Dan Gilliam: Old News

Paintings for my upcoming show entitled, "Progressive Gravity" will be unveiled at my opening Friday Sept. 4th 7:00 p.m. at The Heritage Gallery 314 Laskin Rd. in Virginia Beach. They will be on display for the month of September. After the 4th I will post photos on this web site for internet viewing. Please check back or better yet come to my opening. Thanks for your interest, Dan

My life started over again a year ago and I can't say I am all that happy about it, although I'm getting there. Slowly. Today I find myself unable to envision or articulate what "there" is or what it should resemble and I am writing this to help me make some sense of it. Starting over in the middle of life doesn't come with a set of instructions. Much like birth. But at this age I can think and read, so I find myself looking for some simple explanation of where I am and where I am to go from here. I sense that I am at the back end of a year of departure from a life that seemed to work quite well for me and at the beginning of a new life that holds vague promises of a better one to come. (So I say to myself in hopes of convincing myself to buy this absurd notion.) I think I'll be OK. After all, I still know who I am and I am fortunate to have a clear recognition of what it is that I do and want to do, though where I want to do it changes almost hourly. I am certainly gifted with the clarity that there are two things I am able and willing to do in this life that make sense to me; two things that make me tolerable to myself and useful to others; two things that represent the portal to a loving God and which open doors for me to hear, see, and feel that I am in the right place at all times. My two things: Create art and help drunks. Everything else is just scenery. Whether or not I exercise regularly, eat right, sleep well, or work hard, I am right where I am supposed to be if I can place myself in the position to create art and help another suffering alcoholic. That's right, another one. I'm one suffering alcoholic and helping another one relieves me of the bondage of self and holds up the light for someone else to find their way. I've been aware of this and have been doing this for a long time now. I see no reason to change it although change is not all that scary to me. In fact, I have endured and delighted in so much transition in my lifetime that I am beginning to see that most of the pieces that make up my existence: the places, the circumstances, even the people, are interchangeable and worth keeping a loose grip on because there will come a day, sooner or later, when they will all change. This is what life does. So I guess it might be time for me to get used to it. Truth be told, I thrive on change and most likely, at some level, I facilitate all of my beginnings and endings, whether I sing of their glories or complain of their awkwardness. So, while I may be feeling a little melancholy today about some of the interchangeable places and people that have gone away from me, I am willing, albeit reluctantly, to embrace the redux of my life with an open mind and heart for I know that right where I am is where I belong at this moment. Right now, life is real and it is all good.

DAN GILLIAM: I Am Not Like God
http://cdbaby.com/cd/dangilliam
DAN GILLIAM: Simple God Songs
http://cdbaby.com/cd/dangilliam2
DAN GILLIAM: The Color of God
http://cdbaby.com/cd/dangilliam3
DAN GILLIAM: My Best So Far 1991-2001 http://cdbaby.com/cd/dangilliam4
DAN GILLIAM: Farm Cafe
http://cdbaby.com/cd/dangilliam5

" To live well myself is my first and essential contribution to the well-being of all mankind and to the fulfillment of man's collective destiny. If I do not live happily myself how can I help anyone else to be happy, or free, or wise? Yet to seek happiness is not to live happily. Perhaps it is more true to say that one finds happiness by not seeking it. The wisdom that teaches us deliberately to restrain our desire for happiness enables us to discover that we are already happy without realizing it."

- Thomas Merton, Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander, p. 81.

Like many others I know, I grew up with an inherited ethos and a doctrinal prerogative hell-bent on "helping" people by convincing them to believe the "right" truth. I even went to college and earned a degree in truth-speaking. I have dedicated many years of my life to teaching a better way of living, even before I discovered how to live happily myself. Now just 2 days into my 50th year on the planet I am aware that I believe without a shadow of a doubt that my best impact on people with whom I would wish to share positive influence is in how I live. My spiritual footprint is only as large as the path that I tread. Words are okay if they are used to describe the life I am actually living or to affirm the value and beauty of life around me, but they have little value if I only use them to talk about theories of living that exceed or contradict my own experience.

Like Thomas Merton wrote, it is evident to me that there is a paradox at work with regards to discovering real happiness in this life. Happiness is not something to seek and find, in itself, but rather a gift to embrace that has already been given. My part lies in simply becoming aware that God has already given me everything I need for life and goodness, and this comes most quickly through a daily practice of prayer and mediation and regular acts of service to others. Together, these spiritual principles allow me to "get happy" and learn to be content in any and all circumstances. This is the real work of the Kingdom of God, the inside job stuff that truly allows us to change, grow, and be like Christ to those around us. This real happiness, in no way linked to the purchase, acquisition, or possession of any material good, is what we are all wired to seek and what we are all spinning our wheels to find.

Today, may we all find a quiet moment and place in which to take a deep breath, settle into an awareness of the goodness and happiness that is our spiritual birthright, and hear the affirming inner voice of our Creator say, "Rest in me. I have you right where I want you."

Thank you for sharing the journey with me.

I can’t remember. I know I am supposed to know something but I cannot remember what. There was something before now, something very significant, something supernatural. But I don’t know what. As with everyone, I am part of some sort of Universal Whole, but in my bones I, unlike others, seem to have a deep knowing of exactly what this is. I know but I just can’t remember. Feels a little embarrassing. Surely, something, someone will soon remind me of what it is I know but can’t remember. I really look forward to this revelation. I feel ancient in this youthful, 30 year old, frame – ancient as the desert, ancient as the moon, older than the mountains and the seas. In my body I am young. But in my spirit, in my mind, I am very old. I am old. I Am.

The thing I have done my entire life I no longer want to do. I love the wood, but the nails seem to have something against me. I am convinced I am entering a process of new creation, creating a new self or better yet, revisiting a former, familiar self. All the building, the making, the tearing down, and restoring of physical structures matters not to me now. I will soon be visited, nay consumed, by a season, a dispensation, an era. A time for walking. Walking and talking will be my new job. I think I have something to say, though I know not yet what it is. It will come. A slow burn has begun in my soul. An old fire that warmed my brothers Isaiah, Joel, Jonah and David. The embers and ashes of their prophecies have landed on the roof of my house and I am ablaze with a purpose unrevealed.

Dead is the forest of the spiritual winter. Brown, wet, dark, dank. Barren limbs reach high in their final stretch from wooded graves. Here lies dormant the pregnant life of spring, the birth of Spirit and Sky – the new of the old. Dead is the Temple of Law where God once collected his thoughts and reasoned with men. Gone are the passion and freedom of a people once saved from the wilderness, the flood, the tyranny of Pharaohs and the deep silence of The Creator. Replaced by wrist boxes and foreheads full of rules, worshippers wander now about in fear, toting heavy baskets of false hope and wearing soft brains full of soggy self-concern. Is there nothing left but the shell of the House of God? Why such a love affair with a sun-bleached, wind-whipped carcass? I have something living in me not reflected in that standing rubble. I am expectant with fresh Holy! I wonder, how will the dead welcome the living?

I am a cursed man. What good is it to have knowledge of the Word of the Lord only to be surrounded by men with no understanding of its Truth? I am cursed with eyes that can only see the broken system that my fellow man has adopted for pursuing the mercy of God. They spit out the cream and prefer the splintered pail. Those Pharisees are a gaggle of noisy geese, each louder than the next, squawking about all that they know. They know shit about the heart of the Law. There is no love only legalities – no mercy only monstrosities – no God only god-awful disregard for the people for which the Father cares. (Who is the Mother, the Spirit of God?) This system must die. And in its death new life will rise. Who and how many will have to die with it? Seems that a part of God must die as well if a new thing is to be born. I wonder if I will live to see this.

So I heard from a bird this week that a certain christian church in a Western state recently made the decision to cancel a small prayer and meditation worship gathering because it did not fit within the parameters of their philosophy of spiritual development and programming. Sounds familiar. This gathering did not fit the church’s philosophy and programming from day one. Ironically, that’s why it was started; to provide a place and time for church members (including the church leadership) to grow in their relationship with God by expanding their personal and corporate practice of prayer and meditation. The wheels were in motion to cancel this thing two months after it started. It wasn’t so much a matter of small numbers, though the comparably light attendance figures were a problem for some from the beginning. It was more that the “program” of the silent gathering was unprogrammed and allowed for the possibility that someone might think something to themselves and assign an aberrant message to God. Hmmm. After all, we really can’t know for sure that God is speaking to us unless someone is reading the Bible to us, preferably someone ordained by an approved Bible College. God would never give each of us the ability to learn to hear His voice (like sheep know their Shepherd’s voice) when he has clearly given us preachers to tell us what God thinks and to explain to us how to interpret the ancient words he gave to Moses, Jesus and Paul. All religious people know that silence is a gateway for Satan to come in, therefore it is best if we never wait in quiet before the Lord (except by ourselves at home for our private devotions) when we can safely worship God with clanging cymbals and amplified gongs. Why, if we could hear God’s voice on our own or in small gatherings through Scripture, Spirit, and silence we might not see the need to attend the big worship services or support the institutional church at all. That would be bad. So, it really is best that this prayer and meditation gathering got canceled rather than attended and championed by the ministry staff and eldership. In the long run, it was probably going to hurt the church. Prayer can do that, especially if we don’t really want God’s input into how we do church.

Enjoy Life,

Dan Gilliam

Rev. Mark Angel died working for God
by rgoodman@enquirer.com

The Rev. Mark Angel, a Cincinnati native who was an involvement and outreach minister at Russell Christian Church in Eastern Kentucky, drowned Sunday afternoon while swimming in the Gulf of Mexico.
A certified swimming instructor, he had taken eight college students to Matamoros, Mexico, which is across the border from Brownsville, Texas, on a weeklong mission trip. The men were helping to build an addition to a church there.

Rev. Angel and two of his party were swimming at a beach south of Matamoros when he was pulled down by an undertow or a rip current and was swept into the gulf. Rescuers recovered his body and attempted CPR.

As overseer of the church's mission department, Rev. Angel, 41, went on many missionary trips in the United States and outside the country. His work, which included preaching and teaching, included construction of orphanages, churches and schools.He made blocks and dug ditches, said his mother, Gail Angel of Colerain Township. "He loved the Lord and all the work that went with serving Him."

He met Lori Alexander while on a mission trip to Haiti and married her in 1993. They have a 4-year-old daughter, Riley Grace.

Rev. Angel was born in Cincinnati on Dec. 22, 1965, and grew up in Colerain Township. He was an Eagle Scout and a member of the Colerain High School Class of 1984.After graduating from Cincinnati Christian University in 1988, he served as a youth minister at the Rising Sun Church of Christ in Ohio County, Ind., for three years.

He moved to Russell, Ky., which is on the Ohio River about 150 miles east of Cincinnati, in 1992. He was a youth minister at the church for eight years before being named minister of involvement and outreach.Among other responsibilities, he oversaw the church's ministry for college students and its outreach program.

"He looked for opportunities to reach out in the community and show people God's love in a practical way," said the Rev. Mark McKinney, pastor of the church."Mark was just a great guy. He always believed in everybody no matter what and people loved to be around him. He's going to leave a hole in our church and our community that will be very difficult to fill.
"He died doing something he enjoyed - working with missions and working with young people. It will be a great loss for us but a great gain for him through his faith in Christ."

In addition to his wife, mother and daughter, survivors include: his father, Howard Angel; and two brothers, Gary Angel, of Crosby Township, and Scott Angel of Cincinnati.
Visitation is 4-9 p.m. Friday and 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Saturday at Russell Christian Church. Funeral services are 1 p.m. Saturday at the church.There will also be a celebration service in place of the regular service at 10:30 a.m. Sunday at the church. Burial will be at Bellefonte Memorial Gardens in Flatwoods, Ky.

Memorial gifts are suggested to Workers of Mexico or the Riley Angel Scholarship, both in the care of Russell Christian Church, 1402 Kenwood Drive, Russell, KY 41169.

I got a call at 2:00 this morning that my old friend, Mark Angel,
drowned while on a mission trip in Mexico. This may be the first you
hear of this and I am sorry you did not get a more personal notice. I
just needed to write about it and see it in print so that I can start
to believe it, although I'd rather not.

I met Mark in 1982 when he was a sophomore in High School and I was
his new youth minister. It took a little while for Mark to warm up to
me especially after I "busted him" coming out of an R-rated movie with
a couple of girls from the youth group. (He always made fun of me
because I was there having taken a date to see Black Beauty.) Two
years later, I took Mark on his first mission trip to Haiti. I had to
visit him at his job at Steak-n-Shake to tell him that he wasn't going
to be able to go on the trip unless he made all the mandatory
preparation meetings of which he had already missed a few. He asked me
if I thought he should quit his job for a stinking mission trip, to
which I replied, "You do what you need to do." I can't remember if
Mark every worked at Steak-n-Shake after that but I know he made all
the meetings and that our trip to Haiti had a profound impact on him.
For one thing, he met his wife to be, Lori Alexander, on that trip.
Her family lived in Haiti as missionaries. Over the years, I believe
Mark has been back to Haiti more than a couple of dozen times,
building orphanages, feeding and loving children, preaching about
God's love and enjoying the beauty of the Caribbean.

A couple of years later, Mark spent six months in Kingston, Jamaica
on a mission internship with Dennis Herko and his family. Gary, Mark's
brother, and I made a surprise visit to him and took a little vacation
over to the coastal resort town of Ocho Rios. I will be writing a
chapter for my next book about this experience as it was one of my
last alcohol binges before getting permanently (one-day-at-a-time for
17 years) sober. It broke my heart to see the look on Mark's face when
I told him that I had relapsed while on that trip. The realization of
the heart break I was causing others was a large part of what helped
me get and stay sober.

I have stayed in touch with Mark Angel over the years, more than
anyone else who was once part of the Ohio youth ministry I led from
1982-1986. Many times as I was passing through on I-64 I would give
Mark a call and we would meet for lunch or a cup of coffee. He was a
good friend and I will miss him dearly.

I don't know the details of his death or of the funeral arrangements,
but I will be attending whatever services that are held at First
Christian Church in Russell, KY. I don't doubt that thousands of
people are a part of the legacy Mark Angel leaves behind and that it
will be difficult to find an empty seat in the church. As with most
funerals, Marks' will likely be a reunion of many people who will be
saddened by the occasion but delighted for the opportunity to get
together and love one another. I can hear Mark now,
"Rrrriiiiiggghhhtttt. Hee, hee, hee."

I love you, Mark. I'll see you later.

http://www.wkyt.com/news/headlines/7832467.html

From his youth, Dan Gilliam has been seeking the path to true communion with God. Dan says his new book, God Touches: Finding Faith in the Cracks and Spaces of My Life (recently released by Standard Publishing), “is simply a record of how God has spoken to me in fresh ways through my life experiences.” These stories from Dan’s life illuminate a spiritual journey that causes him to challenge the status quo and seek a simplified expression of church, as found in the New Testament. Dan, a graduate of Cincinnati Christian University, and his wife, Lynn, live in Marion, Virginia, with their three cats.


How would you define the church?

One person honestly sharing his or her life and faith with another. This is church in the most simple "book of Acts" kind of terms. True spiritual fellowship is seeking God in authentic ways and getting together with others to talk about it. The church is alive and well all over the world in many ways that the institutional church isn’t aware of, simply because it isn’t being tracked, counted, or overseen. God knows where we are, however, and Christ is in our midst wherever and whenever we gather.


Can the church provide the kind of fellowship people need to thrive?

Of course. Spiritual fellowship is a viable option for many in the church, but much of it is available and occurring outside of the institutional programs of that which we traditionally call “the church.” It is scripturally incorrect to view churches as entities distinct from the people that make up the body of Christ. Depending upon religious institutions and human leaders to provide for us that which we should inherently seek and find as Christ-followers makes our Western view of church sort of codependant. There’s something “in the air” when you step inside a church building that says property, personalities, and preferences are what matter. I’m one of millions who have chosen (recently, again) to do and be church without having aspects such as these to deal with in order to experience spiritual growth and fellowship.


I think your talking about community. How do you define community?

I think spiritual community is any gathering of people who are trying to be honest with each other—showing unconditional love and acceptance for one another and seeking God’s will and way for their lives. Christ has made this possible and people are starting to figure out that the spiritual life can be real and exciting, fun and free when shared with others who aren’t afraid of their humanity This means, of course, that there will be conflict and difficulty. Avoiding certain topics or situations just because they’re uncomfortable isn’t an option like it is in the big church. The institutional church in my opinion is too committed to cleaning things up before they can be part of our gatherings. God is not uncomfortable with messy things or people. Jesus seemed to prefer people who didn’t look all that good on the outside.


Has your experience as a church staff member jaded you?

Probably. But God has knocked many, many chips from my ministerial shoulders. I’m sure I still have a long way to go. Once you are on a church staff and you see behind the “Oz” curtain, it is difficult to go back to seeing things from your previous limited perspective. On the bright side, having been on staff at several large churches helped to drive me deeper into my walk with God and my community with others, even though I had to go outside the institution to get this. Ironically, I have found working for a church to be spiritually hazardous. This is probably why I have not served in a professional capacity for more than a couple years at a time. I find church to be more real when God is allowed to speak through more than a small handful of people, and this can only happen, in my opinion, when you don’t have a mortgage, a weekly programmed event, or a paid staff.


It seems as if your parents’ divorce started a real downward spiral for you as a teen? Would you call that the defining event of your life?

I wouldn’t say the defining event. It certainly was the first major twist away from how life was unfolding for me. I think it was the beginning of my own journey toward finding a relationship with God that was uniquely mine; therefore it was certainly a defining event. My perspective has been shaped to see that God can redeem any event, no matter how tragic, to his purposes. Unfortunately, it is usually hardship or devastation that causes people to step back from their routine, religious and otherwise, and say, “I know what I’ve been told. Now, what do I really believe?” When we have life-threatening circumstances that force us to let go and trust God for help, he is released to work in us in ways we did not know possible. In this respect, I have come to be grateful for every difficulty in my life. They have allowed God to change me in ways I could never have changed myself.


Would you call yourself the prodigal son?

Oh yeah. More than once. I’m the perpetual prodigal son. I’m pretty sure I’m done leaving the fold, though. If the fold is a religious institution, I’m a prodigal son again. If the fold is the kingdom of God, I’m smack dab in the middle of it. I kind of like wearing the robe and ring and have developed a taste for fatted calf, medium well.


How would you be different if your parents hadn’t divorced?

I probably would have just been another version of who I am now, but with not as many colorful stories to tell.


What other struggles have you faced in life?

As an adult I had a defining moment when I left my first youth ministry under duress because of an addiction to prescription drugs. This opened a Pandora’s box of alcoholism for me that had, for the most part, been in remission since my freshman year of Bible college. I was completely stripped of all I had and knew when it appeared—to my surprise—I would survive it. That, I think, led to a kind of a launching point into what I’ve become now—and what I will become. In 1989, with no place left to go, I found myself glued to a chair in an anonymous 12-step fellowship. That’s where my truest transformation and my best experience of New Testament Christianity occurred. I need to write a whole other book about the other hardships and how God has shown up in the darkest places imaginable to redeem me and show me the way home. Staying active in my 12-step fellowship allows me the opportunity to see God do this for others on a regular basis. I don’t think you get to see people change all that much in traditional expressions of church.


So good can come from bad?

I wouldn’t be who I am now without the good and bad. Whoever said, “I’m a sum total of all my experiences,” spoke for me. I hear scriptural truth ring in that quote—it’s like Romans 8:28. I’m grateful for all those potholes in my spiritual road because they’ve allowed me to bottom out, look at where I’m going, and let God alter my course as necessary.


What do you think it means for a person to be broken?

As you ask the question I can still taste the brokenness lingering in my mouth. Just like anyone who has ever had their face smack down on concrete or asphalt, you don’t forget the sensation or the sound. Brokenness, to me, is a relinquishing of control of my life. It’s getting my knuckles wrapped enough times with some kind of cosmic ruler where I finally let go of the reins. For me, I had to lose a marriage and career and be hospitalized a half-dozen times before I was able to let go and let God. I had to lose absolutely everything before I was 30 years old to say, “OK, God, I don’t have any ideas any more of how you should work in my life.” I gave it up to God and daily give it to him to work in my life any way he would choose. Up until then, I would say “God, I give you permission to work in my life in ways that I deem fit for you.” I see many people whose relationship with God is like that. It doesn’t work very well and it keeps God at a distance, though we usually don’t know it.


Is recovery just for alcoholics and drug addicts?

In modern language we use the word recovery most often to refer to alcoholics and drug addicts. Recovery is just another version of the spiritual program God has given mankind through the revealed Word. Recovery, particularly the 12-step variety, is definitely for alcoholics and drug addicts. Redemption is for everyone. From where I sit, it appears the church is really struggling to find ways to help members of the body of Christ experience the process of sanctification that is intended for us. Getting our souls into heaven, while a welcomed prospect, is a worn-out message for those who are saying, “Hey, I need some salvation in the here and now.” Salvation and sanctification are not separate messages; they’re two branches on the same stick of spiritual development.


How would you define sanctification?

Sanctification is coming to terms with who we are and trusting God to change us into the likeness of Christ. For the most part we are dirty, nasty, ugly, mean, and greedy people, but God is not shocked by that. he is fully prepared for us to be who we are and has launched a plan for us to change. Sanctification is God changing us from the inside out. Too much of modern religion focuses on external activity that is not necessarily flowing from an internal transformation. In God’s economy, it’s a package deal. It seems people are trying to change their insides by working harder on the outside. Service to others will never be truly rewarding or lead us to internal and miraculous transformation unless accompanied by the spiritual disciplines of prayer, meditation, confession, restitution, forgiveness, etc. These may sound like external works, but they are simply keys that allow us to open doors to the workings of the Holy Spirit.


You write about “living an authentic life.” What does that mean?

For me it has meant discovering and experiencing multiple layers of being who I really am—“who God is making me.” It’s experiencing self-acceptance in my relationship with God and unconditional love in my community with others. Living authentically is being aware of your “OK-ness” because of what Christ has done. This is a basic symptom of authentic spirituality. I like myself today, in part, because I am truly and uniquely the "me" God intended.


What would you call yourself . . . storyteller, writer, sage, counselor, theologian, artist? Do any of these rise to the top?

I’m flattered by the choices. I would say artist best describes how I view myself, but I prefer the term “contemplative” because I tend to look for God as he reveals himself in all things and all people. I’m more of a Christian mystic, because I don’t think we can get our minds around who God is and all that he is doing. I celebrate the mysteries of life and embrace all that I don’t understand, though this is a process. I consider myself to be more a spiritual person trying to have a human experience rather than a human being trying to have a spiritual experience.


Who should read this book?

God Touches is written primarily for people who are spiritually hungry but religiously tired. I realize it could also be an encouragement to someone who is active in a congregation but seeking fresh expressions of how to do and be the church. There are novel and energizing expressions of church waiting to be discovered by anyone willing to step back and review what they have been taught, look at Scripture with new eyes, and say with an open heart and mind, “God, show me your ways.” From what I have seen, God is waiting for us to seek him in all of life, in the ordinary as well as the extraordinary.

If you haven't yet ordered or received your copy of God Touches, you can now "Search Inside" the book here: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0784719632
Features include Back Cover, Copyright Page, Table of Contents, Exerpt, and Surprise Me! which takes you to a random place in the book.

You can also do a word or phrase search and see all the places in the book where that subject is referenced.

I want to thank you for your support during this my first publishing campaign. It is my hope that God Touches will acheive and maintain a little market traction and momentum so that I will be able to finish and publish my next book.

If you happen to be one of my many friends who bought their copy of God Touches on Amazon.com, you can help me by taking a minute to write a brief "Customer Review". This will allow folks who don't know me to order the book based on a reference from someone who has read it.

Again, thanks for your support. let me know how I can be an encouragement to you.

Peace, love, and self-promotion,

Dan Gilliam

This morning at 6:30 I shared with Dr. Alvin Jones in a 15-minute
radio interview about my book "God Touches". This is one of a dozen
radio interviews I am doing this month to promote the book.
WCBQ-WHNC-AM in Oxford, NC carried the interview live and while I was
still waking up early in the call I think it was a positive
opportunity to share some of what God has done and is doing in my
life.

It was quite an honor to be interviewed by Dr. Alvin Jones. Check out
his web site to see the list of recognizeable people he has interviewd
over the years.

www.dralvinjones.com.

Here is the link if you'd like to listen to the interview:

www.dralvinjones.com/content/01 Dan Gilliam.wma

This is my experience. This I know to be true:

Deep in our hearts, buried in the core of our internal being, we have a space for the Divine that can only be filled by God. Many theologians and philosophers, artists and writers have said this before me. I know it to be true from my own journey into the spiritual experience. I hear people talk about it almost daily.

After a lifetime of church-based instruction about God there came a point (when I was ready and not before) when above all else I desired something larger than the teachings about God that I had generously been given by my fellow man; I longed for something greater than someone else’s testimony of God. I was tired of knowing things about God but not knowing God. I made a decision to move beyond the beatitudes and platitudes that I had been hand-fed my entire life. I did not need any more answers. I needed God.

So I left the church in search of God. Armed with nothing but a bitter taste in my mouth of what I did not want and a wisp of faith that God was capable of revealing God’s true Self to me through whatever means necessary, I launched out on my journey. This was my dark night of the soul; this was my mustard seed genesis that has grown into a tree-sized system of belief and action that governs my every move and decision.

There are many among us, and I was one, who have heads full of the knowledge of what the scriptures say about God, but who have very little sense of what it is to lead a God-surrendered or Spirit-filled life. I was taught much of what I knew about God by people who were quite possibly agnostics; at least they seemed unsure of what they believed when you got them down out of the pulpit where you could touch them, look them in the eye, and ask them questions. I find this to be true today of some of the loudest and most confident-appearing preachers. They seem to be preaching in order to convince themselves to believe. I don’t have a problem with this but I do think it’s ridiculous to let only one doubter, the one getting paid to be there, do all the talking in church.

Doubts are part of what makes faith authentic. “I believe, now help me with what I don’t believe.” (Mark 9:24 paraphrased) People who have biblical answers for every situation make me nervous. I prefer to hang out with spiritual seekers who are not uncomfortable with questions and who can laugh at the oldest of the sacred cows. Sacrilegious humor in my opinion is the most soul-cleansing.

Do not worry about the language you use when you seek God. God can handle it. Do not feel as if you must envision the person, the man, or the mystery of Christ for him to become real to you. Instead, let the eyes of your spirit look up to see God in the everyday wonder of life and contemplate whatever goodness you experience. God will meet you there and bring you to the highest forms of truth in God’s good time. For the time being, anything that brings you a sense of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness and self-control is the Spirit of the Almighty growing new life inside of you. Embrace these with your heart and soul and let your mind fend for itself. God has no difficulty in revealing who God is to those who earnestly seek God.

Let your fears fall from you, especially those that grip your heart and lead you to hold on to temporal and material things. Focus on love and fear will flee. God is love. Fear is self. Spirituality explores the freedoms of God; religion attempts to contain God and control what people think and believe about God. Religion costs money. God, however, is free. Though it may work for you, you don’t have to practice a religion to experience God, especially if it has been a source of bondage for you. And while you may have to work through feelings of guilt and shame because of your decision to leave it behind it is not all that difficult to do. As Paul Simon sang back in the 70s,

“…just drop off the key, Lee, and get yourself free.”

This is my experience. This I know to be true.

Here is the copy of a print interview I did recently.

Introduction: Our guest is singer/songwriter, artist and author Dan Gilliam. Dan has lived both inside and outside the walls of the church, as well on the streets, on the beach and in a motor home. He is with us today to share his fascinating story of spiritual journey beyond institutional Christianity and into a simpler and meaningful way of living out the principles of Christ and loving the people he created and cares about. His book is God Touches: Finding God in the Cracks and Spaces of My Life.

1. Dan, you were the son of a fundamentalist preacher but left the church and your faith as a teen. Can you share how you got to that point and what was to follow?

“Growing up in the church parsonage certainly had its advantages: a big place to play hide and seek during the week, Sunday School rooms to look for snacks and money, etc. I also had a front row seat to learn about the teachings of Jesus as well as a peek behind the scenes to see how Christians really lived. When my own parents couldn’t stay married because (as I thought) the Christian faith wasn’t working for them, I turned my back on God and the church for several years. I traded in my spiritual pursuits for alcohol, drugs, and a rebellious lifestyle which almost cost me my life. But the grace of God intervened and I was given another chance to try out the Jesus-Bible-Church thing.”

2. What led to your return to God and your reconciliation with family?

“At age eighteen I was living under a bridge in Tampa, FL and barely surviving as an alcoholic and drug addict. I rarely ate or slept, weighed 135 pounds and thought I was close to dying. One night I called out to the loving God I remembered from childhood and asked him to show me the way. I believe he answered my prayer in the form of a long-haired Christian dude passing out tracks on the street about John 3:16. I believe God sent this man to tell me that God still loved me. Within a week I was back in Virginia with my family. Within six months my church had helped me to get a G.E.D. and enrolled me in Cincinnati Christian University. I went from being a homeless alcoholic to studying for the professional ministry pretty quick. I would have more difficult lessons ahead of me.”

3. You write that God seems to prefer to minister through you more out of your brokenness than through your giftedness. Can you share an example of that?

“When I talk with people about what I have learned about God from study, school, church etc., I get blank stares and far away looks. But when I talk about what God has taught me through pain, struggles, devastation and recovery, I get interest, identification, connection, and community. This is the language of the heart that recovering alcoholics and Christian mystics know about. Until I had been sufficiently broken and had lost all dependence on self I could not really rely on God and share with others the transformative power of the gospel. We cannot give away something we don’t have. In my opinion, there are too many people in ministry who are trying to lead their congregations into the ways of the Spirit through the power of the flesh. As long as we think we can do the work only God can do we keep him at bay and provide people with a shallow substitute for authentic spirituality.”

4. You also say you journeyed out of institutional Christianity into a renewed faith in Christ and a “more honest expression of the Church.” What do you mean?

“Like many people I meet in this day and time, I got to the point where I didn’t need any more answers about God; I needed a relationship that would change my life. In all my years of giving organized religion an opportunity to show me this, no one could ever tell me how or where to find an authentic spiritual awakening. The same old answers like ‘Go to church’, ‘Read the Bible’, ‘Give money’, and ‘Pray’ weren’t cutting it. Then one day after I had made the decision to cut myself free from the local church scene, to live out my faith the best I could without religious trappings, God began to show himself to me in ways that I have since identified as another expression, for me a more honest expression, of The Church.”

5. After your adult relapses into drug and alcohol addiction, how did you finally get sober to stay? Do you have any advice for our listeners on how to help an alcoholic or drug addict to find sobriety?

“The best solution in the world today for anyone with a devastating addiction to alcohol, drugs, food, gambling, etc. is in 12-Step recovery fellowships. This is where more often than not God is showing up and changing people’s lives for the long term. And this goes beyond getting free from the symptom to which the person is addicted; those who take the 12 Steps seriously with the guidance of a sponsor and the fellowship of a group will experience change at a very deep and psychic level. As far as for those who want to help someone get sober, the only real tools are prayer and letting go with love. There are also effective 12-Step fellowships for friends and family members of addicts and alcoholics. Just as no one can experience any authentic spiritual transformation alone, neither can anyone recover from diseases of alcoholism or addition without help from God and people.”

6. What are three principles you have found that are Scripturally-tested for living like Christ today?

“Make and maintain a personal and daily connection with God; Experience spiritual journey in the company of like-minded others; Practice Christ’s love through simplicity, sacrifice, and service.”

7. How have you finally found contentment since returning to Christ?

“All that I am passionate about in this life seems to flow from an artistic template and a contemplative bent towards seeing and hearing God in all people, places, and things. I have sampled the spiritual awakenings that come through freedom in the Spirit and I have tasted the goodness of God in many forms of creativity. I have come too far down the corridors of authenticity to turn back toward the false self that is generated and sold by our materialistic culture. There is no substance in stuff and nothing satisfying about the possession of things. Pride of ownership, as purported to be at the heart of the American Dream, is a delusion and, sadly, the church has bought into this consumerist approach to feeding the souls of men. Poverty of spirit is the beginning of all fullness. Dying to self is the pathway to happiness, usefulness and peace. I seek others who will follow Christ with me in this journey.”

"I feel like I can breathe again after reading God Touches. Just when you thought religion would choke every last breath of freedom out of you, Dan Gilliam awakens you to realities you never dreamed possible with God. Too often Christendom dumbs down the Christian life to something shallow and narrow. God Touches unveils a Christian spirituality, which is deep and wide. Perhaps the most hopeful aspect of the book lies in the fact that what it offers can be experienced along the everyday paths of real life by nobodies like me."

Jim Palmer, author of Divine Nobodies: Shedding Religion to Find God (and the unlikely people who help you)

http://www.divinenobodies.com/

"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” (Matthew 11:28)

Reflecting back to a month ago when I was leaving my ministry post at LifeBridge Christian Church in Longmont, CO after only 16 months on staff, I realize that Lynn and I must have made pulling up stakes look rather easy. Lest anyone think I took this decision lightly, allow me to pontificate on how I view my role with regards to God’s work.

Anyone who has known me for long would likely characterize me as a spiritual gypsy of sorts. Over a span of 25 years since graduating from Cincinnati Christian University with a B.A. degree in God, Jesus and Bible, I have done a lot of creative things and have lived in a lot of cool places. (I have also been to hell and back but that's just part of the journey and I wouldn’t trade a day of it.) One factor that has allowed me the freedom to move about so much, chasing my muse and following what I believe to be leadings of the Spirit, has been how I view my role in the Church, or God's kingdom on Earth. Twenty years or so ago, I took myself and this role pretty darn seriously, not that this is a bad thing to do. But in my case, I actually believed that if something needed to be done for Christ's sake, it was really up to me to get it done. Who knows how many times I forced myself into a situation that would have been better served by me letting it alone? By God's grace and quite a bit of work on my own spiritual condition, over time I have acquired a little maturity under my belt to help me see what an ego-feeding proposition this mentality was for me. And while it took some pretty hard raps to my metaphorical knuckles to get me in a position to learn to "let go and let God" I have seen in recent years how minimal my role really is if God is allowed and invited to be in charge. Truth is there are some occasions where my best role is simply to get out of God's way so that he can do his work in others without my help. Imagine that, God doing his work with or without me? What a place of freedom this is, to trust God to do what he wants done in the world, the Church, my family, and in me and to properly estimate my role in his kingdom. When I place listening to and seeking God as a priority in my life and "ministry", and choose to love others as best as I can, I never have to wonder if I'm doing enough or being good enough. God knows and does and wills with or without me wherever I choose to live, work, breathe, and be. Take a deep breath and let that soak in. Now, go get a massage, bowl a couple of games, or just take the rest of the day off. God needs you to give him some room to work.

"My greatest hope with 'God Touches' is that it will find its way into the hands of the many of the Christ-friendly, church attendance-weary people that surround nearly all of us. In this book, I have tried to paint a picture of how the Church is more of a factor in the world and in people's lives than what individuals or the congregational church may realize. My personal journey from institutional Christianity to the discovery and embracing of spiritual development beyond the influence of organized religion is interesting to some, appealing to others and perhaps even appalling to a few. More and more, however, I am hearing my story from other kindred spirits who find comfort in knowing that it is possible to be part of a simple spiritual community and be at the heart of the kingdom of God without having to participate in programmed religious activities or support mega-facilities. It is possible as well that many people who are fringe attenders or even active members of such religious bodies will read 'God Touches' and be drawn into my stories about connecting with God and others through art, nature, prayer, contemplation, literature, friendship, silence, etc, etc. and step up to take their own spiritual commitments more seriously and become more Christ-like in their walks. Perhaps some will even become effective and influential spiritual leaders in their congregations. In this respect, 'God Touches' is a book that may very well help to soften the harsh lines some of us draw between those who seek God inside a congregational expression of Church and those who feel they can be active in the Church without such defined participation. After all, the kingdom of God is our goal and, in Christ, all who seek his kingdom, however this occurs, are one."

Here's the Amazon link where you can take a look at the book cover
and/or pre-order your copy.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0784719632/ref=cm_blog_dp/105-0032884-1009203

At the suggestion of my teenage nieces and nephews, I have joined the MySpace generation. If you happen to be a MySpacer, I invite you to click on the "add to friends" box whereby we will be joined at the mouse and forever linked in cyberspace. At least until "delete friend" does us part.

Here are my links for photos, info, blogs, music, etc.

http://www.myspace.com/dancgilliam
http://www.myspace.com/dangilliammusic

"'God Touches' offers the blandly, stuffily or wearily religious a taste of Christian spirituality that is spicy, natural, honest, and downright vivacious. And it offers the irreligious a window into the soul of a man whose faith never makes him less human, less thoughtful, or less interesting. Beautifully written and inspiring too."

- Brian McLaren, author/speaker/activist (brianmclaren.net)

“Dan Gilliam writes from a unique perspective. He has spent time as both an insider and outsider as far as church goes. He has found both blessing and curse in the church and has spent time blessing and cursing the church. Dan’s wit and wisdom, along with a healthy dose of sarcasm make his book a wonderful read. Dan’s journey or description of that journey may not be for everyone but it is authentic, it is rooted in a sincere and disciplined desire to grow closer to God and it will invite you to look at your own journey. Any book that accomplishes that is worth picking up.”

– Rick Rusaw, Senior Minister LifeBridge Christian Church, Longmont, CO; author of The Externally Focused Church and Living a Life on Loan.

I received the final galleys of "God Touches: Finding Faith in the
Cracks and Spaces of My Life" yesterday. At this point in the process
it is hard to remember the painstaking hours, days, weeks, months and
years that have gone into the writing and publishing of this book. My
only regret is that I wish the synopsis printed on the back of the
book and posted on book selling web sites sounded more interesting.
In my opinion, what is most appealing about my book is that it points
to the spiritual awakenings and encounters available, beyond the
confines of organized religion, to any and all who would seek God to
the best of his or her ability. God is everywhere and anyone can
touch and be touched by God simply by being aware of the life forces
at work all about us. Too much contemporary theology focus upon an
"out there" God who can only be reached through concerted efforts and
active participation in a local church. My story and those of many
that I write about say otherwise. As Christ teaches us, the Kingdom
of God is "in here" and from my experience can be accessed by
simplicity, silence, solitude, creativity, beauty, love and all sorts
of honest intention and expressions. God is touching us whether we
know it or not. Our spiritual journey seems to be about growing in
our realization of these God Touches and responding to them with
increasing interest and frequency. Only then will we find real
happiness and usefulness to God and others in this world and the
next.

I invite you to stop in from time to time at my Amazon Blog to read
updates and add your comments to them.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/blog/id/AUXMD6ROEZHTP/ref=cm_blog_pdp_blog/105-0032884-1009203

After a week of prayer and soul-searching, I have made the difficult
and bittersweet decision to leave my professional staff post at
LifeBridge Christian Church. While Rick Rusaw, the church elders, and
leadership staff have done an amazing job of making me feel welcome
and have granted me unprecedented freedom to develop the recovery and
contemplative prayer ministries, I have reluctantly come to terms with
the still, small voice within me that says I can best resource the
church from the outside. In two weeks, Lynn and I will be moving back
to our home state of Virginia to live near her family and pursue a
quiet life of creative expression, contemplation and simple
usefulness to God and his people.

Concerning the areas of ministry I will leave behind, an "externally
focused" philosophy of recovery can easily continue if each staff
person will develop the practice of referring all alcoholics,
addicts, and their families to the autonomous 12-Step fellowship for
which they qualify. There is a self-stocking literature rack in the
church lobby containing valuable information and meeting schedules.
Several LifeBridge members who are committed and sober members of
such fellowships are also accessible resources. As Sanctum: A
Contemplative Gathering is designed to not be personality driven or
dependant it will continue to meet under the direction and protection
of the worship department. My hope is that the leadership staff will
always remember that Sanctum is simply a place to pray with others in
shared silence. Abiding (Centering) Prayer will also still be
available on Wednesdays at 8:00 A.M. and Thursdays at 7:00 A.M. in
the church library.

I will be eternally grateful for this season I have been given to
share life and ministry again in the local church. The 15 months I
have spent at LifeBridge have given me the gifts of many friendships
and just as many opportunities to share the experience, strength, and
hope God makes available to all who would seek him. My plans from this
point (we'll see in time if they are God's or not) are to spend a
significant amount of time writing and to lead spiritual formation
retreats as they become available to me. Having road tested in two
small groups the six biblical principles contained in A Simple Plan
For Spiritual Formation, I have good reason to believe they will make
for a weekend of profound relational and transformational growth.
Please contact me by e-mail if you are part of a church that might be
interested in such a retreat.

As always, I will continue to keep your spiritual shelves stocked
with interesting tidbits and haphazard anecdotes from my soulful
pilgrimage.

It's all good and it's all God's

“And Solomon, my son, learn to know the God of your ancestors intimately. Worship and serve him with your whole heart and a willing mind. For the Lord sees every heart and knows every plan and thought. If you seek him, you will find him. But if you forsake him, he will reject you forever. So take this seriously. The Lord has chosen you to build a Temple as his sanctuary. Be strong, and do the work.” (I Chronicles 28:9, 10 NLT)

Apparently, doing God’s work effectively, building the place where he lives requires a commitment to grow in intimacy with him through spiritual willingness and worshipful service. We should not be fooled: God sees and knows everything. Like Solomon, we are to take this charge seriously. The implication is that if we ignore the call to intimacy with God we reject him, which in turn leads to the power of God to be absent in our lives. As many of us know firsthand, it is possible to continue to be saved by God’s grace and walk in external forms of righteous living without experiencing the transforming power of God. I guess God can live in us and sometimes not be at home.

In my own life, the seasons when I have turned my back on God by not practicing consistent spiritual study, prayer, meditation, and failing to participate in an accountable community with others have led in time to catastrophic results. The best case scenario has been that I have not been at peace in my own skin or had an effective message to share with others. The worst case is that my life gets interrupted by devastating sin and demoralizing consequences. The fear of repeating this freefall is not a bad motivation for getting up a little early each day to seek God and place myself in a position to listen to his Word for me. Out of this commitment comes the confidence that, even though I am still fraught with flaws and character defects, God will use me to work his will and touch the lives of others with his love and mercy. Building the Temple of God, serving as a worker in his kingdom is not something to be taken lightly. Let us ask God to make us willing to seek his input in all that we do so that we may be strong in his work and build a place where he can live.

“When he opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven for about half an hour. And I saw the seven angels who stand before God, and to them were given seven trumpets. Another angel, who had a golden censer, came and stood at the altar. He was given much incense to offer, with the prayers of all the saints, on the golden altar before the throne.” Revelation 8:1-3 (NIV)

Interesting that before the angels with trumpets were allowed to blow them and before the angel with incense was allowed to light it, there was 30 minutes of silence in heaven. The prayers of the saints were not placed on the golden altar before the throne until a moment of silence, check that, 30 moments of silence had been observed. No doubt, this made everyone in heaven a little uncomfortable. I’ll bet all the angels just about squirmed out of their feathers while waiting for someone to say something, anything. Of course, this look into the future hasn’t really occurred yet in our slice of time, but it has already occurred, is and has been occurring in God’s realm since the beginning. Silence, as a means of showing reverence and as a method of worship is as old as the heavens and as new as our next breath. Those of us on earth who are uncomfortable with silence, whether in our cars, our homes, our heads, or our church services, had better prepare ourselves for some long stretches of quiet in eternity land because apparently God likes it.

According to this passage in Revelation, God prefers to have the table set with some silence before moving ahead with the sounds and smells of worship. How different from the way we currently “do church”. Last time I looked in on a mega church service, the pre-worship music was loud and perky and made me start looking for the food court. I wonder if we couldn’t take a cue from the way they “do worship” in heaven? Does anyone else notice that we in modern America worship like we drive? Lots of quick starts and sudden stops. No time for pausing to ponder anything that was just read, said, sung, or prayed. We’ve got other important things to read, say, sing, and pray. And besides, we only have an hour, we can’t afford to waste any of it just sitting around.

About once a week somebody sends me an article about a “great” church offering a “cool” service in an old building that is attracting hundreds of young adults to attend an “alternative” worship experience. Common elements include hip (read hip hop, grunge or even country) music for worship, espresso coffee drinks, tons of candles and an inspired personality who functions as God’s newest talking head. Signs of success include lots of people with tattoos and multiple piercings, a large contingency of smokers who gather outside and long periods of standing, hand-raising, and clapping during loud segments of musical worship. “God is truly in this place” is often spoken by the person up front after songs have been sung that especially helped people hit emotional high points as if volume and emotional expression is any indication of God’s presence. As Christian mystic and author Meister Eckhart once said, “Nothing in all creation is so like God as silence”. I have a thirst in my soul for times of quiet whereby I can rest in God and listen with my heart for what he might want to say to me. My spirit longs to love God and lean into him with the intimacy that can only occur in silence. Best friends are quite comfortable together in stillness. Most times I go into the woods or walk around the lake to get this level of quiet, though closing my door also works (Matt. 6:6). Who knows? Maybe one day the church will once again be a place of quiet where people like me can go to pray. 30 minutes of silence with much incense. Sounds heavenly.

In case you might be interested, I am sending you two links to where
you can download some of my independant music.

http://www.emusic.com/album/10847/10847717.html?fref=700329
http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewAlbum?playListId=31256905

" I pray that they will all be one, just as you and I are one -- as you are in me, Father, and I am in you. And may they be in us so that the world will believe that you sent me."
(John 17:21 NLT)

My good friend Robert Eugene Smith passed away this week after a relatively short but painful dance with cancer. He leaves a legacy of loving people unconditionally and encouraging them to be all that God made them to be. Bob and I both joined the staff of LifeBridge Christian Church in Longmont, CO in the summer of 2005. The first words I ever heard him speak were in his introduction to the leadership staff where he used a term you don't often hear in church staff meetings. Bob said something along the lines of, "While my job in the technical and communications arenas may not be as sexy as some areas of ministry, it is never-the-less valuable and I am honored to be a part of the LifeBridge team." Upon our first conversation, I could foresee that in the coming days, weeks and months I would share frequently and honestly with this bright, open-minded, and accepting man who made making friends look easy. Without realizing it, Bob Smith became a mentor to me and, I would dare say, to several others on our staff.

Having attended sister Bible Colleges in different decades Bob and I were sort of like Siamese twins from different mothers, joined at the heart by a common religious heritage historically known as the (Stone-Campbell) Restoration Movement. More important to both Bob and me, however, was our tie to the position that God was bigger than we had been taught or could ever understand. We also shared a mutual disinterest and a healthy disdain for any theology that was exclusive with regards to people or limiting with regards to God. Both of us had friends and acquaintances that, without really knowing what we believed, tagged us as sacrilegious and even Universalist, but neither of us was willing to give this kind of fear-based labeling much energy. Bob believed, as do I, that Jesus Christ accomplished his mission of redeeming the world, had successfully created the path of oneness back to the Father, and that this is available through grace to all who would seek it. Our common point of so-called heresy, however, came where we believed that there are many God-seekers in the world who are finding a connectedness with God without full knowledge that Christ is their Connector. When Jesus said in John 14: 6, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except
through me", what he meant, in part, was that all who would experience Kingdom relationship would do so because of his life, work, death, resurrection and ascension. Jesus makes possible all paths to God and no one comes to God except through Jesus. And while there will be a day when "every knee will bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord", there is a tomb-shaped portal opened into the eternal now for those who are finding an authentic life changing friendship with God though they might not yet be getting the Name quite right.

On May 7th, 2006 the LifeBridge staff received this e-mail from Bob, "Myra and I want to thank you for your continued prayers on my behalf. We have been told that the disease I have is not one that the medical profession is able to cure...." Though some might have missed the implications of this missive, to me it was clear that Bob was giving us our first glimpse into the fact that he would not be with us very much longer. Over the summer, as Bob and I continued our tradition of weekly lunch or coffee, as was usual for him, Bob was more interested in hearing about me than in talking about himself. In keeping with that which is common to all effective leaders and great men, he made me feel that what I was concerned about was important and that it was also important to him. Bob had a real knack for listening and for sharing your enthusiasm with whatever project you were working on. He just loved to watch and hear about life as it was unfolding in people's lives. After a couple of failed attempts at probing Bob for details into his worsening condition, it occurred to me that he would probably rather talk about life, his or someone else's, than about his impending death. So from June until October 8th, the day before he died, whenever I was with Bob, I made it a point to always talk about my life and what I saw going on in the world around me. It was amazing to me how he continued to be interested in and aware of others even as he was laboring over each of his numbered breaths. As family, friends, work associates, and even the mayor filed into his hospital room to see him, he would take their hands, say their names, and ask how they were doing. At the risk of painting Bob into the likeness of a saint (which he would hate), he even donated his eyes so that, after he ceased to need them, someone he would never know would have a better life. Anyone who knew Bob Smith was mindful that his was a life well lived.

On his last Thursday, when no one else was in the room, Bob told me that though some might think it sacrilegious, he didn't believe he was going to see any pearly gates or golden streets. He said, "I have the sense that I am just going to be one with God." When I responded with, "How could that be any less beautiful?", he replied, "Absolutely!". From where I was standing, it appeared that Bob Smith was already beginning the journey toward full awareness of his oneness with God. This concept of growing in awareness of our unitive relationship with God is of particular interest to me as I journey in the practice of contemplative prayer. Why would Father God not answer the John 17 request of Christ the Son that we be one just as he and the Father were one? And with all the apostolic references to Jesus uniting us with the Father through the Spirit, would it not seem natural (or supernatural) for us to desire to see our true condition of oneness with God as he sees it? Is this not part of what the apostle Paul must have prayed for in Ephesians 1:18 when he asked that, "...the eyes of your heart might be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you..."? Oneness with God is not something that happens as much as it is something that has already happened (in the timeless, eternal economy of God) and something of which we must become, in this life, incrementally aware. We are already one with God, we just have, for the most part, too many earthly distractions to notice this monumental, all-encompassing fact.


On his last Saturday when I had a few moments alone with my dying friend, I took the opportunity to pray over his tired, worn-out body. Standing over him, moving my hands from inside out and back in again like a swimmer treading water, I silently prayed the name of Jeshua (Hebrew for "Joshua" from which we get "Jesus") over each limb and over every corner of Bob. Though I may have whispered the name aloud at some point, I certainly didn't say it loud enough for Bob to hear. And even if I had it should not have caused him to respond in the way he did. For with a sudden quickness that startled me, considering that he was heavily sedated with morphine and snoring, Bob opened his big, blue eyes and looked sharply into mine as if I had just shouted his name. Though he didn't say a word, and he quietly settled back to sleep when I told him what I was doing, his eyes had for a split second clearly articulated the word, "What?". Now, as most of my friends will tell you, I am not too keen on the dramatic these days, so I am not interested in creating a scene and reading into it things which were possibly just reactions to drugs, pain or whatever. All I know is that I had been praying the name of Jesus over Bob and he responded to me as if I had been calling out his name. The one thought that came to my mind then and the only one that makes sense to me now is that Bob was so rapidly losing his identity as being separate from God that, in that moment, he could not tell the difference between his own name from that of Jesus. I have never seen anything like it. Regardless of what skeptics and the rationalists could say, this explanation doesn't seem outlandish to me. Bob was plainly, with each passing hour, growing in his awareness of his oneness with God. And on Saturday, he was almost there.

On his last Sunday, Bob knew this was his last day and he told members of his family that he was ready to go home. When I visited him for the final time around 5:30 p.m., he was surprisingly lucid for short periods. Seeing this gave me the false impression that Bob would be around for more visits from me, so I may not have taken full advantage of my last minutes with him. Never-the-less, knowing that Bob was a longtime Denver Broncos fan, I talked briefly about the game to be played the next night on Monday Night Football and chatted about the weather. Upon hearing that there was a chance of snow for game time Bob said almost authoritatively, "Good. That'll be good for them." Upon leaving, having said, "Goodbye" to him more times than I had wanted, I said "Goodnight, Bob" instead. I remember feeling grateful when I realized that Bob had heard me because he responded with, "Goodnight, Dan". These were Bob Smith's last words to me. I will cherish them and many other of his words for a lifetime. And while I can't be sure, I would like to think that the first words Bob heard upon crossing that mysterious threshold between earthly death and eternal life were, "Welcome home, Bob, my good and faithful servant. Enter into your rest." And, "Oh, by the way, the Broncos are going to win tonight 13-3."

“When the door of the steambath is continually left open, the heat inside rapidly escapes through it; likewise the soul, in its desire to say many things, dissipates its remembrance of God through the open door of speech, even though everything it says may be good. Thereafter the intellect, though lacking appropriate ideas, pours out a welter of confused thoughts to anyone it meets, as it no longer has the Holy Spirit to keep its understanding free from fantasy. Ideas of value always shun verbosity, being foreign to confusion and fantasy. Timely silence, then, is precious, for it is nothing less than the mother of the wisest thoughts.”

Diadochus of Photiki, “On Spiritual Knowledge and Discrimination: One Hundred Texts”, in The Philokalia, vol. 1, compiled by St. Nikodemus of the Holy Mountain and St Makarios of Corinth, trans., eds., G.E.H. Palmer, Phillip Sherrard, Kallistos Ware (London and Boston: Faber & Faber, 1979), p. 276


While in Tennessee last week on a ministry-related venture I took the opportunity to visit St. Columba Episcopal Retreat near Memphis for a few days of quiet reflection. Having made retreat reservations sight unseen, I was pleased at first glance to see signs encouraging a strict silence in my quadrant of the property. My tiny hermitage, which backed up to the corner of the camp, was shaded by tall oaks, maples, and elms and flanked by a fish-jumping lake. Here I spent four days alone following deer trails through the woods, reading, writing, and seeking the silence of God in my own heart. Though occasionally this silence was broken by the distant whine of a car’s wheels or a truck’s motor, for the most part I was out of touch with the world and free to bask in the solitary domains of forest and fauna. At night, with little sense of time passing I was serenaded by the whir of crickets and choruses of frogs. In my walks, I saw snakes slither and salamanders dart toward points unknown. The sights, smells and noises of God’s good earth took me deeper into the hush in what may well have been the last silence of summer.

Silence is not easy to adjust to when you live your life continually connected to devices of communication and you’re carried along by daily meetings, activities, and appointments that just don’t stop. One reason I am developing the quarterly habit of taking silent retreats is to ingrain in my body, soul, and psyche the ability to STOP and let God have some time to speak to me. Stopping anything requires a decision (or a wreck), but stepping out of our addiction to noise and activity requires a spiritual awakening. My first hours of retreat in the Tennessee calm were delightful and I was surprised at how relaxed I soon became. With nowhere to be and no one to see, I was able to be present with my thoughts and intuitive notions without interruption. But as the day wore on, I began to feel the familiar sense of approaching panic that accompanies separation from the modern way of living. Questions like, “What if this time passes too slowly?”, and “What if I can’t make it and have to leave?” almost made my chest cave in with anxiety. As with most uncomfortable feelings, there is no way through them but to go through them and let them pass. And they passed. And they returned and passed again and again. I decided to ask God to help me be present with each moment and not wish even one minute away. I dedicated the retreat to being present with God, his creation and my self in what might very well be the last silence of summer.

One of the benefits of extended silence is that my inner reservoir is filled and I am grounded with an appetite for quiet. After retreats like my recent one, I find myself choosing my words more carefully as if I only have so many to use. From some place beyond my own resources has come a newfound desire to use them sparingly and well. Unusual for me, words seem less likely to fly out of my mouth in search of a place to make sense or a person to bother or entertain. What is it I really want to say? What could I say that would make the moment better? is it possible that a space of silence could be more profound than any words I might muster or mutter? In a meeting, I sense that if I don’t speak, someone else will fill the void with words and they do. I ask God to give me the words he wants me to say. Nothing comes to mind and I thank him. I am aware that God is at work in this moment and that for a long time I may have overestimated my role in the maintenance of the universe. I reach back to the hours and days of my retreat and enjoy one more moment from what may very well have been the last silence of summer.