God is Spirit

“An hour is coming and now is,

when the true worshippers shall

worship the Father in spirit and truth;

for such people the Father seeks to be His worshippers”

(John 4:23)

It’s a worship from within, in Spirit, tapping into this inexplicable knowledge, truth, a deep form of intuition that goes beyond intuition and into knowledge of truth.

            Next, Yeshua says something revealing: “God is Spirit” (John 4:24).  While this statement does complement the traditional concept of the Trinity, it doesn’t fit into our popular concept of God.  Yeshua’s own depiction of God as “Father” fits the way we perceive God as a much larger and far grander version of us humans.  But, here, Yeshua clarifies that the Father uses the names Father, God, is “spirit.”  In verses 4:21-24, Yeshua uses the names Father and God interchangeably as He who is worshipped in spirit and truth, so Father = God = Spirit.

“God is spirit,

and those who worship Him

must worship in spirit and truth”

(John 4:24)

            In the full statement, Yeshua suggests we cannot worship God unless we worship “in spirit and truth.”  Religion is not worship.  Rituals are not worship.  Adherence to doctrines is not worship.  Going to church is not worship.  These things can be done, and perhaps they’ll be of some benefit, but they are not “worship.”  If we consider this full discourse, with living water “springing up to eternal life” in the one who receives it and worship “in spirit and truth,” then it seems “worship” is more akin to deep prayer and meditation than most of our usual concepts of “worship.”  It can take place corporately, but likely cannot occur unless it also, and most importantly, takes place privately.

© 2014 by Karina Jacobson.  All rights reserved.  Please use only with permission from the author.

To Believe or to Know

“He who comes from above is above all,

he who is of the earth is from the earth

and speaks of the earth.

He who comes from above is above all.

What he has seen and heard,

of that he bears witness;

and no man receives his witness”

(John 3:31-32)

The repeated refrain of Yeshua to Nicodemus in the Gospel of John, poetically expressed as a wrap in verse 31, “He who comes from above/heaven is above all,” sounds curiously akin to a few statements in the Gospel of Thomas, where they are applied to any of the special few men and women who find their way into the kingdom.

Next we see that he who is “above all” knows, for “what he has seen and heard, of that he bears witness” (v. 32).  This one does not merely “believe,” he knows, for only one who knows can “bear witness.”  However, the manner in which he knows is quite distinct from that of men in general, “for no man receives his witness.”  This is because men, in order to “believe” (let alone “know”) must have empirical evidence or a “sign” the people kept demanding.  Men need to see, touch, hear, and taste in order even to believe, let alone know.  However, he who comes from above knows without that empirical evidence because he has evidence that goes even deeper than the empirical variety.

Often, the knowledge begins with empirical evidence, some miracle that should not be chalked up to “coincidence.”  These are moments for which I mock the skeptics: It takes more faith to believe this statistical impossibility was due to random chance than to believe in a divine miracle.  Sometimes a series of such clues coms forth to boost one’s faith, and once one’s “faith has made [himself] well,” one moves beyond belief, trust and faith, and into knowledge: “I don’t believe, I know,” as Carl Jung has famously answered in response to whether he believed in God.

            At this point, one knows not from empirical evidence, but from some remarkable and inexplicable knowledge from within.  It is akin to the knowledge of babies and toddlers that defies any scientific understanding: How do babies learn how to walk and talk?  Frankly, scientists are baffled and admit they don’t know.  So Noam Chomskey coined the term, “Language Acquisition Device,” known by its acronym the “LAD,” to provide, at the very least, a definition of this mystery and a term for the convenience of researchers, psychologists, pediatricians, educators, and others who work with children who may have a weakened “LAD” in contrast to those who have a healthy “LAD.”

In essence, what is the LAD?  A divinely placed mechanism into humans that teaches us to talk, read, write, and communicate.  Neurologists still haven’t found it, and they won’t, for it is not biological, but a divinely implanted system of knowledge in the human mind.  Others have likened this knowledge to knowing a sunset is beautiful.  How do we know?  Because beauty has been divinely written into our hearts, so when we encounter it, we know.

            Likewise, those “born from above” have another divinely placed mechanism within their mind by which they “know” things others don’t.  Psychics, remote viewers, and those with ESP have such unusual knowledge that’s inexplicable to those without this knowledge.  Those who are spiritually infused with special knowledge, who have been “born from above” and are publicly acknowledged to have spiritual insight are called “prophets.”  Others may lack this public acknowledgement but nevertheless maintain such a divinely placed gifting of inexplicable knowledge.

            Given that such knowledge is inexplicable, “no man receives his witness” (v. 32).  “How are we to believe you?” men ask.  “Just because you say so?”  “What evidence do you have?”  “Show us a sign.”  It cannot be done.  Attempting to explain this knowledge is an exhausting and exasperating trial in futility that thoroughly frustrates both the one trying to explain it and the one trying to understand.  Most who have received such inexplicable knowledge have stories of their own futile attempts at explaining it, often to receive mockery, scorn, and diagnoses of psychological disorders.  Eventually, the wise ones learn to shut up and accept that “no man receives his witness.”

© 2013 by Karina Jacobson.  All rights reserved.  Please use only with permission from the author.

Labor pains: Birthing into Something New

“Dear friends, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal that has come on you to test you,

as though something strange were happening to you. 

But rejoice inasmuch as you participate in the sufferings of Christ,

so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed”

(1 Peter 4: 12-13)

Every Christian circle has a few taboo topics.  Here we are on the first day of a new year, and I’ve decided to take one of them on.  Hmmm, I may be asking for a dangerous year.  But it’s time to live bold.  This topic is critical, and when Christians ignore it, they lose what could be one of the most significant opportunities of their lives – because they don’t know how address it.  It’s a pattern that comes forth when spiritual development is on the brink: obstacle, prayer, victory.  If we don’t know the pattern, we may miss the victory.  What do some call this pattern?  “Spiritual warfare.”

If I am to address such a topic, why would I choose to do so, of all days, on New Year’s Day?  Shouldn’t this be a day of celebrating what is new?  Why talk about something that sounds so evil?  Even demonic?  First, it will become clear that I see this pattern as neither evil nor demonic, but purely natural, as natural as labor pains, and, like labor pains to new birth, surprisingly appropriate for discussion as we begin a new year.

I came into the Christian Family at the age of 15, through a church that loved me into the healing I needed.  A year later, I joined my first mission trip to build houses for the poor in Mexico, which touched a passion in me and began a decade of many more such mission trips.  There was an understanding at this church that “spiritual warfare” often accompanies mission trips.  Invariably, they’d warn us, the van may break down on the way (and do just fine on the way back, by the way), or the luggage won’t make it, or team members will get sick, or some other unexpected and obscure hitch will present itself that delays the mission or threatens it altogether.

                 

My church group never expressed that such obstacles derived from some sinister entity, but explained the pattern as one permitted by God to strengthen our faith.  Sure enough, the obstacles came.  Thankfully, because our group was prepared, we knew what to do: circle up and pray.  We didn’t let the obstacles discourage us, defeat us, or hold us back.  Instead, they emboldened us and brought us to prayer, bold prayer.  Then we watched the Spirit move in remarkable ways.  I learned the pattern: obstacle, prayer, victory.

Meanwhile, I and my biological family traveled extensively for study and pleasure, I also noticed that such obstacles were less frequent and less intense on travels for other purposes.  Such hitches did come for those too, but less often and less intense.  And, please, before casting off these observations as unique to my experience, ask a handful of seasoned missionaries if obstacles are more likely on travels for missions than they are for other purposes, and the knowing ones will smile, nod, and say that obstacles, especially on the way, to mission trips defy the statistics.  Seasoned missionaries know the pattern: obstacle, prayer, victory.

The pattern taught me that it held for moments beyond mission trips.  When a spiritual development was on its way, so were the obstacles.  And I understood the proper response: prayer.  Bold prayer.  To meet with triumph, I learned from this church that it takes bold prayer that calls upon a Great God to do Mighty works against any obstacle in the way of what the Holy Spirit is doing.

Thank goodness it was this church that led me into Christ.  Thank goodness this church had prepared me for a spiritual battle many years later that was misunderstood by everyone around me and that otherwise could have led to the very breakdown of my marriage.  Thank goodness this church had taught me about spiritual warfare and about bold prayer.  My gratitude can no longer remain silent.  Let me share my own battle.

During a 3 ½ month period of time, occasionally hinted at on this site, I lived through what I now affectionately call my “summer in the twilight zone.”  I wasn’t calling it that then.  The nightmares were terrifying, and my toddler was waking with them at the same time as I was.  I’d wake in horror, sweating, heavy breathing, wide eyed and shaken, and seconds later, my toddler in the next room over would let out a blood-curdling scream, waking from her own nightmare.  The sicknesses, the lost passports the day before they were needed, the for-a-separate-post trials facing our marriage, the subsequent wedding rings both my husband and I lost, the story I (Karina) shared here, the car accident, which was separate from but later in the week as the story just linked, and other bizarre trials hit heavy over a matter of six weeks, during which I was also awed by extraordinary spiritual glory.  (See again the link just noted.)  As I’ve expressed before, my “summer in the twilight zone” carried a remarkable mix of glory and terror, and it truly was the time of my own Awakening.

It wasn’t until I faced these battles that I discovered how ignorant most Christians are of these forces that come at peak spiritual moments in our lives.  To everyone around me, all of the bizarre circumstances were chalked up to an odd mix of coincidence.  Be they my Christian friends or my spiritual leaders, were the available during this time, they all found me to need psychological help and gave no credence to my cries for bold prayer against the forces terrorizing me.

I say “were they available during this time” because some friends and leaders were out of the country or otherwise inaccessible during this time, but once my twilight zone had passed, the Spirit blessed me with quite a few who understood.  One, after hearing a litany of craziness, stopped me at “car accident,” cast her index finger out, and exclaimed, “That’s spiritual warfare!”  I breathed a sigh of relief.  Thank you.  Finally, someone understood and gave it a label it deserved. 

I had been so exhausted trying to find anybody who could understand, both for the emotional support I longed for and for the prayer team I desperately needed.  My friends could see that my marriage was in danger, so on their own, they prayed for that and probably for my psychological health, but they weren’t willing to pray with me.  They wanted me to stay put at home at a safe distance from them, while they reported they were praying for me on their own.

So I truly had to learn what I heard Christ whisper and often repeat, “I am with you, My daughter.  Come to Me.  I am with you.”  So I came to Him and I prayed, and I prayed boldly.  I saw the pattern: obstacle, prayer, victory.  I met the obstacles, I prayed, I kept meeting obstacles, I prayed more boldly, I still kept meeting obstacles, I prayed even more boldly, and I found victory.  I still kept meeting obstacles.  This is an important point.  The obstacles persist even when prayers are uplifted, and even if we consider them bold, but victory sometimes comes only after we send up more prayers that are more bold than we could ever imagine to be necessary.

Obstacle, prayer, victory.  I had learned the pattern, and I implemented it when it became necessary.  Tragically, not all Christians understand this pattern.  They see these obstacles at very pivotal moments in their lives, at moments when they see all the signs that the Spirit is about to do a great work in them and through them, and they think the obstacles are a cruel coincidence.  And they moan, groan, and whine over the obstacles.  And then the obstacles defeat them, and they cry, and they cry hard because they had “thought” they were on the brink of something great, but the obstacle held them back.

I have sat and listened in grief to such tragic stories of other Christians.  To me, all the signs were clear: the Lord was about to do something great in them and through them.  “So did you pray?” I’d ask.  “Of course,” they’d reply, insulted.  “No,” I’d say again, “Did you PRAY?”  Then they’d look at me more insulted and shake their head, not at my question, but at me.  I got my answer.  They hadn’t prayed.

Obstacle, prayer, victory.  It’s a pattern noted often throughout the gospels and epistles and in a few Christian circles.  In these circles, it is a pattern that often comes under a label that seems to repel other Christian circles, “spiritual warfare.”  I can see why the label doesn’t work for many.  It conjures up images of angels and demons sword-fighting in Christian sci-fi novels.  I get it. 

Further, in some circles, the concept of “demons” is associated with the pattern, and I’d like to acknowledge here that this concept of “demons” can be a helpful way of perceiving it, as imagining “demons” can embolden people to become the very prayer warriors they need to be in order to have victory.  The way I see the pattern, however, is neither sinister nor demonic, but natural.  Perhaps we need a term that is less off-putting and more precise.

Labor pains.  Isn’t that what is happening?  We are on a path of birthing something new and, just when we’re on the brink of birthing it, obstacles and suffering come forth.  We are laboring to birthing something new.  Very little that is truly meaningful comes without labor and without hardship.  So when we see the obstacles, may we not be defeated.  May we not groan at what we’re told to call “coincidences” and, therefore, lack the boldness to fight.  May we name the moment, perhaps as “labor pains” or the simple pattern of “obstacle, prayer, victory.”  By acknowledging the moment for the pattern it carries, we prepare ourselves to pray with boldness and declare victory.

May any labor pains in our New Year usher in New Birth.  May 2014 be a year of bold prayer and great victory.  Amen.

© 2014 by Karina Jacobson.  All rights reserved.  Please use only with permission from the author.

Celebrating Birth

Christmas blessings!

 

Today, we celebrate the birth of the Christ Child, and we can reflect on this birth as a birth for each of us as well.  So on this day of birth, I’m reposting The Birth of the Mystic:



Many of us here began in a tradition that filled us with awe.  In time, we found ourselves conflicted.  We began to “wrestle,” ignorantly thinking that no question is a bad question – only to discover some questions are off-limits.  Why? we wondered.  Isn’t God big enough to take any question?  If we posed this one aloud, we may have drawn out special aggravation, as the answer is clear and implies the next question: Sure, but is the church?

Some of my own questions stemmed from the discord between the God I had discovered within my own heart and spirit and the one described by my tradition, as well as the one described by the scriptures, as interpreted by the religious.  Why, I wondered, did God harden Pharaoh’s heart?  Why would Jesus have prayed for Peter, but not for Judas, when Satan was “sifting” all the disciples as “wheat”?  ("Simon, Simon, Satan has asked to sift each of you like wheat.  But I have pleaded in prayer for you, Simon, that your faith should not fail" ~ Lk. 22:31-32)  And the big stumper: why would God command Joshua to commit genocide?

Posing the big questions can be dangerous, not only for the persecution it might bring from external forces, but even more for the internal persecution it can bring from our own internal forces.  Hence, we hear Dumbledore’s wise admonishment: “Curiosity is no sin, Harry, but one must exercise caution.”  Jesus blessed those who were willing to persevere in this trial: “Blessed are they who have been persecuted within themselves.  It is they who have truly come to know the father” (Gospel of Thomas, 69).

For a time, we wrestled on our own, posed our questions to the Lord in private, and pretended conformity within our tradition – only to betray our non-conformity from time to time.  We did not yet know we were mystics.  We were like “mystics in the womb”: yet to birth what was inside.  So in this season of Advent, we can celebrate not only the Birth of the Christ, but also the birth of the mystic.  This is the moment when the long nights of wrestling and struggling birth themselves into the daylight.  We awaken out of our human construct and into our identity as mystics, recognizing our divine spirit within.  We begin to trust the Light within, follow it, celebrate it, and live into it.

But as newly birthed mystics, we face a new question: as we follow the Light within, do we remain with our tradition as well?  Our tradition, after all, did point us to this Light.  Our tradition taught us the sacred, hinted at the mysteries, and directed us to the scriptures.  Meanwhile, our tradition had also set itself up like a boat with the mission of carrying both the sacred contents and the sacred souls into eternal life.  But once the mystic-in-the-womb is birthed, he discovers holes in the boat.  Using basic logic of cause-and-effect, he sees the ultimate end for the boat: it will sink. 

Upon such a discovery, many leave the tradition entirely – not only the boat, but everything in it.  Some here have done so for a time, and even those of us who haven’t, know many who have.  When some of my friends ask my opinion about those among our mutual tradition who have left, I sometimes return their question with another:  Is it better to embrace or reject a false Christ?  Oops, another “off-limits” question that is usually followed by the critical one: who is the true Christ?

Most of us here are attempting that challenging, narrow, center path: embracing the sacred within the boat, releasing our need for the boat, and expressing love for the boat in spite of its holes. 

I am reminded of St. Paul who foresaw the sinking of the boat he was in and received a promise from an angel that while the ship would be lost, all lives on the boat would be saved.  Regardless of the future of each religious tradition in its outer form, the contents within – the worshippers and the mysteries: found within the worshippers, the scriptures, and the sacred rites – will forever live on and ultimately harmonize into a radiant Bride.

While we celebrate the birth of Christ today, may we also celebrate our own birthing into the Light.

© 2013 by Karina Jacobson.  All rights reserved.  Please use only with permission from the author.

Surprising? Risky? Praying . . .

I just did something unprecedented today: I wrote a letter to POTUS.

In my previous post, you can see my letter to Congress, which began with the answer to my own prayer that President Obama would seek Congressional support for his proposal to send air strikes to Syria.  The response of the media, so surprised by his change of course, prompted me to post a question on Facebook: “Have any of the rest of you been struck by the two most common words the media has been using to describe Obama’s decision to seek Congressional support: ‘surprising’ and ‘risky’?”

My first comment in the comments section read as follows: “From the standpoint of an average American citizen, these two words are 'surprising.' Didn’t he make the common-sense choice? Didn’t he take the right, Constitutional action in a democracy? Then why are all of the reporters in all of the mainstream media outlets beginning their reports with headliners like, 'Obama is taking a big risk . . .' or 'Obama made the surprising move . . .'? Do they know something the average American citizen does not? 

 

"The President's decision to seek Congressional support for the strikes on Syria may be his most independent decision of his Presidency.  And, it may put him in danger.  If Congress says 'no,' then he either goes against the will of the people and faces many angry vigilantes, or, perhaps more precarious, he stands with the people and faces even more sinister forces."  In the next comment, I solicited prayer for the president to follow his own convictions.

A good deal of banter followed, particularly with one friend who said our president doesn’t have convictions and, instead, “bows to his masters.”  I added to my first comment as follows: “According to reports, [his decision] has 'stunned many,' including his 'closest advisors,' who had 'strongly urged' against it. This is why the reporters are so 'surprised.' It appears he followed his own convictions.”

He remained cynical, while I remained optimistic:  “So why do I have optimism? Because I prayed for Obama to change his mind and ask for Congressional support, and he did. And now ‘many are stunned’ and it's being reported as a miracle. So I'm praying for more miracles: for the miracle that Congress says ‘no,’ and then the miracle that Obama stands by the people, and then the miracle that his life is spared, and then the miracle that the Syrian people forge a new life in safety and freedom. I'm praying for more miracles!”

To that he replied, “. . . and they all lived happily ever after . . .”  I chuckled, said “smiling with ya’,” added that “realistically, change is a very slow and painful process,” and noted “momentum is building.”  He wasn’t sure, linked to an article with good facts but a sarcastic tone, and I closed with a line from my letter to Congress: “"How tragic it is that in place of debating how much asylum and humanitarian support we can provide, we are instead debating how much violence we should inflict.”  He “liked” it and our discussion was done. 

 
But my prayers were not.  Today, Syria has expressed a willingness to negotiate, so miracles are possible.  Also today, I was led to send the following letter to our President:

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

September 10, 2013

President Barack Obama

White House
1600 Pennsylvania Ave. NW
Washington, DC  20500

Dear Pres. Obama,

Thank you for asking for Congressional support for air strikes to Syria.  Trusting in your heart of democracy, I had been praying you would make this decision and rejoiced when you did.

To one who had been praying, the media headliners, at first, were puzzling: “The President has made the surprising decision . . .” or “The president took a risky move . . . .”  They noted that “many were stunned” and that many of your advisors had “urged you not to.”  I realized I had prayed for a miracle, and the miracle had been granted.

Realizing this, I wrote my own letter to Congress and began praying ever more fervently not only for the development with Syria, but also for you personally.  In my prayers, it became clear that your decision was not only “risky,” but also dangerous, including to your own life.  If Congress says “no,” then whether you stand with the people or against the people, your next decision is fraught with danger, for your life personally, for our country, and for our world.  I came to see that, perhaps, you have lived your first 50 years for this moment and this decision.

I am praying for you and am calling my friends to pray for you.  Your heart, your mind, and your soul knows the “nothing” or “weapons” debate is an either/or fallacy and that methods of diplomacy, humanitarianism, and asylum are all at your disposal.   But I’ve come to see the peril for you in following your own convictions of peaceful means over violent means and democratic means over dictatorial ones.  May you have the courage to live by your soul and may the Lord protect you as you do.

Thank you and praying,

**signed**

 

"For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul?”  (Mark 8:36)

 

Relief not violence

Although the following post tangents from my typical ones, it certainly reflects my thinking as applied to real world issues, and it is my deep prayer that enough of us will unite together to speak for peaceful means in a violent world.  So today, I sent the following to my own members of Congress and then posted a link for it on my Facebook page.  One of my friends has re-posted it with her own introduction to a larger website.  May it represent one of many voices, and may our voices be heard.  Amen.

 

September 2, 2013

Dear Senators and Representative,

Thank goodness my first prayer has been answered.  The President has decided not to strike a country without seeking the support of the American people, through our representatives.  Now I’d like to participate in my second prayer, that the American people, through our representatives, say “no.”

The Syrian government has no motive to attack its own people and, given President Obama’s threats, a clear motive not to.  The insurgents, on the other hand, who we have supported, do have motives.  A remark that they have neither the means nor the ability to do so is starkly naïve and in great contrast to what has been said and observed of other independent militia groups around the world.  Is our government saying the same about a truly remarkable technical mastermind twelve years ago?

 
Even if the Syrian government did commit the atrocity we claim it did, does that warrant us to commit our own atrocity?  If we are to “lead by example,” then we must truly lead by example – to relieve suffering without furthering it.  How tragic it is that in place of debating how much asylum and humanitarian support we can provide, we are instead debating how much violence we should inflict.

Do we not see this never-ending cycle?  One group uses violence; we use violence in response to them; and yet another group (Russia? Iran?) uses violence in response to us, and so on and so on.

My great prayer is that our country would finally wake up to the insanity of violence and the deep-seated truth that the means to a peaceful end must also be peaceful.  As we celebrate our 50^th Anniversary of the Dream Speech of our great leader, Martin Luther King, let us remember that the battle he forged was fought non-violently.

Please vote “no” on strikes on Syria.

 
Thank you very much,
** signed **

 

The Law of Liberty

           In watching my kids’ dramas, I observe how much can be learned from the parables of our children’s crises.  When my son was a preschooler and my daughter a toddler, their initially happy play at a game my son was creating hit a crisis one evening and I heard my little girl screaming, high-pitched, in an open nook behind our couch.  “What happened?” I exclaimed, and heard her brother’s explanation: “She cheated!  She’s in time-out!”  Holding back chuckles while rescuing my toddler, I said, “Buddy, she doesn’t understand your rules.  You need to let her play her way.”  It didn’t penetrate.  With angry arms crossed, he insisted, “She was cheating!”
            I thought to myself, “Just like the Church: setting his own rules and then punishing others for breaking the rules he made up.”  Jesus complained of the teachers of his day too, who were “teaching as doctrines commandments of men” (Mark 7:7).  Elsewhere, he condemns them more forcefully: "what sorrow also awaits you experts in religious law! For you crush people with unbearable religious demands, and you never lift a finger to ease the burden” (Luke 11:46, NLT).  Throughout his ministry, Jesus was constantly working to liberate people from restrictive rules designed by men.

Ironically, the most powerful institution that was birthed from his ministry, the Catholic Church, instituted what were likely far more demanding regulations and punishments for breaking those regulations than those Jesus had freed his own followers from.  Still, church after church has followed suit.  But if we Christians follow the teachings of our Master, which James calls the “law of liberty,” we’ll be set free into abundant life.

            The most recent sibling crisis in our family took place a couple of weeks ago when my kids and I were on a bike ride.  Big brother had to show off and go really fast and little sister had to keep up, while mom was trailing far behind, but impressed with her daughter’s speed on a bike with wheels so small.  When we arrived, my daughter was in tears.  Her brother is “too competitive,” “won’t ever slow down,” and “doesn’t care.”  After a sympathetic “I know,” a pause, a “Let him do his own thing,” and another pause, I looked my daughter in the eyes and said, “Sweetie, I was left way back in the dust, and I’m not crying.”  Needless to say, that didn’t satisfy her. ;)

            The lesson here is that it’s not always the external force that punishes us.  We punish ourselves, and this is the more damning of the two types.  And even when it appears that the external force (like my son) is doing the punishing, in truth, it’s always an internal choice.  Though she didn’t know it, my daughter could have let herself out of her brother’s time-out, but she accepted the punishment he inflicted, thereby making it internal.

            All of this, of course, is more complex in adult life; however, this idea is the basic principle behind Jesus’ induction to “turn the other cheek.”  He saying, “Don’t internalize an external punishment.”

            We can also choose to play or to bypass the rules and modes of operandi of those in our midst.  My daughter might have complained that her brother is “too competitive,” but what about her?  Why not hang back with slow-going mom? ;)

            So why do we have drama?  Because we permit external forces to determine our way.  Sometimes, we choose to give such power to external forces.  Perhaps we surrender for the sake of societal order or for our own growth, as we trust in a teacher for our long-term benefit, even if short term moments may be amiss.  Even a deeper impulse of growth may have been working within my daughter, who grows by trying to keep up with her brother. 

Or we choose surrender for the sake of love, recognizing our own surrender will help another to grow.  Often, we surrender because we’ve fallen in love and the external force is the one we love.  Sometimes, we think we are in love and perhaps have become needlessly attached, so our choices to surrender can be quite complicated.

            If we are unconsciously following the path others are telling us to take, we remain unnecessarily enslaved.  The choice of independence is a key part of the kingdom of heaven, which Jesus noted to be “within” (Luke 17:21).

When we do surrender our freedom, the key for us is to determine whether we have done so by choice for a higher cause, or whether we have unconsciously relinquished the law of liberty given to us by Christ to an external authority.  Ironic though it may be, we Christians are most likely to unconsciously relinquish our freedom to our church authorities.  If we have, have we done so consciously, by choice, in the recognition that it is for our long-term growth, or have we done so unconsciously, thereby perhaps ironically undermining our own growth?

As we quietly still ourselves before the Lord (psalm 46:10), set our minds on things above (Col 3:2), listen to the whispers of the Holy Spirit, examine the scriptures for confirmation, review our discoveries with those we trust, and remain faithful to the law of love, we will find the law of liberty to become evident in our lives as well.

  © 2013 by karina.  All rights reserved.  Please use only with permission from the author.