free to be love
Jim March 1st, 2007
last night i was hanging out with a group of people and we were sharing various things with one another about our journeys with God. one person shared how her father was a very legalistic and condemning sort of person. she want on to say how thankful she was for him because he had shown her an example of what not to be and that proved to be a helpful guiding influence in her life. i almost laughed at what she said until i realized she actually meant it. she really was thankful for her father for this reason.
i had another experience this week where i observed someone being asked, “do you have any regrets.” the person who was being asked is someone who emanates the reality and life of God through their love and joy. the person responded by saying first that they did feel regret that they hade not come to a greater awareness of God’s love sooner because they hurt a lot of people along the way before getting there. but then he said he did not condemn himself for it because he realized that even those experiences were part of helping him discover God’s love. finally he said, he uses those feelings of regret as further motivation to constantly begin again in the conscious awareness of God’s love and simply be love moment by moment with the life he now haves.
i felt freedom in both those encounters with these people.
the freedom to accept and absorb (even be thankful for) the painful aspects of my journey (both the pain others inflicted upon me and the pain i inflicted upon others) as part of the larger picture of my knowing God. though i don’t think God sends suffering to teach us lessons, i see God utilizing the suffering we experience to deepen his life within us.
so today i begin again. perfect love is within me. i will be love.
(photo by ColourFool)
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[...] My friend Jim, author of Divine Nobodies: Shedding Religion to Find God also alluded to this conversation in a post at his blog this morning. [...]
the other way this is working out in me is learning not to judge people, meaning quit assuming i am in a “better” and “more enlightened” place and need to help others “progress” to where i am. aren’t we all aready in every moment in the perfect place – enveloped by the love of God. and perhaps we all right now are in the place we need to be to grow in our awareness of this. that doesn’t mean we don’t encourage and help one another along. but maybe we act/speak in love and let the chips fall where they may rather than trying to steer/control the process for others because we assume they need to be where we are.