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Paths We Follow · Infinitely Precious

• 0:00
  intro: Welcome to the Infinitely Precious Podcast produced by Infinitely Precious LLC. Your host is James Henry. Remember, you are infinitely precious and unconditionally loved for the gift you already are.
• 0:13
  James: Hello, beloved. It's me, James. And I'm coming to you, once again for another opportunity to share a podcast, some thoughts this week. One of the things that has been on my mind, this particular week has to do with the path we follow in life and how we follow that path. Now, as I think about the path, I also think about the fact that we each come from a place, a perspective, a point of view, And it is indeed a view from a point.
• 0:55
  I have long been raised by and mothered by the path of Jesus, following that path in my life. And I speak very specifically about the path of Jesus, and the reason why I speak about it as a path is because it's more than just something we believe with our mind, even with our heart. It's a way of living intentionally and walking along a path that imitates the path that Jesus himself walked and takes its example from the life of Jesus, this man of two thousand years ago, and yet the habits that he brought into ex that he highlighted, maybe not brought into existence, but the habits that he lived are meant to be, if you will, guideposts for our lives, how we live. Now for so many people I know, they want to believe in Jesus. Now I have no issues whatsoever if that's the point of view, the perspective from which you're coming, but I think what Jesus would really want from us more than simply to believe that he existed, that he's the son of God or whatever thing that you think is important to believe, I think that he would want us to imitate his path.
• 2:36
  Otherwise, why would there be a form that we could follow? Why would there be a person who taught certain practices who helped us learn to think outside the box, teaching in parables and the like. So if following the path of Jesus for each one of us is a path for us, what are some of the markers that lead us to a place where we can follow that path? What is it about Jesus and the way he lived that perhaps we can resonate with, that we can live. Obviously, two thousand years ago, world was different, technology was different, worldview was different.
• 3:28
  The perspective from which first century people of the Southwest Asian area, what we sometimes call the Middle East, what was specific to Jesus? And we could start just about anywhere with some of the things that he does, but I want to start, I'm going to just outline some that come to my mind right off the bat. We're told over and over again in the story of Jesus' life, in the gospels, the good news, that he began his day grounded in prayer. Now, when I think of prayer, and when I think of prayer, from what I have come to understand is a first century perspective, it's less about saying lots and lots of words. In fact, in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said, don't be like the hypocrites who mount up piles of words.
• 4:33
  It's not about piles of words. It's about tuning our heart to God, And oftentimes the best way to tune our heart to God is in silence. Silence isn't something necessarily we do particularly well. Silence is something we often avoid. We fill empty silences with sounds and words.
• 4:57
  If it's quiet, oftentimes we might find ourselves wanting by sort of a knee jerk reaction to turn on some music, or to talk to somebody or to pick up and watch reels on our phone or some other distracting thing. If you're not plagued by that, that's wonderful, but Jesus looked for and found that grounding in kind of a morning prayer, which I envision from listening to, that it wasn't all about words and the accumulation of words. It was instead an opening of the self, a standing back, a sitting down, closing the eyes, falling into silence, falling into a place where it wasn't all about his own agenda. It was about listening so too he could be in tune with the one he would have called alaha or alaha, God in Aramaic, to fall in tune because in that grounded space one sees from a wider perspective. The wider perspective receives from a wider space and is more spacious themselves to receive what comes.
• 6:36
  Every day we have no idea when we enter into the day, what that day will hold. And if we begin that day, ground that day in an openness and an in tune ness to what God is doing all around us, what God is doing within us, and openness to receive whatever comes our way, we're better prepared to face whatever that thing that comes our way is. So a grounding in prayer, and it's probably a silent prayer, a meditative practice, perhaps centering prayer, perhaps a mantra based sitting. And yes, I follow the path of Jesus, and yes, the path of Jesus has several forms of meditation that are available to us. Centering prayer, which is a self emptying form, mantra based meditation, which is simply choosing a word and letting that word become the focus as we try to get our distracted minds to be clear, to be present, to stay focused.
• 7:51
  So prayer as a grounding place. The second thing I would say is because Jesus began in that grounded presence, he practiced presence wherever he went. Wherever he was, wherever he went, there he truly was. If he stopped to talk to somebody who everyone else thought was nobody on the side of the road, he was in that conversation. If he was interrupted on his way somewhere else, he didn't treat the interruption so much as an interruption, as an opportunity.
• 8:31
  When the woman who reached out and touched his garment because she had been struggling with bleeding for a long period of time and had sort of lost a sense of community, been more or less shunned by community because of that ongoing situation. Jesus stopped and talked to her. He was present with her. So that kind of presence, if I want to follow the path of Jesus myself, I need to begin in a grounded space, and then when I am with a person, even as hard as it might be to be present because our mind wants wants to race off in other directions perhaps, we keep practicing being where we are, being in the moment. It's not gonna happen immediately.
• 9:20
  It takes practice, but it's the kind of practice we're doing. We practice being present, being where we are. No matter where you go, there you are. And if we could be like that, then we could really be with our friends, our family, with the people we meet. People we encounter would be less about labeling them by any number of criteria that we tend to label one another with, and it would simply be an encounter with another, and we might find a sense of connection there.
• 10:03
  One of the last things I would say that Jesus practiced over and over again and sort of modeled for us of who Alaha might be, who God might be, is a God of abundance. Now when we think of abundance, we think of a lot, a stuff, more, whatever is more than what we have right now, that might be abundance. But what would it look like to recognize abundance in what we already have? Not what we can acquire later on or what we are acquiring even in the moment, but what would it look like to practice abundance right now, to recognize that I have this moment, and in this moment that I'm talking to you, my heart is beating. I'm breathing.
• 10:57
  I'm here. Here I am. This moment makes for an abundance. I have enough and enough is in itself an abundance. Now, maybe not everyone in the world has abundance.
• 11:15
  Not everyone in the world has enough, but God operates from a place of abundance Rather than trying to hoard things to myself, whether it's my time or stuff I've accumulated, other kinds of things, I believe the model that Jesus had was one of of living from a place of abundance. What I have is enough. I mean, look at Jesus. You could say he's a first century guy, and he's unique, and he's out of the mainstream, but I think this is the kind of path he wanted to model for us and it was one where he traveled light. Most of us cannot travel quite as light as Jesus traveled which is pretty much is, you know, the clothes on his back is what we get the sense that Jesus traveled with.
• 12:09
  And then with some companions, but not a lot of things. Maybe we have to have a few more things than that, but what would it look like for each of us? I ask myself this regularly, what would it look like for me to travel light, to recognize and have abundance with a lot less than I really may want, but certainly enough that I need. So, to recap. I may have oversimplified it in some ways, but for me, I am called, we are called to follow a path.
• 12:52
  For me, I try to model my path after Jesus. I don't elevate him to such a high level that I can't follow him. That he is so high above me that all he wants me to do is be devoted to him or simply believe in him. What he wants from me, why he taught a path, is so that I would ground myself and bring myself into tune with God, that I would learn to be present wherever I, am, that I would learn to recognize what enough truly is in my life and that I have abundance so often, so much more often than I need, instead of always thinking I don't have enough. So for me those are places to begin the path of Jesus.
• 13:42
  It's an important path for me. Maybe you have another path. I m always interested to hear from other people about their path. But for me, the path of Jesus following in many ways the church has been my mother, has been the one who has mothered me into this world. And so knowing that is to find that the path of Jesus is the way for me.
• 14:09
  Remember always whatever path you're on, you are infinitely precious and unconditionally loved for the gift you already are. And until the next time I wish you all the best.