Читать книгу Echoes of Eternity, Vol. I - Hal M Helms - Страница 4

Talking and listening. Speaking and hearing. These are the fundamental prerequisites for conversation. Yet with most of us, our relation with our heavenly Father consists mostly of our speaking. Our oldest traditions, however, tell us that we are invited to hear as well as speak.

We do well to be cautious in this procedure. Our own wishes and the interference of other voices can drown out the “still, small voice,” unless we arm ourselves against illusion, delusion and deception. We do well to be modest in our claims about what we have heard.

Yet having said all that, there is a wonderful invitation that stands as valid today as it was when it was spoken:

“If any one hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me…. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.” (Revelation 3:20b, 22 RSV)

What the Spirit has said to one who has listened is shared in the hope that these impressions will convey “what the Spirit says” to the hearts of those who read them and will encourage others to “open the door” to hear for themselves what the Spirit is saying.

Hal M. Helms Chaplain of the Community of Jesus, Orleans, Massachusetts August, 1996