{"id":6744,"date":"2012-05-15T14:57:03","date_gmt":"2012-05-15T21:57:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/iamsignificant.ca\/andre\/?p=6744"},"modified":"2016-09-01T21:19:26","modified_gmt":"2016-09-01T21:19:26","slug":"show-me-the-way","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/iamsignificant.ca\/andre\/significant-sustenance\/show-me-the-way\/","title":{"rendered":"Show Me the Way"},"content":{"rendered":"

It has become a bit of a frustrating game with the Lord the past couple of years.\u00a0 The way we interact has changed and so the way He tends to speak to me has been changing.\u00a0 It has been comical in a sense because I find myself in a kind of argument, two ways with God that He isn\u2019t speaking to me. \u00a0 I caught myself in this silly exchange - laughed out loud and realized that I am hearing God, just differently than before!<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

One particular argument has gone like this.\u00a0 \u201cFather, please show me the way, the way through this situation, this issue in my life.\u00a0 Please show me the way!\u201d\u00a0 No sooner do I end my thought and I hear \u201cI am the way.\u201d\u00a0 I would rebut \u201cNo Father, you know what I mean - Please show me the way.\u201d and hot on the heels of my trailing syllable is His kind but deliberate \u201cMichael, I am the way.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0To be honest, I was frustrated by the response but would smile and say \u201cOh Father\u201d and be on my way just as frustrated as before. \u00a0 After a number of these kinds of exchanges, I finally asked Him what He meant. \u00a0 He smiled and seemed to say - \u201cThis is a much better question.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Kierkegaard said life is best understood looking backward, but as we all know we have to live life forwards.\u00a0 Looking back it is apparent; He was leading me back to an area we had previously spent a great deal of time - His present presence.\u00a0 It was a paradigm shift in my faith life - a shift from how to whom.\u00a0 Christianity at is best is indeed all about love and this love is in Jesus - the person of Jesus not a relationship with what He has done or what He will do, rather the person of God. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I am reminded of a Hasidic Jewish story.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\"A young man asked Reb Yerachmiel ben Yisrael \u201cRebbe, what is the way to God?\u201d The rebbe paused and looked up from his work and replied: \u201cThere is no way to God because God is not other than here and now. The truth you seek is not hidden; you simply do not notice it. It is here for you if you will only awake.\"*<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0This transition is really at the core of what many may describe as religion - peoples effort to find god with a focus on the right kinds of effort - to a relational, incarnational paradigm where God is indeed present. It is more about the present presence of God - a shift from how to whom.\u00a0 The question is answered in the person of God.\u00a0 Jesus said I am the Way<\/strong>, the truth and the life...\u00a0 Jesus is the WAY<\/strong> & the WHOM<\/strong>.<\/span><\/p>\n

This is an important shift in many ways.\u00a0 First<\/strong>, we are awakened to the reality that God is present with us in each and every moment.\u00a0 We learn that we are not alone, we find comfort, and it infuses each task, conversation and decision with meaning.\u00a0 This in itself is really powerful.<\/span><\/p>\n

Second<\/strong>, we connect God with our everyday, physical reality - there is no longer a separation between secular and sacred.\u00a0 For Christians, it's all sacred.<\/span><\/p>\n

Third<\/strong>, it turns 'have to\u2019s' into 'get to\u2019s'!\u00a0 This means that thing that may have been laborious and done out of religious obligation can take on new life - no longer in an effort to strain to get Gods attention, favor, love or salvation (we already have that in Jesus).\u00a0 Rather, those practices that perhaps we have found a burdensome take on new life and vitality when out from under a cloud of religious obligation.<\/span><\/p>\n

(* I read the Hasidic Jewish story on David Brenner's blog.)<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

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