I read recently that Jesus lived in unrestrained love, inwardly free: He challenged others not by argument or attack but out of a deep center of love....'Do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also' (Matthew 5:39).
I've been pondering that, trying to get a fix on love...other than romantic love or familial love, what does, say generic, love mean to me personally.
I'm going with love is nonresistance. Period.
With that in mind, picture a rattlesnake at our feet. We wouldn't resist the rattlesnake since clearly we would lose. We would silently, stealthily back away...give over. We would not need to hate the rattlesnake, want to kill the rattlesnake. No...we would need no judgment of the rattlesnake. We would need our judgment to decide how far and how fast we can back away from the rattlesnake...or to stand still and let the rattlesnake move on. Resist not.
I'm not about to keep the image of a rattlesnake in my mind to learn to live nonresistance, but, who's kidding whom, there are a kazillion things I can substitute, without thought, that I resist daily.
Well, now. There is a fine example of contempt prior to investigation...I decide I'm not about to before I've come up with another workable image. This, after my inner-bragging recently about how good I'm getting at letting God's will, God's way be whatever "regrettable" comes from me or to me.
I suspect it was God's prompting the use of nonresistance in place of love. Face it, love has too good a rep to be used with the image of rattlesnakes or personal poisons. Nonresistance, now...a right good fit.
Blinding flash of the obvious: Retraining the brain...that's what nonresistance amounts to. This cannot be done without using the Higher Power's wiring.
Thank you.
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