Knowing our Purpose

We enter our third week of inquiry in the series that invites us to embrace the question and know the Truth. This week we look at one of the fundamental questions of a human/spiritual journey: How do we sense and claim our deep purpose and infuse our lives with meaning?

Most people don't dwell on the question of life's meaning very much. Most of our questions are about acquisition and activity; concerns with what I have and what I do. The equation of the surface mind is this: who I become is based upon what I do, and what I have. Being is relegated to an outcome, the result of my actions and possessions.

For many years of my adult life, I followed this syllogism. I believed that my life would be meaningful and valuable once I reached a certain level of success, either in stature or acquisition. My sense of self was equal to what I did in the world, my title, the esteem of others, my socioeconomic status - I was my job, my house, my car, etc. But the realization came one day while I stood gazing at the ocean from the deck of our home in Cayucos that all the doing and having left me feeling mostly empty and meaningless. The pain of that bottoming out experience drove me to embrace the questions that we are asking in this series.

The most troubling questions were about identity, meaning and purpose, Who am I, and why am I here, and do I matter? These questions gnawed at me daily for many months until one day I found myself in a Unity church in San Luis Obispo and my journey toward finding meaning and purpose began in earnest.

These questions are the call of the hero's spiritual journey. This call typically sounds from within us out of a state of discontentment or deep restlessness, when what we believed was the way for us leaves us wanting. I believe this calling is our soul's intention to reveal itself and its mission through our human journey. It is always calling us but we aren't always listening. We have ears but do not hear. When we do hear it, we recognize that we are here in human form for a purpose greater than simply living, surviving and dying. It is a realization that our true self, our essence is not merely physical, but spiritual. Once we behold this truth it imbues our every step and every moment with a higher purpose. It reverses the syllogism for successful living. Knowing ourselves as Spirit puts Being in a place of supreme importance. Being who we truly are is primary, and from that knowing what we have and what we do flows appropriately and gracefully from wholeness and generosity.

Knowing the spiritual truth about ourselves is the supreme purpose of life, and can bring us back home no matter how far afield our journey takes us. Spiritual purpose is like Ariadne's thread that Rev. Denese mentioned in last week's sermon. In the myth, Ariadne gives Theseus a ball of string, which he unwinds upon entering the labyrinth and then follows it back out. Spiritual purpose transcends life's greatest obstacles because who you truly are cannot be limited by circumstances. Such knowledge can bring you home time and again. It can save us from total despair, apathy, and self-centeredness. As A Course in Miracles puts it, we can choose to be a "hostage to the ego or a host to God"; we can choose to strengthen the false self or reveal the true self; we can choose to make idols out of externals or bear witness to the eternal dimension of life.

Discerning God's Will

Recently, a story surfaced about Republican Vice presidential candidate, Sarah Palin, reporting she gave a talk at her hometown church in which she told the assembled ministry students that the U.S. war in Iraq is a "task that is from God," and that the building of a proposed gas pipeline was "God's will." In the glaring lights of public scrutiny, these remarks have kicked up a firestorm of discussion over propriety of politics in religion and religion in politics. Though it is an important discussion, I'm not going there for this article. There is a deeper spiritual question for each of us at the heart of this issue, and that is, how do we discern God's will or divine guidance when facing the tough decisions in our lives?

Even attempting to answer this provocative question requires a brief refresher on our concept of God. In Unity, we do not envision God as an anthropomorphic being which resides in some distant heavenly abode and acts upon the earth and its people like a remote landlord. Neither, do we see God as a great judge, nor as the great decider of all that takes place, nor even a God who has opinions on everything under the Sun. We don't believe that God passed down all wisdom and laws exclusively and entirely to ancient prophets, sages and inspired writers that have become the sacred scriptures of the world religions. We see God as Spirit, the loving source of all that is, the one power, all good, everywhere present, as divine energy which is continually creating, expressing and sustaining all creation. We believe that we are emanations, offspring of this divine energy, and that we literally, "live, move and have our being" in God.

From our understanding of the divine, the question of knowing God's will becomes, how would God most completely create and express itself through its creation. In other words, God's will could be simply said as God's desire to express itself through its creation. We are God's creation - the most conscious of the species. We have the ability to choose how and what we will express. The closer our choices are to the expression of God's nature (love, peace, joy, wholeness, etc) the closer we are to being authentic expressions of our creator, or in a phrase, doing God's will.

A more fundamental Pentecostal view would answer this question in a radically different way. There are those who believe in a God who demands apocalyptic destruction as a prelude to the coming of the kingdom of heaven. In Unity we do not believe it is God's will that we set about to destroy the power of evil in hopes for a better afterlife. Rather, we believe we are divinely guided and equipped to seek opportunities in our lives to express the infinite love, peace and joy that indwells us. When we are being true to God's will we are more interested in finding harmony in diversity than imposing opinion. We are more inclined to keep our hearts open, than destroy our enemies. We more interested in transcending suffering than avoiding pain. Simply put, we are here to bring the kingdom of heaven into expression here and now.

When facing a decision, and seeking divine direction, our question should turn us inward where guidance is accessible. This is possible when we reframe the question to what can be known by us. Then the question of divine will becomes: Is this decision rooted in love? Will it bring me peace? Will it expand the possibilities of good for all concerned? Is it an expression of my wholeness, compassion? Is this choice an expression of my highest self, reflecting integrity and authenticity? Will I validate my true self and true purpose if I go down this path, or will I lose myself or compromise my deepest spiritual values?

We don't need God to write it's will in plain letters across the sky. In our pure heart, we are God's will awaiting expression; to bring forth on earth what is already true in the Heaven within us. Feel free to ask. It is God's will that you know.