this prey of grace

Education has taught me to think, to analyze, to make sense of things.

I was wonderfully made with a thinking mind that was meant to be used.

I was raised in a religion that was unthinking, conservative, fundamentalist. Don’t think, don’t question, don’t doubt, just believe.

As my mind awakened under the tutelage of such brilliant minds as Krishnamurti, Sam Keen, Echhardt Tolle, I learned to question everything.

Through this questioning, I came to embrace the mystery of life. I have better questions than answers.

I settled into this way of “seeing”. This perspective on life opened my mind, opened my heart, and opened my hands in everyday life. The answers aren’t final. I’ll never understand life or death or God or the universe. There is a tentativeness in all of my beliefs, in all of my thinking. I can no longer dogmatically tell anybody anything.

And yet he pursued me . . .

This brought me to the question of religion, spirituality, and God. How can I know anything for sure? I’m human. My puny mind is so limited.

And yet he pursued me . . .

“I would rather live in a world where my life is surrounded by mystery than live in a world so small that my mind could comprehend it”

– H. E. Fosdick

“Each of us creates a picture of our world by connecting a dozen or so of the trillions of dots that would need to be connected to make a ‘true’ portrait of the universe.”

– Sam Keen

And yet he pursued me . . .

Agnosticism made sense to me. How can I know anything for sure, especially when it comes to the question of God. Especially when the weight of the pain of my life was grinding my face further into the dirt everyday.

And yet he pursued me . . .

“Fear wist (knew) not to evade, as Love wist (knew) to pursue.

Across the margent of the world I fled

“Still with unhurrying chase,

And unperturbèd pace,

Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,

Came on the following Feet,

And a Voice above their beat–

’Naught shelters thee, who wilt not shelter Me.’”

Then, one by one, each finger of my grip was released, pealed away from the objects of my subconscious clutching. Those values I thought so dear . . . ripped away. With nothing left to clutch, what am I? What is left beside these rags? Nothing. Nothing to boast. Nothing to demand. Nothing to expect. Nothing to deserve.

And yet he pursued me . . .

This stubborn chase, this relentless pursuit, this persistent grace; in pursuit of what? of who? of nothing. Why???

And yet he pursued me . . .

This hound of heaven

(He said),

“And human love needs human meriting :

How hast thou merited –

Of all man’s clotted clay the dingiest clot ?

Alack, thou knowest not

How little worthy of any love thou art !

Whom wilt thou find to love ignoble thee,

Save Me, save only Me ?

All which I took from thee I did but take,

Not for thy harms,

But just that thou might’st seek it in My arms.

All which thy child’s mistake

Fancies as lost, I have stored for thee at home :

Rise, clasp My hand, and come !”

Halts by me that footfall :

Is my gloom, after all,

Shade of His hand, outstretched caressingly ?

Ah, fondest, blindest, weakest,

I am He Whom thou seekest !”

After losing all, I fall down, exhausted, heaving, and yet crawling, still crawling, crawling away, unable to believe this pursuit, this persistence, this strength, this love . . . though completely undeserved.

Without understanding what was happening, the journey of my mind was blind-sided by the journey of my heart. The reality my mind perceived was derailed by the reality my heart experienced.

I stop. I quit. I fall . . .

into his arms . . . a fetal mess . . . and yet . . . at rest

Grace is the greatest of all
mysteries.

Grace leaves us in such a state of paucity and dearth, we have nothing left to prove, nothing left to make sense of, nothing left to hang on to, nothing left to do, nothing can be done.

Left prostrate . . . asking “what happened”.

All we are left with is to just rest, just be, just wait, here and now, in the open hands of love.

I think I’m beginning to understand faith, hope, and love . . . at least with my heart.