Thursday, March 5, 2020

Lenten Reflections, Second Thursday of Lent, Seek and you will find


Day nine, Second Thursday of Lent
Search and you will find
Matthew 7. 7-8
7“ Ask, and it will be given you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you. 8 For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.

Hard to believe what Jesus tells us, that God will give us that for which we ask. It’s hard to believe because we misunderstand what Jesus is talking about. Jesus is not talking about things of the ego. God doesn’t know anything about the things of the ego because the things of the ego are things that we humans, in our separation from God, have just made up in our dream. The things of the ego are illusory. They are impermanent. They are no more real in the life of the Spirit than a bad dream from which we awake.

What Jesus is talking about are the things of the Spirit. If we ask God for an experience of Love, it will be given to us. If we are searching for Love we will find it. If we knock on the door of Love, the door will be opened for us.

If we want the things of the Spirit and ask for them, they will be given to us, and if we are indeed genuinely searching for Love, we will find it, and if we knock on the door of Love and ask for entrance we will be admitted. In fact, in the very seeking, asking, knocking, we have already been admitted. We can’t seek and ask for what we haven’t already guessed is available to us. We already have an inkling or we couldn’t have begun our search and knocked on the door of heaven.

As Bob Dylan sings in his great song, some of us are “knocking on heaven’s door.” Bob is singing about being on the edge of physical death, but death can also be psychological when we choose to give up the things of the ego.

Lent is about giving up the things of the ego and turning toward and searching the things of the Spirit. We can’t really search for Spirit and knock on the door of the Spirit when we are preoccupied with the things of the ego. When we become aware of the choice, we have to choose. Will we seek the things of the ego or the things of the Spirit? Lent is the season when we are intentionally asked to become aware of our choice and to make a decision. Jesus tells us that if we choose the Spirit it will be given to us, and if we search for Spirit we will find it, and if we knock on the door asking for entrance, it will be opened for us.





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