Misguided (2)

Our lack of conviction in our beliefs has two potentially dangerous consequences for our spiritual wellbeing and peace.
The first, is that in our seeking of a greater certainty we may too easily be led by others; the second, that we will omit to seek the insights and guidance of others completely and pay no heed to any unsought support when it is offered, attempting instead to fix beliefs more firmly by dwelling solely on our own experience.
The danger in the first is that, through our lack of discernment, we shall allow ourselves to be led by the wrong people.
In the second, our inability to understand just how little experience we really have makes inner solitude itself dangerous.
We should not attempt to rely on trying to learn from ourselves alone until we have a great deal of experience behind us, and until that experience – of good and bad, success and failure, of sinfulness and of grace – enables us to form a central certainty amid our doubts. This is the certainty that what little we do have to hold onto is built on firm foundations. It becomes an anchor for our further seeking; for the possibly lengthy period of our continued sense of not having found a safe anchorage. It enables us to weather the storms, temptations and distractions that will seem to draw us away from our search by portraying it as unnecessarily distressing and even debilitating; restrictive and futile. It maintains our link with the rock upon which we have secured our core of certainty, and, so long as we hold onto that, however much we are buffeted and swept about by the currents that strive to tear us free, we shall be brought to the security of the harbour by the wind of the Holy Spirit blowing constantly in our lives.

I have walked my own path in this way of formless doubt and slowly reducing confusion for years, and it is only recently that I have stepped into a more settled awareness of my own self and my place within the all encompassing breath of the Spirit. I believe my own danger during those years has rarely been listening to the wrong people; it has been keeping too much to myself, both in the sense of not revealing my thoughts and feelings to others, and in that I have rarely had any meaningful contact with other Christians: contact that is perhaps usually referred to as fellowship.
When looking back over the pattern of my spiritual life, all the stages seem to fall into place leaving me with the contented alertness that accompanies my steps today. I know my story is not yet complete, but I am no longer apprehensive about where it may be leading me. Again, it is only recently that I have found myself riding on these calm waters. I believe it is because, at last, after nearly twenty years of mostly single-handed sailing with a never-diminishing sense of having never sailed before, I have experienced enough, and understood well enough about that experience to learn from it. I have reached a point where, for the first time, I am able to judge myself well enough to learn the real lessons hidden in my experience; this is what I mean when saying that I am able to learn from myself.

One of the lessons learned is about my long period of having few real connections with other Christians who may have been able to contribute to my progress. I have long been aware of this as a series of blank pages in what has otherwise been a deeply engrossing story of journeying and discovery, and have been troubled by the contradiction presented by this and my awareness of the need for all Christians to belong to a group of believers, however small, and thus become visible as part of Christ’s Church.
However great our need for the support of others, we still have gifts to bring to those around us; and however much we have to give, we can still feel a need, however infrequent, for human input from outside our own experience. None of this will bring us closer to the safe anchorage we seek, however, unless the guiding light for our own vulnerability and strength is the same one guiding those to whom we look for guidance and encouragement. Only if the ultimate guide for all of us is the Holy Spirit shall we find ourselves, not merely becalmed and lost in one of spirituality’s many backwaters, but empowered and joyful in the living peace that is Christ’s presence among and within us.
The few human guides I have had have been the right ones; in that I have been truly blessed, and without the amount of solitary time and space the Lord has granted me over the years I doubt that I would be the person I am today. Hindsight tells me that He led me into the spiritual environment and ways of nurturing that would match the human nature He gave to me. I have learned that, as with each of us, He intends to draw out the best from me.

In a talk entitled ‘Sailing in the Spirit’ (Gloucester. Nov 2007), Roy Hendy of The House of The Open Door Community prayed, “Lord, inspire your people to set sail.”
I echo his words. How can we expect to catch the breeze if we do not lay our fears and apprehension aside, hoisting our sail with a longing that it be filled to bursting with the breath of the Spirit.
The ways in which the Spirit will lead may not conform to the ways planned and laid out for us by men, but ultimately, as the Church’s only guide, we must learn to understand and act upon His leading. In doing so we shall never be misguided.