Contemplative Christian

Contemporary Protestant spirituality seems to have adopted the notion that relationship with Christ can be achieved through right  living, through careful study of the bible, through “knowing the Word of God”.  It’s the idea that if we learn how to think correctly about God, if we learn to act correctly – and speak correctly – we’ll somehow become closer to Him.  If we act right, we’ll be right with Him.   Church culture often assumes you are lost if you don’t fit in with the majority.  To me, this is backwards.

Relationship with Christ comes first…it always comes first.  My acceptance by Christ has nothing to do with my behavior…how could it?  It has nothing to do with how I speak…how could it?  No, we first accept love from Him…we take the risk of loving Him in return…and we begin to love ourselves as broken images of our Creator.  It is the relationship that changes us, our behavior and our speech.  We are created and recreated anew in the context of the relationship with Christ, and this is utterly independent of anything we bring to the table. He cannot be bought or earned, controlled, withheld or given away. Let that sink in…let that become freedom.

Is God sitting on high with a legal pad, watching and critiquing us with a critical eye?  Or, is He infinitely close to us…gazing upon us with eyes of love and perfect acceptance?

If God is angry, mean and unpredictable we’ll surely walk on eggshells around Him, careful to “get it right’, careful not to screw up, or to be found lacking.

However, if God is a God of grace…a God who walked among us, suffered among us, and died among us…whose primary motivation seems to be our freedom and peace (that surpasses all understanding)…then perhaps we’d be less concerned with how we present ourselves and simply run and fall into His arms…

Richard Rohr:

It’s not, “If I am moral, I will someday achieve union with God.” That’s backwards. We must put the horse before the cart, and not the cart before the horse. Union with God is objectively already given to everyone from the moment of their creation. Who else created them? All we can do is awaken to it. We cannot achieve it. Once we live the life of union and abundance—not hating ourselves and apologizing for ourselves every minute—then we start living in our inherent dignity, a dignity that no behavior has given to us and no one can take away.

Then the horse is first and the cart comes along. Not “If I am moral, I will be in union with God, but when I live in union with God, morality will come naturally and powerfully!” A completely different path.

Adapted from The Cosmic Christ (CD#1)

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