A couple of months ago I bowled fourteen strikes in a row during league play. Ten of them were in the same game, so I ended up with a score of 278 I think it was. Several people came up to me and shook my hand, like I had done something great. I felt uneasy, perplexed. I wanted to say to everyone, "Hey, it's just me. I'm still the same person." Something worked through me.
Many times when a sports figure is interviewed they end up giving the credit to God. I think they are being honest when they do this, but it is confusing to us viewers sometimes. We start to think that God somehow caused one side to win, and the other to lose. Inevitably the question is raised- What if two God-fearing teams faced off against each other? What would God do then? Who would God back? This question misses the point.
A person dedicates them-self to a craft, and they become creative in that craft. The craft becomes an art. What used to be compartmentalized steps becomes whole, as the next move flows from the last in a fluid, ethereal current. At this point, openness is all that is needed. What is birthed from this synergistic acceptance is something amazing.
When we look at that amazing product of our dedication, our love, inwardly we realize that we could not have created this on our own. We don't know how the sum could be so much greater than its constituent parts, but it is. Somehow, some sort of brilliance was allowed to work through us. We just made ourselves available to it. And we feel incredibly lucky to be a part of this process!
The whole ball game was full of inspired people, on both sides. The sum of the whole experience is a dance, or a play, and the entertainment to the fans is greater than any score.
All of life is this way. No matter what activity we dedicate ourselves to doing or being a part of, if we have that dedication of heart and soul, we can't fail to see some gracefully talented art or skill come from it. But what if we take this dedication to a deeper level?
A while back I stated that our openness to another produces a relationship, and the result is a trinity of sorts. We have these mini-trinities all the time, with friends, family, coworkers, and neighbors. I did not come up with this on my own. CS Lewis basically said the same thing ('God in the Dock'). Martin Buber expressed the same idea ('I and Thou').
The relationship is spiritual, that is, it is not a material thing that you can lay your hands on. Nothing in the material world can truly change it. It can only be changed by spiritual (non-material) means, because it is not physical. Similarly, a relationship must be fed spiritually, with the spiritual food of love, kindness, and shared warmth. The dedication of each goes into the other, and there is a spiritual merging. The relationship begins, and lives, as a pure, spiritual intercourse between two spiritual beings. Each acts as a catalyst to the other, and the sum is so much greater than its constituent parts!
Just as art is (amazingly) produced from the dedicated love of an activity, true friendship relationships are a type of art that is (amazingly) produced from dedicated openness to others. But what if we take this dedication to an even deeper level?
If we follow the self-sacrificial, surrendering example of Jesus, of not letting our ego pursue revenge, of being open to and loving our neighbor, of continually seeking to walk and talk intimately with God (as in the garden) we will have God's spirit in us. All we need to do is be honestly open, as much as our limited vision will allow. Just as a newborn baby's eyes develop, becoming more acute, our vision will increase, too.
Beautiful art, or great physical prowess in sports, or brilliant programming or surgery, seems to be something that just channeled through us from somewhere beyond. It is a spiritual thing that is greater than what we could have done on our own, and we know it! Relationships are also a spiritual something we cannot do on our own. And the ultimate relationship between our-self and our creator is also something that cannot happen just by our self, in seclusion. No man, or woman, is an island.
The following is much the same idea, expressed by Thomas Merton: (the section numbers are his)
...78. ...The recognition of our true self, in the divine image, is then a recognition of the fact that we are known and loved by God. As such it is utterly different from any self-awareness, no matter how deeply spiritual it may seem. It is utterly different from any other kind of spiritual awakening, except perhaps the awakening of life that takes place within a man when he suddenly discovers that he is indeed loved by another human being...
...79. Without this inner awakening, which springs from the realization of God's merciful love for us the image remains a mere potential likeness, buried and obscured, unappreciated because unseen. The image springs to life when, at the touch of God's ineffable mercy it begins to take on its lost likeness to Him Who is Love. The presence of God in us is the presence of His likeness in our own spirit-- a likeness which is more than a representation, it is the Word of God Himself, united to our soul by the action of His Spirit. The sense of being 'carried' and 'drawn' by love into the infinite space of a sublime and unthinkable freedom is the expression of our spiritual union with the Father, in the Son, and by the Holy Ghost, which constitutes us in our true identity as sons of God.
80. It is quite usual, when a man comes into intimate spiritual contact with God, that he should feel himself entirely changed from within. Our spirit undergoes a conversion, a metanoia, which reorientates our whole being after raising it to a new level, and even seems to change our whole nature itself. And then, 'self-realization' becomes an awareness that we are quite different from our normal empirical selves. At the same time we are vividly conscious of the fact that this new mode of being is truly more 'normal' than our own ordinary existence. It is more 'natural' for us to be 'out of ourselves' and carried freely and entirely towards the 'Other'-- towards God in Himself or in other men-- than it is for us to be centered and enclosed in ourselves.
We find ourselves to be most truly human when we are raised to the level of the divine. We transcend ourselves, we see ourselves in a new light, by losing sight of ourselves and no longer seeing ourselves but God. Thus in a single act we accomplish the double movement of entering into ourselves and going out of ourselves which brings us back to the paradisiacal state for which we were originally created.
81. It is a pity that this metanoia is so rare, often so completely unknown, in the lives of men... It is because of our fear, our blindness, our ignorance, our hatred of risk. For after all, in order to make this leap out of ourselves we have to be willing to let go of everything that is our own-- all our own plans, all our own hesitations, all our own judgments. That does not mean that we give up thinking and acting: but that we are ready for any change that God's action may make in our lives...
82. God will not reduce the distance between ourselves and Him by any compromise with our own weakness and imperfection... the total gift of ourselves to Him... is obstructed, within ourselves, by our own self-alienation.
83. ...If we are to recover our own identity, and return to God by the way Adam came in his fall, we must learn to stop saying: "I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked. And I hid." (Genesis 3:10) We must cast away the 'aprons of leaves' and the 'garments of skins' which the Fathers of the Church variously interpret as passions, and attachments to earthly things, and fixation in our own rigid determination to be someone other than our true selves.
NOTE: We must stop running, trying to hide from God. We must cast away- what, exactly? 1)passions, 2)attachments to earthly things, and 3)determination to be someone other than our true selves. As I said before (referring to Jesus' temptation in the desert)- Easy to remember: Needs, Ambition, Wants. All fears fall into one or more of these categories, and oppose spiritual growth.
How are you a catalyst to others? What do you produce together? Can you help them find their true 'identity'?
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