Holiness: Growing the Friendship with the Goodness

In the backyard, there is this Maple tree… maybe six feet in girth, over a hundred feet tall, and unique in that it is growing straight up, no lean to the left or right, as though it wants to be the first to greet its creator. It is unflappable except when it gets excited to praise God by gentle swaying. There is also a placid, beautiful, little Silver Lake close by. Silver Lake is picturesque and sings to God in silence by reflecting the sun and the moon. What is common is that neither is looking to grow rich or popular, and they exist for others. They take the goodness from heaven and provide shelter and rest for squirrels, hawks, ducks, and fish. A tree brings glory to God by being a tree.

I struggled to come up with a helpful way of thinking about holiness beyond nuns and priests walking in white habits and stern faces. While re-reading Bonhoeffer, a way of thinking about holiness struck me. Holiness is living for others through Christ. This is both energizing and freeing: I don’t have to follow 101 rules and my brokenness is not a permanent impediment. Examples for me are Jesus (aka The Goodness), Bonhoeffer, Mother Teresa, Desmond Tutu, MLK, and some friends. Although most of these have known faults, they model sacrificial lives through Christ in an uplifting way.

Now that this Vision is clear, I can look for Intentions and Means. First is an acknowledgement that growing in holiness is about becoming more of what God made me to be, entirely initiated by God’s grace, and that, my effort, while crucial, is not sufficient. A second acknowledgement is that a growing friendship with The Goodness is a pre-condition to living for others, and that, it is the slow, hard, heart-work of loving others first.

Intentions involve decisions to trust that this direction from The Goodness is in fact, Good. Intentions also involve evaluating my actions in terms of whether I am acting for my benefit, or for others… I will likely need a lot of laughter and humility to forgive myself.

Means involve growing the friendship with the Goodness, sitting down every morning asking for love, asking for guidance on all matters, especially for matters of people on my path. In addition, I will also need to develop disciplines of taking less, getting used to less comfort by fasting and staying in places of less comfort, learning from the lives of examples, and asking for God’s direct influence on my inner orientations.