Three Truths That Will Leverage Your Genius This Year

Albert Einstein once made the astute observation:

“Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.”

There are three points from Einstein's statement I want to unpack relating to what it means to living your strongest, most authentic life this new year.

First, everybody is a genius.  That means you.  That means me. That means the person next to you, too.

Does it feel that way to you?  Does this statement resonate as truth to you?

Perhaps we have difficulty believing this truth about ourselves and others because we live in a culture that equates genius narrowly with IQ.  Or we equate genius with a certain kind of thinking style (e.g. those who know how to work through complex mathematical equations or quick and astute problem solving).  Or we were raised in a family that emphasized a certain style or kind of learning and since we didn't match that, we felt stupid.  Or we were raised by emotionally stunted parents who were inherently insecure and took it out on us by putting us down and telling us we weren't worth much and wouldn't amount to much.

But I think Einstein is absolutely correct about people.  Everybody is a genius in some area, especially in the arena of their own strengths.

Second, we must start measuring the right things to ascertain genius.

Truth is, fish simply can't climb trees.  They're not designed for that (except for the Mangrove Killifish and several other types which wait out the dry season for several months on a low lying branch until the rainy season brings more water).

When is the last time you went to an aquarium, looked at the fish, and remarked disgustingly, "Stupid fish.  Why aren't they up climbing trees!  Instead, they're just content to swim around here under the water.  Idiots!"

No, you and I don't judge fish for not climbing trees.  We don't measure the genius of fish by whether they are climbing trees or not.

But think about how our culture is fixated on weakness--parents spend more time focusing on where their kids are failing or what the kids aren't doing enough of, managers spend more time trying to fix employees' weaknesses, politics obsesses on leaders' inabilities and mistakes, media fixates on what's wrong.  Everybody gets judged for "not climbing trees."

When people are measured by the wrong standards, and they get judged by how far they are from that standard, what ultimately happens is people internalize this message "I'm stupid!"  I've coached people who have that mental tape that plays every time they do something and can't do it well.  "I'm stupid."

And they often never get to the possibility of realizing that in fact they're not stupid at all, they're simply being measured by the wrong standard.

We all have to do things we're not really good at.  We have to manage around our weaknesses in order to fulfill our obligations and responsibilities.

But if we focus more time and energy on trying to improve our weaknesses to the exclusion of operating within and leveraging our strengths, we are draining unnecessary energy from our brains.  And our emotional mood plummets.  Our self esteem ultimately hits rock bottom.  And the painful and vicious cycle spirals on.

And today, self esteem is at an all time low in individuals, organizations, and even regions.  We don't feel good enough.  We don't feel like we're ever measuring up.

Third, everybody is a genius in the arena of their strengths.

Coaching hundreds of people through the years, I've seen time and again that everyone is an expert in the area they're suppose to be an expert in, their strengths and how to use them.

One of the reasons why I love doing strengths coaching is because of the question we focus on:  instead of asking, what's wrong with people and how do we fix it, the question is, what's right with people and how can they leverage it?

Those of us who work with the StrengthsFinder assessment (developed by the Gallup organization) which identifies a person's top five signature strengths know that there's a 1:34 million chance that someone else has the same top five strengths in the same order as you.  This makes our individual genius amazingly unique and special.

Fish instinctively know how to swim and do underwater acrobats because they're designed and wired for underwater swimming.  Some fish are wired to even fly out of the water, but they always go back under.  They're water creatures and that's what we measure them by.

Once strengths are identified (and people do have to engage in the identification as they answer questions related to what behaviors they do that bring them energy and feelings of strength), everybody can increase their instinctive ability to know how to use them.  And with coaching, they are able to establish new ways to both notice and leverage their strengths---conscious competence.

Latest Research Confirming the Significance of Strengths Living

The point of strengths work centers on the well-researched fact that when we focus on our strengths, we are 8 times more likely to be more engaged and more productive in what we're trying to do.  We believe in ourselves more and live with more confidence which in turn increases effectiveness.

Here's some science to confirm this reality.

A recent blog post I read referred to some fascinating new studies using fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging) to track neural activity showing how  focusing on your strengths

"arouses the parasympathetic nervous system, invoking cognitive, emotional, perceptual and behavioral openness and improving performance.  It also creates the conditions for neurogenesis, allowing people to learn and develop new healthy habits and competencies."

By contrast, focusing on weaknesses arouses the sympathetic nervous system which increases your heart rate, raises your respiration, moves blood from one place (e.g., your digestive system) to another (your muscles), etc. These responses are all "arousal" responses which get you ready to fight or flee in times of danger---good for short term survival; terribly damaging for long term health.

Ways to Be Strengths-focused This Year

I'm challenging you to make 2014 the year of living your strengths in unprecedented ways.  * Identify your strengths - take the test.  * Notice how you're using them - make a list.  * Establish how you can be even more intentional about using them in new ways (try planning goals this year around each of your strengths and keep track of how you're doing).  * Learn about the strengths of the people in your life (at home, at work - I do a lot of strengths coaching with couples as well as work teams - very profound).  * Affirm their use of their strengths every time you notice it.  * Hire a coach to guide you and support this revolutionary journey of growth and effectiveness.

I guarantee that if you take these steps, you'll notice radical improvement in your attitude, your self esteem, your energy, your focus, and even your whole body.

Einstein is right.  Everybody is a genius!  So go out and live your genius this year!  I'm cheering you on.

______________________________

Looking for a Speaker or Coach?

If you or someone you know in your organization is looking for a keynote speaker or workshop teacher for events in your company, congregation, or association gatherings, I would be happy to come speak on this theme or others like it.  And interested in strengths coaching?  Feel free to email me at greg@gregorypnelson.com.

What Is Faith and How Does It Impact Your Life?

I heard of a professor of theology at Harvard Divinity School ending every class with the question, "So what's the cash value?"  His point was that theology, any discussion about God, any view of the nature of God and words and descriptions of God, theological ideas have real effects on the world, they must result in something practical and ethical for the good of the world.  There must be "cash value" from both the ideas and the conversation. So what's the cash value of faith?  How do you define faith and what difference does that faith make in living your life?  In truth, how we define faith radically shapes both how we show up in the world and what kind of life experience we enjoy.

Is the Universe Friendly?

Albert Einstein once said, "The most important question you'll ever ask is, Is the universe friendly?"  His point was that how a person views the universe impacts the way that person responds to the challenges of life and uses available resources for those challenges.  Here's how he put it:

"For if we decide that the universe is an unfriendly place, then we will use our technology, our scientific discoveries and our natural resources to achieve safety and power by creating bigger walls to keep out the unfriendliness and bigger weapons to destroy all that which is unfriendly, and I believe that we are getting to a place where technology is powerful enough that we may either completely isolate or destroy ourselves as well in this process.

"If we decide that the universe is neither friendly nor unfriendly and that God is essentially 'playing dice with the universe', then we are simply victims to the random toss of the dice and our lives have no real purpose or meaning.

"But if we decide that the universe is a friendly place, then we will use our technology, our scientific discoveries and our natural resources to create tools and models for understanding that universe [and cooperating with it]."

His point is that how we see the universe is ultimately an issue of faith.  Faith has cash value - it radically impacts the way we react and respond and behave toward ourselves, others, and our world.  It takes the form of both attitude and behavior. It impacts how we use all the resources available to us - either in love-based or fear-based ways.  Everything we think, feel, and do will follow our faith correspondingly.

God Is Love

Sounds a lot like the biblical perspective emphasized in 1 John 4:  "God is love, and all who live in love life in God, and God lives in them.  And as we live in God, our love grows more perfect.  Such love has no fear because perfect love expels all fear.  If we are afraid, it is for fear of judgment, and this shows that his love has not been perfected in us."  (verses 16-18)

Love is the central value and force in the entire universe.  Love is the very nature of God.  No wonder Jesus made the same claim by saying that all of God's commandments are summarized into two:  loving God with all your heart and loving your neighbor as yourself.  All of God's totality manifested in words are summed up by love.  Love is the operating force in the universe.

Fear is antithetical to love.  Fear judges.  Fear condemns.  Fear criticizes.  Fear chooses against the other.  Fear coerces.  Love and fear cannot operate at the same time.  Human life is comprised of making the choice to think, feel, and act in love or in fear.  Life works best, the way the Creator of the universe designed it, when it is lived in harmony and alignment and congruency with love.  Faith is believing enough to stake your life on the centrality of love, even when it seems counter-intuitive in a situation you're encountering.

What Is Faith?

Marianne Williamson, a spiritual teacher and author, in her book Return To Love, describes the cash value this way:  "To trust in the force that moves the universe is faith.  Faith isn't blind, it's visionary.  Faith is believing that the universe is on our side, and that the universe knows what it's doing.  Faith is a psychological awareness of an unfolding force for good, constantly at work in all dimensions.  Our attempts to direct this force only interferes with it.  Our willingness to relax into it allows it to work on our behalf.  Without faith, we're frantically trying to control what it is not our business to control, and fix what it is not in our power to fix.  What we're trying to control is much better off without us, and what we're trying to fix can't be fixed by us anyway.  Without faith, we're wasting time ... We learn to trust that the power that holds galaxies together can handle the circumstances of our relatively little lives."  (p. 52, 56)

Two Ways Faith Impacts Life

So what's the cash value?  Here are several implications I'm learning. One, relax.  Have you noticed how much of life is lived with anxiety, uncertainty, chaos, conflict, power struggles?  We invest an inordinate amount of personal energy in those negative energy fields.  Think of the "fights" you have with your significant other, for example?  How much energy is used up in those fights?  Over what?  Universe-altering issues?  Global-impacting concerns?  Do or die principles where life will literally come to an end if the situation doesn't resolve according to your idea?  So this implication is hugely significant.  Relax.

But what does faith have to do with my ability to relax?  If I believe that God is working for my greatest good, and I'm willing to surrender the results to God in every situation, allowing only my self to learn what I need to learn as opposed to having to teach everyone else what I think they need to learn, I can relax.  I can have a greater inner peace about stuff.  Why?  Because I'm not obsessing, anxiously trying to control and fix everyone and everything else around me according to what I think everyone needs.  I'm not desperately trying to hang on to a specific outcome.  I can relax in a trust that the Power holding the galaxies together, the Power behind even our own laws of gravity and photosynthesis and thermodynamics in our world, for example, can and is handling the convoluted and chaotic circumstances of my own inner and outer life.  I can relax because I am choosing faith, love, and surrender.

Two, cooperate.  My ability to relax is directly related to my willingness to cooperate with the universe's law of love.  If I believe that the fundamental nature of the universe is love rather than fear (as both Einstein and 1 John 4:16-18 suggested), then when I make the deliberate decision to love rather than to fear in any specific situation I am intentionally placing myself in harmony with God's universe.  I am choosing to come into alignment with God's fundamental nature and operation.  And here's what happens:

"When we love, we are automatically placing ourselves within an attitudinal and behavioral context that leads to an unfoldment of events at the highest level of good for everyone involved.  We don't always know what that unfoldment would look like, but we don't need to.  God will do God's part if we do ours.  Our only job in every situation is to merely let go of our resistance to love.  What happens then is up to God.  We've surrendered control.  We're letting God lead.  We have faith that God knows how."  (Ibid., p. 57)

Here's how this works.  Surrender, cooperation, means giving up attachment to results.  I realize that most of my personal angst in both my relationships and my life experiences are often because of I grab a hold of a specific outcome (result) and refuse to let it go at any cost.  So when it begins to appear that others aren't working for MY results, I get threatened and insecure.  I often fight back to try to ensure I get my way.  And painful conflict results instead.

But when I surrender to God (cooperate with God), I let go of my attachment to how I think things are suppose to happen on the outside and I become more concerned with what happens on the inside of me.

"The more important it is to us, the more important it is to surrender.  That which is surrendered is taken care of best.  To place something in the hands of God is to give it over, mentally, to the protection and care of the beneficence of the universe.  To keep it ourselves means to constantly grab and clutch and manipulate.  We keep opening the oven to see if the bread is baking, which only ensures that it never gets a chance to."  (Ibid., p. 58)

What's the Cash Value?

So imagine being able to live life with a more relaxed attitude toward everyone and everything.  Imagine seeing all of life, including yours, in the hands of a benevolent, loving God who loves and provides equally for us and everyone else.  Imagine experiencing a profound peace from being able to surrender everything in your life to Love and no longer having to control or manipulate or coerce or connive life to conform to your expectations.  Imagine the transformation possible from only having to look at your self and aligning your self with God and letting God take are of the rest.  Imagine a world where others are doing the same thing, where Love is the reigning, guiding force in all relationships and life experiences.  Wouldn't that be Heaven?  Not bad for cash value.

Developing A Faith That Works, 4: A Way of Seeing

[Please SHARE this blog with people who might be interested!  Hit the button on the right to subscribe or to share the post] In August of 2007 the New York Times reported that in her collection of letters, Come Be My Light, Mother Teresa (1910-97) confessed that for years she had harbored deep, troubling doubts about the existence of God, even as she worked tirelessly to relieve the pain and suffering of the sick and dying in Calcutta.

In one of her journal entries, she cried out, "Where is my Faith - even deep down right in there is nothing, but emptiness & darkness - My God - how painful is this unknown pain - I have no Faith - I dare not utter the words & thoughts that crowd in my heart - & make me suffer untold agony.  When I try to raise my thoughts to Heaven - there is such convicting emptiness that those very thoughts return like sharp knives & hurt my very soul. - I am told God loves me - and yet the reality of darkness & coldness & emptiness is so great that nothing touches my soul. Did I make a mistake in surrendering blindly to the Call of the Sacred Heart?"

Her honest confession evoked a wave of criticism.  Was she a hypocrite?  Had she been faking it all along?  Or was she, as atheists are now claiming triumphantly, simply a self-deluded person trying to have a faith in something that obviously doesn't exist?

But in the flood of public comments that followed the publishing of her diaries, a student named Krista E. Hughes made the most telling comment in a letter to the editor.  "Mother Teresa's life," she wrote, "exemplifies the living aspect of faith, something sorely needed in a society where Christian identity is most often defined in terms of what a person believes rather than how he or she lives.  Shouldn't it be the other way around?"

Krista Hughes speaks truth, and Mother Teresa illustrates that truth:  faith is not just about what you believe, whether you give mental assent to a propositional statement about what Reality is or isn't; faith isn't simply believing that God exists.  Faith is, as Harvey Cox (emeritus professor at Harvard Divinity School) in his book The Future of Faith puts it, "more a matter of embodiment than of axioms ... a way of life, a guiding compass ... the experience OF the divine displacing theories ABOUT it." And sometimes the experience of the divine is more an action in harmony with the Presence than a feeling of Presence (as Mother Teresa showed).

There were times Mother Teresa wasn't even sure God existed, at least for her.  But she continued living the Way of Love to the suffering and dying poor in Calcutta.  She continued the practice of compassion regardless of her doubts because of her love for Jesus not just her experience of Jesus.

That's why Jesus called himself "The way, the truth, and the life."  And to illustrate an experience of Jesus in this reality, his disciples were called followers of The Way.  Following Jesus meant walking the path of Jesus, the path of self-denial and unconditional compassion and justice.  Spiritual practices and disciplines emerged to help empower followers to walk this Way of Jesus.  Following that was known as a life of faith – a way of the heart, not just the head.

SO IN THIS SERIES, we've been taking a look at three words that are translated as "faith."  We're unpacking each word and exploring what it means and what the differing nuances suggest about developing a faith that works in real life, a faith that transforms life, a faith that defines ourselves and produces a rich and deeper experience of both God and Life.  It's a return to the core of what religion was always meant to facilitate but has too often lost along the way:  a transformation of the heart.  So far, we’ve looked at FAITH AS fiducia – trust, relaxed confidence, fidelitas – faithfulness, loyalty, allegiance.  The third word is visio.

Faith As Vision

The third Latin word for faith is visio which literally means “likeness, face, visage."  It's our English word for “vision.”  This is faith as a way of seeing – a way of seeing “what is,” of seeing the whole.  The Christian New Testament often connects faith with seeing a certain way.  H. Richard Niebuhr, a mid-twentieth century theologian, in his book The Responsible Self, speaks of the central importance of how we see the whole of what is, for how we see the whole will affect how we respond to life.  He describes three contrasting ways of seeing life and reality.  Notice the corresponding attitudes and responses to life with each life vision.

REALITY 1:  Life is hostile and Threatening.  Corresponding attitudes:  Paranoia; “None of us gets out of here alive”; Life is filled with threats to our existence.  Response to life is:  Defensive; Seek to build systems of security and self-protection to fend off hostile powers; God is our Judge - God is going to get us – unless we do the right things to secure His favor.

REALITY 2:  Life is indifferent.  Corresponding attitudes:  “What is” is simply indifferent to human purposes and ends and meanings; Universe is neither hostile to nor supportive of our lives and dreams.  Response to life is:  Less anxious and paranoid than the first vision; But still likely to be defensive and precautionary; We build up what security we can in the midst of an indifferent universe; Though we may enjoy times of rich aesthetic to life, ultimately, we are likely to be concerned primarily for ourselves and those who are most important to us.

REALITY 3:  Life is life-giving and nourishing.  Corresponding attitudes:  Sees reality as gracious; It has brought us and everything that is into existence; It is filled with wonder and beauty, even if sometimes a terrible beauty; Jesus’ theology:  God feeds the birds and lilies, clothes them; God sends rain on the just and unjust; God is generous.  Response to life is:  Faith as a radical trust in God; Frees us from the anxiety, self-preoccupation, and concern to protect the self with systems of security that mark the first two viewpoints; Leads to a “self-forgetfulness of faith and thus to the ability to love and to be present to the moment”; Generates a “willingness to spend and be spent” for the sake of a vision that goes beyond ourselves; St. Paul:  leads to a life of freedom, joy, peace, and love.

Niebuhr's point is that the way we see the whole radically impacts the way we live life.  Vision makes a transforming difference.  And since faith is about vision, how we see, the quality of one's faith directly affects the quality of one's life.  This is why Albert Einstein made the provocative observation, "The most important question you'll ever ask yourself is, Is the universe friendly?"  With all his scientific knowledge, along with his growing spiritual awareness, he began to put the two "worlds" together and realized that one's perspective on the universe and the cosmos and the Force behind and in it all was a hugely important issue.  Is Life, is God, is the Universe friendly or not?  That starting point affects everything.

But to develop a vision of reality as life-giving and nourishing is not to be naive or to turn a blind eye to the darker side of life.  Here's the way Marcus Borg summarized it:  “Niebuhr was no Pollyanna.  He knew about the Holocaust and all the terrible things that we are capable of doing to each other.  The point is not that reality is simply ‘nice,’ or that one can demonstrate that it is gracious.  Rather, the point is that how we see reality matters, for how we see ‘what is’ profoundly affects how we experience and live our lives.” Marcus Borg, The Heart of Christianity, p. 36

Faith then is a choice for how you want to see, what lens you want to look at life through.  As quantum physicists are saying these days, your perspective helps to create and shape your reality.  You end up seeing what you choose to see.  The depth and quality of your spirituality and faith is a lot about making choices about vision and sight and a view of reality.  And what you decide impacts what you experience.

So of the three realities Niebuhr describes, which do you tend to live in the most?  How has that impacted your life experience?  Do you see yourself as being able to change visions and lens?  Or are you simply stuck where you're at?  Are you living out of an expansive and liberating life view or a constricted and confining view?  Are you caught up in your own little world (preoccupied with self survival) or are you living life with a clear vision of the whole, an ability to live beyond yourself in loving response to others?  Or like many people, perhaps you're somewhere in the middle between those two poles, leaning toward one side or the other depending on your current life circumstances?

I'm amazed at Mother Teresa's honest recounting of her often painful spiritual journey.  But I'm also comforted.  I can relate to pieces of her journey.  Faith isn't about never doubting God or about never questioning or about having all the right answers.  Faith is about staying on the journey even in the midst of uncertainty, about hanging on even when you can't sense the divine.  And that comes from a certain vision, a way of choosing to look at life and what's most important.  Mother Teresa, though not feeling God's direct comforting presence, chose to hang on, continually addressed her journal to her Jesus,  expressed honestly her doubt and pain, and kept on working for the poor and suffering in the world anyway.  She chose to live compassionately as her highest value.  Which of the above 3 Realities was she choosing to see and live from?

In my next blog post, we'll look at an intriguing story from ancient scripture showing how these contrasting views of reality impact life experiences and how this Latin word for faith (visio) plays out.  Maybe you'll see your current faith journey illustrated somewhere in the story.  Stay tuned.

Developing A Faith That Works: What Is Trust?

[Please SHARE this blog with people who might be interested!  Hit the button on the right to subscribe or to share the post] Marcus Borg, a professor of religion and culture at Oregon State University and a prolific author and speaker about the importance of a progressive Christianity, was on a plane trip sitting next to a woman who said, "I'm much more interested in Buddhism and Sufism than I am in Christianity."  When he asked her why, she said, "Because they're about a way of life, and Christianity is all about believing." She continued:  "I don't think beliefs matter nearly as much as having a spiritual path and following a way."

He commented later in one of his books:  "I understood her comment, even as I silently disagreed with part of it.  To begin with the disagreement, Christianity is about a way of life, a path, and it has been from its very beginning.  At the center of Jesus' own teaching is the notion of a 'way' or a 'path,' and the first name of the early Christian movement was 'the Way.'  Indeed, seeing Christianity as a 'way' is one of the central features of the emerging paradigm." (The Heart of Christianity, p. 31)

The woman's statement does reflect the most common understanding of the word "faith" in modern Western Christianity:  that faith means holding a certain set of "beliefs," "believing" a set of statements to be true, whether cast as biblical teachings or doctrines or dogma.  If you possess this faith, you're even called a "believer."

As a result, this concept of faith as primarily an intellectual exercise has turned faith almost exclusively into a matter of the head.  But significantly, that was not the central meaning and use of the word "faith" in scripture and among followers during the centuries from the time of Jesus to the Enlightenment.  Faith was not a matter of the head but a matter of the heart - that deep level of life below our thinking, feeling, and willing (intellect, emotions, and volition), deeper than our conscious self and the ideas we have in our heads.

And faith was always seen as central to experiencing the God-life, accessing the divine spirit and allowing It to transform existence.  One of the authors of the Christian New Testament even stated this spiritual reality in strong terms like this, “Without faith it is impossible to please God.” (Hebrews 11:6)  He’s not suggesting that God hates us if we don’t have faith, or that if we don’t believe the right things God thinks less of us.  No, he’s saying that “faith” is central to the spiritual journey – it’s a key to accessing the divine life and living a transformed life.  In fact, that verse is in the context of a whole chapter that tells the stories of how various people in the Bible journeyed with God – some of them knew a lot about theology, others knew very little.  But all of them chose to stay on the journey with God through thick and thin, successes and failures.  That was called “faith” – the willingness to be in presence (in synch) with the divine spirit

OVER THE NEXT FEW BLOG POSTS, we'll take a look at four words that are translated as "faith."  We'll unpack each word and explore what it means and what the differing nuances suggest about developing a faith that works in real life, a faith that transforms life, a faith that helps define ourselves and produces a rich and deeper experience of both God and Life.

TODAY’S WORD: “fiducia”

This is the Latin word for “faith” which literally means trust, confidence.  It's where we get our financial word “fiduciary” - a person to whom property or power is entrusted for the benefit of another. Of, based on, or in the nature of trust and confidence.  I mean think about it - if you're going to give another person access to all of your money and estate, you want to be able to trust that person.  Right?

In a biblical context, this word for “faith” is describing a radical trust IN God.  This trust "faith" may not mean you know everything there is to know about God.  There will still be lots of questions, maybe even doubts about the metaphysical issues surrounding the divine, the universe, how it all came into being, who or what started it all and how everything is sustained.  But faith as trust is the willingness to connect with God (as you know It/Him/Her) and has a degree of confidence that this Divine Force is, as Albert Einstein put it, a friendly Universe - that God has your best interests in mind.

So let’s look at a couple of metaphors and illustrations of what TRUST is – how TRUST relates to our experience of God and the spiritual life – what are some of the dynamics of TRUST?

Floating in Water:

Soren Kierkegaard, one of the pre-eminent existentialist philosophers and spiritual writers in the 20th century, described faith like this:  “Faith is like floating in seven thousand fathoms of water in the ocean.  If you struggle, if you tense up and thrash about, you will eventually sink.  But if you relax and trust, you will float.”

So, if God is the water, and we’re floating in It, what does this metaphor mean?  Floating in water (without struggling and thrashing about) describes a kind of relaxing quality to trust – you can hold your life without struggling – you relax with yourself and with the Unknowns in your life (after all, you don’t know or understand everything about the fathomless ocean you’re floating in but you can still be there) because you’re being “held up,” supported – the physics works whether you understand everything about the principles and dynamics or not.

Fighting and struggling and thrashing about only tire you out and facilitate your sinking.  Trusting means letting go of your fears and anxieties and uncertainties and simply letting yourself live life in the embrace of God and God’s love; relaxing in the truth that the Universe is friendly and is on your side and will bring what’s good to you and will redeem what’s painful and evil and bad by bringing good growth to you.

So would you describe your personal spirituality or style of life with the word "relaxed?"  Would your faith be described as a "relaxed confidence" in Life or God or Goodness?  Do you feel that the Universe is fundamentally friendly (as Einstein once said, the most important question we'll ever ask ourselves is, Is the universe friendly?).  Faith as TRUST is about relaxing, holding life with an open hand (rather than a clenched fist that tends to signify our desire to control, to hang on for dear life from fear of losing something).  A relaxing confidence!

Rock and Fortress:

The Hebrew poets of sacred scripture, especially in the book of Songs (Psalms) often used two other metaphors to describe faith as trust:  God is both Rock and Fortress.  Notice this piece of poetry:

⁵ Let all that I am wait quietly before God, for my hope is in him. ⁶ He alone is my rock and my salvation, my fortress where I will not be shaken. ⁷ My victory and honor come from God alone. He is my refuge, a rock where no enemy can reach me. ⁸ O my people, trust in him at all times. Pour out your heart to him, for God is our refuge. (Psalm 62)

What do these metaphors – Rock, Fortress - say about trust?  God is secure, solid, able to be counted on.  What’s that insurance company that uses the “rock” in their advertisement?  Prudential.  What’s their point:  you can count of them when you need to – they’re reliable – “rock solid.”

Notice the phrases about “trust” in these verses:  waiting quietly before God, putting hope in God, not being shaken, resting in a safe place, pouring out our hearts to God.  The poet's point is that he can trust in God as the one upon whom he relies, as his support and foundation and ground, as his safe place.   A solid confidence!

Does this kind of "solid" trust mean that you never have any doubts about God?  That God always comes through for you by protecting you from evil or harm or danger or pain and suffering?  This is certainly the kind of theology (picture of God) that many religious people have - it's very simplistic though real to them.  But, as I've experienced personally, the danger of this belief is that when you go through the storm, the tendency is to question God and wonder what the heck is going wrong?  Where is God?  Why am I going through this?  God really must not care about me after all!  When I lost my job, went through a divorce, experienced great failure in my life, I wondered where the Divine Rock and Fortress were for me.  Either I had failed so miserably that God had left me and wouldn't have any more to do with me or God simply wasn't going to come through for me and couldn't be expected to.  Either way, I was on the losing end!  There wasn't much solid in the swamp I was in.

The psychiatrist and spiritual writer Gerald May once wrote:  "I know that God is loving and that God's loving is trustworthy.  I know this directly, through the experience of my life.  There have been plenty of times of doubt, especially when I used to believe that trusting God's goodness meant I would not be hurt.  But having been hurt quite a bit, I know God's goodness goes deeper than all pleasure and pain - it embraces them both."

The naive belief that if God is truly good and solid in that goodness then your trust in God will be rewarded with lack of pain and trouble and suffering.  God's goodness = no pain.  I learned that, as Gerald May wrote, it isn't true.  God's goodness, God's solid rock and fortress, can be counted on to be a reliable presence in the midst of ALL of life's experiences (self-imposed or externally imposed).  God showed up for me during those dark times most often through other people who chose to come along side me and support, love, care for, and journey with me.  And as the dark tunnel finally emerged into the light, I saw that God's goodness was involved in helping to redeem the pain in my life by ultimately bringing good out of it, by doing a work of transformation in me, maturing me, establishing my confidence in myself, in others, and ultimately in God.

So would you use the word "solid" to describe your confidence in Life or God?  What would you use the words "rock" and "fortress" to describe in your life?  What power outside yourself can you count on to bring you redemption and transformation or is it just up to you alone to muddle through the swamp?  Is God a "safe place" (as the poet described) you can be with or be in?

Faith is about trust; and trust is about both a relaxed and solid confidence in Another.  And that kind of trust can only come from a journey ... together ... through the bumps, bruises, hurts, joys, sorrows, ecstasies of life ... where you begin to discover that nothing you do minimizes or maximizes the Divine love or Goodness for you.  It continues flowing like a River all the time, in you, around you, through you, enveloping you, embracing you.  Trust is about choosing at some point to relax, to give in to the Flow and embrace It back and let it carry you along the winding waters until It empties out into the boundless and deep Ocean.

Stay tuned to word two for faith.