God’s Questions

God’s ultimate questions to us are of being—not questions of knowing and especially not questions of doing.

His question to Adam and Eve about location (“Where are you?”) has greater bearing, not on the bushes they were hiding in, but rather where they were in relationship to Him.

Where are you spiritually?  Where are you in relation to your real Self—which is, after all, God-within-you?

Elijah flees for his life after Jezebel promises to kill him.  Then he decides he is no better than his fathers and tells God he is ready to die.  God tells Elijah to stand before Him on the mount.  And a great wind came and an earthquake and a fire.  But God was not in the wind or earthquake or fire.  And after the fire came a still small voice.  We, too, seek a knowing in a still small voice.

God directs us through the psalmist to “be still and know that I am God” (Ps. 46:10).  Notice the need to be still in order to know.  When we know God, we come to know ourselves and the divinity in our being.  We come to know that our being in relationship with God is his greatest desire.

Ann Glover O’Dell

June 2018

The Secret

Throughout the Psalms the writers entreat God to take away their sin.  And through the prophets God tells his people he will take their sin away.  So what does that have to do with us today?  Is anybody asking God to remove his sin, and does God’s promise still hold?

Many wonder if God desires to be active in the lives of mankind since few examples are seen.  I argue that once we remember the secret and act on it, we can be recipients of the sin-dissolving grace of God.  Remember the prophets who engaged in conversation with God?  Especially the one who looked for God in the storm and whirlwind but found him in the still small voice?  And Samuel who heard God calling his name in the night?  And look at the example Jesus gave, repeatedly going to a quiet place to commune with his Father.

And Gethsemane.  We have only one part of the conversation but we can imagine that God was making himself heard in that exchange.  God’s secret, which is described throughout scripture, is the spiritual conversation God wants to have with us in order to initiate the cleansing we need.

Our free will is as important to God as his love for us.  He will not override the will he has given us.  Instead, he waits for our permission to do what is necessary to wash away all that is blocking us from joyful relationship with him.  Our participation in God’s salvific act is what is required.

It is up to us to initiate the dialog that will give us the confidence in God’s power so that we will give the important permission.  Take paper and pencil and begin with a question.  You are always in control.

Ann Glover O’Dell

6 August 2018

Children of the Father

To understand our identity all we need do is look at the Jesus narrative to the prayer he taught his disciples when they said they didn’t know how to pray. In fact, the first two words tell it all. “Our Father.” We are children of the kind of father with whom Jesus had an intimate relationship. Children with whom this father is as well pleased as He was with Jesus at the river baptism. Not well pleased with the ugly, greedy things we say and do. But pleased with the essence of who we are, because the essence of who we are is the essence of God, the essence of the great benevolent energy of the universe. The water baptism is a naming and a preamble to the baptism of the Holy Spirit who enables us to know our essence.

The voice of God speaking on the mountain top when the disciples saw a vision of Jesus along with Moses and Elijah applies to us and all God’s children as well. “This is my beloved. Listen to him” applies to us whenever we speak kindness and compassion. Whenever and wherever that happens, God not only wants others to listen to us. The reality is that others will listen to us. Whenever and wherever we exhibit fruits of the spirit—goodness, patience, gentleness, and joy—others will pay attention. And they will listen to what we say because there will be wisdom that comes from this fruit.

What gifts to wish for!—that we might know ourselves to be God’s beloved in whom He (and we) take great delight and further, that we observe ourselves producing fruit of the Holy Spirit for all who witness to partake of.

27 September 2015

EASTER

Easter is all about Relationship.

The idea of resurrection suggests the emergence of something that was dead but is alive again.
Nature comes alive again in spring only as flowers and trees stay in relationship to what gives them life—sun, rain, and the fecund soil which holds their roots. The more a plant spreads its roots into the soil, the stronger and more productive it becomes.

The same is true for us. Following the Jesus narrative, something in us must die for us to be resurrected into intimate Relationship with God. The dead husk of our lives must be sloughed off so the kernel of new life can germinate and emerge.

Authentic Relationship with God requires the same as nature requires of her kingdom—something new must emerge. For us that new thing is a being cleansed of anger and guilt which, fresh and new, knows the Ground of its Being, and spreads its roots deep into holy soil. In that rootage we discover the divinity that was always hidden within us and always at our disposal. We become able to walk and talk with God in our spiritual Eden where we experience great beauty and great joy. And all is well with our soul.

(Note: To learn how to give permission to something beyond your control to cleanse you of anger and guilt, see Humpty Dumpty Hatched under BOOK on this website.)