Who is our neighbor and how do we actively and internally love them? Jesus said that loving our neighbor the most essential component to his teaching. He also tells us that loving our neighbor is the same as loving God and both acts are tied up together and not separate. It can be easy to love the ideal of a imagined neighbor, but real neighbors require a lot of grace, patience, discernment, time, and are as complicated as each of us are. Loving a real neighbor requires personal sacrifice and intention. We are invited into this beautiful mess of loving our neighbor well and are told this outward expression is linked to loving God. We will not do it well all days, but with humility and perseverance, we can practice this teaching. Sometimes our neighbor is one person, and other times it’s an entire nation of collective neighbors. If we want to practice the teachings of Jesus we are invited into this sacrificial life of loving God and neighbor. We are promised that if all where to practice this unreasonable love that the kingdom of God will be actualized on earth as it is in heaven. There is tension and idealism in this practice, but when flesh and blood enters this practice, its messy, and its beautiful, this is the live we where born into. Today lets put on the practice, let us not expect to be great at it right away, but lets keep it up. If you want to be great at any craft, you must start at the beginning and practice, practice, practice.

 

Jesus Teaching #6

The Teaching: “Love your neighbor as yourself,” this is just like loving God.

 

The Practice: Set aside our own agenda or obsession with safety and personal comfort and respond like our creator does with grace, patience, discernment, humility, perseverance, and sacrificial living.

 

I reflect on this teaching this morning as I sit on the shores of the small island of Lesbos, Greece. I’m here assisting the Syrian refugees to safety with many international volunteers. Here I can see how the Syrian in my neighbor, here I think about Mexico and how they are my neighbor too and also how my new Greek roommates are my neighbor. I hope the teachings of Jesus will continue to shape my political understanding of the world more than nationalistic or media propaganda. We are invited to actively try to practice the teachings of Jesus, to make a mess of it, to sit in the tension of our own personal shortcomings, but to keep practicing. We say with Jesus, to the divine creator, let your will be done. I am invited into a beautiful surrender. As I sit above our camp on watch for refugee boats I hear the words of the 90’s band Tesla and reflect upon this situation, “What give you the right to put up a fence”?

God of Rage vs. self fulfilled God of love

 

So, you left your faith, you want to re connect, but the old concepts still haunt you. Are you sick for the toxic repression of a God of rage, calling you back into submission and fear? There is hope yet. As a friend of mine said, “We suffer from a crisis of imagination.” Maybe you’re reading the wrong pages, old stories with old wine that is passed its sell date. Question all authorities, don’t allow fear and false power enslave your vision of God. There is freedom; imagination and wonder in knowing the God that invites all to the table, all are welcome at this party. There is room for you, your fear, your poorly constructed bias, your childhood wounds, your self-hatred and pride. I know this, because I’m invited to the love that God is with in all these for mention present within me.

 

Jesus teaching #5

The Teaching: Our Creator wants everyone to have union with him, (a full house) but not all will show up or be ready. Don’t give God excuses, give him your presence.

 

The Practice: Make yourself available to God, he wants your presence . Listen for the invitations of the Spirit and respond. Value your connection with your creator above all things.

 

Luke 14:15-24 (NIV)

The Parable of the Great Banquet

15 When one of those at the table with him heard this, he said to Jesus, “Blessed is the one who will eat at the feast in the kingdom of God.”

16 Jesus replied: “A certain man was preparing a great banquet and invited many guests. 17 At the time of the banquet he sent his servant to tell those who had been invited, ‘Come, for everything is now ready.’

18 “But they all alike began to make excuses. The first said, ‘I have just bought a field, and I must go and see it. Please excuse me.’

19 “Another said, ‘I have just bought five yoke of oxen, and I’m on my way to try them out. Please excuse me.’

20 “Still another said, ‘I just got married, so I can’t come.’

21 “The servant came back and reported this to his master. Then the owner of the house became angry and ordered his servant, ‘Go out quickly into the streets and alleys of the town and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind and the lame.’

22 “‘Sir,’ the servant said, ‘what you ordered has been done, but there is still room.’

23 “Then the master told his servant, ‘Go out to the roads and country lanes and compel them to come in, so that my house will be full

The teaching #4: Immerse yourself in nature and pay attention

 

The practice: Take time in nature, pay attention, and listen

 

“Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life? See how the flowers of the field grow.” Jesus of Nazareth

Immersing ourselves in nature is a spiritual discipline that Jesus tells us to do and modern science confirms. Jesus gives us the secret to reducing stress and anxiety; consider creation, the fields, the tress and the birds that live there. I discovered that installing a humming bird feeder outside the window next to my desk helps me relax. Maybe we should be less concerned about style religious rituals and create fresh organic ones that are happening all around us.

“Jesus’ spirituality was immersed in the natural world: Jesus says matter and spirit, divine and human are not enemies, but in fact are two sides of the same coin. They reveal one another and are finally one! Once you grant subjectivity to the natural world, everything changes. Things out there are no longer mere objects with you as the controlling subject, but you now share mutuality with all things.” Richard Rohr

Jesus goes on in this same passage the most westerners have herd “But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” Jesus I so enjoy how he says, “Tomorrow will worry about itself!” Jesus is not advocating not planning, he is advocating time in nature and pursing plans that have eternal impact. Saying, “Don’t worry,” only makes worry worse, but giving a practice that reduces worry, is of great value. Jesus gives us both. I know that Bob Marley read the words of Jesus often, and I like how he sings about his organic spiritual discipline that Jesus taught, “Rose up this morning, smiled at he rising sun, three little birds where by my door step, singing sweet songs, a melody pure and whole.” The message nature then replies back to all of us is, “That every little thing is gonna be alright.” Yes you child may die of cancer, yes war will go one, yes natural disasters will strike and pain is apart of life, but the grace of the humming bird is also present, the beat of her wings and the beat of your heart, and the breath in your lungs today rises and falls like the sun. Jesus invites us not into tomorrow’s ills, but into the present grace that is always with us and nature whispers our creator’s secrets if we have an ear to hear.

Why did Jesus of Nazareth, and Jim Morrison cross the road?

To break onto the other side… of consciousness.

 

Jesus’s teaching #3: We are one with God our father

Distinct but not separate – “that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me.” Jesus (John 17:21)

 

The practice: meditation on oneness

 

“Consciousness is the state or quality of awareness, or, of being aware” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consciousness

The state of consciousness I want to discuss is Unitive or unity Consciousness. “Unity Consciousness: moving beyond the I-Thou relationship with God to unity, experienced as being one with God.” The human soul yearns for union with its life force and creator. It turns out the creator also yearns to have this union with what has been created. Union with humanity, nature, the cosmos, and the creator is an ultimate reality and can be an awareness to live in. Unitive Consciousness… it is an awareness!

The Apostles Paul’s comments on Unitive Consciousness

“In Him we live, and move, and have our being.” Paul (Acts 17:28)

We are not identical to God but, we have our being in our creator.

Learning to identify with our Higher Self–our soul, not with our lower self: ego, body, appetites, intellect is a large part of unitive consciousness.

 

Links I took ideas from

http://www.spiritualpaths.net/mystical-experience-or-unitive-seeing-by-cynthia-bourgeault/

http://www.cruzetech.com/wudhi/mysticism/dcw/unitive%20and%20dualistic%20consciousness.htm

http://www.spiritualemergence.org.au/#!episodes-of-unitive-consciousness/c1bfz

“A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in him, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in him.”

 

The practice this week is to store up goodness in our hearts if we want goodness to come out of our lives. If we involve ourselves in evil, its because that’s what has been planted, sowed, and stored up. Our actions become a testament to what we have stored up. Lets practice storing goodness this week in following the truth that Jesus presents to us, and this truth is relavent today.Lets investigate our lives, and contemplate how we spend our time and resources, and see what is being brought up. This is following Jesus and learning from him.

Love for Enemies

Mathew 5:43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. 46 If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? 47 And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? 48 Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

 

1. The Command to follow, Love for enemies

 

2. Step one of the practice, pray for those who persecute you.   Step one towards transformation.

 

3. Examples and how we receive revelation about the creator through the natural world as teacher. (Rain and sun for all. Free grace of God for all regardless)

 

4. The perfection of our creator is made evident in loving the persecutor, even in the face of the evil they enact.
5. so friends, no one said we would be good at it, but an old adage says practice makes perfect, here’s to practice. Consider what this means in your own life, this is following Jesus!

New Year,

 

I put this blog, “thegodimage.com,” together to invite people into the Jesus story that has so empowered my inner hope and reservoirs of inspiration. I’m inviting you to join me as I spend 2016 contemplating and practicing the teachings of Jesus. The call to action is to contemplate the teachings of this man that hailed from Nazareth, a po-dunk town on the edges of the empire, and to try to contemplate and practice his teachings. I believe that practicing his teachings will bring us closer to the path of love and justice he laid out and ultimately can bring us to union with God and neighbor. I invite Atheist, Muslims, Agnostics, Hedonist, Christians, Yogis, Mormons, Jehovah Witnesses, Hindus, Buddhist, and Nudists a like to just try on these teachings like a coat and see how they fit in 2016. We are all invited to the table of grace and Jesus promises his followers that their lives will be grounded if they don’t merely listen, but practice these teachings.

I gave myself permission to take a long break from church. I wanted to understand the inner turmoil and angst I experienced due to my involvement in Christian church and have some time to reflect. I discovered that I spend a lot of time trying to be moral, or to posses systematic answers, and that many others including myself do not feel these endeavors where bringing them a closeness with their creator they may have believed it would. During this time I have read many books and learned a lot about contemplation. I also had a fun question surface during this season and I have posed many people I connect with that are interested in the Jesus story, “What is one of your favorite Jesus teachings and why?” I have asked this question often over the past two years to stingers and friends a like and discovered that many people, know very few of his teachings or the stories he told. In 2016, I invite you to journey with me, as I put forward a teaching of Jesus to contemplate and to try to practice. I pray that this process will be rewarding, life giving and ultimately bring each of us closer to the Spirit. Stay tuned… teaching one is on the way…

I was having lunch with my cousin and felt so moved as I herd the verses of this classic Christmas song bouncing off the walls of a Thai restaurant. The next morning I looked up the words and listened to Dustin Kensure’s rendition of it and put it on repeat. The power of the words where so inspiring and currently relevant. “In Roquemaure at the end of the year 1843, the church organ was recently renovated. To celebrate the event, the parish priest asked Cappeau, native from this town, to write a Christmas poem. Cappeau did it, although being a professed anticlerical and atheist.”^[1]Wikipedia I was moved that an atheist had penned these words I hold sacred. There is an invitation to us to be open to more people than those we agree with. Its amazing how limitless our creator is and how his music is realized in all his sons and daughters. I hope you consider sitting with this poem over the next few days. Let the truth of a 19^th century atheist penetrate your heart and draw you into the spirit of God. I dig this irony!

 

O Holy Night Placide Cappeau and John Sullivan Dwight

O holy night! The stars are brightly shining,

It is the night of our dear Savior’s birth.

Long lay the world in sin and error pining,

Till He appeared and the soul felt its worth.

A thrill of hope, the weary world rejoices,

For yonder breaks a new and glorious morn.

Fall on your knees! O hear the angel voices!

O night divine, O night when Christ was born;

O night divine, O night, O night Divine.

Led by the light of Faith serenely beaming,

With glowing hearts by His cradle we stand.

So led by light of a star sweetly gleaming,

Here come the wise men from the Orient land.

The King of Kings lay thus in lowly manger;

In all our trials born to be our friend.

He knows our need, to our weaknesses no stranger,

Behold your King! Before Him lowly bend!

Behold your King, Before Him lowly bend!

Truly He taught us to love one another;

His law is love and His gospel is peace.

Chains shall He break for the slave is our brother;

And in His name all oppression shall cease.

Sweet hymns of joy in grateful chorus raise we,

Let all within us praise His holy name.

Christ is the Lord! O praise His Name forever,

His power and glory evermore proclaim.

His power and glory evermore proclaim.

How does one destroy a good poem? Read the poem as if it as literal! Not only is this confusing, but sometimes out right strange. Trying to read God into our story has been the mistake of humans since the beginning of time. We become aware of Gods story when we surrender our answers and systematic codes. We are invited into the greater and larger story of God. We should never insist on shrinking the creator into our small spaces and consciousness. There is an invitation to the divine rhythm and Jesus shows us how to sing in tune with all creation. Jesus embodies its ok to accuse God of abandoning us in our time of need. He has compassion towards his violent oppressors and speaks to the goodness of his father in the mist of suffering. Remember, Jesus did not die to pacify God; he died that we would stop perpetrating the myth of redemptive violence. He died that we could forgive ourselves, our neighbor and return the love that has always been God. He rose to show us death is not the final authority, his father is. The ancient and persistent myth that the Gods need blood to be happy with his creation is the oldest misconception in all the ancient books. This sad deceit continues to keep the violence in our lives. The sooner we quite making ancient poems into facts and ancient tribal codes into the very words of God, the sooner we will stop acting out these toxic visions of God on earth. Jesus models how to live with in violent systems; he was born into one of the most oppressive regimes known in human history. He gives us less answers than most preachers allow themselves to admit. What most of us are hoping for is permission to accept our own inadequacies, permission to believe, but we often get confined to once progressive ideas that are now regressive. God is calling us forward into himself, to the of redemption.

I affirm with all my heart that God is good, and yet fear is ever present causing me to question my creator’s affection or good will. Lets lament, curse, cry, surrender, and fall into the darkness that may be present, because God is near. Darkness only last for a night, but morning is coming, and there is joy there. All seasons have their boundaries and so do we. I want to emulate the Jesus stories, follow them and stop playing into ancient beliefs, a God who is far from a loving father. Jesus invites into a better story! Though the story has been long high jacked, its ours to re discover.

“Killing in the name of,” Killing in the name or Spirit of God is for the ignorant. We as Christians ignore the critiques of our society and write them off as those who would oppose us. However, they are calling us to the standard that we hold, the beautiful message of Jesus Christ. We in the West live in an era where our voices can be used and our lives are not threatened for proclaiming a merciful and loving God. It seems that the atheist and the agnostics understand the message of Jesus much clearer than many of us who profess to follow him. These critics call us to follow the teachings of our founder, their voices call us to practice radical grace, and yet we insist upon justifying our violence, in the name of a wonderful God. Jesus took our violence upon himself to bring about his kingdom of peace, not the peace through violence, but in spite of it. “We have got the American Jesus, see him on the interstate,” says Greg Graffin from punk rock band, Bad Religion. Greg points out our hypocrisy for what it is and calls us towards a higher ground. When will we start following the wonderful teachings of Jesus? When will we stop mindlessly following our cultural Jesus and start living with in the rhythm of the prophet from Nazareth?

During the first 3 century’s A.D. Christians where a minority cult that was tragically persecuted by the Caesars of Rome. These early followers of Jesus died in order to continue following the teachings of Jesus. While the Roman Emperor, Constantine was praying before a battle, he thought he saw the sign of the cross in the sun’s rays and believed he was told by God to conquer his enemies by this sign, the sign of the cross. He then won the battle he chose to convert to the Christian faith and began going to war in the name of Jesus! This must have been an absolutely stunning turn of events that would have evoked much confusion and bitter sweet for the followers of Jesus during the 3^rd century. They must have been over joyed to be granted religious freedom on one hand, and enraged to see the teachings of Jesus greatly miss understood by the Emperor and the new multitude of followers. Killing in the name of Jesus would have made no sense at all and been an absolute irony of the worst kinds for the original flowers. This act of just war, conquest and violence where never apart of the early followers of Jesus. The early church where victims of these systemic evils, but not perpetrators of it. The only thing worse than being victims of the violence would be to do it in the name of Jesus.