Going inside toward home.
I have been exploring the inner-universe of my soul lately.
The compass and map I use are silence and honesty.
I have discovered there are many roadblocks and detours as I make my journey home, they are: fear, denial, shame and dishonesty.
But the longer I sit in silence bypassing the roadblocks, and the more honest that I am with myself preventing unnecessary detours, the closer I get to my soul. The soul is not a fearful place; it is home. It is where I rest with God. It's my "true self". And like the old saying goes, "Home is where the heart is."
I am not sure what takes us so far from "home". I am unsure why many are so afraid to take the journey to our true home... the Kingdom of God within ourselves. Perhaps, for some, there is fear that they won't like what they see... their external home has always been a place of guilt and shame... a place that is truly not safe to be.
For me, I get attached to those external things and I hold on with my EGO telling me who I am and the tighter I grip at religion, people, places and things that make my external world appear safe, in control, and secure the less able I am to let go and float through the great expanse eventually landing on my soul.
I am not sure it is possible to go on the journey alone. Perhaps we need a trusted friend or support group who has either been on the journey or is on a like journey. We don't have to go it alone... and as I listen carefully I can hear the voice of God calling my name like my mother used to do when I was a kid playing in the neighborhood, "Time for dinner."
I guess I just yearn for home more than I yearn for anything else.
Dorothy was right, "There's no place like home... there's no place like home." It's where we find our heart, courage and wisdom for real life; it's where we find ourselves and God.
For once I get home I can finally rest. Like Augustine said, "Our hearts are restless until rest in you alone, Oh God."
11 Comments:
maybe that's why i keep getting so lost on my path - i am trying to find my way home alone, without a guide, a friend. sometimes i think i should just give up and settle for a homeless existence of survival...but perhaps you're right, maybe i just need a friend on the journey. i'd be open to that but its hard to make friends when you're busy isolating yourself from the world.
It is not possible to go the road alone.
This is why we were given and called to discipleship.
You give your words of wisdom here. Rick, someone will be there to bring you along and walk with you on this path.
Together, we all go to Jesus.
To me, discipleship is takes about 30 seconds.
"Look at what God showed mankind through the cross of Christ. He took extreme steps to prove His love for us. Now, go and enjoy life with God, who has made peace with you."
The "church" needs to keep things as complicated as possible. They need you to rely on them to "show you the way" because that's how they pay their bills. But, I say the gospel of Christ is simple and believable. Telling someone that God has reconciled His creation to himself takes less than a minute, and frees a person to live in peace with the One who created them. And you don't have to pay me a cent!
I journaled on this, yesterday. Like you seem to be doing, I was trying to figure it out.
I feel it has to be the right balance of being with others and being with God alone. The balance is different for everyone, but sooner or later, you have to be willing to stand before God, alone.
When all is said and done, to drop the hands of others here on earth, in order to take the hand of God, is what draws us closer~ first to God, then to others.
In the willingness to face God, by myself, I come to know God better, then I find myself, and finally, I find unity with all God has made.
Because, sometimes, seeking the company of others in spiritual matters is more about avoiding God~ and sometimes it's about sharing God~ and you have to make a smart distinction between the two.
beautiful post.. thanks for this. i need to make my way back to that honest, silent place.
great reminder..
peace,
jeff
hey rick - could you email me at emergingsideways AT gmail DOT com??
i have a lead that i think it really well suited for you.
still praying!
Great post, Rick. The inner-universe is just like the outer one: expansive!
I guess I just yearn for home more than I yearn for anything else.
me too and sometimes that takes me to a yearning for more of Him and maybe that yearning is as close as we get here???.....
To me silence takes the abode of the soul and makes it feel like I'm outdoors in Arizona. Huge, beautiful, and oh, so much to explore. You are never anywhere near done.
The first anonymous commenter here sounds so much like my life before I got sober. My theme song was Simon and Garfunkel's "I Am A Rock," and I was sure that you holy folks and your "You'll Never Walk Alone" was just a fantasy for me.
The folks who have said, "We see you; we know who and what you are; and we welcome you," give me the greatest gift a human being can receive.
I understand exactly what BruceD is saying - because the "institution" of the church can be a blood-sucking, life-sucking entity. But it also can be the heart of fellowship and companionship on the road to the New Jerusalem. If we can stick to what we share in common, and ignore the things that separate us, we-as-the-church can be a powerful force for the Gospel in the world.
As Ecclesiastes says, there is a time to everything under heaven. My challenge is recognizing it - to see when I am supposed to speak truth, and when I am supposed to "be still and know which one of us is God, and which one ain't."
In silence, I have the chance to hear the truths that are shouting in me to be heard. In honesty, I have the chance to accept those truths, and act on them.
I was convinced, in my selfcentered egotism, that if God ever got done with Bosnia and wars and floods and stuff, and actually found me, a just God would have no choice but to roast my ass. I knew if God caught up with me, I'd burn - and that sounded like a bad idea.
So I did everything I could to avoid the encounter with holiness - compulsive eating, drinking, working, prescription abuse, you name it. My thought was that if I kept running, kept moving, and never shut down and sit still, God's master targeting computer just couldn't get a good tone lock...kind of a Top Gun of the soul.
Fifteen years ago, a group of people in a church in Prairie Village, Kansas tried to welcome me. For once, I was brutally honest with them - I told them, "You folks don't want someone like me. I'm a liar, a cheat, a thief and an embezzler, a barely recovered alcoholic. I'm just not a nice guy...you need to keep your distance from me, or I'll poison your world just like I did with my own." (Those may not have been the exact words, but it's close.)
And they said, "Is that what you are, or what you were? Because if you want it to be your former life, you're welcome here. We don't care what you used to be - we only care about what you want to become."
When churches can welcome and affirm someone like me, then they are doing God's will, for sure.
On my way home to my Heavenly Husband, I found that there is only one roadblock, a block so big it is impossible for the human ego to get over, around, or through. That roadblock is adultery. It is much mor encompassing than the idea of idolatry or infidelity. Adultery is the perversion of some pure substance. The Word is the only "pure" essence in the universe. Out of it and by it all things are, and it is an offense to the human soul.
My soul always rose up against it in justification, until I was shown that there was nothing to me but adultery or perversion. When I saw that in its fullness, all I could do was lay down in His sweet bed and say, "I will do all that You say, whether I am lost or saved, no matter."
That began the journey of eternity, and I love every step He beckons me to take.
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