I picked up a book from Half-Price Books yesterday and just started looking over it last night. WOW. The Inner Voice of Love: A Journey Through Anguish to Freedom by Henri J.M. Nouwen is a collection of journal entries from what he describes as "the most difficult period of [his] life." Each entry is anywhere between one to three pages of spiritual imperative written to remind himself of Truth. My sweet friend Crystal had the great fortune of talking to me immediately after I read through the first 10 or so entries and patiently processed with me what the Holy Spirit was already revealing to me through this man's reflections.
My favorite entry so far is below. It exposed my wrong belief that my body is what keeps me from truly experiencing intimacy with God. For the longest time I've thought that if my soul could just exist outside my body that I wouldn't be weighed down with so many of the sins I constantly struggle with. While this may be partly true, the incarnation of Jesus removed any value my excuse may have had. Because Jesus "shared in [our] humanity" and was "made like his brothers in every way" (Hebrews 2:14, 17), He proved that it IS indeed possible to live in the flesh and still be the soul God created me to be!
Trust in the Place of Unity
You are called to live out of a new place, beyond your emotions, passions, and feelings. As long as you live amid your emotions, passions, and feelings, you will continue to experience loneliness, jealously, anger, resentment, and even rage, because those are the most obvious responses to rejection and abandonment.
You have to trust that there is another place, to which your spiritual guides want to lead you and where you can be safe. Maybe it is wrong to think about this new place as BEYOND emotions passions, and feelings. BEYOND could suggest that these human sentiments are absent there. Instead, try thinking about this place as the core of your being--your heart, where all human sentiments are held together in truth. From this place you can feel, think, and act truthfully.
It is quite understandable that you are afraid of this place. You have so little knowledge of it. You have caught glimpses of it, you have even been there at times, but for most of your life you have dwelt among your emotions, passions, and feelings and searched in them for inner peace and joy.
Also, you have not fully acknowledged this new place as the place where God dwells and holds you. You fear that this truthful place is in fact a bottomless pit where you will lose all you have and are. Do not be afraid. Trust that the God of life wants to embrace you and give you true safety.
You might consider this the place of unification, where you can become one. Right now you experience an inner duality; your emotions, passions, and feelings seem separate from your heart. The needs of your body seem separate from your deeper self. Your thoughts and dreams seem separate from your spiritual longing.
You are called to unity. That is the good news of the Incarnation. The Word becomes flesh, and thus a new place is made where all of you and all of God can dwell. When you have found that unity, you will be truly free.
2 comments:
Very good. So many truths in such a few words. I have been thinking about you lately and have wondered how you are doing. We are doing well. Brent and Michelle are now serving FBC Sunrise Beach as associate pastor. He will be ordained this fall. Kenny and Jessie will be moving to Shawnee, Kansas in a couple of weeks to begin their new job. They are going to be house parents for 3 mentally disabled adults. They are really looking forward to it. David N. is getting along on his Master of Education degree at SBU. His wife, Nikki, will be starting at SBU in the spring, I believe. I think all of them will be here at our house on Monday. I think of you often and pray for you when I do.
I looked for this book at a bookstore here yesterday. It was "out of stock." Which is another way of saying "We don't have it now and we have no idea if we will ever have it again." :)
I love that when truth is spoken it hits us hard in different ways. I love that when the Holy Spirit speaks through something he molds it to shape our hearts the way he designed them to be. This passage spoke to me so strongly, but in such a different way than it spoke to you! Thanks for sharing with me friend. I'm so glad that even though we are far apart, we are walking on this journey together :)
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