Spiritual Solutions

“Guidance” is a common word in our day. Everyone seeks some kind of guidance: guidance for children, for adolescents, for marriage relationships, for the businessperson, and so forth. Occasionally, someone might suggest the idea of spiritual or “Divine” guidance.

Unfortunately, that suggestion may be looked upon with distrust, simply because the term “Divine guidance” is usually related to the magical, mystical or psychic. Yet there is an almost instinctive feeling in every person that there is a “Something” beyond personal prejudices, different from the mental state of worry and concern, and that this “Something” can be reached.

But this feeling for the “Something” has often been dealt with on the level of superstition. Thus, many persons look for guidance through a sign or leading, all the way from the flipping of a coin to reading the stars or the numbers, the cards, the tea leaves or the crystal ball, and then on to Indian guides and spirit readings. This is not to put down any of these pseudo-sciences, but rather to point up the fact that involvement in them is a subtle form of self put-down.

If any person evidences, even in a brief showing, some kind of inner direction or direct knowing, it is often identified as ESP or psychic phenomenon or spirit guidance. This is to malign our potential as a spiritual being, and to deny the inherent flow of guidance within us that is just as natural as the instinct of animals. Remember this dynamic statement from the book of Job: “There is a spirit in man, and the inspiration of the Almighty gives him understanding.” So why do we refuse to accept this inner knowing?

Maybe it is that religion has not really dealt with the whole of the person. The dictionary defines “religion” as “divine revelation for human guidance.” But most religions have become exteriorly oriented, dealing with God “out there” or “up there.” We may be told in impassioned sermons that our need is “to find God.” But God is not to be found – for God is not lost. 

It is not God’s hiddenness, but our blindness that is the problem. We live in a state of ceaseless guidance, in a field of Infinite knowingness, but we are blind and deaf to the process. Emerson says, “There is guidance for each of us, and by lowly listening we shall hear the right word.”

To find God, to understand God, we need to expand our thoughts to the realization of the omnipresence of God and then know, in the words of former Unity minister and author Eric Butterworth, “The whole of Spirit is present at every point in space at the same time, and in its entirety.” There is no distance between us and God. There is nowhere to go to get guidance or inspiration or creativity. We are in it, all of it, all the time!

Divine guidance, or spiritual guidance or “direct knowing” is the same as getting an immediate answer to prayer in time of need. It is but another way of explaining the work of intuition. The ancient wise ones called these occurrences “illumination.” The mystics called them “showings.” Many call them “leadings.” But again we lose the real idea if we see these things as some kind of special access to the inner secrets of the Universe, or some kind of psychism or divination.

The term “Voice of God” is purely a poetic expression. It is found all through the Bible.   And it has been terribly misleading for many people. The classic instance is Moses’ experience at the burning bush. “God called to him out of the bush: ‘Moses, Moses!’” This was an experience of direct knowing. The Bible writers used highly symbolic language and overstatement, such as describing locusts as big as giants that jumped from hill to hill. So they are saying in this passage about Moses that it was a knowing so clear that it was as if God was actually talking to him.

Remember, “The Father knows even before you ask Him”; “Before they call, I will answer.” This means that God is present – always and in all ways. God knows. God knows in you, for you. Knowing is, and it is at hand. It is now. The way out (the way to escape the difficulties at hand) is at hand.

But this guidance or direct knowing comes into consciousness most easily through a mind that is uncluttered with the known. If you know about a lot of things, it is difficult to know the Truth, which is to know the Knower. A creative mind, or a mind in a creative experience, is so involved in knowing that it lets go of what others know about, even if they know about things that indicate impossibilities.

Most people have preconceived notions which they bring into their prayer time. They have a strong idea of what they want to have happen, and often, even in seeking guidance they are actually looking for “Divine approval” of something they have already determined to do. To have the mind full of preconceived notions, even images and treasure maps representing outlined goals, is to frustrate the process of direct knowing.

The important thing to remember is that wherever you are, God is. The whole of Spirit, the Holy Spirit, is present in its entirety at every point in space at the same time. Spirit is present, as presence. All-knowing is present. The answer to your dilemma is present – here and now. There is nowhere to go, nothing to reach for, and no one to contact and plead with.

Prayer is communion, oneness, a listening. “Be still and know that I am God.” When you know that I AM is God, you humble yourself to listen; you expect to be guided. In childlike faith, you know the Knower within you that is always present.

Remember, God is Blessing You Right Now!

Rev. Alan A. Rowbotham

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Rev. Alan A. Rowbotham, a Unity minister for over thirty-eight years, invites you to subscribe to his free inspirational newsletter, Spiritual Solutions.

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All of us are called to a spiritual journey, whether we realize it or not. It’s a special calling, and our life is not complete until we heed that call and move forward according to the Spirit. We are guided by God’s presence; we are strengthened by God’s comforting love. Even in the deepest and darkest times, God’s love is always present to uplift us and sustain us.

In the Zen tradition, there is the idea of the sacred ox. The sacred ox symbolizes the wonderful and powerful qualities we have within us which begin to manifest as we awaken to the truth of our being and start on our spiritual journey.

The beginning scene on the scroll is the seeking of the ox. On the scroll there is a man who is wandering through the thickets in the mountains of China or India, and he is looking for himself. He realizes the ox is never lost, but he doesn’t know where to find it, so he is seeking the tracks of the sacred ox.

Behind him in the scene are all different criss-crosses of roads that he has taken – pain and loss and confusion and upset and praise and blame and all of those things we go through in life, all the roads that criss-cross behind him. And off he goes, seeking the tracks of the sacred ox. Finally he enters the forest and he stops to rest. And as he rests and becomes quiet, he looks down and he sees the tracks of the ox.

This tells us that the first steps in all spiritual journeys start with silence, start with moving into the forest in our own being to find that quiet place. It has to start there. And there we have an awakening, which Joseph Campbell called “the awakening call” or “the inner pull.” And I’m sure you’ve felt that pull, the pull of Spirit within you; that’s when you begin to see the tracks for the first time. Then, of course, you want to follow the tracks. So you try to follow the tracks of the sacred ox, that’s the next thing.

Following the tracks is a little different story, because what happens then is you begin to become aware not only of the outer life in which you are involved but you become very much aware of your inner life. You become aware of the vast inner regions of your being and the work that needs to be done there in order to feel whole, to feel that sense of oneness with God and the truth of your own being.

So we begin following the tracks of the sacred ox. Some people warn us not to take it, because when we take that spiritual journey our life is changed forever. Nothing is ever the same again. When we take that spiritual journey it touches every aspect of our life. So some warn against it.

I remember when I first went into ministry, just before I went into ministerial school at Unity Village I’d been accepted and I wanted to go. I’d never been to Unity Village and so I thought I’d better go and find out what’s going on, and I needed a place to live so I thought I’d scout around and see what I could find. So I made an appointment to see and talk with Jim Freeman, a writer and a wonderful man; he was director of Silent Unity for many years and he’d been called the poet laureate of Unity.

Writing had been flowing through me at that time, poetry and all kinds of things in my awakening. I went to Jim and I told him about all this and said, “I need some sense of direction. I’ve applied for the ministry and been accepted. What do you think? ”

“Look,” he said, “If you can do anything else, do it!”

Just like that. “If you can do anything else, do it.” And he said, “As for writing, many people write but not many come out of a cave like Mohammed did with the Koran.”

So anyway, I said “Well, I’m going to go ahead.” And that’s what happens when we’re ready to move to a new level in our spiritual journey; we feel the pull of Spirit.

There’s a story that Jack Kornfield tells about Chogyam Trunpa, the Tibetan monk and teacher. He arrived late at a lecture he was supposed to give in San Francisco. The hall was crowded, and when he arrived he said “Any of you who would like to have your money back because I’m late, you can have your money refunded.” He said, “You know, you who are new here you have to recognize that this is an arduous journey that you are starting on, it’s not all peaches and cream.” He looked around and said, “In fact, if you haven’t started it yet, you’d best not start it.” Then he looked around again and he said, “But if you have started it, you’d best finish it.”

It takes courage to start something, to realize the truth of your being and to step out in the direction and let Spirit lead us. It takes courage also to keep on keeping on. And that’s what he’s saying. If you’ve already started it, it’s best to keep on keeping on. Because you can’t stop in the middle of it. It starts with that quiet place within you, and it ends by going deeper and deeper and deeper.

What happens when we start on that journey is at first we have some tender remembrances and wonderful revelations come to us. But we also experience the stirring of things within us that come to the surface and need to be released, the old beliefs, old habits, old limitations that need to go. So it’s not always a journey of light and life; it’s also sometimes a journey of darkness and struggle.

That’s the spiritual journey. But the thing is that, with every challenge also comes a blessing; with every letting go comes the touch of angels to lighten you up and move you along the way.

No matter what is happening in your life there is the light that is leading us on toward the truth of your being. It’s already there within you. It’s not necessarily a journey toward the light, the light is already there within you. So with that light you can journey through light and dark, you can journey through ups and downs, you can journey through the mountains. And you can know that no gorge is so deep that God is not there, for God is there in all things.

God is Blessing You, Right Now!

Rev. Alan A. Rowbotham

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