… A Chasing After Wind

FRI., FEB. 9, 1996, 8:47 AM
OFFICE, PULLIAM

As I offer you this Teaching remember My preference for both/and thinking and My love of diversity. This means that two (or more) premises that seem to conflict or be in actual opposition may both be true and relevant. Also, equally good and dedicated servants of Mine may be standing for opposing and contradictory ideas and actions.

With that premise established I’ll reassure you that participation in the life of your university, your community, and your church is desirable and is what I want from you, now. You are making a difference in the lives of a few students, and you serve your church well in a couple of ways. You are fairly faithful in contributing to important causes, even as you don’t participate actively in what you support. Individual persons sometimes do make a difference, a basic premise of your political system.

And then I’ll say, as I had the Preacher declare, in Ecclesiastes, “All is vanity and a chasing after wind.” You have letters to write recommending some young folks for positions or for awards. Some of these may make a difference. Most shall be a chasing after wind. This could be a more productive day than yesterday OR what you did and didn’t do yesterday may be as worthwhile as academic tasks.

It is, of course, partly a matter of age and, even, maturity. You have lived almost 70 years, and you’ve led an active life. You achieved more than you initially thought you would, and, as you look back, you are almost surprised at what you accomplished. And yet that which is the final “you,” that which will go on, when the body dies, is spirit, with the enrichment that has come through these Teachings from Me, Holy Spirit. In earth terms these have consumed much “time” that you could have been using for productive tasks more valued in your culture. But I say, of all that you do in your waking hours, this close, continuing relationship with Me is the least “a chasing after wind.”

As I’ve told you repeatedly, most of the news is of no final consequence. It can be just as worthwhile to sit on your deck or in your garden with a beer than to listen to, watch, or read about what is reported as news. You have almost “internalized” the words to that song you regularly sing, “I love to see the morning as it steals across the sky… I love to remember and I love to wonder why… still I love to see the sun go down, and the world go around…” To see that first, and then that last, edge of the sun, heralding and then ending a day can be as worthwhile as all that is done in that day.

I do much… and I do very little. Oh, I am responsible for some important actions, and I prevent some others from happening. I have unlimited power, and if I really “worked at it” I could make this earth into the marvelous, peaceful, sharing place that some of you envision and await. Yet I know, for I’m also all knowing, that actions to change some situation “toward the better” can have other ramifications that I’ll then have to deal with. Hence, I usually see intervening in earth life as “a chasing after wind.”

I also know that the challenges of earth life, without My interventions, do produce spiritual growth, even more than living in a perfect world. You do remember My interpretation of the Garden of Eden story to you. They were in that idyllic setting long enough for Me to see that there would be no real “progress.” So I had to get them out, with some amount of guilt and shame, and I had to provoke Cain to a criminal act. Now there as a better chance for real spiritual increase.