The preacher's final sentence in his sermon at the little Zen Baptist church just before the invitational hymn.

"And if David's heart could cry out so for Absalom, think how much God's Heart cries out for you!"

Gregor's Sermon

Preach-Off: Gregor’s Sermon

(Excerpt from "The World's First Ever Baptist Crime Novel)

In his deep inner being, Gregor knew that he had doomed himself into his current condition, a remarkable insight for a demon. He had been, even more than now, a rebellion hellion. But Gregor carried a small glimmer of light, a teeny sliver of hope, even though hope and light caused his dark heart burning pain.  

Oh, it was still easy for him to lapse into blame of others for his devilish predicament. He had full access to and continued to wallow in the seven deadly sins of Christianity, to cultivate the unwholesome mental factors and cognitive afflictions warned against in Buddhism, to delight in the infidel status ascribed to him by the Quran, and to enjoy being the poster demon child warned against by all religions and spiritual paths.

But Gregor knew that the Universe has an excellent recycling program. These bursts of insight came from a unique event – the visit of Jesus to Hell. Gregor had been present when the visit occurred and his future had changed forever. 

In the church bulletin all had received from the diligent ushers at the little church’s front door, they saw that Gregor’s sermon was entitled “Rescued From Hell.”

After the required prayers and announcements and hymn singing and the taking of the offering, Gregor took the pulpit. His deep bass voice rolled through the congregation.

Have you ever been in that place where life itself is like a living hell? I’ll bet everyone here has felt that at one time or another. (Nods of agreement) Well, I’ve been in that place a lot. In fact at one time I was a prisoner there.

(He had their attention right away with that remark.).

But I wouldn’t be talking with you here today if that was all there was to it. You know how they say that in the darkest night a candle glows? (Amens were spoken.)  And every cloud has a silver lining? 

I’m here to tell you that there is a little bit of heaven in the depths of hell! (Not a single amen on that one. It went against popular theology. But Ted began to smile.)

Now you might not be used to thinking that way. I hope I can make it clearer to you here tonight. 

My life was once in the pits! But something happened and I stand before you now. I think you will be startled by my story.

Will you please turn in your Bibles to Isaiah 24:22?

It says, “And they shall be gathered together, as prisoners are gathered in the pit,

and shall be shut up in the prison, and after many days shall they be visited.”

That’s the pit I’m talking about! Imagine yourself down in that pit milling around in the foul waste of yourself and others, sleep-deprived, taken out and tortured, agonizing over your unknown fate. 

(Junior nudged Thelma, “Is he one of those Ay-rabs we captured?” “Hush, Junior! Just listen!”)

And then, wonder of wonders, totally unexpected, you get a visitor!

I don’t know if you grasp the full implications of that. You are alone, without hope, the only thing keeping you going is some kind of stubbornness deep inside that won’t give up. Days and nights go by indistinguishable from each other. All you know is suffering and uncertainty and fear. 

Then you notice a difference in the atmosphere. The pit-keepers seem both agitated and excited. You are taken with the others and hosed down with cold water, washing away your filth. Clean prison garb is given. 

The word is in the air. Visitor! A visitor is coming! All of a sudden you are reminded that there are worlds other than the hell you are in. Your head lifts up a little bit. Something begins to stir in the numbness – the numbness that has allowed you to survive. 

It’s like when your arm has gone to sleep from laying on it the wrong way and that feeling like tingling painful needles that shoot through when it begins to wake up. 

Except that now it’s not your arm, it’s your soul. The familiar numbness can seem more like your friend than this painful awakening.

(The congregation gave him full attention now. They knew exactly what he was talking about.)

The Visitor was unlike anyone I have ever met. He was powerful, of radiant heart and mind. His eyes were piercing but emanated a force, an energy I knew little about. His gaze would have been unbearable except for his deliberate softening of its intensity. For the first time in my life, I knew mercy. I knew love.

(Eyes were tearing up. Tissues were retrieved from purses, handkerchiefs from pockets.)

It  didn’t take me long to understand the purpose of His visit. You can read it for yourself in Isaiah 42:7.

(Gregor allowed folk time to find it. Many of them being good Baptists and having participated in Sword Drill in the Sunday evening Training Union found the passage immediately.)

I will read it aloud.. “To open the blind eyes, to bring out the prisoners from the prison,

and them that sit in darkness out of the prison house.”

(People began murmuring. Who was this preacher? That verse they just read was generally interpreted as referring to Jesus. Was he saying he was there when Jesus visited hell?)

Some in our group stayed in their numbness, not ready to hear what he had to say. Others, like me, attuned to him right away.

I know what you are thinking. Is this true? Did Jesus really preach to those in hell?

First Peter 3: 18 through 20 says that after Jesus’ crucifixion, he was “quickened by the Spirit: By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison; Which sometime were disobedient, ….”

Jesus had just gone through hell on earth. Tortured in the worst way possible. Abandoned by everyone. By everyone! So he knew what hell was. And when he came to visit, we knew he knew. That made all the difference. In a sense he was one of us.

(People were spellbound now, not knowing what to think. You could hear the sparking fizzle of minds short-circuiting.)

Now I know you are going to be judging me, once all this sinks in. Not only is it the nature of humans to pass judgment, though Jesus taught not to do so, but in this case, my case, it is foretold in the scripture I am about to read.

My last Bible text for this preach-off sermon (Gregor was reminding people where they were, bringing them out of the hell-visitation imagery to the here and now) is I Peter 4:6.

“For this cause was the gospel preached also to them that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit.”

Jesus visited hell to preach the gospel, the “good news.” And some of us heard it and some of us didn’t. Those of us who heard stayed behind and talked with him a little more.

He told us many things. I share two with you. He said that we had done so much wrong that we would always be judged harshly by most people. We understood that and accepted it. But he also said that we were not to be taken down by those judgments. 

And this is the really good news! We did not have to stay in hell but could “live according to God in the spirit!”

And if that is true for demons in hell, think how true it is for you!

Brother Ted, will you lead us in prayer?

Midnight

3 a.m. or so I was reading one of the passages from the Zohar, the one about Midnight, the time when the Ancient Holy One appears with his retinue in the Garden of Eden to visit with all who are open. I felt Presence as I was reading. I finished the passage and sat quietly. Suddenly the lights went off, total darkness, then on again. The digital clock reset to Midnight. Strong calm Presence and happy open heart.

original sin

Want to know what original sin is? (Now don't go climbing up on your high horse and stomping all around at the very mention of the two words. Calm down. You can always do that later.) Want to know what original sin is? It is the separation of ourselves from the Interflow of Life Itself. We stand erect and proud and separate.

This sets up a chain reaction where now we are forced to do something about the Other. We have divided ourselves into Me and All That. All That has now become foreign. 

Love goes away and Fear-Anger-Anxiety move in. We have lost our Birth Right. We have sold it on the Market of Separation.

The good news is this separation can be overcome with Humility and Compassion, the two-fold formula for transformation. Humility: becoming as humus while not losing your sense of humor. Compassion: feeling empathy, identity, with the Other.

I was meeting with a healing class on the Winnebago reservation some time ago. We sat in a circle and began by introducing ourselves. An older woman, gray-haired and with a sparkle in her eyes said: Just call me Dirt Bag. We laughed with compassion and understanding.

Okay. You can get up on your high horse if you wish. But doing so is the replication of original sin -- a moving away from humility and compassion.

mutual weeping

We are all broken-hearted. The Spirit of the Source of our Being, the Blessed Holy One, enters through the openness of our broken hearts and weeps over us, weeps with us. This mutual weeping helps the healing. This world was created to be ruled with love. Broken hearts ensure that love prevails. Mutual weeping creates strength. Then we get up, move on.

That I AM God

"Be still and know that I am God." Psalm 46:10

O humans, this does not mean that you are God no matter how much you like to think so. You are not speaking here. You are being spoken to. Be still, and out of that stillness comes a knowing, a knowing of the "I Am" God, the only God.

What shall I say, asked Moses, when they ask who sent me? God said, Tell them I AM sent you. (Exodus 3:14)

Be still and know that I AM God.

All love, all radiance, all charisma come from here.

God speaks

Each wound is a mouth which speaks. 
God speaks through the wounds of the world, 
not through the scabbed-over.

Journey

In my first 25 years I studied the Bible. In my second 25 years I studied alternate approaches to the Mystery. In my third 25 years I studied the consciousness of individual humans. In my fourth 25 years I return to the Bible as if for the first time.

Job and God

Hey George. I have a question you might be able to answer, scholarly mystic that you are. Regarding the story of Job, Job was God's buddy too. God called him a righteous man. And the bad guy made a bet with God, that he could turn Job against God. And God took the bet. Without going into details, the bad guy/God (I'n not sure which one), gave Job a really hard time - as in brutal, physical psychologically and emotionally heart-rending bad time. Job supposedly remained a righteous servant of God throughout his ordeals. God rewarded him with a lot good stuff. But I just don't get that God would play games with someone who loved him and was a righteous man. Can you explain the lesson here, please?

George Breed Testing of the mettle always happens. Otherwise we sit on our spiritual couch in blob land. We go "down, down, down in that burning ring of fire." How we respond both results from who we are and determines who we are. Job had extremely strong mettle so testing had to be extreme to produce effectual change. What happened was a renewal of a contract -- a renewal at a higher deeper place. You can see the renewal in two verses. After Job's buddies gave all their lawyerly responses, God said (Job 38:3) to Job: Quit groveling around and get up ("Gird up thy loins now like a man") and (here comes the first part of the new contract) "for I will demand of thee and answer thou me." The second part of the new contract comes from Job, as it should, it's a two-way deal (Job 42:4). Job says to God: "Hear, I beseech thee, and I will speak: I will demand of thee, and declare thou unto me." Job gets up on his hind legs as God requested and his first act is to make demands of God. The two. God and Job, now have a tighter relationship. Mutual hearing, mutual demands. Like any friendship. No games.

Bible Walk

"With a leap he stood upright and began to walk" Acts 3:8

Sometimes I get stuck in my head with its visions, its imagery. I catch myself. Hey! With a leap I stand upright, grab my hat, my coat, my camera, head outdoors and begin to walk.

Then the miracle happens. My entire consciousness changes. Birds call. Barren wintry tree limbs wave. Feet feel the earth. The winds sigh. Head stuff lags way behind, disappears. My heart opens and sings.

With a leap he stood upright and began to walk.

eye dull

Terms must be used. Let us use the terms creator and creature. Creator is infinite. Creature is finite. As infinite, Creator cannot be known. As infinite, creator is no object. I capitalize Creator to show it is no object. If we worship Creator as an object, it becomes creator. We make Creator into a thing. Our eye becomes dull. This is an eye dull (idol). 

Bible Walk

Bible -- Walk

Today I begin meditating on the word "walk" in the Bible. I will use Strong's Concordance and investigate each verse as it appears (from Genesis to Revelation). I love to walk. I will "walk" through the Bible. If you wish to join me, click on. If not, ignore me or delete me. I walk on.

Verse One
"Arise, walk through the land in the length of it and in the breadth of it; for I will give it unto thee." Genesis 13:17

To walk, the first action has to be to get up. Get up out of the stale old, the frozen positioning. Arise. A good word "arise." Reminds me of bread dough preparing for an oven bake. You may look as if you are doing nothing but inside you are rising up; the body then follows. Arise.

Walk through the land. The land may be from here to the bathroom or from here to the kitchen. Doesn't matter. Walk it. The length and breadth of it. As you walk, it is claimed. It is given to you. And you are given to it. You are each others. You are the path you walk.

After claiming the land of your dwelling place, your house, your apartment, your shelter, walk outside. Feel your feet on the earth. Look at the sky. Breathe the air. Listen to the sounds. Claim the ground you walk on and in as your spiritual space. Allow it to claim you.

Go for your walk. Kiss the earth with your feet. Swing your arms. Lift your face and laugh. Breathe! Walk. Continue walking through the day, whenever you are on your feet. It will be given to you. What will? You will find out.

Wu Chi Ku

Note to all concerned: I hereby change my soul name (the name which best represents this felt flow of mystery, imagery, energy) from Zen Baptist to Wu Chi Ku. The Z. B. name has become too rigid of confinement, a soul prison. "Wu" and "Ku" mean empty and empty is the only way to continue opening to the felt flow that is. "Chi" means energy or life force. Wu Chi Ku is imaged as a sphere with no surface whose center is everywhere. The soul is freely forming. -- If this does not concern you, be on your way.

Going Soul-ar

Restoration of soul: "Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind." (Romans 12:2)
What is the world but the imagery produced by the party lines of a consumer society? The verse above is revolutionary. Do not be conformed to this imagery though bathed in it, though washed in the ongoing blather of its continuous churning.

Con-formed means to be formed by the con, to adjust our shape to the shape that is called for by those who seek profit from our conformation. Do not be con-formed.

Instead, use soul power. Move from being a fossil to soul-ar. We can trust the core of our being, of our soul. At our core is light and truth and goodness. We toss away the conformation and allow our light to shine through continuous transformation, through moving with a continuous renewal, an eternal opening of our heart-mind.

How do we do this? Through attention. Whatever we attend to, we become. Want to continue attending to the world? Fine, but put it in your peripheral vision. For transformation of our soul and of the world soul, we already know what to give attention to. If you have lost touch with that, sit quietly, listen, and open. Or, my preference, go outside and walk around. Solvitur Ambulando! It is solved by walking around.

As a Zen Baptist

As a Zen Baptist, my relationship with Jesus is direct, immediate, open, with little or no doctrinal interference. The parables of Jesus are regarded as koans, problems to be solved, not on any intellectual or emotional level, but in the realm of paradox. The parables "solve" themselves deep within, exploding and imploding, creating transformations of consciousness not to be predicted or foreseen. Jesus is the Zen Master refusing to rigidly instruct, even casting you away as a student or rather allowing you to cast yourself away if you insist on superficiality or concretized judgment. Jesus is a warrior of spirit, THE Warrior of Spirit, who teaches by example: compassion, strong stance, crucifixion on the cross of time and space, going to the wilderness for contemplation and meditation and demon wrestling but always coming back to face it all again one more time. Jesus, my Teacher, my Sensei, the one who loves me with a fierce love of deep understanding and the willingness to take me back into the dojo, the training hall, the arena of Now, when I fall. He looks at me with stern eyes of compassion and says, "George, here we go again!"

Bread

"Man does not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God." Matthew 4:4

In this story, the Adversary is trying to get Jesus to focus on material bread. Jesus gives this strong reply -- a sword slash cutting through a narrow focus. Without spirit, we are effectively dead.

"Man does not live by bread alone." Man means all humans. We need the life force of physical food to survive. But by itself it is not enough.

"but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God." This means the continuous outpouring of life producing all that is -- from the vastness of the subatomic to the infinity of the metagalactic. Ever-changing, ever being born while ever passing away. Rising while falling.

This is the Formless producing form. This is the Formless forming. This is who we are.

Look in people's eyes. The eyes tell the depth of spirit. Sense your own soul. At times you are more alive than at other times. Ice cream and doughnuts are a temporary fix.

We do not live by pizza and coffee alone (or by arugula salads). But by the energetic life force producing all that is. 

Embodying

Zen Baptist Sunday Sermon: I regard myself as an embodying of the Cosmos. And you as well. When we use the word "God" as a name and sound to represent the Source of this continuous unfolding of the Cosmos, we are embodyings of God. This is no new news amongst many religions or spiritual paths. Jesus himself said "You are gods." Some of us act as if we are IPBs (Isolated Protoplasmic Blobs), dancing around and shaking our fists at It All. But that is just another embodying of the Cosmos, of God. Alan Watts said that we are nerve endings of God. Some of us have a lot of nerve. That's okay. I think Jesus in his time on earth loved them best. They were just entangled in their birth caul.

Knowing Jesus

What does it mean to know Jesus? Not to know of Jesus but to know Jesus. It means to share consciousness. To share the same consciousness state, the same consciousness process. This is not so strange as some might think. Your consciousness is not a closed system. Far from it. Your consciousness state is an interflow of all the people you have met, all the books you have read, all the movies you have seen, all the experiences you have had, and are having, with all that exists both near and far. 

No matter how much some of us like to think so, we are not an island unto ourselves, independent separatenesses standing alone with a fist raised to the sky. The entire cosmos is a web, a matrix of ongoing relations.

To know Jesus means to enter his consciousness, to share his view point, to stand where he stands and look out through his eyes. This is done in the same way that one knows Socrates and Buddha and Lao Tzu and Wolfgang Pauli and Carl Jung and Emily Dickinson and Ibn ‘Arabi and the person who wrote that letter to the editor. It is a familiar process. One we engage in constantly.

To know Jesus I read his words. I read them carefully, slowly. I read them with my heart as well as with my eyes. My consciousness merges with his consciousness. I understand what he is saying. I do not stand out here and look at him and worship him or revile him. I merge consciousnesses. This is how I know Jesus.

Of course, you may not wish to know Jesus. That is your affair. Relax. No one is trying to shove Jesus down your throat. You may wish to know someone or something else. Do it. Do it well and thoroughly. 

As for me, I have become well acquainted with those other folk mentioned above, but the one I love the most and with whom I continue to be engaged in ongoing conversation is Jesus. I love his consciousness: a great sense of humor, of irony, of paradox, of empathy, of understanding, of forgiving while taking no shit. Our relationship continues.

not my will but thine be done

"Not my will but thine be done." What does this mean, this prayer that is not only Christian but also Taoist, Buddhist, Islamist, Judaic, Vedic? How can you surrender to the will, to the influence of your Source? You know how not -- to be crusty, self-reflective, self-absorbed, to dummy down into a small and dense container, to go through each day with a continuous taking of "selfies," a poser of self-disgust mixed with self-admiration.

How can you allow the Source That Births Us to have Its will be done? Why should you even want to? You may awaken to the understanding that you do not know what you are doing, that your actions, including your very thoughts, have far-reaching consequences of which you are not aware. A higher wisdom has birthed you, continues birthing you with the unfolding of each nanosecond. Yet this wisdom is constrained by your obtuseness, by your unpreparedness to receive, by your undeveloped capaciousness. Water takes the shape of its cup and can fill the cup only to the cup's capacity.

The way you live according to the Higher Wisdom rather than to your short-sighted fumbling is through first of all, recognizing that it is possible; secondly, to want to; and thirdly, to develop the capaciousness, the room for this to happen. You do not have to join a religion to do this. It is a direct encounter between you and your Source. 

Making Room

My Mom used to say that God is a gentleman. God will not come where God is not wanted. If you want to know God, you must WANT to know God. Otherwise, you sit within your ego-mobile, your ego-sphere, surrounded by your halls of mirrors and your ongoing "selfies," enamored with your own reflection, both despising it and pumping it up to your orgasmic satisfaction.

The way out is to burst that bubble and open to infinity in every "direction." This is automatically done when you open with Love and with Compassion.  This capaciousness allows room for our Source, the Wellspring, That-Which-Breathes-Us, God. No longer are we alone, looking to fill our date book with every distraction. When continuing to fully open, we are the Cosmos Itself, with the wisdom and energy needed to transform the world we are. 

the warp and woof of spiritual endeavor

The warp and woof of spiritual endeavor: For each person has their conceptual schema, their thought helmet, their consciousness state which places them squarely at the latitude and longitude of their spiritual geography, the triangulation of their soul. As true for you as for everyone, thus view each other with equanimity rather than with triumphal stance or prideful derision. We are each a light within the cosmic heavens.

even in hell

Our Source is everywhere, not just the goody goody places. "If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there." (Psalm 139:8)

that by which

Our Source is not that which one knows but that by which one knows.

zeneration

Observation without identification is zeneration.

the mocking of Jesus on the cross

"The mocking of Jesus on the cross continues to this day. 

We stare into the mirror at our own Medusa reflection and turn to stone with our eternal selfie or we open to the continuous flow of birth and death and resurrection of That-Which-Births-Us-And-Gives-Us-Life." 

(From my forthcoming book, "The Hidden Third: The Story of God.")

rooting and grounding in love

Spiritual Practice (Qi Gung):
"Rooting and grounding in Love." This is an actual whole body movement with the condensing of rooting and grounding then the opening and expansion of Love. It has its own rhythm. You can hear it and feel it in the words as you repeat them: rooting and grounding in Love, rooting and grounding in Love. Get up and do it. Condense. Expand. Condense. Expand. Do the body movements that come naturally. Breathe!

the hidden third

I am enamored of "The Hidden Third" which can resolve much division. For example, imagine a triangle. At its flat base, place "Buddha" on the left of the baseline and "Christ" on the right. On this straight line they are eternally divisive, forever apart. Now, at the apex of the triangle, put "The Hidden Third." The Hidden Third gives birth to both simultaneously. Separate unto themselves but not separate at all. The Hidden Third gives birth to and resolves all paradox, all duality, with no resolution.

zen name

My Zen name was once Nothing Doing.
Now it is Wreck Loose.

on the mark

Zen Baptist -- "Thy words have I hid in my heart that I might not sin against thee." Not the head brain. The heart brain. Not the genital brain. The heart brain. "Sin?" A much derided word. All it means is "missing the mark," one's aim is off course. Breathe and stand as pure heart, no separation from the Interflow of Now, and the arrow you are has already struck the mark before and during release. "Thee" and "thy?" Our Source, the One-Who-Breathes-Us, now and every nanosecond.

Yes

Yes, I am a Christ-ian, a follower of the Christ Wisdom, of the melding of God and Human, of the Source Sourcing, of the Wellspring Springing. Yes, I follow the Christ, the Radiance of Being, the Light that lights all consciousness. 

Contemplation

Attention directs energy. Whatever we attend to, we become. We become like that to which we attend. Attend to a character in a movie, we start becoming like that character. This is why prayer, meditation, contemplation are so important and so powerful. When we pray, we become like our prayer. When we open in con-templ-ation, we enter the templum, the clear open space, and become like that clear open space, like the Godhead that births God, the Wellspring that springs forth, the Source that sources all. If we do not meditate, contemplate, or pray, we pretty much stay a sack of meat caught in thoughts.

The Hidden Third

We have (are) our sensory world of what we call fact and we have (are) our inner world of what we call imagination. They say if we live by the first alone, we are subhuman. If we live by the second alone, we are insane. So most of us move through the day doing a balancing act, always reconciling the two. We move rapidly back and forth from one to the other, so quickly that we may not even notice what we are doing. Yet there is a third force, that which births the two. No, it is not out there in the world of fact. No, it is not in here in the world of imagination. It is the source of the two. It is the Source sourcing. Not defined by “in” or “out,” it is the Third. The Third from which all arises. We are the Source sourcing. We are the Third, the Hidden Third, dualing / dueling. This is the Wellspring springing forth. This is the Living Water which is never quenched, which quenches all thirst.

Heart of Joy

Joy! He realizes deeply that his reason for being is the expression of the joy in his soul, the joy at his core, the joy of seeing a chicken on a roof, of seeing a cat by a pumpkin, the joy of the moon sending bliss through the trees. Others at times seem to wish him to suffer, to be grave and serious, but try as he might, the best he can muster is sincere. Sincere: from the heart. And what is his heart but a heart of joy. Nothing he can do about it. It is his nature and nature they say must take its course.

Confluence

How can we understand others unless we are converted to their position while maintaining our own? This can be particularly difficult with those we like to dislike, love to hate. We may have already decided that we do not wish to understand them at all. Yet this is the example that God, our Source, gives us. God understands everyone. God is isomorphic with, confluent with everyone’s position while maintaining His own. This is different from gods and goddesses who never convert to anyone’s position, who only pretend to in order to get their own way or engage in outright warfare for self gain.

With God as a role model, we engage in paradox. God is nothing if not paradoxical. We open completely to the other’s world view, to the other’s experience of the world while simultaneously not abandoning our own. Paradox. Holding contrary views simultaneously. How is this done? Is it not easier to stand firm within one’s own calcification and judge the world from there? To stare out at the world from within one’s own fortification, protected from all further understanding? 

Self-fortification is old school. These times require, demand interflow. Vengeance and anger and self-righteousness are out, side pockets of putrid staleness. We are becoming more like God and less like gods. How is this done? By moving with the currents of the Life Force itself, by moving with the currents of Love.

Faith, belief, and dogma

Belief, faith, and dogma. Take a chair. Belief is that the chair will hold you up. Faith is actually sitting in the chair. Dogma is believing that your chair is the ONLY chair.

the way you take it

You can take it metaphorically or you can take it literally. Me, I take it intuitionally and those two too. Intuitionally means the whole inner core of the earth you are rumbles and rattles and sends vibrational quakes outward in all directions shaking what is not nailed down and loosening the nails in all the rest.

the eyes have it

Be careful where you place your eyes, for what your eyes take in you become. The eyes are the outward manifestation of the brain. The brain and the heart are intimately connected. The eyes feed the soul. 

The inner vision is as important as, perhaps more important than, the outer vision. Our vision creates our world and co-creates the world of us all.

Jesusian

It is fashionable these days to not believe in Jesus, to not believe in God, and definitely to not believe in Jesus as God personified. So I am out of step with fashion. It is more safe to be a Buddhist or a Taoist. One is spared the anti-God rant. It is also easy to stand on one’s hind legs and howl and yowl at the heavens. Piece of cake. Been there, done that. Or sit quietly in existential despair while one sucks what teats of satisfaction that can be found. Mocking is also “in,” as well as yelling that if one believes in God, one is anti-science. Poppycock. I am one of the most avid scientists I know.

I’ve been re-re-reading the Book of John and find Jesus to be the most powerful example of intellect and heart that I know (and I have read all the “greats”). He is hilarious in some of the things he does and says. He cannot abide pomposity, pops those balloons of righteous indignation as soon as they appear. He leaves the self-absorbed pompous sputtering or with gaping silence. He loves and hangs out with the street folk of good heart, the so-called common folk, while talking at the highest and deepest intellectual and spiritual level with the educated seeker.

I love this Dude. God, our Source, embodying to ask our forgiveness for being such a self-absorbed ruler in earlier times and now coming as a servant to set the new tone. Plus, he speaks in parables, my favorite kind of fare, the cosmic food I love to ingest. I don’t mind if you don’t think this way or experience Life this way. You will do as you will. As for me, I know that we are the Source embodying, that this is the greatest gift that can be bestowed, and that Jesus blazed the trail as the Role Model, the Example.

Global Spirituality

Global Spirituality: the ongoing movement within us all, as planetary citizens, to listen to and move in accord with the Spirit, the Life Force, that forms us, the Spirit of Love, of Grace, of Interflow.

God

The story of God's embodying as Jesus in order to do recompense for his own distancing from and treatment of the humanimals he created makes more sense to me than the story that he did so because of our screwups. By taking on a human life, suffering rejection, and dying young in the cruelest death, he acknowledged our situation by sharing it, taking it on personally, rising out of death anew with a fresh start -- the fresh start being a different relationship, forgiveness all the way around, especially with our forgiving of God. Now we have company, a compassionate, loving, and understanding God. One who truly knows what we are going through. No blame. No judgment. Forgiveness. All the way around. (On reading Jack Miles, "Christ: A Crisis in the Life of God.")

I Die Daily

“I die daily.” I Corinthians 15: 31

What does this mean, to die daily? It means to take the time to release yourself from all your plans and schemes, to know that the hardened shell you have created for yourself as your self is just that, a shell. Not to worry. You can form it again. Or perhaps form one that is a little more effective in your ongoing shell game. “I die daily.” Once a day I release. I let go. I allow go, the onrush of the life I am. I am the flowing water rather than the container. I breathe. I sigh, like the tree branches in the wind. I disappear. Only life remains. I die so I may come to life.

My Work

I do not wish to stand and look at what is wrong. I leave that to others compelled to do so. My work is to assist in putting the first humans on earth. By human I mean one whose consciousness is open to the ongoing flow of the Life Force which births us, which brings us into being, whose embodyings we are. By human I mean one whose mindheart is in conscious relationship with the Source of all being. By human I mean one who lives every moment, every day as a springing of the Wellspring. By human I mean one who is more than an Isolated Protoplasmic Blob (IPB) who lives mainly in a society of IPBs. By human I mean one who has surrendered her IPB to the open radiance of the interflow of the eternal. By human I mean one who has burst open the coffin of self-definition and has become as nothing so that the Great Something can be and is born. I do not wish to stand and look at what is wrong. My work is to assist in putting the first humans on earth.

Children of the Cosmos

We are children of the Cosmos, offspring of the Wellspring, creations of Yahweh, lovers of Allah, daughters and sons of God by whatever name. Each of us receives this knowledge, this knowing, this understanding, this rejuicing and rejoicing in ways we understand. Each cup holds the water according to its shape and its capacity. All cups are welcome in the Kingdom of the Father, the Queendom of the Mother, the Realm of the Infinite Eternal. Each of us holds a sacred space that no other holds. We need each other, learn from each other, respect each other's understanding while not relinquishing our own. This is who we are. This is what we do. Blessings to you if you think your cup is the only one, the true one, and that all other cups are false. The cup is not the focus here. The focus is the Water. Are we open to the flow through of the Water of Life? Are we continuously baptized in its cleansing flow? We open. We pray. We are grateful for the Graciousness. We breathe in Its Goodness. We breathe out Lovingkindness to All.

street talk

Had a really great, deep and interesting spirituo-theo-logical conversation for about 20 minutes or so with a friend I bumped into on the sidewalk today. Enlightening. Thought-provoking. Those just don't happen every day.

One of the topics my friend brought up was pre-prayer. You don't just rush in and grab God by the throat (my terminology). You settle down into a relaxed quiet stillness and then begin your conversation. He brightened at the analogy I used of the anteroom or mud room in South Dakota where you divest yourself of your coat, hat, gloves, muddy or snowy boots and then go in to the inner sanctum of your warm cosy house.

C.H.A.N.G.E.

We live in and as an ever flowing streaming of energy. This energy flows out of and is the Mystery that is so intimate, so close, that provides us with our very breath, that is our Source. We separate ourselves from it, from this streaming at our own peril. We become hardened cysts as we re-cyst the eternal flow.

Let us call this flow Newly Generating Energy. It is happening now, this moment, and every moment. It has moment-um. It is Continuous. It is C.H.A.N.G.E. which takes one of two forms. We are the ones who choose what it is to be.

This eternal flow that we are is either Continuous Hassle Amidst Newly Generating Energy or Continuous Healing Amidst Newly Generating Energy. This is who we are. One or the other. Hassle or Healing. We decide.

We are a closed and knotted fist against it all or we are open flow. What is this Newly Generating Energy that is so healing (making whole, making holy: heal, whole, and holy have similar roots)? It is not the energy of the world we have created for ourselves with its divisiveness, its angers, its separations. That is not the Newly Generating Energy. That is a carbuncle on the butt of God.

The Newly Generating Energy is the life force that births all, from the subatomic to the metagalactic; that births us and continues to birth us ALL. The NGE is the Flow that continues to manifest in all formations. We are embodyings of the NGE. When we identify with the Flow rather than the meat, our lives transform. Love the meat and be the Flow. That has been the way of our spiritual ancestors, spiritual gangsters all.

the soft glow of my awareness

3 a.m. -- Awaking from sleep -- the intermediate world between sleep and wakefulness -- I saw that to “have no other images before me” means to have no images at all in one’s consciousness -- none “before” me. I saw one, sometimes two, images floating in the soft glow of my awareness and my ability to make them disappear -- the lesson repeating itself in my mind -- “have no other images before me.” (Exodus 20:3)

Commentary: If you truly want to see, let go of attachments to your favorite images, to all images, of you, of others, of the world. Let go of self-hypnosis (hip gnosis).

Renegade Preacher

Dear Unborn Kin,

A little info to let you know who continues to write to you. I am a renegade preacher, a mouthpiece for the truth I hear in the marrow of my bones and the blood of my heart. Preachers are not popular anymore but when has that ever mattered when you know what you know and are compelled to speak it out loud. Though I do like the appellation of mouthpiece better. The mouthpiece gets out of the way and lets the client do the talking.

One of my favorite parts of the Bible is In Hebrews !3 where it refers to Jesus going “outside the camp.” This is where I went and still am. Outside all camps of formulated thought. Outside all camps yet seemingly welcome at every campfire. Like I said, renegade preacher.

Nothing to be done about it. Nothing I want to do about it. It's who I am and what I do. The next time I write I will move far away from this, to me, boring topic. Back to the condition of the world we find ourselves in today.

I hope all this that is happening now in 2014 has turned out well for you.

Your Loving Ancestor

Views

A gentleman was on TV tonight saying that the Pope's statement that evolution is not inconsistent with the notion of creation is a case of the Pope trying to have his cake and eat it too. He said it was dualism (matter plus spirit, the Pope's view) versus materialism (only matter exists, his view -- which he regards as absolute truth). He neglected to mention my (and a few others' ) view, which he may not know exists, that all is spirit (the life force) and that matter is simply condensed life-force or spirit. All three views accept that everything came from NoThing. As for me, I certainly don't mind calling that God.

the seen and the unseen

The Seen and the Unseen. The Seen is what is seen through the physical senses. The Unseen is all else. The Seen is a very small world compared to the Unseen. To build one's life around the Seen and ignore the Unseen is like an eagle trying to live in a hummingbird's nest. Or, perhaps more appropriate size wise, like trying to fit the boundless Cosmos into a thimble. And here is the Mystery. It can be done. This is who we are.

Yayyyy Jesus!!!

Many seem to have made Jesus into a sanctified marshmallow for their salvational s'mores, but he was a wild paradoxical parable speaking dude who hung out with the lowlife, spurning the societal, religious, and political establishments! Yayyyy Jesus!!!

capaciousness

"Capaciousness. It's all about capaciousness. Capacity. Room." The folk around me have heard that more than a few times. Here's a Jesus story that points to the truth of that. I read it a few minutes ago. It's in Mark.

"6 1-2 He left there and returned to his hometown. His disciples came along. On the Sabbath, he gave a lecture in the meeting place. He made a real hit, impressing everyone. “We had no idea he was this good!” they said. “How did he get so wise all of a sudden, get such ability?”

3 But in the next breath they were cutting him down: “He’s just a carpenter—Mary’s boy. We’ve known him since he was a kid. We know his brothers, James, Justus, Jude, and Simon, and his sisters. Who does he think he is?” They tripped over what little they knew about him and fell, sprawling. And they never got any further.

4-6 Jesus told them, “A prophet has little honor in his hometown, among his relatives, on the streets he played in as a child.” Jesus wasn’t able to do much of anything there—he laid hands on a few sick people and healed them, that’s all. He couldn’t get over their stubbornness. He left and made a circuit of the other villages, teaching."

There you go. They thought about him this way, then thought about him that way. Then decided to shut down. No capacity to receive. No capaciousness. Then, no matter what, Jesus "couldn't get over their stubbornness." My point? It seems to be a law of the universe. If I don't make any room in the In, nothing will get in. Capaciousness. I'm the only one that can open and allow greater and greater understanding and the happiness of a large and gracious spirit.

Zen Baptist Book Intro

Long years ago I packed my metaphysical bags and left Troup and Fulton counties and the Baptists behind to go see what the Buddhists were up to. I could not have stated it clearly at the time but I had a definite sense of mission and purpose. Little did I know that I would learn the rudiments of Zen through the martial arts at Tatsuo Shimabuku's dojo behind his house in Agena, Okinawa. Now I am reporting back to the Baptists as some kind of rebound missionary with my gained perspective. But they may not trust me. Am I still a Baptist? 

I am a Zen Baptist -- a peculiar sort of Baptist to be sure. Buddhists of old were horrified by the Zen Buddhists chopping up wooden likenesses of the Buddha for firewood because they were way too cold. This Zen Baptist has no problem with chopping up the icons that we Baptists get too comfy with, too attached. But then neither did Jesus in his day. The rigid ones gave themselves holy hell over his words and ways.

Marcus Borg writes eloquently and well of the pre-Easter Jesus (the human historical Jesus) and the post-Easter Jesus (the experiential Jesus of Christianity). I write of the post-Christian Jesus, who has escaped the mindset, dogma, and doctrines of Christianity, who has gone beyond human consciousness structures, who cannot be captured by a net of moral values and triumphant righteousness. I know and love all three. 

I was looking at a book my Mom gave me a few years ago: George MacDonald’s “The Highlander’s Last Song.” On the title page, she wrote in her fine penmanship, “Just wanted to share with you such deep-thinking and good words. So much like you. Love always, Mama.” She then inscribed “p. 53, 54 bottom paragraph.” The paragraph, marked by her with a line in the margin, says: 

“Ian was one of those blessed few who doubt many things by virtue of a larger faith—causing consternation among those of smaller faith who wrongly see such doubts as signs of unbelief. But while his roots were seeking a deeper soil, his faith could not show so fast a growth above ground. He doubted most about the things he loved best, while he devoted the energies of a mind whose keenness almost masked its power, to discover possible ways of believing them. To the wise his doubts would have been his best credentials; they were worth ten times the faith of most. It was truth, and higher truth, he was always seeking. The sadness which colored his deepest individuality could be removed only by the conscious presence of the Eternal.”

Thanks, Mom.

Son of Man

As I continue becoming more closely reacquainted with Jesus through reading The Message, a translation of the Bible in contemporary street language (more my style), I am struck by his use of "the Son of Man" in referring to himself. I googled it and found considerable disagreement as to what it means. So I sat quietly and I could see what it means. Jesus is the furtherest birthing of all humanity. He is out there, ahead of all of us. He is the advance opening of consciousness, of wisdom, of understanding. As we continue to open to the consciousness state of Jesus, we move the consciousness state of humanity, of Man (which includes all gender) to higher, wider, deeper realms.

morning thoughts

Morning thoughts: I dearly love Jesus. Am reading anew of his exploits in Eugene Peterson’s “The Message.” He really gave the hypocrites (those who say one thing and do another) and the warmongers of his day a tough time. They couldn’t do a thing with him in direct encounter. So they had him killed of course. Not much has changed. Except for one thing. The spirit and presence of Jesus is still around. Here I am talking about him, loving his example, and laughing about some of the things he said and did. I think Jesus and Buddha and Lao Tzu and Muhammad and Chuang Tzu would get along well. In fact I think they do. It’s we humanoids that set up barriers and sit within our exclusive enclaves hurling out invectives at all who disagree with us. It’s time for people of Heart in all spiritual paths to love, respect each other and to work together in harmony. We are all members of the Navel Tribe, plucked from the same vine, with the belly scar to prove it.

Awareness awarenessing

We are Awareness awarenessing. We generally identify only with the small "a" awareness. We are like a pen writing upon a page. The pen point thinks it is of independent existence making this mark here now (small "a" awareness). The pen point fails to realize (real eyes) that it is a part of a pen held by a hand attached to an arm attached to a body of Conscious Awareness. Thus we have "churches" of the Holy Pen Point, others of the Total Pen, a few of the Hand and Arm, some of the Entire Body, and almost none of the Wholly Beyond. We are Awareness awarenessing, yet we become so engrossed in the marks we are making on the paper that we rarely open to Awareness. This is the world we live in. This is the world we have made and are making.

no such coin

There are those who worship God "out there" and those who reject God "out there." The worship and the rejection are two sides of the same coin. The coin is projection. The two, worshipper and rejector, though appearing diametrically opposed, are bound together by a common element: divisive consciousness. The person who lives as Interflow has no such coin in her pocket.

grace and wu wei

When one does not cut God off by putting Him as "out there," the Christian concept and experience of grace is highly similar if not the same as the Taoist concept and experience of wu wei, flowing with What Is.

friction

This world is friction. Walk is friction. Talk is friction. Thinking is friction. Relationship is friction. Even love needs a lubricant. The move toward homogeneity (sameness) and the move toward heterogeneity (difference) is ongoing. Neither goes away nor should or this world will disappear. These two simultaneous counter moves creating such friction are balanced by a third force: stillness. A dynamic stillness moving with (not against) the friction. This stillness is at our core.

framed

Our physical body has a skeleton, a framework for supporting it. So does our spiritual body. The spiritual body's frame is called a religion or philosophy. Whatever it is called, our spiritual body has a skeleton. It is a handy device for holding one's place, for getting around. One day it will dissolve too. Then where will the spiritual body be? Where it is right now when it has no frame.

Question: Why were you like you were?
Answer: I was framed, Your Honor.

who

Cosmotheophilosphy 101. Some believe there is a Divinity. Some believe there is not. My question is: Who is this believing? Who is this believing there is? Who is this believing there is not? Who? You might say "I" or "me." Who is this I? Who is this me? You might start to give some explanation, but that just sets up the same question: Who is it giving this explanation of who they are? Who is it that has a mind made up?

Jesus and Buddha

Jesus gave me love. Buddha opened my mind.

mister awake

To my Christian friends who may not know: Buddhism is not a religion and Buddha is not seen as a god. He was walking along after his awareness opened, noticeably different, radiant. Someone asked, "Are you a god?" He said, "No. I am awake." Buddha means awake. He is Mister Awake. Buddhism is a philosophy of life. One of its teachings is that attachment is suffering. He also said, "Don't listen to me. Go find out for yourself."

the three stooges of the mind

Amongst all the cosmic realms, the realms of conscious awareness, we live in the Realm of Desire. Three forces keep us here. One is wanting what we do not have. This craving, this never fulfilled greed, is a hell of eternal dissatisfaction. A second is not wanting what we do have. Hostility and anger. The willingness to throw it all away. The third is stupor, the willingness to shut down awareness. Ignore-ance. These are the three stooges of the mind: Greed, Hostility, and Stupor. They come in both subtle and blatant forms. We see them operating in others more easily than the mind rotting that takes place within ourselves. To escape their hold, a first step is to become aware of their existence. I learned this from Buddha, Mister Awake, the great psychologist. Jesus, the great heart, fully agrees.

relational christianity

Orthodox christianity is based upon sin being obliterated through sacrifice. Relational christianity is based upon ignorance being obliterated through awareness.

the same infinity

No answers exist "out there" that are not also "in here." The outer infinity and the inner infinity are the same infinity.

theological filter

A theology is a developed system of religious belief and theory. What many folk who say they rely upon the New Testament writings about Jesus as truth do not comprehend is that those writings are a theology, a developed system of religious belief. That system, composed of Greek, Roman, and Jewish thought, is superimposed on Jesus. Only writings about Jesus that fit that organized system of thought and belief were allowed into the New Testament. All other writings were excluded. In reading the New Testament, one is looking at Jesus through a filter.

conversion

On Conversion. A simple way to experience conversion (change of consciousness state) is, if you are sitting down stand up, or if you are standing up take two steps in any direction (watch out if you are standing atop a tall building), or go to the next room. We are "converting" from our old selves all the time yet may think we are the same.

what is man?

"What is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him?" (Psalm 8:4)

Or as the genderly correct might say: What is a human, that thou art mindful of him/her? and the offspring of humans, that thou visitest her/him? But if you take the deeper mystic understanding that these two questions go beyond mere gender differences and their bounds we so love to defend, these two questions reverberate in a deep cosmic cry. Who are we? Who is this breathing us? Why are we alive? What is going on?

Being a psychologist, a mystic and a mythopoet, I see two consciousness realms referred to here. One is ordinary everyday make-a-buck linear eat-and-poop consciousness. The other is mythopoetic cosmic mystic supramental consciousness. The one deals with hardcore matter (condensed lifeforce); the other opens to boundless mystery.

The two questions contain their answers. When we are in ordinal consciousness, everyday consciousness, we are locked into ourselves, and our Source can only be mindful of us. We allow no more than that. We are a private universe chugging along on our own mission.

When we open awareness as the "son of man," as that which is emerging from ordinal consciousness, we are visited by an awareness that goes beyond all human societal definitions, aims, wants, and wishes. We become not only planetary, but cosmic citizens. We move from being a closed system to open interflow with all that is. Our education has just begun.