Out of emptiness, dark things come

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“The opposite of faith is not doubt, but certainty. Certainty is missing the point entirely. Faith includes noticing the mess, the emptiness and discomfort, and letting it be there until some light returns. Faith also means reaching deeply within, for the sense one was born with, the sense, for example, to go for a walk.”

          Anne Lamott, Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith

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Someone once asked me if I believed in demons

 

“Yes,” I answered

“I do.”

 

We all have our demons

Those hungry ghosts that lurk in our souls

Those voices telling us we are not enough

Those voices telling us that “they” are the enemy

 

Jesus understood that what is going on within

Profoundly impacts how we live

 

Out of the heart, he suggested

Comes evil

Comes lies, slander, hate, greed

Comes words that hurt

And actions that wound

 

It is not so much that we are filled with

Awful things (call them what you will)

But that we are NOT filled with love.

 

Looking back on my own life

My worst moments have come because

of a profound emptiness within

 

from a void at my core

that comes when, for whatever reason

I am not abiding

 

Am not connected to Love

Am not filled with that spring of living water

Welling up

 

When I am empty

Terrible things fill the void

Doubt and despair

Anger and resentment

 

When I am empty I am needy

And I reach out seeking to fill the void

 

I seek to accomplish

I try to build myself up

I reach out to others

But reaching out in need,

I am grasping

I am a taker

I use and manipulate

It gets ugly!  I have done ugly things.

 

Wretched man!

Who will rescue me?

 

I need that spring of living water

I need that holy presence

I need to be filled

 

I need to take the time to go down deep

Inside

To that place that defines me

To that place where Sacred dwells

 

And find Sacred

Find love

Find me

 

For only when I have become inwardly intimate

With God, and even with my true self

Can I be outwardly

A person who reflects in any way

the Image of God

 

If I have made that inner connect

Then when I move outward

It is out of fullness, and not need

And that makes all the difference!

 

Poor Donald

So needy

Poor Mitch, Marjorie, Mike, Joe, Nancy

Poor all of us

 

To whatever degree we are empty

We are destructive

 

Faith means reaching deeply within

For the truth

That we are loved

And we don’t need to dominate, control, use, take, consume

We are loved

 

So we can give, care, forgive, protect, include

 

We are loved

And that is the beginning and the end

Of our story