"If your eye is good your whole body will be full of light." - Jesus, in Matthew 6:22
Occasionally I experience an epiphany, which according to the dictionary is a "moment of sudden insight or understanding." You have experienced them, too. Refreshing, aren't they? "Why did I never see this before?" is a question we may ask ourselves when we have such experiences, since the new awareness seems so obvious we wonder why it was never evident to us before!
I don't think these experiences can be told to someone else in a way that they "get it" too. Do you know that sinking feeling as you are trying to explain it that they just aren't getting it, even though they may be smiling and nodding? Of course since it is new to us we may assume it is new to them and not realize that they are responding the way they are because they "got it" a long time ago! The point is that epiphanies are unique to the person experiencing them. They also cannot be made to happen. They just happen; they are not a result of logical "figuring something out." They cannot be organized, though we
can put ourselves in positions where they are more likely to happen.
I've been reading
The Naked Now by Richard Rohr and have been thinking a lot about how the ability of our eyes to see is diminished by dualistic thinking - the tendency to think in black and white, right and wrong, all-or-nothing ways. Wanting to experience oneself as "right" is often behind these tendencies, which, of course, reveals our insecurity.
Did you pause a bit when you read my initial question above, "Of all the perspectives, how can I know that mine is right?" Does that sound like a good question, or do you wince when you hear it?
Why would I need to believe that my perspective is right when it is obvious it is only a view from a point? And a very small point, at that! How big do I think my perspective is? Why is it so difficult to accept that one cannot know that one is "right?" I can believe something with conviction, but that does not make me right - it simply means that I think I really believe what I am saying (although the way you know if I really believe it is if I am
living it. What people say doesn't really say much about what they believe, does it?)
I was so ticked along these lines by a
story Shane Hipps told in his talk called "Calling" at Mars Hill Bible Church on January 17 of this year. (It begins at 23:51 of the mp3, if you can download it) About someone living out his faith in costly ways and then what he says after he tells his story. I hope you have the time to listen to it. Such a good illustration of not needing to know if one is right. (If you have trouble getting the mp3 so you can listen to it, ask someone who knows about computers and he/she will be glad to help!)
There is no end of learning if one does not need to know one is right. Conversations change when one no longer needs to be right - people actually get listened to! If you have nothing to prove, you can come to "see" a whole lot that simply was not evident before. A whole lot more light can get in. So if we want more light we need to give up our concern about being right. Much more light comes to those who admit "I am in the dark and it's ok" than comes to those who believe they are in the light and have no real need for more.
"Jesus, your mission seemed to be a whole lot less about teaching people what is right to believe and more about inviting them into a different way of looking at things. While the former seems more manageable, the latter seems more freeing. I long for the sense of Life that comes from knowing You rather than the sense of being right that comes from believing the 'right' things. Help me to let go of any need to be right and increasingly step into the unpredictability of real relationship - with You, with others. Amen" I work with individuals, couples, and families to identify the ways of life and death in their lives and help uncover the motivation to choose that which leads to life, whether it be through counseling or spiritual direction. - Sheldon Swartz, MA/LMFT
