If, as I said yesterday, spirituality is based on the assumption that God’s Spirit is actively and purposely involved in the unfolding of our universe and we find most fulfillment when our lives are in concert with God’s purpose, then our spiritual practices are for the purpose of connecting with God’s spirit. Our life finds its central purpose and satisfaction when we are connected with the meta-story of God. People do that in a variety of ways. As clergy we seek to encourage prayer and Scripture study for that purpose.
The challenge for clergy is to also practice those and other spiritual disciplines to enable us, personally, to make that connection. How do I listen to God in order to allow the Spirit of God to direct my life and ministry. I think that begins with entertaining some basic questions. The first, and primary question, is what is God’s final purpose for created life? Do you believe that from the beginning of creation God had an intention or purpose that God willed to see fulfilled in creation? If so, what was it?
Closely aligned with that first question, but critical to your spiritual journey is another question. Do you believe that God can and will accomplish God’s intention for creation? To reflect on that must include recognizing all of the dark side of creation including the presence of evil in this world. Some people choose to believe that God simply created the universe and now we are basically on our own. (The Deists) Others believe that God may have had good intentions when the universe was created but simply is not able to accomplish those intentions. (Rabbi Kushman in “Why Do Bad Things Happen to Good People”) We are dealing with the issue of Theodicy here. If God doesn’t care or is incapable of accomplishing a Divine purpose, then our spiritual practices are simply about how to hold on during our life time but have no eternal significance.
Reflect on those questions. They are critical to shaping the direction of your spiritual practices.
