Experiencing the Divine

Our faith is based on our individual and other’s experiences with the Divine.  Admittedly, there are those who claim our faith is also based on sacred writings and traditions (rituals), and some even include reasoning as an important element; but don’t the sacred texts and traditions of any faith come from the experiences others had with the Divine.  Sacred texts did not just suddenly appear, someone experienced an encounter with what they believed to be a Divine being and wrote about it, or they witnessed something miraculous, attributed it to the Divine and wrote about it.  Some of those writing also included rituals which became some of the traditions of the faith. Whereas other traditions evolved over the years based on the experiences of other individuals and groups.  So why are our experiences today any less authoritative than those of people who lived hundreds, and even thousands of years ago?

The sacred text of the Judeo-Christian faiths began as oral traditions handed down from generation to generation.  These texts evolved over more than 1,000 years; they were changed, modified, updated to suit the current situation of the people, and other texts were added that contradicted older ones. Once they were written down, it became more difficult to change them. Then once they were finally canonized, and a group of men declared everything that needed to be said had been said, there were no more changes.  It was as though God stopped talking to us.  But did God stop, or did we just stop listening?

Many people give up on faith because those sacred texts are no longer relevant to their lives, and the rituals that were once powerful to those who practiced them, have lost their meaning and no longer inspire a new generation of believers.  We need to listen to the Divine the same way our ancestors did.  We need to break through all the noise of our busy schedules to find moments of sheer silence when we can hear and experience that still small voice. We need to get away, sit quietly and experience the Divine. We may hear an outer voice, but mostly we will hear an inner one that seems to come directly from someone other than ourselves.  Or we may experience a feeling:  one of overwhelming love, peace and joy as all the stress of the day slowly lifts from our shoulders and we know that we are not alone.  When we come together as a group of believers, we may need at times to reassess the way we worship and witness to our faith.  Do our rituals or other traditions need to be changed, updated, or even replaced to be more relevant to life in the 21^st century as opposed to the 11^thcentury?  

My point is: are we acknowledging and listening to our experiences that help us to have a closer relationship with the Divine?  And as co-creators with the Divine, are we contributing to building the society we were created to create?  We must allow ourselves to be open to receive the presence of the Divine in our lives, to experience that presence and to follow where the Divine is leading us.  

At least once, preferably twice a day find that space and time where you can create sheer silence so you can be with and experience the Divine creative force of the universe.