New Acts of Devotion

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Evolving Worship & Becoming Mystical Creators
Devotion to God in the Integral Christian Community — Part 7

We all have the desire to live for something greater than ourselves.

Or at least, that’s my belief of what is in the depths of each person, if only everyone were able to unearth that vital force from the core of our soul. We do not live for ourselves alone.

Traditionally, the act of devotion has been a way to give purpose to our lives by becoming dedicated to something or someone outside of ourselves. We may do this consciously or unconsciously, giving ourselves to our work, to our families, to an achievement like climbing a mountain or running a marathon. We may devote our time (and so our lives) to learning more, to adventure and discovery, to honing a skill.

All of these are worthy endeavors, and can give a sense of purpose to our lives—perhaps even degrees of meaning. But far too often we look to these external objects to bring a sense of value to our days, or a feeling of worth to how we spend (spend!) our time.

In religious devotion, we give ourselves over to God, which is expressed in a number of different ways—most often still with a sense of dedicating ourselves to someone (something?) outside ourselves as well, like the church, a religious order/denomination, or “God’s will” as we can best determine it.

In the mystical life, we seek to live from the reality that we are not separate from God. Yes, there is distinction and still the beauty of relational devotion and communion with the forms of God-Beside-Us, as the first parts of this series have explored through the metaphors of family, friendship, and lover.

I find myself asking as well, if God is deeply within, closer to myself than I am, how do I live in devotion to that reality? Or rather, how might I live in devotion from God. 

What acts and expressions would fit and make sense from that perspective, from that way of being?

My Journey with Devotion

Pretty much my whole life, I’ve always been devoted to God. But what that has meant has transformed over time and continues to change.

As my understanding and experience of God expanded and intensified, so too did my need for finding ways of living and expressing this devotion that reflected a reality of the divine that was and is not a distant king, a leader of my tribe, an impersonal force, or even another name for ultimate reality itself.  

Two years ago, I wrote about evolutionary devotion, the devotion to the infinite Mystery of God-Beyond-Us that always draws us forth into more than we know now. There’s certainly something grand and cosmic in this sense of devotion to that which is always “beyond.” Which always invites more and keeps us expanding further. And while that still rings true, it names only one aspect of a bigger picture.

This can be held together alongside the intimate devotion with the face of God-Beside-Us that Paul has written about so wonderfully in this series, which has also been a crucial part of my healthy reintegration of the personal God with me at all times.

These days I’m finding myself drawn to another integration—the devotion to/as God-Being-Us, the inner face of God living out right in front of me, as me. A down to earth devotion that embodies the reality of God in me and in all things. Devoted to living a life of becoming as participants in our divine nature.

The Problem with Worship

In my Christian upbringing, most of church was devoted to two things. Learning more about God through sermons and praising God in worship through singing. Youth group was filled with passionate longing set to acoustic guitar. Worship songs gave voice to hearts yearning for God.

At some point though, the songs stopped “working” for me. It wasn’t just my changing theology and understanding of God that made the meaning lose its resonance—though that was part of it. It wasn’t just the repeated patterns of emotional manipulation and sonic conjuring that lost its charm.

As I feel it now, I think it was actually a transformation of longing. A deep desire to no longer direct all of my reverence, my adoration, my homage outside of myself.  

That might sound narcissistic or egotistical, but it wasn’t that I wanted to keep it on me or focus more on my small “s” self. Though I couldn’t have named it at the time, I was feeling a mystical ache to more deeply and truly worship the reality of God within, my own deepest identity and being. To revel in this inner reality. To not keep laying my treasure at the feet of the God who just wanted me to claim what had been given to me in love. To stop returning the gift back to the giver.

Yes, there is an element of humility, or recognizing that God is so much greater than we are—but that is not God’s attitude toward us. God is not the almighty king on high who desires groveling and fawning, or requires tribute given. This is the royal-court worship we would do well to leave behind.

Certainly, we can sing songs and give praise. We can exult into transcendence with joy and adulation. In whatever form we are used to worshipping, whether that still has resonance for us or not, the crucial element I believe is that in offering and giving worth to God, we do not denigrate and subjugate ourselves in the process—for we too are the altar, we too have been given the divine mantle.

Integrating the inner face of God-Being-Us in our devotion and worship is to claim the reality of the ever-present God in all things, including ourselves, that is within us in order to be lived out in the world. To not give back (away) our power, but to claim and manifest our unique, incarnated divine life in generative expression and creative form.

Creativity as Worship

“To worship is now becoming to devote oneself body and soul to the creative act”
— PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDIN

With the inner face of God-Being-Us, devotion is not something we do, or even something we move toward. It is the orientation of living from the deepest ground of our being.

In one sense then, we are worshipping—giving worth, showing love and respect to—when we open ourselves more to being present from this reality. When we welcome the flow from that deep (divine) being and refuse to just live on the surface of things.

So we are devoted to a way of being, to coming from a starting point—tapped into source, into origin, into the reality of God being through and as us.

Here we have few prescribed liturgies or lyrics of expression. For we are all the unique outflow of this divine life being lived—we each have our gifts, our passions, our deepest callings that spring up from these same depths. Like the water of spirit soaking our ground of being to sprout forth each shoot springing into bloom in its time.

Or as Jesus described it, the rivers of living water flowing forth from our wombs. The vital energy of our distinct expression of God being us, of our divine life brought forth into the world, made manifest not by just living out our days, but through becoming divine creators daily.

This is not creativity just as artistic expression—though it could be that. Nor is it an invocation to self-improvement and personal development, though that can be a form of honoring and opening more to our divine nature too. It is a calling to embody our devotion in empowering the necessary expressions coming from this divine vitality—the creative offerings of love to a needy world.

Though each expression is unique, it is not individual, for we are all planted in gardens and fields of becoming together. In the symbiotic and synergistic community through which all life thrives.

While these vital expressions flow forth from us each uniquely, they are not focused on or from our individualized self—they are the arisings of the deeper divine orientation that is rooted in the timeless and eternal source. It is not about us nor is it solely from us. Like most great artists, we are channeling and tapping into something greater, into the divine life flow that is so much bigger than us.

When we devote ourselves to the creative act, as Teilhard puts it, we are devoting ourselves to living from this divine source that shows up in the world through beautiful expression. God loves to create. To dwell in the inner face of God-Being-Us is to become this divine creator ourselves, co-creating the transformation of the world in participation with divine, loving evolution.

What will you (we) create that is so needed in this time?

A New, Living Cathedral

In the days of old, Christians built great cathedrals of stone to show the grandness and majesty of their God.

Today, it might be more fitting for us to “build” great living cathedrals of people who are embodying the presence of God and enacting transformation unbound by a singular enclosure—whether that be physical or institutional.

While the walls of the old may be crumbling, the web of the new is intensifying and interweaving. The mystical bonds and interconnections that substrate the old barriers of institution and even religion.

The nave leads us straight to the altar of divine source. No intermediaries necessary. No restricted access and appointed times of distribution. We are always connected to the communion of the saints with one another, old and new, now and not yet.

In this living cathedral, we may find ourselves drawn to communities of co-creation, of becoming sacred enclosures with others. Not defined by shared walls, but by generative intimacy and love. Forming together particular “spaces” and altars of worship—not to the revered past or to a great saint of old, but to the sacred future and our participation in the co-creation of the world anew.

What are the sacred enclosures of which you are a part? The communal grottos that invite pilgrims to discover the divine in a unique way and offer the possibility of generative creation from that collective, living chapel.

What are your new, creative acts of devotion that will contribute to the assemblage of this living cathedral?  

That will tap into the deep, divine passion you have within you to live a life of meaning and ultimate fulfillment because you are living in devotion from and out of the compelling vitality in the depths of your unique being?

What might that look like in your life today?

Yes, we can worship the God-Beyond-Us, marveling at the unending mystery and ever-unfolding greatness that will always keep unfolding and opening up to more. Yes, we can relate intimately with God-Beside-Us, reveling in sweet presence with the many forms and ways we encounter God’s presence, appearing through the metaphors of family, friendship, and lovers. And yes, we can be devoted to God-Being-Us through embodying the creative and life-giving divine impulse, the flowing-forth of love becoming.

We can integrate them all, as they come.

Personally, these days, I find the multi-faceted quality of my devotion shimmering with different spectrums as the light hits the diamond each day, each moment.

In an instant, it is glimmering through the eyes of my children. The next, the longing within. In another, the presence of Jesus. Later, the unglamorous act of service. Tomorrow, it may be the precious ache of the mysterious unknown.

And now, in this moment, it is all of it.

The singularity I can find no other word for that fits quite like the one that has held my devotion as long as I can remember. 

God.