God's Plans

“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” Jeremiah 29:11

I have an older friend who has spent her life as a missionary devoted to spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ and studying the Bible. She is extremely disciplined in her prayer life asking God for both guidance and help in carrying out his plan. Her focus is on a deep understanding of man’s separation from God, the reconciliation and redemption through Jesus Christ and the final fulfillment of his word and eschatology through the study of the Bible.  Everything for her is based on a personal relationship with Jesus Christ and the word as revealed to her in the Bible.  Her belief is grounded in Evangelism which believes to experience and know God and understand his plan you must immerse yourself in the Bible. She knows that verses within the Bible evoke a deep sense of comfort in his love and his protection.  Although very disciplined in her approach to immerse herself in the Word, she also has a longing to tap into a spirit or intuitive guidance from God, a direction from within by the Holy Spirit.

My life has been very different.  I worked until my early thirties never reading the Bible and without a faith in God or consideration of what happens at death.  But then at the age of thirty I found myself suddenly fighting injustice and abuse, but in doing so experiencing a sudden vision in which I felt an evil presence that was part of a more insidious plan to get a spiritual stronghold and spread destruction.   I found myself racked in terror sobbing because I was going to have to face it in order to stop it.  But the problem was I had no foundation in the Bible, no understanding of God as love, no faith of trust in God that goodness will prevail in life and death. In the process I lost everything, but I knew from that experience that humankind will not survive unless there is a higher power.  My saving grace was that God then showed me a vision of a sinless earth with no illness or death -  an immersive experience in a different reality.  

As a mystic I experience the presence of good and evil and I can sense the progression.  I am aware of alternative realities and outcomes.  My challenge has been to not be overwhelmed by the visions, not to feel responsible for the outcome, but to trust that God will handle the plan and that I need to be in the moment acting from love.  And step by step, God has opened doors to bring me closer to him and gave me the grace to make mistakes as I learned to manage my gifts.  My joy and inspiration come from feeling God in the human experience as expressed in nature, my friends and family, my pets, and the arts and science.  My relationship to God is also a deeper connection to the Universal Christ in the cosmos and spiritual realm as inspired by scripture.  I communicate with God and others through knowing or wordless thought. 

Although I possess these gifts, I understand a carpenter (like Jesus) can experience God through by practicing his or her craft or an environmentalist can experience a deep connection to God through nature.  To know or experience God can be to feel a deep appreciation for this gift of life and beauty of this world -  the joy in fulfilling one’s purpose.  My experience is there are no limits on how God can communicate with us his plan or his love for us and it is not limited to the Bible.  Love is the universal language and God is love.

My spiritual journey has not been an easy road, but I am confident that God has been preparing me in a plan that is unfolding and to have joy knowing I am part of that plan.  My thoughts come from a deep intuitive connection and experience with God that I find again and again reflected in scripture.