May 04, 2014

I fled Him, down the night, down the days,

I fled Him, down the ache of the years,

I fled Him, down the labyrinthine ways

Of my own mind, and in mist of tears.

    Hound of Heaven, Frances Thompson, 1895

This beautiful poem written over a hundred years ago (this is only the opening lines) echoes my life with God,

and reflects where I am in life. Nothing I could do could make God stop calling me, following me, Hounding me, waiting for the crash so God could comfort me. No matter what I did, God was waiting. No matter what I thought, God was waiting. No matter if I turned my back, God was waiting, always so close that I could not miss the Cloud of God, waiting, waiting. Finally I gave in, and relaxed in the Cloud of Joy that awaits anyone who let's God into their life. Time and time again this cycle was repeated, for God was truly the Hound that stayed with me, never letting me go, taking me as I was at that moment.

God has led me here, at age 80, to a point that I see the echo of God's presence in everything I see, everything I touch, everything I feel, filling my mind and being with God's Love and Light. Each day slips by to join the myriad of previous days, each day more filled with the presence of God than the previous day. I know that the day will come when I will join God face to face, and it will mark the culmination of this lifetime of being pursued by the Hound of Heaven, and I will find that the Cloud of God will envelope me and not let go.

But I find myself here, in this space and time, working all my life in the delightful world of constant challenges, always calling me to discover something new to me, calling on my trait of curiosity to learn more, always learn more. This push obviously is not only for my own delight, but to become part of the fabric of the rebirth of our world. Many of these challenges are personal, as I can tend to withdraw into my own world of delightful learning, but we are always called to give to others what has been given us. I find it delightful to be part of this wondrous world of rapidly expanding knowledge of all things, especially the making of the universe from the beginning almost 14 billion years ago, to the realization that everything is some form of energy and is in constant flux, right under our noses, even in the most solid of appearances such as a mountain, if we are aware of it or not.

I grew up as a Roman Catholic, always delighted to be part of the rich heritage of the 2000 year old Church. God called me for certain actions during this time. My wife and I raised seven children, were always active in, usually, Church activities. My type A personality gave me some leadership capabilities that I used as I was led, and my wife found herself in leadership roles whether she wanted it or not.

During this time I was led to read many of the books by the leading theologians, including those whose work led to Vatican ll. Then God began some 25 years ago to lead me to widen my understanding, to read other religious books, at the same time leading me to become fascinated by cosmology or the beginning of the universe, and particle physics, the makeup of the very small of our universe. These readings, along with reading more esoteric books by modern free thinkers and eastern religions such as Deepak Chopra, Eckhart Tolle, Wayne Dwyer, and eventually to Neale Donald Walsch and the Conversation with God series, leading me to understand that God has spoken to humanity in many ways, down through the centuries, brought beautiful insights into a vast number of paths in various parts of the world. There was constant shifts as some great thinkers and Masters gave voice to different aspects of the reality of God as revealed to them through the centuries. Even in my Roman Catholic Church, the great voices of Teihard de Chardin and Diarmuld O'Murchu gave voice to a different way of looking at creation, and even though some of their works were attempted to be silenced, their great works of breathtaking vision have been released for our delightful perusal.

During this time, God revealed to me quite clearly that God is Love, and only Love. As I looked and prayed and pondered this overriding thought, I became aware that much of New Testament was not the thoughts and words of Jesus, but of the writers, put down some 40 years and more after the time of Jesus. This gave me great pause and I spent a few years grappling with this, before understanding, with God's help, that several key aspects of Christianity as taught today is in error. First I realized that the God of Love could not have a hell. No, if God is Love, there can not be a hell. I also realized, that if there is a hell, then God is NOT a God of Love, and the world is in really bad shape. That led me to realize if there is no hell, Jesus did not die to save us from hell. So who was Jesus? My ponderings on many levels, including history, led to the understanding that Jesus has to be fully human, for his teachings of God are about the divinity of all of us, not just himself.

Then my understanding of cosmology led me to inescapable conclusion that everything is one. Nothing is not part of the one. If we say that God is All in All, a basic teaching of all our spiritual teachings, then quite simply all is God, for if all we call creation is not God, then God is not All in All, but simply something out there, not here, despite what Jesus said. Some of the phrases that we believe Jesus actually said are “You are the branches, God is the Vine”. What this says is that we are divinity, not the whole of divinity, but still divinity. “What I do you shall do greater.” “The kingdom of God is within.” Jesus spent his time telling us we have the capacity of a Master, one equal to him, if we but accept who we are.

I am a Branch of the Vine. As a Branch I am divine. Do I live like that? That is my choice in this world of only three dimensions plus the dimension of time. We have limitations, but these are the same limitations of Jesus: time constrains all we have, and the energy bonds we have accepted to be here do have some limits on them, but they are ours to control.

We have choices in this life, and if we dare to exercise them. We are so afraid to become who we can become, for then,p we have responsibilities, and as Jesus said, much will be expected of them who have been given much.

But there is the conundrum in that statement of fear: we are afraid we Will have to do something, BUT, all of us, every last one of us, has been given much, and much is expected of all of us.

Who am I? I am divine. Let us rephrase that: I am Divine, you are Divine. Where am I? I am In this time and place, for a purpose, for much has been given to me, and much is expected. If much is expected, what am I doing?

I have other musings on God at my journal on God in Beliefnet.com, under Dave434.