The Call Goes Unanswered

by Jon Mundy, Ph.D.

 

Ever since Adam bit into that fateful apple, (It might have been a mushroom) and thought it possible to think a thought outside of the mind of God, we’ve been trying to run away from God. Running away has become a bad habit. Adam goes off and hides in the bushes; Jonah, rather than doing what he is asked, chose instead to “flee from the presence of the Lord” (Jonah 1:2); Moses, called to deliver the people out of Egypt, ran off into the desert. We each as prodigal sons and daughters, find various ways to avoid God, and thus, our inevitable destiny. We get lost instead in the dreaming of the world and a host of diversions, distractions, and desperations. Once when I went to see Ken Wapnick, he began our conversation by saying, “How’s your kingdom?” The right answer to that question is, “What kingdom?” Did he mean God’s Kingdom, the only Kingdom there is or did he mean my own little kingdom, a kingdom of my own making?

 

     A Call to Adventure

     A universal theme in mythical traditions is the call of the hero or heroine to undertake a journey. One of the most enduring allegories of all time is the story of Christian, an “everyman” character, in John Bunyan’s Pilgrims Progress (1678). It was the best-selling book next to the Bible and required reading in Protestant Schools until the beginning of the 20^th Century. Pilgrims Progress is the story of a hero who seeks a way out of the "City of    Destruction" (the world), in search of the "Celestial City" (Heaven). Spiritual seeking often begins at the point of desperation when one begins to become aware of the artificial nature of the  collusion of the illusion that dominates one’s world.

 

In the same way, Siddhartha of Hermann Hesse's Siddhartha, becoming weary of the world and a life of pleasure seeking, leaves his palace in pursuit of spiritual awakening; and, Dr. William Thetford tired of the bickering that characterized their relationship turned to Helen Schucman and said, “There must be another way?”

 

The hero often receives a call at the point of great desperation. In Star Wars, our hero, Luke Skywalker, is called to save Princess Leia from “the evil empire.” Destiny summons our hero when Princess Leia, accidentally (that is faithfully) appears in a three-dimensional laser image saying, “Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi.” Just as Jesus ventured off into the mountains or into the desert to look more deeply within, Luke Skywalker now goes off on a great journey of the planets. Over and over again, we hear a similar story. The hero or heroine, caught in a world of their own making and the collective dreaming of the world about them – receives a call to awaken.

 

You have chosen a sleep in which you have had bad dreams,

but the sleep is not real and God calls you to awake.

There will be nothing left of your dream when you hear Him,

 because you will awaken. (bold mine)

T-6.IV.6:2-4

 

Wanting very much to do things our own way (dream our dreams), the call to awaken is ignored – in favor of something much more mundane. The Prodigal Son goes off and spends his money on “wonton” living. Wonton means undisciplined, immoral, and extravagant. In Pilgrims Progress, Wanton is also the name of a temptress who tries to get Christian to abandon his search for the Celestial City.

 

The Authority Problem

According to the Course, the arrogance of sin, the pride of guilt, the sepulcher of separation (T-19.IV.C.4:5), all keep us trapped in our dreams, and therefore, unaware of the love of our Father. The main problem we encounter in raising children is, “Whose will, will rule?” When our daughter Sarah was a   teenager, had her will ruled, we would have eaten pizza every night. We are each faced with the same seeming dilemma, does God win or will I unhappily continue to do things, in my own way, in my own time, until time runs out, and then, only God is.

 

In truth, the final answer is always a “win-win.” Surrendering our will to God’s, we discover it was our own will all along. We try to be “self-made men and women.” Being self-made, we project our self-centered dreams onto the world. For every hero and heroine who is willing to pay attention and listen, there is an inner guide (often identified as the Holy Spirit) ready to assist as a pathfinder on the journey home. It is the task of the Holy Spirit to fulfill His   mission by helping us to fulfill our own (T-12.IV5:6).

 

We are each called to find the entrance into the Kingdom of Heaven and thereby awaken to our own call (T-11.VI.9:1). The body and the world in which the body finds itself is a place of duality, deception, and dreaming. Opportunities for comparison and judgment abound, good and bad, nice and not nice, pretty and ugly, all get in the way of true perception (knowledge). Being seduced by the world, we forget the call; we easily get lost; and, we find ourselves in a desperate state, bereft of the presence of God.

 

The Slough of Despond

In Pilgrim’s Progress our hero, Christian, begins his journey carrying on his back burdens with names like Fear, Envy, and Despair. These he has learned of by reading “the book at hand,” (The Bible). The heaviest of all these burdens is his deep conviction of guilt and his reality as a sinner. He then goes through a variety of experiences – the Slough of Despond, the Hill of Destruction, Doubting Castle, the Valley of Humiliation, the Valley of the Shadow of Death. (Ever been to any of these places?) Christian learns something from each adventure (experience) and dropping his burdens (removing the blocks to the awareness of love’s presence), he arrives at last, at the Celestial City as naked as Adam and completely unencumbered.

 

We have a mission here.

We did not come to reinforce

the madness that we once believed in.

W-pl.139.9:1-2

 

Our mission is one of waking up, remembering our identity and returning home. As in Jesus’ parable of the Prodigal Son or Christian in Pilgrim’s Progress, the hero invariably goes off course, gets caught in ego concerns, and wanders about in sloughs of despond and valleys of humiliation. I’m often amazed when engaged in counseling how simple the solution to someone’s   problem may seem to me. Just drop the silly addiction. All that is required is a speaking of the truth, a release of some place of “stuckness” and unforgiveness; and yet, I know while it all seems easy “from the outside,” to the one so ensnarled, extracting themselves from the quagmire of one’s own making may seem far from easy.

 

The Ego, the Body, and the Dreaming of the World

 

The dreaming of the world takes many forms,

because the body seeks in many ways to prove it is autonomous and real.

It puts things on itself that it has bought with little metal discs or paper strips the world proclaims as valuable and real.

It works to get them, doing senseless things, and tosses them away

for senseless things it does not need and does not even want.

(T-27.VIII.2:1-3)

 

It is easy to get caught in ego affairs manifesting in bodily, material, emotional, and psychological concerns. The body is a great distraction. We spend so much time feeding and clothing it, avoiding pain, seeking pleasure, and whenever we get a chance, checking out our visage in the mirror. We are presented with a variety of addictions: alcohol, smoking, drugs, caffeine, fats, sugars, sex, adrenalin rushes, and more. There are so many potential burdens, financial and emotional, the need to be liked and the need for self-esteem. There is nothing wrong in any “thing,” but the minute we have to have anything, freedom is lost. Buying into the story of the world, we lose connection with the infinite, we forget our Heavenly home – we easily forget our destiny.

 

The Voice of the Ego and The Voice of the Holy Spirit

In every moment of every day, we can listen to one of two voices – the ego or the Holy Spirit. The more we are caught in the ego’s house of fear, the easier it is to be pulled off course and ignore the voice of God. Jonah, afraid of God, gets on a ship and goes out to the ocean – away from God’s presence. Like Jonah, we all hear the call. Truth is, we all know what we are to do; and yet, we resist or we pretend that we do not hear, all the while the call remains as loud and as clear as our willingness to listen! (T-8.VIII.8:7)

 

I was once leading a group session which included a doctor and his wife. The wife’s position in life was greatly eclipsed by that of her successful husband. When I asked her to tell me what she understood her mission to be, she said she did not know. I told her that I believed that she did know and she could tell us if she wanted. There was a moment of silence and then she began to cry. She said I was right. She did know. She spoke from her heart, as she had perhaps never done before and her spirit lifted. She later became a well-know artist and philanthropist.

 

It is possible to reach a state in which you bring your mind

under my guidance without conscious effort, but this implies

a willingness that you have not developed as yet.

The Holy Spirit cannot ask more than you are willing to do.

T-2.VI.6:1

 

The question isn’t why can’t I hear the voice of Holy Spirit, the question is why don’t I do what he is asking me to do so that I can hear His voice even better. What are you supposed to do?

 

It is something very near to you, already in your mouth

and in your heart; you have only to carry it out.

Deuteronomy 30:14

 

The Belly of the Whale

When the call is refused, what might have been a joyful adventure turns   instead into a struggle. Prodigal sons and daughters create kingdoms (dream dreams) of their own making from which they (we) must eventually awaken, though “waking up is hard to do.” Not paying attention to the higher calling, one adventure problem (bad dream) after another presents itself. Rather than paying attention, we go unconscious. We pour another drink, light another joint, take another Xanax, or get lost in self-righteousness and our image as the “Chairman of the Board” of the local congregation. Losing sight of our mission, we use our talents in service of the ego rather than our Self. The result is unhappiness, frustration, anger, and despair. The “slough of despond” is nothing less than an attack on Self. Christian of Pilgrims Progress sinks deeper and deeper into the slough of despond under the weight of the burden of guilt he has placed upon himself.

 

Moses, afraid to speak God’s word, uses his speech impediment as an excuse for not responding. Jonah, unwilling to pay attention to the call from God, winds up symbolically in the belly of a whale. We each find various ways to hide out behind our own projections and neurosis. We put second-class things first and first-class concerns second, and thus, ignore the call within.

 

The good news is that:

· Sometimes when we are most under attack by the ego,

      we may be the closest to a breakthrough.

· When we are very trapped in the dreaming of the world

      we are even closer to the real world.

· When we are very far off course,

      then a transpersonal perspective becomes possible.

· Sometimes we have to be under a great deal of stress.

· Sometimes we need to break down and cry.

· Sometimes we need to admit to an ego attack,

      before we can see things differently.

 

The Inn and the End of My Methodist Ministry

In 1988, after ten years of working in the same small parish, and after many years of asking to be transferred to a larger parish and repeatedly being told that nothing was available when in fact there were openings, I found myself in a dilemma as a minister in the United Methodist Church. I was as they say, “dead in the water” and going nowhere. My overt preaching from A Course in Miracles, in the pulpit, my Interfaith activities, my adventures into shamanism in the jungles of Mexico, my new age inclination, and my inability to settle down as a married man (I had not yet met my darling Dolores), were all getting in the way. My Bishop suggested maybe I would like to try something else for awhile. Needing something new and different to do, I sold my home and with the resources atempted to achieve some success by owning and running a country inn and restaurant. Less than one year later, I was in serious financial trouble. On my birthday in May 1989, the whole world fell apart. It began to rain and it rained for two days without stopping.

 

The Inn, was built over an underground stream and before long the basement flooded. I opened the door to the cellar only to see water lapping against the top step. Paper goods for the restaurant were floating around on the surface. Below all that water there was the furnace, the hot water heater, the supplies, and furniture for the restaurant. Everything was gone.

 

I climbed the ladder up into the attic to see how badly the roof was leaking. Looking up at the tortured timbers that supported the roof above, I could hear the wind outside howling though the cracks in the sides of the building and I could see water sadly seeping in, weeping slowly down along the beams then dripping like tears down onto the ceiling. I had often said that I felt like “Jon-ah” in my relationship to the Course. The call could not have been louder. Helen Schucman literally put the books in my hands and said, “I think you’re supposed to teach this.” The huge arching beams looked like gigantic ribs holding a decaying carcass and there was a stench of rot and rain. It was cold and it was dark, and I had been swallowed by this monster. Would I ever get out of this hell? Was there any way out?

 

I had fallen into the Slough of Despond – an absolute abyss. I climbed down out of the attic completely defeated. All my swans were geese. Everything had fallen apart. Although I never went bankrupt, I was at that moment very close to it. Every time the phone rang, it was someone asking for money and I didn’t know what to tell them. The mortgage company was beginning to yell, “foreclosure!” I looked about and saw things as I have not seen them before. I was acutely aware of the part I had played in this tragedy.

 

Only you can deprive yourself of anything.

Do not oppose this realization,

for it is truly the beginning of the dawn of light.

This is a crucial step in the reawakening.

T-11. IV. 4:1-2

 

The Flare Prayer

With the world crumbling in around me, I went and sat in my desk chair, folded my arms on the desk and let my head fall forward onto my arms. I was in deep trouble and I screamed “Help!” I said, “I’m not very good at praying but right now I need help.” And then I heard, “Haven’t I always taken care of you?” I sat up and looked about – no one was there. This message is there for all of us, all the time. As Lesson 49 from the workbook says, “God’s Voice speaks to me all through the day.” A strange peace came over me, I did not know how but I knew somehow this nightmare would end.

 

The local fire department came and pumped out the basement. The oil company got the furnace working once again. A few weeks later the former owner, Mr. Golden (that’s his real name), offered to buy back the inn for $100,000 less than I had paid him for it, and I gladly accepted his offer. I was nearly broke, but I was also free of a white whale that had swallowed me. I was spit out back on dry land. I had not been paying attention to what I was called to do. I now threw myself into a new, renewed and yet deeper reading of the Course and into the production of Miracles magazine. Think you understand the Course, have a heart attack – then read it, go through a bankruptcy or a divorce and read it again. Then it was that Rev. Diane Berke and I began our Interfaith Fellowship in New York City, and I wrote my first book on the Course appropriately titled, Awaken to Your Own Call. Slowly, slowly, everything began to change. 

 

Some of your greatest advances you have judged as failures,

and some of your deepest retreats you have evaluated as success.

T-18.V.1:6

 

There is no learning in pain, but there is learning in the overcoming of pain. It's the overcoming that matters. It’s the overcoming that gets us back on track. The voice of the Holy Spirit is always there and it is always reassuring. I lost nearly everything I had, financially speaking, but I was free and paying attention. I was back “on course” and there was reason for celebration.

 

Asking for Help

Resistance to the call can be very strong. Knowing we are off course, it may seem we cannot stop our wandering about and our wanton living. We may choose to believe that if we continue to manipulate the world long enough, it will eventually give us what we want and yet changing the world is not what is called for. Real transformation only happens within, which is why of ourselves we can do nothing. What is called for, is a change of mind. Once the “within” changes, everything changes. 

 

Accepting the call, the burdens, the addictions, the habits that seemed impossible to let go of are happily set aside so we can go ahead unencumbered. I had been trying to make it on my own. No one wanted to help out with the inn, and you could not blame them. It was, after all, a losing concern – a real money pit. Now that I was doing what I was supposed to do, lots of people wanted to help – in the development of our Interfaith Church – in the production of Miracles magazine – and the editing of the new book. One friend sent me $100 per week for 12 weeks so I could buy food and groceries.

 

This is the only thing that you need do for vision, happiness, release from pain and the complete escape from sin,

all to be given you. Say only this,

 but mean it with no reservations, for here the power of salvation lies:

 

I am responsible for what I see.

I choose the feelings I experience,

and I decide upon the goal I would achieve.

And everything that seems to happen to me

I ask for, and receive as I have asked.

 

Deceive yourself no longer that you are helpless in the face of what is done to you. Acknowledge but that you have been mistaken, and all effects of your  mistakes will disappear. (T-21.II.2:1-7) (bold mine.)

 

At any moment, we can awaken to our own call and pay attention to the  inner teacher; or, we can ignore the Voice within. Making a first step back to God and toward the goal can be as simple as asking for help, but it must be a sincere     request. We must mean it! To be in the Kingdom we must focus our full attention on it. (T-7.III.4:1) As one of the old gospel hymns expresses it: “Have you trials and temptations? Is there sorrow anywhere? Take it to the Lord in prayer.” That prayer need be nothing more complicated than “Help!” “Help!” is a very good prayer. It is a sincere prayer. I call it the “flare” prayer. Addicted to a drug, it may look as though you can never be free of it. Yet right now, this second, the decision can be made, “You don’t have to.” As Alcoholics Anonymous says it, “one day at a time,” which means one minute at a time. “This minute, I don’t have to.”

 

Never attempt to overlook your guilt before you ask the Holy Spirit’s help.

That is His function.

Your part is only to offer Him a little willingness

to let Him remove all fear and hatred, and to be forgiven.”

T-18.V.2:5

 

We Just Need a Little Willingness

The destiny to which we are called is always there – always present – in fact, it cannot be lost. The Holy Spirit’s function is communication. As we bring the blocks that impede our progress to Him, His light shines upon us and the blocks disappear and fears are dispelled. The good news is:

 

Under each cornerstone of fear on which you have erected

 your insane system of belief, the truth lies hidden.

T-14.VIII.2:7

 

Bring everything to the Holy Spirit, every secret locked away in despair. There it will be undone and we can be set free. To attain the Kingdom of Heaven, we must be burden free. We must come to God without an agenda, with an empty cup, and a clear heart ready to receive. The Course says we must ultimately (which means now), forget this world, forget even this course, and come with wholly empty hands unto our God. (W-189.7:5) Speaking of himself in the Gospels, Jesus says that “his burden is light, his yoke is easy.” He has no burden to carry, no heaviness of heart. There was nothing of the world and its many dramas which weighed upon him, not even the imminent loss of his body.

 

How Long Has This Been Going On?

Once the response is made, the results are wonderful. Doing what were called to do means living a guided and inspired life. Actor, Tony Randall, tells of his discovery of opera at the age of thirty. He was taking voice lessons, and his teacher asked him to go listen to a particular male opera singer. Randall was  resistant – in fact, not interested. He had always avoided opera. Now, on the   directive of his teacher, he went. He was entranced, enthralled, and enchanted. A new world suddenly opened up for him. At the end of the performance, he came out saying, “How long has this been going on?”

 

There is no need to live in bondage to the ego. There is no addiction, no  special relationship – nothing which can take the peace of God from us. There is nothing to do but God’s Will. Then it is that we can say, “Let me not try to make another will, for it is senseless and will cause me pain.” (W-307.2) Doing God’s Will brings our greatest happiness. Nothing else will do. Nothing else will ever work. When we respond, when we do what God is asking us to do, we may then turn and say, “How long has this been going on?”

 

Look up and find your certain destiny

the world would hide but God would have you see.

(C-ep.3:7)