Peterson on Spirituality
Mark Galli recently interviewed Eugene Peterson for Chrsitianity Today (http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2005/003/26.42.html) on spirituality. As usual Peterson's simple wisdom shines.
Question: "Many people assume that spirituality is about bcoming emotionally intimate with God."
Peterson: "That's a naive view of spirituality What we're talking about is the Christian life. It's following Jesus. Spirituality is no different from what we've been doing for two thousand years just by going to church and receiving the sacraments, being baptized, learning to pray, and reading Scriptures rightly. It's just ordianary stuff.
The promise of intimacy is both right and wrong. There is an intimacy with God, but it's like any other intimacy; it's part of the fabric of your life. In marriage you ddon't feel intimate most of the time. Nor with a friend. Intimacy isn't primarily a mystical emotion. It's a way of life, a life of openness, honesty, a certain transparency."
I guess I'm thinking that to call people to a deep personal walk with Jesus may just be doing a person a deep disservice. Particularly, if we allow contemporary searches for intimacy to define the spiritual life. As Peterson will go on to say, intimacy often means getting something from someone else. And a whole lot of people are running around today looking for someone or something to deliver a load of meaning and completeness. What they end up with is nothing less than more emptyness.
Perhaps it would be more appropriate and authentic and realistic to propose a way of life that leads to meaning and purpose. To pursue the spiritual is more about work and life and study and prayer and the passing of time; it's less about ecstasy and intimacy. Or, to put it another way, God's love shows up in ordinary ways in our lives. And we had better get used to looking for it on Monday afternoons and Thursday mornings. The annual church retreat isn't the standard by which we measure spirituality;being faithful day in and day out is.
Question: "Many people assume that spirituality is about bcoming emotionally intimate with God."
Peterson: "That's a naive view of spirituality What we're talking about is the Christian life. It's following Jesus. Spirituality is no different from what we've been doing for two thousand years just by going to church and receiving the sacraments, being baptized, learning to pray, and reading Scriptures rightly. It's just ordianary stuff.
The promise of intimacy is both right and wrong. There is an intimacy with God, but it's like any other intimacy; it's part of the fabric of your life. In marriage you ddon't feel intimate most of the time. Nor with a friend. Intimacy isn't primarily a mystical emotion. It's a way of life, a life of openness, honesty, a certain transparency."
I guess I'm thinking that to call people to a deep personal walk with Jesus may just be doing a person a deep disservice. Particularly, if we allow contemporary searches for intimacy to define the spiritual life. As Peterson will go on to say, intimacy often means getting something from someone else. And a whole lot of people are running around today looking for someone or something to deliver a load of meaning and completeness. What they end up with is nothing less than more emptyness.
Perhaps it would be more appropriate and authentic and realistic to propose a way of life that leads to meaning and purpose. To pursue the spiritual is more about work and life and study and prayer and the passing of time; it's less about ecstasy and intimacy. Or, to put it another way, God's love shows up in ordinary ways in our lives. And we had better get used to looking for it on Monday afternoons and Thursday mornings. The annual church retreat isn't the standard by which we measure spirituality;being faithful day in and day out is.
posted by Carson | 3:19 PM
<< Home