, making him incapable of watching the game.”  The ad ended with a very clear message to men, “change out of that skirt.”  One of my favorite lines was from Dove soap. The ad. wants men to be “comfortable in their own skin.”  There seems to be an appeal to a more nurturing and caring man with the phrase “men and care.”  The day after the game, I bought USA Today.  There was a whole page ad for dove.  It said, “It’s about time you had a reason to sing in the shower.” Well, there you have it.  Just a sample of all their is to discuss. 

I for one was thrilled by the ads.  It was an expression of our wayward culture in full display trying to address the issue of maleness in our culture.  I do not know how the average male in America is able to find his way in such a confusing spiritual, moral and psychological swamp as our culture has become.  There needs to be a light, a compass and a voice to get us out of this swamp.  The light is Jesus, the compass in God’s word and the voice is the Holy Spirit, especially speaking in the midst of committed men who are crying out to God in one voice, “We want to get back our hearts.”   So men consider these ads as a prophetic call to men to get down to the business in recovering their masculine soul.  Be encouraged that what you are sensing in your heart for change is from God. “The purposes of a man’s heart are deep waters, but a man of understanding draws them out” (Prov. 20:7).  Give yourself permission to trust the inclinations of your heart.  Also be assured that God is working among men today in a new way. “The lamp of the Lord searches the spirit of a man; it searches out his inmost being” (Prov. 20:27)

I would like to start this post with a quote from Thomas Merton, “In prayer we discover what we already have.  You start from where you are and you deepen what you already have, and you realize you are already there.  We already have everything but we don’t know it and don’t experience it.  Everything has been given to us in Christ.  All we need is to experience what we already possess”  Wow, that says a lot about what I am trying to say when a man steps through over the threshold, surrendering “the clinging mind’s” need to know and be in control.  One of the scriptures that I came back to often were the last words of Jesus in John 17:26.  To me this absolute key verse in understanding the contemplative journey.  “I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them.”  Jesus makes the love of the Father real to us, while abiding in our hearts

At this point I want  to give a word of assurance to that one man out there  to  whom I am writing.  It is to give assurance that you do not have to “leave your brains” at the door or somehow have to turn off your capacity to think.  What I am advocating along with so many others on the contemplative path is for a balance.  We have become in Western culture, mostly “thinking” persons.  Having a clear grasp of sound doctrine based on Scripture is our framework. You can’t have a spirituality floating in midair, which by the way, is true of a lot of spiritualities of our day.  They are not grounded in reality.  For me reality is found in the revelation of God in Christ and give witness to in Scripture.  That is reality.   But we have become overbalanced.  We have forgotten the heart.  The heart is the intuitive-imaginative function of our  deeper mind.  You could say that we should think of the “heart-mind” or visualize two minds – one rational, the other intuitive.  We need to think this way because of the great split that has occured between the two.  The contemplative seeks to bring about a balance and harmony between the two.  There is not a duality in understanding the deep of the human heart. 

Have said that, let use the next two paragraphs in giving two images of this deeper, inner life, what one author called “the homeland,” that you are entering when you venture across the threshold.  The first is the realization that you are in the river of God’s love.  The Spirit is described as “flowing water” and “as a spring inside you” (John 4:10-14) or at tht end of Revelation as a “river of life” (Rev 22:1-2).  Our task is to trust the river.  We don’t have to control or ever understand at times, but simply allow.  So don’t push the river or even try to creat the river.  It is already flowing from the heart of God.  “Faith does not need to push the river precisely because it is able to trust that there is a river.  The river is flowing; we are in it” (Rohr).  The river is God’s love.  Guess what we are to learn to do.  Float!!!  Yes, float.  I have spent years learning to float.  Learning to float has brought me to rest in the love of God.  It is like the Nestle plunge of years ago, when the man just fell backwards in the pool.  So I am learning to “relax” and just fall into the river of God’s love.

The second image is that of a sponge in the ocean.  This comes from Martin Laird.  The depths of the human are like the sponge in the ocean.  “The sponge looks without and sees ocean; it looks within and sees ocean.  The sponge is immersed in what at the same time flows through it.  The sponge would not be a sponge were this not the case…..the more we realize we are one with God the more we become ourselves, just as we are, just as we were created to be.  The Creator is outpouring love, the creation, the love poured out.”  This is a very freeing image for me.  I am immersed in the love of God.  For years I had a fear of God’s real presence.  I felt shame and guilt.  I had a lot of self-pity and even self-hatred.  But on the contemplative journey I have come more and more to rest in the love of God for me.  Again remember “God does not love you as you should be, but as you are.”  That is very freeing.

In this post I want again to start with a quote.  This is from William Shannon, “Wordless prayer…..is humble, simple, lowly, prayer in which we experience our total dependence on God and our awareness that we are in God.  Wordless prayer is not an effort to ‘get anywhere,’ for we are already there (in God’s presence).  It is just that we are not  sufficiently conscious of our being there.”  When you are either at the threshold or have now gone through, you are being drawn by the voice of love.  You are there in the presence of love.  Remember it learning to receive this love, not try to analyze or experience love in a certain way.  Just sit there and receive love.  Two of the sure indicators that you are being drawn beyond your usual way of relating to God is first;  the realization that the manner in which you have related to God no longer bring satisfaction.  This is an indication that God is calling you to a different place.  You are being called to leave the safety of the familiar. It is the call to come home.   Many pull back at this point.  The second indicator is the presence of an underlying peace.  Even though you might feel confused, uncertain and even somewhat fearful, there is an unlying peace that you should keep the journey.  Benner makes the interest observation that “the thing we fear the most is what we need to most.”  Of cours, that is the love of God.  A third indictor is the awareness that you can’t go back.  Don’t go back.  Stay there with you gaze upon Jesus.  Make Psalm 27: 4 and Psalm 105:4 your daily prayer.

In a real sense you are leaving the known and going into the “unknown.”  It is like leaving the old country for a new country.  Be assured that someone else is holding you and guiding you. Remember you are coming home.   Paul are reminds us, “no eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him’ (I Cor 2:9).  There is much more to reality then you had assumed with your small, isolated, ego-centered minds.  With the mind you have only material eyes to see what is there.  You can get caught up in a “mass cultural trance’  (Rohr)  that causes you to accept the illusions of your own thinking and the culture as reality. You are trapped in a kind of normalcy which says “this is the way it is.”  God is now trying to “wake” you up to what is really there.  He wants you to have spiritual eyes.  You could say that you need to have your spiritual lens cleansed so you can see.  You cannot do this on your own.  You have to allow it to be done to and for you 

Richard Rohr calls this movement the gaining of a “beginner’s mind.”  It involves knowledge that can be felt. He compares it to the first experience of learning for an infant.  It is primarily felt in the body (kinesthetic knowing).  The child knows self by being held and gazed upon by the mother. It infant and mother are not separate but one.   It is not seen, heard or thought.  It’s felt.  It is beyond words and discrption.  It just is.  Similarly God wants us to know him in the same “felt” way.  No separation with our mind but oneness at the heart level.  Our problem is that we are dualistic.  We are split from our hearts, where we experience knowing God’s love.  Instead of usual comparing, judging, and controlling  of our minds, we simple learn to rest in the love of God.  In this regard I have found real comfort in Psalm 130:2, “But I have stilled and quieted my soul; like a weaned child with its mother, like a weaned child is my soul within me.”   

So in this post, I want to assure that one man who I am writing for, that going through the threshold might be rather frightening.  It sure was for me.  All my fears, the illusions of my mind, and the protective attitudes of my fragile ego all cried out to stop and turn back to the familiar.  I was not comfortable with not knowing and walking in the darkness.  It could be that you will pull back at times.  That’s o.k.  But go through again and again.  Learn to stay for a longer period of time.  This is sacred space beyond ordinary normalcy.  Be assured that if you have your gaze upon Jesus, trusting that He is bringing you home to the Father by the presence of the Holy Spirit, and if you are storing up basic promises  from scripture for assurance, and if you hold unto the Apostles’ Creed as your statement of faith, and if you are seeking out the fellowship of like-minded pilgrims, you are being lead by the Spirit of love.  Make Eph 3:16-20 your daily prayer.  Don’t let some well-meaning man or woman who has not crossed the threshold, hold you back with some kind of nonsense about “new age thinking.”  I have fought many of those battles over the years. My journey began as a Lutheran.  Then I embraced fully the evangelical movement.  I have been deeply involved in the charismatic movement.  They are all still a part of my journey.  But it has been the contemplative journey that has allowed me to learn how to receive the love of God and know deep within heart that “I have a Father in heaven who delights in me.”

“I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith.  And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge – that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.”   Richard Rohr encourages us to repeat this mantra throughout the day:  “God’s life is  living itself in me.  I am aware of life living itself in me.  God’s life is living itself in me.  I am aware of life living in me.

I want to begin this post with some thoughts from M. Basil Pennington, a Cistercian monk, who taught on Centering prayer, “God is infinitely present.  He will not push himself into our lives.  He knows the greatest thing he as given us is our freedom.  If we want habitually, even exclusively, to operate from the level of our own reason, he will respectfully keep silent.  We can fill ourselves with our own thoughts, ideas, images, and feelings.  He will not interfere.  But if we invite him with attention, opening the inner spaces with silence,  he will speak to our souls, not in words or concepts, but in the mysterious way that love expresses itself – by presence.”   What Pennington so wisely is describing is the experience of “knowledge through  love.”  For years that thought bothered me.  But now I know some of its reality in my life.  I have a burden then you who read this post might experience “knowledge through love.”  That is the contemplative journey.

To finally know God’s love at the level of the heart, we will need to learn the practice of silence and solitude.  In silence we  move away from the distractions and demands of our daily life, finding a quiet place to just be.  Men, you will simply have to take the time.  Not a lot but some.  Have a short devotion and then just sit there.  We will talk more about this later.  This practice will then begin to produce inner solitude in our hearts, a quiet space that allows God to speak to us.  In the words of Leanne Payne we learn to “see that which is invisible and to hear that which is inaudible”, seeing with the eyes and ears of our heart, that which is the “unseen Real.”  In the silence comes a growing awareness of the “still, small voice” coming from deep in his heart. There is a growing discontent with the ordinary, creating a hunger to experience God in deeper, personal ways.  It is like a longing and desire for more of a connectedness to God.  

If you are a man who is already practicing silence before God, then you have passed the threshold.  You know some the joys and struggles of “letting go” of the controls of the mind, the need be be in charge, and facing the fears of the unknown.  It is a practice that has to be learned through intentionality. At first you will have to be disciplined to stick with the time alone.   Others might not be aware or even care to pay attention to the longings of your heart.  I have to say honestly, these posts have little relevance to where you are on the journey.  Basically you are stuck in “the control tower” of the mind, afraid to risk being loved.  But it is especially the men, who know they need to go deeper, to move beyond what has been their normal practice in devotions, to finally come to a place where they know they are loved and accepted by God just as they are, not as they should be.  If only one man is at that place, and he is reading this blog, I want to be a voice of encouragement in your life.  I would like to be another man “who is willing to fight for your heart.”  In the words of Richard Rohr, “you can trust yourself” ; that is, follow the longing and desire.  The first step is to start quieting down and learn to listen.

In listening we are learning to be attentive and aware of our hearts.  We “sink” with our minds into our hearts.  This is wordless prayer in which we are not making a effort to “get anywhere,” because we are already there (in God’s presence).  It is just that we are not conscious of our being there.  So my best advice is to learn to just be there in the presence of God.  You don’t have to think any thoughts or do any spiritual practices.  Just let God speak to your heart.  You are learning to let go of the controls of thought and practice. Instead of learning in the usual sense, you are “un-learning”; that is you are getting acclaimated to not knowing.  It is similar to spiritual sitting in the dark, yet knowing that you are being loved in the darkness.   Don’t let the distractions that come discourage and frighten you.  This is only an indication that you are slowing down.  All of what has preoccupied your attention is demanding your awareness.  Learn to just sit with the distractions, treating them like  ‘cobwebs’  you simply learn to blow away.  Most of all, continue the practice just being there.  With the eyes of your heart, look up and  out at Jesus as you weather the storm of  your mind wanting attention and control.  Again I am warning you, it will take time to get used to the storms of your mind.  After awhile you will get used to it.

In my my last post I ended by saying in order for men to have a “heart” connection with the  love of God, we will need to learn to “receive” and “see.”  For us to get “unstuck” so we can communion with God, that is, have a relationship beyond thoughts, perceptions and feelings, we are going to have to pay attention to our hearts.  Heart is the innermost core of our being, the meeting place between ourselves and God.  “The heart” observes James Houston, “is not to be identified with intellect, emotions, or will.  Instead all three are held in balance.  To be at home in the heart is to be truthful to one’s self.”  It is in communion, a heart to heart relationship with God, that we experience love.  The great spiritual tradition called it “knowledge through love.”  Theophan the Recluse put it this way, “The principle thing is to stand before God with the intellect in the heart, and to go on standing before him unceasingly day and night, until the end of life.”  “To stand in the heart……is a relationship that springs from the deep center of our personality, where we can be directly in God’s presence, and open to divine love.  The distinction between intellect, emotions, and will is no longer needed” (Houston).  In the Cistercian tradition the emphasis is on finding our way back to the heart.  We are explorer moving into the unknown, pilgrims away from home in search of our hearts.  Heart is home.  As Henri Nowen observes, “may of us don’t know our address.” 

So I picture myself, standing in my heart before God.  Can you picture this posture for yourself.  What are your responses to this imagery.  If you are anything like I was when I first read the quote from Theophan over 20 years ago, I was confused, frightened and very uncertain about such a practice.  Why?  First of all, I had never been exposed to the contemplative tradition.  For me it had been  mostly thinking the right thoughts and then trying to do the right things.  This has been big in my life since I have been a pastor, “being paid to be good.”  But I knew the “heart connection” was not there.  Secondly, I didn’t want to be out of control.  I had a need to understand and grasp what I was experiencing in this practice. Thirdly, was it biblical, or was I going to leave my ” Evangelical Lutheran moorings.”  Some men reading this post have already crossed the threshold, having embraced some part of the contemplative practice. In the simplest terms, you are moving from your head into your heart.  But my concern is for those of you, who are at the door of the threshold.  Let me assure you that all is well with going into your heart.  It is the way of Jesus.  He tell us, “Live in me.  Make your home in me just as I do in you.  In the same way that a branch can’t bear grapes by itself but only by being  joined to the vine, you  can’t bear fruit unless you are joined with me” (John 15:4 – The Message). I needed that assurance for quite sometime.

So let’s say, you are at the threshold, or you have gone ahead but pulled back out of confusion or uncertainty.  In this post I have three pieces of advice to give you, as I look back on my own experience.  I will make it short in this post and come back to these points later.  First, take some time to sit and listen.  This might be difficult for you to do.  What I am aiming at, is the need for you to hear the deepest desires of your heart.  They are for God.  There is the inner voice of God calling you home.  You have gone so far away that the voice is rather strange and foreign.  But it is the voice of God. So many other inner voices have been able to drown out the “still, small voice.”   That is what you have to pay attention to on the contemplative path.  Second, give yourself permission to” let go” or as the spiritual tradition says, “detach.”  Let go of preconcieved ideas regarding your relationship with God and how it should work.  If you are dissatisfied with your “connectedness” then you should be letting go.  “Letting go” is going to be like “unlearning” certain assumptions you have had.  Thirdly, if at all possible, find a fellow pilgrim who has been on the contemplative journey for awhile.  It will be of great help.  My pilgrim was,  Hal Green in Des Moines, Iowa.  I will be forever grateful for his guideance as I got on the contemplative path.

I will be coming back to the first two points I made in the past paragraph.  That is all for now, since this has become a longer post than normal.  One word of encouragement.  When you move over the threshold, into the contemplative dimension, you will experience darkness. That is a normal experience to get used to.  Don’t fear or worry about what you preceive to be darkness.  God is allowing the darkness so that he can teach you and help you to unlearn some things.  It is a time to learn new dimensions of trust.  Isaiah give us this exhortation. “If you walk in darkness, without a ray of light, trust in the Lord and rely on your God” (Isaiah 50:11).

I wonder if there are not men who are read this blog from time to time, who are living lonely, isolated and frustrating lives, wondering if it is really possible to connect and relate to God on a more personal level.  David Benner points out that the deepest yearning in the heart is spiritual. We were made for intimate connection with God.  For men this is a hard concept.  We prefer to stay on the surface of things.  He observes, “Our need for love, connection, and surrender from the spiritul core of our personhood.”   There are many “church” men going through the motions of the spiritual life, trying to believe the “spiritual stuff” and do all the right activities expected of them.  They just don’t feel they measure up spiritual to their wives and the pastor.  They go through steps and starts and then fall back again into a resignation that accepts a kind of “low grade” sense of failure for not being a “spiritual” man.

I have a burden to communicate with men caught in this dilemma.  I have know a lot of men like this in my years as a Lutheran pastor.  It is only in the last ten years that I feel I have learned how to come alongside  these “good, decent and honest” men and be a beacon of encouragement.  In my early years of ministry I was guilty of encouraging men to do the right spiritual things, such as pray more and have a devotional time.  But the heart and soul of men was not affected.  Not until I learned how to experience God at the heart level did my approach with men change.  I could not give and share what I had not learned and experienced myself.  So I have decided for better or worse to write a series of post entitled “a Father who delight in you” to address this issue.  It will be a work in progress.  I know what I want to say, but saying it in written form is the challenge for me.  So if there is anyone reading this blog who is being helped, give me a “heads up” so I know I am not “whistling in the dark.”

The first thing I would say from my own experience, is  “relax.”  If you are a man who has trusted Christ as your savior, then you have God’s presence within you not just with you.  It is as simple as that.  You don’t have to earn your way, you don’t have to “be more spiritual”  or be more deserving.  Greater intimacy and awareness of God in your life is all gift and grace.  Hang unto that truth on your journey.  The journey that I am discribing can simply be called “the contemplative way.”  Listen again to Romans 8:15-16, “For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship.  And by him we cry, ‘Abba, Father.’  The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children.”  You need to know that the very presence of God is not just “up there” somewhere or “around you”, but He lives within you.  We are talking about what Leanne Payne calls “incarnational reality.”  Jesus said the He and the Father would come to make their home in us.  “My Father will love them. and we will come and make our home with each of them” (John 14:23).  It could not be any clear.  God is in you.  That is of first importance.

So this means, men, that you do not have to do anything more about the indwelling presence of God in your life.  You are united with Christ at the center.  He is present at the deepest level of your being.  He is at the core, the very darkest place of your soul.  He knows you through and through (read Psalm 139).  It has all been give to you.  New, abundant, glorious life in God.  The liberating presence of the one who say “I delight in you” dwells at the center.  Don’t let go of that reality.  At the center is love.  You have all you need with His presence dwelling in you.  So what is the problem.  The problem is “awareness.”  We have not been taught to “see what is there.”  That sure was the case for me.  I lived a dualistic life for many years as a Christian man.  God was out there and I was on the inside with myself.  I was more an observer rather than a participate in the life of God.  I thought hard about God and did all the “spiritual” stuff to make it real.  But I was not making the connections.  So the first thing we have to learn how to do is “see” and “receive.”  So with that I will leave you till the next post.  Pray that somehow my simple, humble posts will help a few guys make the “great and glorious” connection in their own hearts.  Hope I have some guys with me.  I guess I will see in the days to come.