Luke tells us that Jesus walked the journey of faith just as you and I do, and thus has him pray Jesus needed strength and resorted to prayer – during his temptation in the desert, before choosing the apostles, during his debates with his adversaries, in the garden, and on the cross. We like to imagine that Jesus did not flinch, doubt, or ever question Gods love. The much greater message is that, in his humanity he did flinch, have doubts, and ask questions and still remained faithful. He is indeed our “pioneer and perfecter” in the ways of faith, who “disregards the shamefulness of it all” (see Hebrews 12:2).

We see Jesus’s faith being tested in the temptation scenes in Luke 4:1-13. The basic question, put before him three times, is this: “Is God to be trusted?” That is the great question the human race is asking at the most basic level. We hear Jesus answer, ever more resoundingly; “Yes, God is on your side. Yes, God is more for you than you are for yourself”

+Adapted from The Good News According to Luke: Spiritual Reflections, p. 92.

If we want to go to the mature, mystical, and non-dual levels of spirituality, we must first deal with the often faulty, inadequate, and even toxic images of God with which most people are dealing before they have authentic God Experience. Both God as Trinity and Jesus as the image of the invisible God reveal a God quite different than the Santa Claus god who made “naughty and nice” lists or an “I will torture you if you do not love me” god (worse than our worst enemy, I would think). We must be honest and admit that this is the god to which most people are still praying. Such images are an unworkable basis for any real spirituality.

Trinity reveals that God is the Divine Flow under, around, and through all things-much more a verb than a noun, relationship itself rather than an old man sitting on a throne. Jesus tells us that God is like a loving par- ent who runs toward us while we are “still a long way off” (Luke 15:20), then clasps and kisses us. Until this is personally experienced, most of Christianity does not work. This theme moves us quickly into practice- based religion (orthopraxy) over mere words and ideas (orthodoxy).

By teaching “Do not judge” (Matthew 7:1), the great teachers are saying that you cannot start seeing or understanding anything if you start with no. You have to start with a Yes of basic acceptance, which means not too quickly labeling, analyzing, or categorizing things as in or out, good or bad, up or down. You have to leave the field open, a field in which God and grace can move. Ego leads with no, whereas soul leads with Yes.

The ego seems to strengthen itself by constriction, by being against things, and it feels loss or fear when it opens. No always comes easier than Yes, and a deep, conscious Yes is the work of freedom and grace. So, the soul lives by expansion instead of constriction. Spiritual teachers want you to live by positive action, open field, and studied understanding, not by resistance, knee-jerk reactions, or defensiveness, and so they always say something like, “Do not judge,” which is merely a control mechanism.

Words and thoughts are invariably dualistic, but pure experience is always non-dualistic. You cannot really experience reality with the judgmental mind because you are dividing the moment before you give yourself to it. The judgmental mind prevents you from being present to the full moment by trying to divide and conquer. Instead, you end up dividing yourself and being conquered.

+Adapted from The Naked Now: Learning to See as the Mystics See, pp. 46-47, 49-50, and When Action Meets Contemplation (Recording).