| ANNE WILLIAMSON |
You may or may not be familiar with last week's World Vision news story. To summarize: World Vision works to end poverty and injustice around the world, most visibly through child sponsorship. On Monday, March 24, World Vision (US branch) announced it would begin employing gay Christians in legal same-sex marriages. After intense criticism and dropped sponsorships from conservative evangelical Christians, on March 26, WV reversed that decision.
Now, as a person unapologetically in favor of comprehensive equal rights for LGBTQ individuals, there are a myriad of reasons I'm anti WV's reversal; but, honestly, the biggest has to do with timing. Sources tell us WV spent 2 years in prayer and discernment around employing committed LGBTQ folks. They took just 2 days to reverse that decision! 2 years of listening amid normal daily life versus 2 days of mind-racing amid a media frenzy and disappearing contributions. If God "speaks," how does God "speak"? How do we decide to trust what it is we "hear"? LISTEN, LEARN, LOVE...
| "He said, 'Go out and stand on the mountain before the LORD, for the LORD is about to pass by.' Now there was a great wind, so strong that it was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind; and after that wind an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire; and after the fire a sound of sheer silence. When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave."
- 1 Kings 19.11-13
Sit with these words a moment. Be still. What do you hear? Meditate. Pray. Wonder. Keep listening...
Transcript excerpt from Oprah's Super Soul Sunday interview with Eckhart Tolle. Video unavailable.
Oprah: "What is your own personal spiritual practice? Do you have one?"
Eckhart: "I don't have a practice as such, it's a..."
Oprah: "Do you meditate?"
Eckhart: "Not in a formal sense, but I, sometimes I sit and just be... without doing anything."
Oprah: "I want everyone to know that you can just do that... There was a wonderful line in the book... I can't remember..."
Eckhart: "Stillness is the language God speaks, everything else is a bad translation."
Oprah: "Say it again."
Eckhart: "Stillness is the language God speaks, everything else is a bad translation. And, of course, the... in stillness you get closest to the source of life, which is God and which is essentially yourself...
Oprah: "Which is the One..."
Eckhart: "The One..."
(Original air date: 11.11.12)
What resonated for you? Or perhaps, did not? Put another way, where did you experience an internal "yes" or "no"? Share it... with a partner, friend, pet, God, etc. Keep listening. Then...
Do something. Try a new way. Actively love another, yourself, God... by setting an intention for the coming week.
Maybe spend some time reflecting on how you make decisions, calling to mind one recent or upcoming. Do you take the time to be still and listen? Or, do you tend to just react? Perhaps you seek out the opinion of others. I do this. Sometimes I'm open to and seeking true counsel, but other times, unfortunately, I'm simply listening for what it is I want to hear. Trusted advisors are good but getting still enough for the core of you to connect to a God, a universe, that wants you (and the world) to be whole is better.