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Wisdom Words
*From Thomas Keating. Heart of the World. On "Humility of Heart."
Humility of heart is the capacity just to be for the sake of God. He called us into being. What more could one ask than the enjoyment of it? We did not ask for it; we did nothing to attain it. It is; and yet we cannot fully enjoy it without humility of heart. We always want to know, "What am I going to do with this being? Do I like it or don't I?" We are able to ask this question because we are free to be. And that freedom is what distinguishes us from the rest of material creation.
One way of entering into this fundamental Christian attitude is to learn once again what it means just to be~to allow ourselves to rest before God with the being he gave us, with no other intention, effort, or purpose, except to surrender that being back to him. This is the orientation of contemplative prayer and the ultimate purpose of every genuine spiritual exercise. Our part is to prepare our faculties to become interiorly quiet until thoughts about God are no longer as important to us as the mystery of God's presence. Our part is to identify with that deep pervasive peace, and not to want to do anything else~not even to brush away the superficial distractions that pass through our mind. This orientation of contemplative prayer is the closest thing to the experience of being, short of God's drawing us into union with himself. We cannot bring this union about, but we can prepare ourselves to receive it, by learning again just to be before God.
Humility of heart is not only just to be. It is also the spontaneous capacity just to do. One cannot just do until he has first learned just to be. It is out of that experience of just being that one can then be content with the joy of just doing. Just doing does not mean that one does not have a purpose, does not think, does not plan. ... Our problem is that we get wrapped up in what we are doing and why we are doing it~analyzing it, planning, worrying about it~so that we lose the joy that is always available~of just doing.
Just to be, just to do~these are the two great gifts of God, the foundations of every other gift. We need to return to these two great capacities again and again and cultivate them. The events of daily life need to be placed in perspective by a deep sense of prayer, by learning how to be before God. ... Every event is a touch of the living finger of God, which is sketching in us~body, soul, and spirit~the true image of his Son, the being that the Father originally gave us and which he is restoring.
Into the Day
I pushed my hands against the Light
Cold became I and lost the Sight
Then palms turned within and opened without
Did cusp warmly the glory bright
I saw that before a table made of wood I knelt
Partaking of wine and bread
But rejoiced, one day, to be fed the Life
After which my heart bowed reverently dead
In this darkness I lay resigned
Within a wombish tomb of water and drear
I arose after travail into the Day
Summoned by a Love that holds all as most dear
. . .
There is a Grace that beholds all equally
Dive into that Eye and live for that Seeing
*Brian K. Wilcox, March 12, 2008
For Brian's on-line audio sermons, go to www.wherethelightshines.org and select Pastor's Corner; on the following page is his weekly sermons given at Christ United Methodist Church, Punta Gorda, FL.
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For replies and biographical information, and submission to "The Light Shines" daily devotionals ~ a ministry of Christ Community United Methodist Church, Punta Gorda, FL, see next page:
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