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Spiritual Habit 2

Waking Up

Life is no passing memory of what has been nor the remaining pages in a great book waiting to be read.

It is the opening of eyes long closed.31

– David Whyte

The Gospel of Luke tells the story of a couple traveling on foot along the seven-mile path to Emmaus from Jerusalem after Jesus’ execution.32 Along the way, a man came up and started walking alongside the couple, but they did not recognize him. Since he seemed oblivious to the events of the week, the couple recounted all that had happened in Jerusalem. “We had hoped that he was the one who would deliver Israel,” they said. Then the man began to tell them how the recent events were a fulfillment of all that the Torah and the prophets had taught.

When they got to the edge of the village, the man acted as if he were going on, but the couple invited him to their home. “Stay and have supper with us,” they said. “It’s late and the sun is going down.” So he went into the house and sat down at the table with them. Taking the bread, he blessed and broke and gave it to them. At that moment, they suddenly woke up and recognized Jesus. Then he vanished from their sight.

“Didn’t our hearts burn as he talked with us on the road?” they asked each other. Immediately, they were up and on their way back to Jerusalem. When they arrived, the disciples and their other friends told them, “Simon has seen Jesus!” Then the couple related what had happened on the road and how they had recognized Jesus when he broke the bread.

Educator, clinical psychologist and theologian James Loder calls the events in Emmaus that night a “convictional moment.” Convictional moments are times when we wake up to the activity of the Spirit, when our eyes open to a larger reality that changes how we choose to act, and when we perceive the whole that is more than the sum of its parts. According to Loder, convictional moments follow a pattern with five movements:33

1 A RESTLESS INCOHERENCE that comes about when we experience something new which stands in opposition to what we assumed to be true. In this movement we become aware of a tension between our need for internal harmony and the sense that something is just not fitting. The travelers had hoped that Jesus was the one who would redeem Israel, but with the crucifixion, their hopes were shattered.

2 AN INTERLUDE FOR SCANNING in which we put the conflict into the back of our mind. In this movement we may randomly, almost passively explore possible ways to resolve the tension we feel. The travelers opened themselves up to the teaching of the one who had joined them. They did not engage in debate; in fact the story gives the impression that they listened almost passively to what the stranger had to say – although later they reported that their hearts were burning as he spoke to them on the road.

3 AN INSIGHT FELT WITH INTUITIVE FORCE in which we experience an “ah-ha” and are surprised with a larger, wholly new outlook that comes to us from beyond ourselves, simplifying and unifying the elements that have been in conflict. In this movement, the tension not only is constructively resolved, but we become “new creations.” In the story, that insight took place when Jesus broke the bread. The couples’ eyes were opened and they experienced an “ah-ha” of “seeing,” not the “unrecognized visible Presence” who talked with them on the road, but the “recognized invisible Presence” in their midst.34

4 A PERIOD OF RELEASE AND REPATTERNING in which energy once invested in and bound by the inner conflict is made available for creative action in light of the new insight. As tension is released, we find a new home, and we experience a sense of enlargement, a new quality of openness to self and world.35 Life appears fresh, wholeness returns, and we are amazed that the struggle which occupied us resolves itself in a surprising way. In this movement we make a bold move, choosing a risky path. The couple immediately traveled back to Jerusalem in the dark.

5 A TIME OF INTERPRETATION AND VERIFICATION in which we tell others what happened. In this movement, we put our new way of viewing the world to a public test as we try to live as a new creation. When the couple compared notes with the disciples, the cohesiveness in the stories verified their truthfulness.

Looking back over their life together, most transforming congregations can point to one or more convictional moments when the church was surprised by an awakening in which it received insight from beyond itself and changed because of that new perception. Here are some examples of what it sounds like when transforming congregations talk about the experience:

“We thought we knew where we were headed, and then we all read that book together. It changed everything. Now we are approaching our ministry so much differently.”

“We were doing pretty much the same thing week after week; then four gay couples joined our church. They made us re-think everything we stood for.”

“After the fire we began worshiping in another congregation’s sanctuary. That experience freed us up so much, we’re not sure we even want to build again.”

“I don’t know what happened, but all of a sudden we had six autistic children attending our Christian Education program. Boy, did that change how we taught!”

Convictional moments are those times when the church moves forward by leaps rather than by inches. Looking back on those moments, transforming congregations notice how they were joined to the vitality of God, how their consciousness expanded, causing them to feel like they were participating in a mystery larger than themselves. A convictional moment unites a congregation with the energy of the Sacred Spirit that enlivens, dispels fear, and encourages them to engage in compassionate actions beyond selfish pursuits.

For one church, a convictional moment came in the form of an earthquake. Over the years, the church had engaged in many planning retreats. They had talked about reaching out to their changing neighborhood. They had held workshops about contemporary worship. But the church never actually changed. Each time a new idea came up, the affectionate attachment the congregation had for the building would get in the way.

The neighborhood church council wanted to use the kitchen to prepare a community meal once a week for those who were living on the streets; but the leaders rejected the idea because they did not want outsiders using the facility. The local shelter wanted to use the third floor of the church to house families; but the leaders said no because people in the congregation were concerned about germs in the restrooms. A group proposed the congregation host a day center for senior adults; but stairs up and down at every level made that impossible. Some people in the church suggested they hold a lunchtime Bible study in the parlor for students from the community college right across the street; but there was a rule against food in the parlor so the idea was squelched.

“Finally, we were literally blasted out of the church,” one leader told me. “It was like the Spirit knew we were never going to get anywhere as long as we were in that building. When an earthquake shattered windows and damaged bricks, the building was so structurally unsound, we couldn’t do anything but find a new place to worship.” The church moved up the street where it began sharing worship space with another congregation. Later, the two churches became one merged church. Now, that new congregation engages in many neighborhood ministries.

The Age of the Spirit

Theologian Harvey Cox suggests that we in the 21st Century are living at the dawn of a multi-religious, global awakening he calls the “Age of the Spirit.” It is a time when individuals across the world experience a new sense of mystery, wonder, and awe that comes from connecting with the power and the presence of the Spirit, relying on that Spirit for guidance and wisdom, and sharing in its creative work.

Yet many historic Protestant congregations tend to be skeptical of anything to do with the Spirit. Some shy away from the term “spirituality” because they associate it with the Pentecostal congregation down the street. They do not want to raise their hands or speak in tongues or dance in the aisles of the church. Some confuse spirituality with the metaphysical philosophy called “spiritualism” made popular by Edgar Cayce. They do not want to get mixed up in trying to contact the dead through séances. Some view spirituality as a fallacy based in superstition. They are used to relying on rationality as their primary way of knowing and associate spirituality with the New Age snake-oil they see in the self-help section of the book store.

Transforming congregations, on the other hand, overcome their distrust of spirituality and unearth a rich and long tradition of Christian teaching related to the Spirit. They develop an understanding of Spirit by first recognizing that it reveals itself through symbols, signs, and metaphors. That means it is not usually perceived through rational logic but through intuitive knowing. To be spiritual is to see with the eyes of the heart, to experience the energizing power of God through whispers, hints, nudges, and insights. The language of spirituality is the language of dreams, stories, and visions—forms that are rather foreign to the Western bias towards objectivity, fact and proof. Yet transforming congregations develop a familiarity with that sort of metaphorical communication and learn to detect those convictional moments when their “hearts burned” in the presence of the sacred.

Transforming congregations understand that the Sacred Spirit resides within each person, that every human being is created in the image of God,36 blessed by God, and called to live in harmony with the created order. Recognizing that humans often get lost along the way and do not cultivate that divine seed that is their birthright, transforming congregations hold individuals accountable for life-long learning and growth. They teach people how to ground themselves in the sacred presence of God through prayer, to resist evil through acts of justice, and to allow God’s power to work through their lives just as it worked through the life of Jesus of Nazareth.37

The Spiritual Habit of Waking Up

Transforming congregations seeking to live in the Spirit claim far more is going in any moment than can be apprehended by the human senses. They recognize the Spirit is at work in the world, freeing the enslaved, energizing the disconsolate, making bold the timid, and bringing peace to the anxious. Yet that Spirit cannot be seen, tasted, touched, smelled, or heard. It can only be known by noticing the results of its work and sometimes those results can only be recognized in hindsight.

That’s why for centuries Christians have prayed the “Prayer of Examen.”38 They start by “examining” a day, a week, a month, or a year, allowing the events of that time period to play like a movie in the mind. Then, they seek to see the underlying work of the Spirit in and through those events. They notice where the Spirit seemed to be particularly present in their inner thoughts and experiences, in relationship, in systems and structures of the world, or in the environment of God’s creation.39 (See Appendix C for a hand-out on the Prayer of Examen.)

Next, they seek to discern what the Spirit might be offering by way of wisdom or guidance through those past events. Did images show up more than once? Where were there surprising coincidences that resulted in good? When did a door open or a helping hand show up? Viewing a past event as a sort of waking dream helps the church understand the language of the Spirit which often communicates in metaphor, symbol, or sign. It allows congregations to notice the presence of God and to follow the Spirit’s energy that opens the way forward.

My friend Doug noticed how the Spirit had been at work, guiding him during an activity as mundane as exchanging a pair of pants at the store. The pants had been sitting around his house for several days but on this particular day, he picked them up and decided to take care of the errand. While he was at the store, he ran into a friend he hadn’t seen for several weeks. The friend was in need of support and counsel and the two of them found a place where they could have coffee and conversation. When Doug returned home his wife asked if his trip to the store had been successful. Doug replied, “Yes. But it was not about the pants.” He saw the events of the day not just as a series of coincidences, but as the Spirit’s guidance.

When transforming congregations awaken to the presence of the Spirit, they begin to see underlying wholeness, vitality, and goodness present everywhere grounding their lives in the power of that presence. As they learn the language of the Spirit they begin to notice larger patterns, relationships and connections. Instead of seeing coincidence, they see God at work. They begin to trust unscheduled events as a form of spiritual guidance.

Yet one does not need to look far to notice the mind’s power to deceive itself. Over the years, many have claimed to read the signs or to experience the leading of the Spirit. They have wrongly predicted the end of the world; they have led people into mass suicides, death, and destruction. How do we know something is truly of the Spirit and not just, as Ebenezer Scrooge says, “an undigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of an underdone potato?”40

Christian spiritual teachers have long taught that discerning the presence and guidance of the Spirit does not happen in a vacuum. Waking up is only one part of a spiritual practice shaped by scripture, connected to God through prayer, and tested in the context of a spiritual community. Although the activity of the Spirit can be surprising, it will never go against the nature of God and will always lead toward consolation, goodness, and light. Although the guidance of the Spirit is often revealed by non-linear, non-rational thought, it will never go against the voice of reason—it will always make sense.

Transforming congregations wake up to the presence of Spirit in their midst with a sense of humility, confessing that the holy mystery of the sacred can never be fully known, and admitting that human perceptions may be dead wrong. Yet they do not shy away from asking the question, “Where is the Spirit at work in our congregation, in our neighborhood, in the life of the world?” They pay attention to the times when something unexpected interrupts their best laid plans and give thanks for convictional moments when they happen. They notice larger patterns in the stories they keep hearing from both those who come through the church door and those who live in the neighborhood. They see connections between those stories and the scriptures they read in worship.

In the power of the Spirit wind, transforming congregations often find themselves taking risks they never would have imagined themselves taking before. Some decide to leave their money-consuming building behind in order to meet in a more cost-saving facility or in public space so they have more resources for outreach. Some choose to start a new ministry to meet the needs of a changing neighborhood. Some dare to get acquainted with strangers and to form new partnerships. Transforming congregations make bold decisions about their life and ministry, even when those decisions make them vulnerable to rejection or scorn. They are always ready to follow the Spirit in a new direction they had not imagined before.

Questions for Reflection

1 Looking back over your life or the life of your congregation, what is one time you experienced the “ah-ha” of a convictional moment? What happened?

2 Why is an open heart an essential prerequisite to noticing the presence and guidance of the Spirit?

3 What might your congregation do to get more comfortable with the language of the Spirit?

4 How can your congregation counter some of the dangers that engaging in Spiritual discernment might pose?