I. The Judgment of the Holy Spirit, P 5
5 It is surely good advice to tell you not to judge what you do not understand. No one with a personal investment is a reliable witness, for truth to him has become what he wants it to be. If you are unwilling to perceive an appeal for help as what it is, it is because you are unwilling to give help and to receive it. To fail to recognize a call for help is to refuse help. Would you maintain that you do not need it? Yet this is what you are maintaining when you refuse to recognize a brother’s appeal, for only by answering his appeal can you be helped. Deny him your help and you will not recognize God’s Answer to you. The Holy Spirit does not need your help in interpreting motivation, but you do need His.
Journal
I love this paragraph! I am going to write about something in my life and use this paragraph to see differently. A couple I know very well are having marital problems. When I first witnessed an argument between them, I was certain I understood the problem. The man was drinking too heavily and was being an ass. There! That was simple to figure out.
“It is surely good advice to tell you not to judge what you do not understand.”
Ok, maybe I could be wrong, here. I am judging the situation according to what I think I know using the ego mind to do the reasoning. My judgment is based on my past experiences, and really, just on my interpretation of those experiences. In truth, I don’t really understand anything. I don’t understand what anything is for so how can I make a true judgment, and without the true judgment, how can I give good advice.
“No one with a personal investment is a reliable witness, for truth to him has become what he wants it to be.”
So, I have these pasts experiences that came from living with alcoholics. I obviously still have resentment and anger about these experiences and the people involved; otherwise my judgment would not have been so quick and so harsh. As they say, I have a horse in this race. I have a personal investment because I want the truth to be that this guy is a jerk when he drinks and he should just stop. Clearly, I am not a reliable witness.
“If you are unwilling to perceive an appeal for help as what it is, it is because you are unwilling to give help and to receive it.”
My original judgment of this situation and the man involved had nothing to do with help. Sure, I could tell myself that I was helping her, or even that I was helping him. It would be a great help to him to understand his problem and get help for it before he destroyed the relationship. I mean I know this, right? And maybe he does need to do this.
What I did not see is that his behavior is a call for love. To perceive the call for help as what it is, I would have to forgive him for exposing my fear and dread around my own personal past hurts. I would have to see that I have failed to forgive and this unforgiveness would have to be looked at and resolved.
I would have to let some people off the hook, including him. In holding him to my judgment, I am failing to give the help he needs, and at the same time I am failing to receive the help I need. I need to forgive in order to know I am forgiven. I need to respond with love to know I am loved.
“To fail to recognize a call for help is to refuse help. Would you maintain that you do not need it?”
When this first happened, I did not see a call for help. I saw my past being superimposed on this situation. I saw a guilty person who needed to straighten up and do right. The thing is, I had to deliberately see this as a matter of guilt rather than a lack of love in order to refuse to help. If I had been willing to see the true purpose of the situation, I would have immediately chosen to respond to the call for love. Obviously, I was still treasuring my judgments and didn’t want to relinquish them.
“Would you maintain that you do not need it? Yet this is what you are maintaining when you refuse to recognize a brother’s appeal, for only by answering his appeal can you be helped. Deny him your help and you will not recognize God’s Answer to you.”
I see that I do need God’s help, and I accept that it is only in giving help that I know I have been helped. It is the elegant solution to our only problem. We treat our brothers the way we would want to be treated and in so doing we begin to recognize that we are one mind, that we are one with our brothers. In other words, through giving what we would receive, we undo the separation idea in our mind.
This brother of mine, is deceived in his understanding of what he is. He needs my forgiveness, that is, he needs me to give him the love he thinks he lacks, so that he can remember his true self. In so doing, I experience my true self, the self that loves rather than judges. As I allow God’s Answer to my brother rather than the ego’s answer, I become aware of God’s Answer to me, and so I begin to remember who I am. The separation idea undone!
“The Holy Spirit does not need your help in interpreting motivation, but you do need His.”
Even while I lied to myself about my judgment of this man, and tried to convince myself that he was guilty and so deserved my judgment, I knew this could not be right. So I didn’t say what I felt, and for that I am grateful. While I was judging him and arguing for my judgment, I was, in essence, trying to convince the Holy Spirit of my interpretation. As it turns out, He doesn’t need my help. Big surprise there. Anyway, I see that I certainly needed His help, and my willingness to be helped eventually opened me to receive the help.
Am I supposed to do anything in this situation? If so, what? Well the first thing and most important thing I can do is to know that this man is perfect and whole and absolute joyful love, regardless of the story he is living. His reality has nothing to do with his behavior and this is what he needs me to know for him, while he is still confused about his identity. My absolute certainty in him will help him to see himself differently.
As I know it is true for him, I begin to accept that it is true for me. I am not guilty of judging him anymore than he was guilty of my judgment. As for anything I am to say or do, that is up to the Holy Spirit. I remain open and ready with a mind that is clear of ego judgment. If He needs me to do something in this situation, the Holy Spirit will channel through me what needs to be said.
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