THE LOVE OF GOD

By Thomas Merton (arranged in stanza and poetry form by Keith Jensen)

For it is God’s love that warms me in the sun

And God’s love that sends the cold rain.

It is God’s love that feeds me in the bread I eat

And God that feeds me also by hunger and fasting.

It is the love of God that sends the winter days

When I am cold and sick,

And the hot summer when I labor

And my clothes are full of sweat:

But it is God Who breathes on me

With light winds off the river

And in the breezes out of the wood.

His love spreads the shade of the sycamore over my head

And sends the water-boy along the edge of the wheat field

With a bucket from the spring,

While the laborers are resting and the mules stand under the tree.

It is God’s love that speaks to me in the birds and streams;

But also behind the clamor of the city

God speaks to me in His judgments,

And all these things are seeds sent to me from His will.

If these seeds would take root in my liberty,

And if His will would grow from my freedom,

I would become the love that He is,

And my harvest would be His glory and my own joy.

And I would grow together

With thousands and millions of other freedoms

Into the gold of one huge field praising God,

Loaded with increase, loaded with wheat.

If in all things I consider only the heat and the cold,

The food or the hunger, the sickness or labor,

The beauty of pleasure, the success and failure

Or the material good or evil my works have won for my own will,

I will find only emptiness and not happiness.

I shall not be fed, I shall not be full.

For my food is the will of Him Who made me

And Who made all things in order to give Himself to me through them.

My chief care should not be to find pleasure or success,

Health or life or money or rest or even things like virtue and wisdom—

Still less their opposites, pain, failure, sickness, death.

But in all that happens, my one desire and my one joy should be to know:

“Here is the thing that God has willed for me.

In this His love is found,

And in accepting this I can give back His love to Him

And give myself with it to Him

For in giving myself I shall find Him

And He is life everlasting.”

By consenting to His will with joy and doing it with gladness

I have His love in my heart,

Because my will is now the same as His love

And I am on the way to becoming what He is,

Who is love.

And by accepting all things from Him

I receive His joy into my soul,

Not because things are what they are

But because God is Who He is,

And His love has willed my joy in them all.

(New Seeds of Contemplation, pp. 16-18)

WHO AM I?

“All things done in love become you.”

QUESTION: What does it mean to “do things in love?”

ANSWER: To choose and act in love is to do things from the heart. It is awakened doing. The three modes of awakened doing are: acceptance, enjoyment, and enthusiasm. Each one represents a certain vibrational frequency of consciousness. (A New Earth, p. 295)

“[W]hatever is done, whether in the physical world, in human relations, in the substance of thought, or spiritual contact—whatever is done with love endures. All else is consumed in the eventual transformation. . . ‘[T]hings done heartily’—these alone have a complete and ultimate influence in the accretion and the fashioning of the spirit entity.” (With Folded Wings, p. 50) The course of personal development, then, is a constant transferal from that which is outside in experience, permanently to that which is—not inside, but ourselves." (With Folded Wings, p. 33)


“For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.”
(Matthew 6:21)


I Am
(Written by Keith L. Jensen on 1/26/2010)

I am loved
I am a unique individuating free will

I am the wind blowing across open prairies
I am the sun sparkling on new fallen snow
I am the laughter of a crystal clear mountain spring
I am long walks by myself . . . and with a friend or two

I am a son, a brother, a cousin, a nephew, a . . .
I am the partner of my beautiful wife
I am the father of two beautiful children

I am curiosity—the wanting to understand the “how’s,” “what’s,” and “why’s” of life

I am a lover of stories
I am a teller of stories

I am a loving presence, a loyal friend
I am courageous

I am laughter, music, dance . . .
I am the silence—the stillness—between each sound and motion

I am a unique combination of all things I love

I am becoming a son of God
I am a mystery . . .

THE FAITH THAT ONE IS LOVED

The beginning of the fight against hatred, the basic Christian answer to hatred is not the commandment to love, but what must necessarily come before in order to make the commandment bearable and comprehensible. It is a prior commandment, to believe. The root of Christian love is not the will to love, but the faith that one is loved. The faith that one is loved by God. That faith that one is loved by God although unworthy—or, rather, irrespective of one's worth!

In the true Christian vision of God's love, the idea of worthiness loses its significance. Revelation of the mercy of God makes the whole problem of worthiness something almost laughable: the discovery that worthiness is of no special consequence (since no one could ever, by himself, be strictly worthy to be loved with such a love) is a true liberation of the spirit. And until this discovery is made, until this liberation has been brought about by the divine mercy, man is imprisoned in hate. (New Seeds of Contemplation by Thomas Merton, pp. 76-77)

We love him, because he first loved us. (1 John 4:19)

The Creed of Elbert Hubbard

(Elbert Green Hubbard—June 19, 1856 to May 7, 1915—was an American writer publisher, artist, and philosopher.)

I KNOW: That I am here. In a world where nothing is permanent but change, And that in degree I, myself, can change the form of things, And influence a few people;

And that I am influenced by these and other people; That I am influenced by the example and by the work of men who are no longer alive, And that the work I now do will in degree influence people who may live after my life has changed into other forms;

That a certain attitude of mind and habit of action on my part will add to the peace, happiness and well-being of other people, And that a different thought and action on my part will bring pain and discord to others;

That if I would secure a reasonable happiness for myself, I must give out good-will to others; That to better my own condition I must practise mutuality; That bodily health is necessary to continued and effective work;

That I am ruled largely by habit; That habit is a form of exercise; That up to a certain point, exercise means increased strength or ease in effort; That all life is the expression of spirit; That my spirit influences my body, And my body influences my spirit;

That the universe to me is very beautiful, and everything and everybody in it good and beautiful when my body and my spirit are in harmonious mood; That my thoughts are hopeful and helpful unless I am filled with fear,

And that to eliminate fear my life must be dedicated to useful work—work in which I forget myself; That fresh air in abundance, and moderate, systematic exercise in the open air are the part of wisdom; That I can not afford, for my own sake, to be resentful nor quick to take offence;

That happiness is a great power for good, And that happiness in not possible without moderation and equanimity; And that the reward which life holds out for work is not idleness nor rest, nor immunity from work, but increased capacity, GREATER DIFFICULTIES, MORE WORK.

I BELIEVE in the Motherhood of God. I believe in the blessed Trinity of Father, Mother and Child.

I believe that God is here, and that we are as near Him now as ever we shall be. I do not believe He started this world a-going and went away and left it to run itself.

I believe in the sacredness of the human body, this transient dwelling-place of a living soul, and so I deem it the duty of every man and every woman to keep his or her body beautiful through right thinking and right living.

I believe that the love of man for woman, and the love of woman for man, is holy; and that this love in all its promptings is as much an emanation of the Divine Spirit as man’s love for God, or the most daring hazards of the human mind.

I believe in salvation through economic, social and spiritual freedom.

I believe John Ruskin, William Morris, Henry Thoreau, Walt Whitman and Leo Tolstoy to be Prophets of God, who should rank in mental reach and spiritual insight with Elijah, Hosea, Ezekiel and Isaiah.

I believe that men are inspired today as much as ever men were.

I believe we are now living in Eternity as much as ever we shall.

I believe that the best way to prepare for a Future Life is to be kind, live one day at a time, and do the work you can do the best, doing it as well as you can.

I believe we should remember the weekday to keep it holy.

I believe there is no devil but fear.

I believe that no one can harm you but yourself.

I believe in my own divinity—and yours.

I believe that we are all sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be.

I believe the only way we can reach the Kingdom of Heaven is to have the Kingdom of Heaven in our hearts.

I believe in every man minding his business.

I believe in freedom—social, economic, domestic, political, mental, spiritual.

I believe in sunshine, fresh air, friendship, calm sleep, beautiful thoughts.

I believe in the paradox of success through failure.

I believe in the purifying process of sorrow, and I believe that death is a manifestation of life.

I believe the Universe planned for good.

I believe it is possible that I shall make other creeds, and change this one, or add to it, from time to time as new light may come to me. (The Note Book of Elbert Hubbard, pp. 24-26)

The Parable of the Potluck

(Keith L. Jensen, July 2008)

"That's why the Lord made such an everlasting variety of a world for, so every man could find his own kind of knowledge. There used to be a fellow down at Toll House, who had been reading these health magazines until he began to eat nuts and raisins and olive oil and pine sawdust — and not much else. Old Doc Harkness was talkin' to him once when I was there. 'But, Doc,' says he, 'this yere editor don't eat nothin' else, and he works fifteen hours a day, and keeps healthy on it.'

'Sure,' says Doc.

'And ain't they the healthiest sort of foods?'

'Sure,' says Doc again.

'Then why . . .'

'Do you like 'em ?' the Doc interrupted him.

'Not very well,' said this fellow at Toll House.

'Well, then they ain't healthy for you. That's why there's forty-eleven sorts of grub—so you can get what you like.'"

Chapter VII “ON THE CONDUCT OF LIFE” (as found in Stewart Edward White’s book The Cabin)

When I was a kid growing up in Sun River Valley, one of my most pleasant memories is of potluck dinners at the Sun River Valley LDS Church. On a summer evening on the 4th or 24th of July, we would all gather at the Sun River Valley LDS Church. Depending on the weather, tables would either be set up in the cultural hall or outside on the grass. Everyone would bring their favorite dishes to share.

Some were made from family recipes handed down for generations, and others were made from recipes newly discovered. My mom would make her rice pudding that her mother had taught her to make. Bernice Christensen would bring a green jello with pineapple and cottage cheese salad. Aunt Donna would bring her homemade chili, and Aunt Wanda would bring her homemade rolls.

And so it went on and on, everyone would bring the food item that they felt best about and would like to share. With joy, I’d get in line and wait my turn to select the foods of my choice. With plate in hand, I’d begin to make my food selections. My selections would be based on a number of factors. I’d listen to recommendations made by others.

“Oh, you just have to try Sister Feeler’s fried chicken. It’s to die for!”
or
“Son, you better not have any of Bishop Christensen’s baked beans. Those are only meant for the men here.”

Other selections were based upon memories of dishes from previous years. Sister Vergie Nielsen’s crumb crust deep dish apple pie was always a dish that would get my attention. And then, there were always the selections based upon the sights and smells of the day.

“MmmMmmMmm! What’s that that smells so good? I just have to have some of those scalloped potatoes.”
or
“That has to be one of the prettiest tossed salads I’ve ever seen. I think I’ll just try a bit of that.”

And so it went. Each person got to select the foods they’d like to eat. There was no one making an announcement that because of their position or calling that they knew what the best or “most right” foods that everyone ought to eat. In fact, the whole joy of the “potluck experience” was that I got to eat just what I wanted and in the portions I liked.

At a potluck dinner the very idea of someone getting up and saying—

“Through much prayer and fasting the brethren have received a revelation on what the proper and healthy potluck diet is. Each of you has been given a list of ‘appropriate foods.’ Please make your selections only from this list. And remember, ‘even though there is meat on this table, as God’s chosen people, you are to partake of none of this’”

—would seem ridiculous and absurd, and I hope few of us would put up with it. If we did, the whole experience of the potluck dinner would have lost much of its appeal as a fun and festive gathering.

And yet this is the very trap that we fall into when it comes to many aspects of our lives such as parenting, religion, and spiritual matters. We have bought into the delusion that someone has a special dispensation from God and that they know what’s best for us. We have lost touch with our own bodies and the messages that they first quietly speak to us and then more loudly and loudly they shout when we are no longer listening. Constantly, God is speaking to each of us, but we have fallen into a sleep of not hearing and not seeing. We have fallen into the trap of believing that there are others who can hear for us and see for us. It all reminds me of Jesus’ words in Matthew.

“Therefore speak I to them in parables: because they seeing see not; and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand. And in them is fulfilled the prophecy of Esaias, which saith, By hearing ye shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing ye shall see, and shall not perceive: For this people's heart is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes they have closed; lest at any time they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears, and should understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them. But blessed are your eyes, for they see: and your ears, for they hear.” (Matthew 13:13-16)

A Couple of Poems

"A Poem"
(written by Keith Jensen on Sunday, June 12, 2005)

Sitting, pondering, once again emptying,
Striving to do that which I cannot do alone.
Smiling, remembering, writing, connecting,
Striving to increase in faith in God alone.

Letting the solitude and quietness wash over me,
Listening and hoping, trusting and letting go.
Believing God and starting to see,
Changing my life, so I can someday know.

Sometimes fearful, often joyful,
Sometimes forgetting and sliding back.
Centering on Christ and being hopeful,
Trusting in God's love where I lack.

Living, breathing, grateful to be alive,
With fondness, remembering the past,
With excitement, looking for the future to arrive,
Believing, hoping, trusting the good I cherish will last.

"A Poem"
(written by Keith Jensen on Tuesday, June 28, 2005)

The tick tock ticking of time passing quickly.
Seconds becoming minutes, becoming hours,
Becoming days that stack up into years,
Years of my life that seem to be a dream.

Who am I? Where am I going? What am I becoming?
I'm six years old and then I'm 47.
Sometimes time seems to rush along.
Other times it creeps along slowly.

Past, present, future all seem to merge into one.
I'm a babe, a boy, a man.
I'm old and feeble; I'm young and strong.
I'm everything and everyone.

I see myself reflected in everyone I meet.
I'm the young child who delights in rain.
I'm the young couple just starting out.
I'm the old man quietly looking ahead.

And sometimes behind all these reflections,
I catch a brief glimpse of me,
Peaking out from behind a corner,
Urging and beckoning me to meet myself.

To let go of all the false me's,
To reach out with a firm grasp,
And clasp hands firmly and familiarly,
And say, "I remember you!"

Some of Keith Jensen’s Thoughts on “God” & “Love”

(Written and arranged on November 9, 2009)

I have been pondering the concept of “God” for the last several years. I once believed that my idea of God was the only valid one. However, I no longer believe that way.

Thomas Merton wrote:

So much depends on our idea of God! Yet no idea of Him, however pure and perfect, is adequate to express Him as He really is. Our idea of God tells us more about ourselves than about Him. (New Seeds of Contemplation, p. 17)

So if my “idea” of God tells me more about myself than it tells me about the nature of God, then I wonder what might be a more accurate and inclusive concept of God that I might consider.

In my opinion, the next two excerpts suggest an “idea” for the mystery of “God,” and which I believe are more inclusive and more accurately reflect the wide variety of human experiences.

Experience of “God”
These experiences, besides being ecstatic, were for me aha! moments. They gave me a new understanding of the meaning of the word God. I realized that God does not refer to a supernatural being “out there” (which is where I had put God ever since my childhood musings about God “up in heaven”). Rather, I began to see, the word God refers to the sacred at the center of existence, the holy mystery that is all around us and within us. God is the nonmaterial ground and source and presence in which, to cite words attributed to Paul by the author of Acts, “we live and move and have our being.”

Thus I began also to understand what it means to say that God is both everywhere present and “up in heaven”—both immanent and transcendent, as traditional Christian theology puts it. As immanent (the root means “to dwell within”), God is not somewhere else, but right here and everywhere. To speak of God as being “up in heaven”—that is, as transcendent—means that God is not to be identified with any particular thing, not even the sum total of things.

God is more than everything, and everything is in God. Being a thinking type, I began studying experiences of God in both mystical and nonmystical forms. I learned that even though these experiences are extraordinary, they are also quite common across cultures, throughout history, and into the present time. Gradually it became obvious to me that God—the sacred, the holy, the numinous—was “real.” God was no longer a concept or an article of belief, but had become an element of experience. (Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time, pp. 14-15)

Being / God
When you say Being, are you talking about God? If you are, then why don’t you say it?

The word God has become empty of meaning through thousands of years of misuse. I use it sometimes, but I do so sparingly. By misuse, I mean that people who have never even glimpsed the realm of the sacred, the infinite vastness behind that word, use it with great conviction, as if they knew what it is that they are talking about. Or they argue against it, as if they knew what it is that they are denying. This misuse gives rise to absurd beliefs, assertions, and egoic delusions, such as, “My or our God is the only true God and your God is false,” or Nietzsche’s famous statement “God is dead.”

The word God has become a closed concept. The moment the word is uttered, a mental image is created, no longer, perhaps, of an old man with a white beard, but still a mental representation of someone or something outside you, and, yes, almost inevitably a male someone or something.

Neither God nor Being nor any other word can define or explain the ineffable reality behind the word, so the only important question is whether the word is a help or a hindrance in enabling you to experience That toward which it points. Does it point beyond itself to that transcendental reality, or does it lend itself too easily to becoming no more than an idea in your head that you believe in, a mental idol?

The word Being explains nothing, but nor does God. Being, however, has the advantage that it is an open concept. It does not reduce the infinite invisible to a finite entity. It is impossible to form a mental image of it. Nobody can claim exclusive possession of Being. It is your very essence, and it is immediately accessible to you as the feeling of your own presence, the realization I am that is prior to I am this or I am that. So it is only a small step from the word Being to the experience of Being. (The Power of Now, p. 11)

Keith’s Thoughts: What if God is Reality? And what if in some mysterious way, we are “of God”—that we are God’s children? Then, I would suggest that the following statements are worth consideration.

“What you do—or don’t do—has absolutely no effect on God’s love. God doesn’t love you more because of your ‘righteous’ acts. And, He/She doesn’t love you less because of your ‘sinful’ acts. You are simply loved of God, and there is absolutely nothing you can do to either increase or decrease this infinite and pure love.”

Perhaps, what I’m trying to define is grace.

Thomas Merton wrote:

Grace
What is “grace”? It is God’s own life, shared by us. God’s life is Love. Deus caritas est. By grace we are able to share in the infinitely selfless love of Him Who is such pure actuality that He needs nothing and therefore cannot conceivably exploit anything for selfish ends. Indeed, outside of Him there is nothing, and whatever exists exists by His free gift of its being, so that one of the notions that is absolutely contradictory to the perfection of God is selfishness. It is metaphysically impossible for God to be selfish, because the existence of everything that is depends upon His gift, depends upon his unselfishness. (The Seven Storey Mountain, pp. 303-304)

Your are loved
The beginning of the fight against hatred, the basic Christian answer to hatred is not the commandment to love, but what must necessarily come before in order to make the commandment bearable and comprehensible. It is a prior commandment, to believe. The root of Christian love is not the will to love, but the faith that one is loved. The faith that one is loved by God. That faith that one is loved by God although unworthy—or, rather, irrespective of one’s worth!

In the true Christian vision of God’s love, the idea of worthiness loses its significance. Revelation of the mercy of God makes the whole problem of worthiness something almost laughable: the discovery that worthiness is of no special consequence (since no one could ever, by himself, be strictly worthy to be loved with such a love) is a true liberation of the spirit. And until this discovery is made, until this liberation has been brought about by the divine mercy, man is imprisoned in hate. (New Seeds of Contemplation, 76-77)

We love him, because he first loved us.
(1 John 4:19)