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If it were possible for [a person] to remain quiet for an hour or less in his inner self-will and speaking, the divine will would speak into him. Through this inspeaking, God's will forms His will in man in Himself, and speaks into the formed, natural, essential, external life of reason and smashes the earthly formation of the rational will, and enlightens it so that immediately the supersensual divine life and will sprouts in the rational will and centers itself in it. ... For if life stands quiet in its own willing, when it stands in the abyss of nature and creature, in the eternal speaking out of God, then God speaks in it. ... Since the abyss, as God, is an eternal speaking, a breathing out of Himself, so also the abyss is spoken into the resigned life. ... Life has arisen out of divine breathing and is a likeness of the divine breathing.
Jacob Boehme (b. 1575), German Lutheran Mystic
How can God speak within me, if I do not restrain my speaking? How can I hear God inspeaking--which is God giving God's Self into and within my self and, thus, transforming my self into God's Self, so that there does not remain a my self--, if I am enraptured and fascinated with my outspeaking? How can I savor the Word, if my ears are filled with words?
If I gaze into my knowing, confident of my seeing, how can I receive the gaze of Christ lovingly looking into and through me, and enter into the Holy of Holies of knowing beyond knowing, and see the Seeing seeing me Within and Without from all things, Who is Seeing, so that there is no more See-er or Being Seen, Know-er or Known?
The Word arises in the absence of words; Thought shines brightly in the night of thoughts. Like a stilled pond perfectly reflecting the Moon in the darkness, the mind perfectly reflects the Divine Face, the Will, when reason is subdued in Stillness. A House speaks secrets from Foundation and Walls, and Ceiling, too--All Inspeaking to all; Wisdom is unheard, until the children fussing are silenced by the head of the House--the will, manifested in choice.
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My own will, an idol--and what an obdurate, will-filled ideological image is that standing proudly in defiance against the general Life and going by the name of God God's Self--must be melted by the fiercely compassionate Sun Sight and transformed, again, into the Tree of Life flowing with the sap of Uncommon Wisdom and bearing the Fruit of Effulgent Vitality--returning, yet going on, before even the Three-in-One did speak or inspeak into that Wisdom had spoken, did breath or inbreathe into that She had breathed into and forth--for we and all creation are Her Fruit.
This Miracle of Non-Religious, or Spiritual, Rebirth happens to and within one who stills the mind and will and holds self in resignation and receptivity--mere silence is only mere silence. It is one thing to be reborn in a religious sense--from below--, another to know the Spirit beyond religion--being reborn from above. The Wind is not a sect, and Christ is not a Christian, or anything else. I am a spiritual Christian, if I have passed through the forms of faith in Christ to the Formless Three-in-One in Christ, the Godhead I cannot attain but can reflect in and only through Undivided Love, which is Beautiful Grace.
Therefore, the Tree of Life, without divisions, is the Tree of Life, and to be in Christ is to devote oneself to no idol, called worldly or religious. The Wind contained becomes other than the Wind; the Spirit contained--that is impossible!
Prayer
Speak afresh in me, Source of Life. Living Wisdom, My Love, breathe into me new vision and new optimism. Revitalize my body and mind. Silence the words in my mind, that I might be filled with your Mind. Still the affections in my heart, that I might be filled with your Love. Speak in me, breathe in me, until I am no more and only You Are. In Christ, My Beloved, and through the Holy Spirit. Amen.
*Jacob Boehme quote is from Jacob Boehme: The Way to Christ, Trans. Peter Erb, in "The Classics of Western Spirituality"
**OneLife writings are offered by Brian K. Wilcox, a United Methodist pastor serving in the Florida Conference of the United Methodist Church. He writes in the spirit of John Wesley's focus on the priority of inner experience of the Triune God; scriptural holiness; ongoing sanctification; the goal of Christian perfection (or, wholeness). Brian seeks to integrate the best of the contemplative teachings of Christianity East and West, from the patristic Church to the present. Brian lives a vowed contemplative life with his two dogs, Bandit Ty and St. Francis, in North Florida. OneLife writings are for anyone seeking to live and share love, joy, and peace in the world and in devotion to God as she or he best understands God.
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