ON BEING EVER TURNED TO GOD

I read the following somewhere but did not note where, and to me, plain and simple, it is a short-form of the Sermon on the Mount broken down into plain English:

• Don’t focus on external conformity to moral codes but on internal transformation in love. 
• Don’t have anxiety about money or security or pleasure at the center of your life, but trust yourself to the care of God. 

There. It seems to me that external conformity to moral codes before we have sought unto realization  and been raised into an internal transformation in love is the leading cause of rigid, righteous and right, the birth of self-determined objectives. 

Plainly put, not lying is good; not lying to the point of being hurtful to others is not good. Anything, without the inner transformation of love, or left to the reasoning mind alone, can be weaponized, even telling the truth. 

Then there is anxiety about money or security or pleasure at the center of your life. There it is...self-centered fear. 

Money in particular internalized is "profit" which to spiritual growth is "oh-no" aborning. Who's kidding whom? Anxiety about money is not concern for yours but for mine, my getting /keeping it. With all the highest motives we can muster...for food, clothing, shelter, necessities for heaven's sake!...we're praying for self. Self-centered fear in martyr's clothing.

The cure-all is not more money, security or pleasure, but trust...trusting ourself to the care of God before we have money, security, pleasure. 

We get that trust, not by self-determination but by holding our nose and taking a leap of faith. When (not if) life hands us a big raspberry. 

We build our trust when we feel we are stepping out on that frayed-rope bridge because...finally...our reasoning mind has come up empty; we can think of no other way to go. 

  

I must confess that in the end, this short form of the Sermon is my proof that the simpler the direction, the harder it is for me actually to do. Which, BFO, is the good news...it keeps me ever turning to God.

Thank you.