Order in the Garden

Bienhome Muivah *

Ashei Ningthou Garden situated at Matai village in Imphal East district :: Pix - Daniel Chabungbam

Howard Rutledge, a United States Air Force pilot, was shot down over North Vietnam during the early stages of the war. He spent several miserable years in the hands of captors before being released at the war's conclusion.

In his book "IN THE PRESENCE OF THE ENEMIES", he reflects upon the resources from which he drew in those arduous days when life seemed so intolerable.

During those longer periods of enforced reflection it became so much easier to separate the important from the trivial, the worthwhile from the waste. For example, in the past, I usually work or played hard on Sundays and had no time for church. For years (Phyllis, my wife) had encouraged me to join the family at church. She never nagged or scolded-she just kept hoping. But I was too busy, too preoccupied, to spend one or two short hours a week thinking about the really important things.

Now the sights and sounds and smells of death were all around me. My hunger for spiritual food soon outdid my hunger for a steak. Now I wanted to know about that part of me that will never die. Now I wanted to talk about God and Christ and the church. In solitary confinement, where there was no pastor, no Sunday-school teacher, no Bible, no hymnbook, no community of believers to guide and sustain me. I had completely neglected the spiritual dimension of my life. It took prison to show me how empty life is without God.

It took the pressure of a POW camp to show Rutledge that there was a centre to his private world that he had been neglecting virtually all of his life. This centre is a person's spirit; others call it the soul. You can't physiologically locate the spiritual centre of a person's private world, but it is there. It is eternal, and it the point at which we most intimately commune with our heavenly Father. The spirit can never lose its eternal nature, but it can exist in a state of such disorganization that almost no communion with God is possible. That usually leads to a general chaos in other parts of one's private world.

The Christian is theologically convinced of the existence of the soul. But many Christians struggle with the quality of life within the centre. At least that is the impression we get when we listen for very long to those who are willing to talk about the meaning of private spiritual activity. Many men and women are painfully dissatisfied with their level of contact with God. "I just don't feel like I get through to Him very often" is a typical comment.

A disorganized spirit often means lack of inner serenity. For some, what should be tranquility is in fact only numbness or emptiness. Some suffer from restlessness, a feeling that they never quite measure up to the expectations they think God has for them.

A common concern is the inability to maintain spirituality momentum, to have reasonably consistent attitudes and desires. "I start out my work with great intentions", a young man comments, "but by Wednesday morning, I've lost interest I just can't sustain a spiritual life that is satisfying. So I get to the point where I am tired of trying"

The quick fix

A look at the great saints of scripture sometimes makes us envious. We reflect upon the burning bush experience of Moses, Isaiah's vision in the temple, and the confrontation Paul had on the road to Damascus.

We are tempted to say, "If I could have had an experience like any of those, I'd be spiritually fixed for life". We think our spirituality might be enhanced by some dramatic moment that would indelibly burn itself upon our consciousness. Having been so impressed by such a spectacular touch with God, we would never be tempted to doubt the matter again.

That is one reason many of us are tempted to reach out for a sort of QUICK FIX that makes God seen real and more intimate. Some feel deeply enriched if they are caused to feel terribly guilty by a preacher who angrily thunders forth with accusations experiences that lift them out of themselves into ecstatic levels. There are those who immerse themselves in endless rounds of Bible teaching and study, making the search for pure doctrine a way of finding satisfactory intimacy with God. Still others pursue spirituality through their busy schedule in the church. Usually our choice of these or other ways of filling the seemingly empty spirit is based upon our psychological temperament-what most effectively touches us for the moment and makes us feel at peace.

But the fact is that the average person-like you and me-is not like to have a great biblical confrontation, nor would we be satisfied by the dramatic experiences that happen to others. If we are ever to develop a spiritual life that gives contentment, it will be because we approach spiritual living as a discipline, much as the athlete trains his body for competition.

One thing is certain. If we do not choose to take on that discipline, there will come a day-as it came to Howard Rutledge (POWs)-when we will regret that we had not undertaken the challenge.

Cultivating the Garden

How shall we describe this centre, this inner spiritual territory where encounters are almost too sacred for words? Beyond the theological definitions, we are left with not much more than a collection of metaphors.

David of the Psalms was thinking in metaphors when he imagined his inner spirit to be like a pasture where God, the shepherd, led him as a lamb. In his metaphor, there were calm waters, green pastures, and tables loaded with food to be eaten in safety. This was a place, David said, where the Soul was restored. The eighteen-century Christian poet William Cowper used the metaphor of a quite pool.

For me the appropriate metaphor for the inner spiritual centre is a garden, a place of potential, peace and tranquility. The garden is a place where the spirit of God comes to make self-disclosure, to share wisdom, to give affirmation or rebuke, to provide encouragement, and to give direction and guidance. When this garden is in proper order, it is a quite place, and there is an absence of business, of defiling noise, of confusion.

The inner garden is a delicate place, and if not properly maintained it will be quickly overrun by intrusive undergrowth, God does not often walk in disordered gardens. And this is why inner gardens that are ignored are said to be empty.

That is exactly what Howard Rutledge was struggling with when the pressure was at its highest in "Heartbreak" prison. Total isolation, frequent beating, and deteriorating health had made his world a hostile place. What resources did he have to draw upon that would sustain him? According to his own admission, he'd squandered opportunities earlier in life to store up strength and resolve in his inner garden. Nevertheless, what little he had from his childhood, he seized and developed. Suddenly, God was a very real and very important part of his existence.

Bringing order to the spiritual dimension of our private worlds is spiritual gardening. It is the careful cultivation of spiritual ground. The gardener turns up soil, pulls out unwanted growth, plans the use of the ground, plants seeds, waters and nourishes and enjoy the harvests that result. All of this is what many have called spiritual discipline.

So friends, let us begin soon; time is short! The discipline of the spirit must begin now.

Experience the eternal communion with the spirit!