christopherhildreth

I love the Old Testament stories of Moses. He led the children of Israel through many disheartening situations; he delt with revolt and rebellion; but through it all he eventually took them where he had wanted to take them for many years. At the end of his life, he ended up only seeing the Promised Land.

I believe that this could be a parallel to what many in the religious community are experiencing. We have a tendency, at least in America, to consume. We buy things we don’t need because we are told we “need” them, but we know we really don’t have any need or use for them. The same is true for spiritual experience. We have become “spiritual consumers”. We want to feel something or hear something or be given something, but our response, most often, is not to let these things flow out of us to others. By in large we simply consume more; in effect wasting spiritual experience for the sake of self-gratification.

Don’t get me wrong, spiritual experience is wonderful, but if it leads to nothing more than an over active appetite for more of the same, I fear we have missed the point of these experiences. If anything we should walk away from these experiences knowing how much we are all connected in the spirit, not with a singular point of view that amplifies our self view. When we approach the spiritual with an attitude of emptiness in order to be filled, we experience the truth. If we come to experience and then use the experience to lift ourselves, we have made a mistake.

These experiences, if they are true, lead us closer to God. As we near Him we embrace the oneness of spiritual things. When we abandon the self, we embrace our real self. “To live, we must die.” I do not intend to simply watch the great things of God, I intend to be actively involved with them. I hope that you too will desire to truly experience and not simply consume.