Our Relationship With God
Our Confusion Over What That Looks Like

  1. Many people measure their relationship with God with an expectation for a painless existence in the physical world.  In our culture, we have grown accustomed to qualities we do not intend to give up.  We look to God for guidance but we also have a desired framework in which we would like that guidance to appear.  We have filters in place that cause us to search for God’s will where we want to find it, e.g., answered prayer, miracles, or opportunities suddenly coming into our lives that will bring increased promise, comfort and security.  As a result of our preconceived thought forms, even sacred ones, we may miss experiencing God’s guidance and we may remain confused and frustrated as to why this is so.  For example, the fear that God is absent from our lives might lead us toward a more disciplined religious life, i.e., we must work harder, become more committed and disciplined while we ignore family and job related responsibilities.  Equally, we may believe that our prosperity is due to God “blessing us,” which communicates that routinely God materially rewards faithfulness.

  2. A number of us have become librarians, i.e., we have collected numerous books authored by Spiritual teachers who have written on the subject of Metaphysics.  We know the words and concepts of spirituality because we resonate with them.  We always enjoy the writers who communicate in the same stream of consciousness in which we navigate.  We also can become specialists in knowing various spiritual techniques and disciplines for manipulating energy, e.g., crystals, yoga, reiki, aromatherapy, reflexology, acupuncture, etc.  We appear extremely informed while our personal demons quite often remain entrenched and unscathed by our knowledge.

  3. Our relationship with God may unfold in a form that we do not recognize.  For example, are we prepared to look upon a terminal illness as an opportunity to serve God and humanity, e.g., Mattie Stepanek?  Are we prepared to experience one unexpected change after another and realize that carrying these with peace may be our specialized ministry?  Are we committed to staying in a job that has the potential to make us miserable, a marriage that has grown stale, or teach in a classroom filled with evil pupils because we represent stability in the midst of a raging storm?  Are we prepared to be a light in darkness?  By seeing God as a being who bestows rewards and prosperity on the faithful, we may miss seeing our mission when such material expressions do not arrive during our earthly sojourn.

  4. Individual guidance from God often comes in a pattern tailor-made just for us.  We are designed to bring our most peaceful thoughts and responses to the moment in which we find ourselves.  We only disrupt this process when we make judgments about the content and substance of what we are experiencing.  We can circumvent this error in judgment only when we trust God that we are where we need to be to achieve our mission.  This is not predestination in the sense that “this event was ordained by God” but rather a learning design we choose prior to our being born.  When every experience is viewed from this perspective, we are better prepared to display gratitude for being where we are in order to achieve our purpose of evolving while enabling others to evolve.

  5. We have the inner potential to stand forth with enormous power when in the presence of a personality, who appears stronger, more articulate, brilliant and connected to the power brokers of this world than we are.  We can become a David while in the midst of countless Goliaths when we become a fearless channel through which God’s energy may flow.  This response means dealing with our fears with trust that God’s will is always being done. Moses used this understanding while in the presence of Pharaoh. 

  6. We easily interrupt this energy flow when we open ourselves to personalizing what comes from people or circumstances in our environment.  The moment we perceive any experience as a reality that defines us we are being seduced by an illusion.  We immediately trade our objectivity for subjectivity as though we have the capacity to understand the meaning of the encounter.  We do not.  The moment we decide what a particular event means, particularly if we decide to own a negative self-definition, our energy reverses and it flows back on us.  The resulting disease is low self-esteem.  We need to realize that we created our response based on our interpretation of the encounter.  However, when our energy continues to flow away from us, no errors in judgment are possible.  We are not making any.  Personalizing anything becomes impossible because we are extending loving energy without evaluating the worthiness of the recipient or circumstance.  This is the result when we are thoughtful about the direction our energy flows and the consequences when it reverses direction.

  7. Do we have the power to stop our evolution?  The answer is, “No.”  When it is God’s will that we evolve, the only power we have is to engage in delay.  One of our temptations is to want the rewards of having a superior belief system without having to do our inner work.  As people practice their craft, however, they cannot pretend at being a skilled surgeon, pilot, sea captain, or master builder.  No one arrives at such stations in life because of their beliefs; they arrive there because of their level of skill and understanding.  The same is true as we evolve spiritually. Forgiveness, generosity, empathy and moving mountains are not given form because of our beliefs.  They become energized because of our persistence at polishing our own stone with practice, clarity of will, and because God’s will is manifesting through us.

  8. Jesus stood among us as one who saves lives by helping people prioritize who they want to be.  This process saves them from visiting countless blind alleys, senseless entanglements in social issues, and from the deceptions offered by the material world.  For example, nothing about Jesus’ life appeared fair or just.  He did not resist.  He spent the greater part of his life supporting his family.  He spent up to three years in a ministry that was awkward at best (no place to lay his head, being betrayed by one of his chosen and having Peter show up in the garden with a sword).  After being labeled as a troublesome heretic, falsely accused and condemned to a death that was reserved for those committing capital crimes against Rome, he was crucified.  Think!  Absolutely nothing made sense while these events were taking place.  BUT, Jesus stood forth as a light in darkness allowing his energy to flow away from his center and that has given humanity a new paradigm to examine.  He did this willingly, while fully trusting that his relationship with God did not hinge on how fair or just life appeared.  He taught us what such a relationship with God looks like.  By judging the worthiness of our circumstances, we can easily miss our calling.  While delay is always an option, why go there when Jesus modeled everything we need for our evolution to continue?