All is Well: A Journey in Contemplation

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This is where it all begins.  Growing up as a Christian I knew that love was at the centre of my faith but what I learnt often emphasised rules, obligations and beliefs.  For all the amazing words about love in the Bible, the realisation that God is love took a long time to dawn.  When I use love as the lens to read the Bible, observe the natural world and understand relationships, the world makes sense to me in a different way.  Love gives me a place to rest and a way forward, and I find it incredibly helpful to interchange the words God and Love.  When I see Love, I see God – when God is present, Love is manifest.  This is where it all begins. This is the ground that I stand on. This is what holds everything together.

What is love?  Love is a force and an energy that moves between us: in its perfection love drives out all fear: love is patient, kind and compassionate – it keeps no record of wrongs: love is what connects us.  When I ask myself what love is, I am asking myself who God is.  God is a force and an energy that moves between us: God drives out fear: God is patient, kind and compassionate – he keeps no record of wrongs: God is the force that draws us together.  God is present all the time – love is present all the time, only that sometimes we sail on unaware of this presence.  The call to contemplation is the call to slow down - to pause - and recognise the presence of love which is always accompanying us and within us.

One morning walking up to church a ‘picture’ came into my mind.  I was speaking that morning about the kingdom of God and the fact that each of us, by virtue of our existence, has a piece of God planted in us.  In my mind’s eye that piece of God inside each of us was a point of light – our individual opening to God.  As I pondered the picture it became like a dot-to-dot puzzle – if the points of light could be joined up they would create a picture of God’s Kingdom of Love. The image stayed with me and I realised that the way that we join up our points of light is through love.  When I act in love I draw a line between myself and the person I am loving.  The dot-to-dot puzzle is transformed into a web of light which grows and expands with each loving action, word, thought and prayer.  A picture of the creation of God’s kingdom of love.  I am not unique in having been given a picture like this. This force of Love, which some of us call God, wants to communicate with us and encourage us to live in line with love and create a beauty. 

Love is the true connector.  If we let Love do her work she will connect us deeply and widely, with people we find difficult; people we have never met; creatures and plants; the very earth.  That is Love’s work.

Think of someone that you find difficult.  It could be a neighbour, a colleague, a boss or a leader, someone at your church.  This person may be difficult in different ways.  Maybe you can not tolerate their political or religious beliefs; maybe they have been unkind to you; maybe you find them irritating or boring.  For a moment put that hurt or irritation out of your mind and think about the love that person has for someone in their life: their partner; their parents; their children; their friends.  That love they have is real – as real as the love you have for your partner; your parents; your children; your friends. I remember having this realisation when someone I don’t always find easy opened up about the concerns they had for their children.  Suddenly my internal judgement and my discomfort dissolved as I saw clearly this person’s love for their children.  It was a bit like tumbling to the ground – I saw what joined us, what made us the same.  That thing was love.  We stand on the same ground.  If we let her, Love will take us deeper.

Think of a situation in the world which you may not understand or know much about, but you know that people are suffering.  Unfortunately, there are many to choose from.  Often the people we see on the television news or in pictures in newspapers are nameless, but even if we know their names it can feel impossible to connect with them.  Just for a moment think about the nameless person or people and remember that they are someone’s child.  Maybe they are someone’s sister, or brother; someone’s mother or father; someone’s friend.  Their situation – their suffering – is having an impact on a web of people who may well be in the same danger.  The love they have for each other is real, and it is the same love that you have for that web of people that surround you.  They and we are human, and the love that they and we give and receive connects us.  If we let her, Love will take us wider.

If we let her, Love will connect us with the living creatures on land, sea and sky; with the trees and plants; with the very elements of the earth.  Because we are all made from the same stardust. Our likeness draws us together, whilst also generating the energy that allows our universe to keep expanding.  Love anchors us and allows us to grow.

For me the journey in contemplation is answering the call to Love.  Tuning into a different spiritual wavelength in order to experience and pass on this positive force which is God.  It involves: slowing down; letting go of the things that distract; being intentional; recognising love at work in places I don’t expect to find it.  Surely this is the key to life: surely this is the Way. And the Truth.  And the Life.  Because Love is the answer: the answer to my frustrations, my fears, my disappointments, my failures, my desires.  Sometimes the road that it takes me on is hard: it looks like the road of loss, deprivation and failure.  Love doesn’t take away pain or darkness: it enables the suffering to transform us and it never lets us go. 

Photo by Jeremy Bishop on Unsplash