Lessons of the Soul: Revealed in Wilderness

By Rodney R. Romney

BOOK PROPOSAL FOR “WILDERNESS OF THE SOUL
Rodney R. Romney
WILDERNESS OF THE SOUL is a book about personal spiritual growth. It begins with the premise that life is a love story designed by a loving God, who calls each of us to be a part of that story. The book makes a frank and eclectic examination of a Wilderness God, a Deity that no religious system has been able to define or control. Rather than viewing God as a capricious prankster or bully, who toys with our lives just to test us, the book sees God as a mysterious presence who cannot be controlled or denied, but who loves everything unconditionally.
The book advances the life of Jesus as an example of the wilderness life, one who became alienated from his own religious tradition, because it imposed too many restrictions and excluded too many people. By entering fully into the wilderness of his own soul, Jesus found a path that brought him into the mystery of an all-inclusive and all-loving God.
The major portion of the book details ten stages (or marks) of spiritual growth for the one who seeks to explore the authentic or God-realized life. The initial stage is exile, which we all experience when we first enter this earth experience, and the final stage is graduation (or death). We go through these ten stages of growth and learning in order to learn the highest lesson of all: how to make our lives an expression of unconditional love to God and to the world.
The book concludes by asking the question, “Whose Side Is God On?” with particular reference to the complex and troubled situation of our world today as it hovers on the brink of war.
WHAT IS UNIQUE ABOUT THIS BOOK?
This book offers the analogy of wilderness as a teacher that seeks to lead us toward spiritual fulfillment. It will have special appeal to a growing audience of people who are learning to honor the earth, to those who see truth in all spiritual and religious traditions, and to those who are searching for the transforming presence of the divine in their human experience.
The book includes practical suggestions by offering spiritual exercises for each stage of growth. These exercises are presented without theological strictures or bias, thus making an appeal to an interfaith audience. The book also includes service and social justice as an inseparable outgrowth of spiritual practice. Social action is not viewed as separate from spirituality, but rather is presented as essential to its completion.
The book also offers occasional glimpses into the life of the author. Most people do not want to hear only moral invectives when it comes to the inner life. They want to know something about the life of the person who is writing. Therefore, I occasionally include aspects of my own struggle in the various stages of spiritual growth.


WHO IS THE PROSPECTIVE AUDIENCE FOR THIS BOOK?
Church growth analysts often overlook the fact that the fastest growing religious group in this country is not fundamentalism or liberalism, nor what might be classified as “new age.” The new and rapidly expanding group can best be described as the de-churched, or to use John Shelby Spong’s term, “Believers in Exile.” These are people who have discovered that institutional religion as they have known it does not meet their needs, because they can no longer accept the religious presuppositions of their past. Yet their spiritual hunger remains strong, and they search for ways to nourish their own hunger.
It is to this huge, often recognized, group that WILDERNESS OF THE SOUL will make its appeal. It is a book that addresses the universal spiritual hunger that every person has, yet it does not impose strict theological dogmas or religious dictums. Its premise is that the human soul is the greatest wilderness of all, a wilderness that waits to be explored, and it offers suggestions and ways by which that exploration can be conducted.
Spirituality is a comparatively new word in the English language that speaks of a growin

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Feb 2, 2007
• ISBN: 9781465319340

Rodney R. Romney

Rodney R. Romney, author of I HEARD A CROW CALL MY NAME, is a retired minister. He wrote this book based on his true life experiences with a family of crows who lived above the trees at his home in Seattle, Washington. Embellished by his imagination and enlivened by the antics of these wild birds, the book is a call to everyone to deepen relationships with the wilderness in which we all live and with its creatures. Dr. Romney is the author of several other books, his two most recent being "Wilderness Spirituality" (Element Books) and "Lessons of the Soul" (XLibris). Since his retirement from ministry, he and his wife Beverly have made their home in Idaho Falls, Idaho.

Book preview

Copyright © 2007 by Rodney R. Romney.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Rev. date: 08/18/2021

Xlibris

844-714-8691

www.Xlibris.com

559875

Contents

Part 1—The Journey

Introduction

1. Life is a Love Story

2. Wilderness as Reality and Metaphor

3. The Call of the Wild

4. A Wilderness God

5. Jesus and the Wilderness Life

Part 2—The Marks of a Wilderness Life

Introduction

6. Exile

7. Solitude

8. Ritual

9. Community

10. Suffering

11. Reverence

12. Nonviolence

13. Service

14. Joy

15. Graduation

Part 3—The Practice

16. Whose Side is God On?

Endnotes

Part 1

THE JOURNEY

Introduction

A wilderness is an uncultivated, uninhabited, and sometimes barren region. Following this definition, soul is the ultimate wilderness, largely because of humanity’s basic uncertainty over what it is or even if it is. The premise of this book is that soul is the essence of who we really and truly are—not ego, not personality, not self, not even spirit. Soul! Soul is the divine principle in every person, which exists independent of body, mind, or spirit and yet is strongly related to each. Soul is that part of a human that is God individualized. Soul transcends both birth and death. Soul is eternal and imperishable. It came with us to this earth experience. Its work is to affirm and direct us while we are here. Our work is to help the soul grow and to let its imprisoned splendor escape to bless the world. When we leave this earth, the only thing we take with us will be our soul.

The truly authentic life is the spiritual life, and that life is only discovered in the wilderness of the soul. This does not mean we need to live in a wilderness setting, but we do need to dwell in a wilderness frame of mind, one that is constantly journeying into new and unexplored territories of thought. We must abide in a wilderness state of being wherein lies the source of transformation of the human life in all its individual and social aspects. This has to do with intention, the removal of barriers and contaminants, anything that keeps us from a God connection, until we are finally able to respond lovingly to everyone and everything we encounter.

Several rules for this wilderness journey must be initially understood:

1. We do not choose the spiritual life—it chooses us, or more accurately, the soul chooses it for us.

2. The only guide we will have in the pursuit of this life is love, for love is the pure essence of the soul.

3. Our only assurance of achievement lies in the fact that we cannot have anything until we are willing to let it go, for the soul calls us away from the inordinate attachments that the mind or ego would establish and into a life of freedom and power.

The opposite of love is not hate; it is possessiveness. Real love is letting go of everything and everyone, for the soul allows no lasting attachments except one: God.

We all live the wilderness life at some level, for it is the life for which every person hungers. That hunger will not be fulfilled until we know who we came here to be, what we came here to do, and to whom we ultimately belong. How do we open our lives to God? How do we embrace the darkness and suffering that mark the human pathway, thereby learning the lessons they would impart? How can we trust the unknown path before us and find the light that will illuminate that path? How do we find the wonder and bliss that veteran explorers of the wilderness have found? How do we open ourselves in greater trust to those who share the journey with us? These are some of the questions we will explore in this book.

Building on the theme of one of my earlier books, Wilderness Spirituality (1999), I invite the reader into a thoughtful and sustained exploration of wilderness as both reality and metaphor, from which evolves our spiritual calling. We will examine the characteristics or marks of a wilderness lifestyle and how to integrate those marks into the daily life through spiritual exercises.

We are all the beneficiaries of the spiritual seekers who have gone before us or who are living in this world now. Their lives of gentle goodness continue to lure us to the truth that God and love are all there is. Their living examples have informed and inspired us to explore the wilderness of our own souls. This book is dedicated to that exploration.

Chapter 1

LIFE IS A LOVE STORY

Life is a love story. Or is it? Maybe life is a mystery. Perhaps it is a tale of horror and sheer destruction. Or perhaps, like a popular novel, it is a mixture of all three.

No matter which period of time you examine, there is always tragedy and sorrow. Rising tides of poverty, homelessness, disease, crime, and despair eat steadily into the daily fabric of people’s lives. Every day, people starve and die. While most of the world’s population is dirt poor today, a few rich persons sit in plush offices and hatch up plots and dream up wars by which they hope to get even richer. Is this the Apocalypse, the end of the world, which Christian fundamentalists have warned about?

This planet has been around for about four billion years, with intelligent life for about two hundred thousand years, and yet in less than a hundred years, we have produced weapons of mass destruction that could lead to the extinction of the human race and our planet. Even if you take war out of the equation, every day, babies are born deformed or crippled mentally and physically, innocent people get maimed or killed, and thousands die from diseases and accidents that strike randomly and indiscriminately. Tragedies happen daily, and they are almost enough at times to break your heart or make you want to check out altogether from this enterprise that we call life.

One day while driving, I was stopped at a crosswalk for a young man who, on deformed legs and held up by unsteady crutches, was trying to get across the street. Every movement seemed to be agonizing, yet he persevered in trying to push himself forward. My mind had been on this chapter, Life Is a Love Story, and as I watched him, I asked myself, How can I defend the premise that life is a love story, when almost everywhere you turn you see horrible suffering and incredible pain? The answer came back immediately: God’s love is not diminished by any of these things. God’s love is not only omnipresent and eternal; it is the foundation for all life.

There is more to life than physical existence alone. There are underlying spiritual truths of life for all of us, truths that help us overcome the obstacles I have just described and which will help us offer a better world to future generations than the one we have today. There is an eternal truth about the life that is carried in these physical bodies that we must not forget, and it is that truth that will help us get through all suffering into a place of true security and authentic peace.

We need suffering and pain in order to grow. I am what you might call a pearl theologian—the pearl in the oyster is only produced by the gritting action of sand. Not that we don’t need the serene times. But sometimes we need to have our serenity challenged in order to find the pearl of great price and our true treasure, which is the love of God.

I recall a time in my life when accusations were made against me, which were false, but which had the potential of completely ruining me (or so I thought). It was one of the darkest nights of my soul, and I wondered how I would ever get through it. Then one morning, waking before dawn, wet with perspiration and gripped with nauseous fear, I felt the presence of someone standing beside the bed who said to me, You have given this thing way too much power over you. Let go of it. The way is already cleared, and you will see it pass as you release your fears. It was a time when I knew I could not go further unless I went deeper. I began then a daily spiritual practice of reading, praying aloud, and meditating in silence, a practice that continues for me today. As my soul expanded in wisdom and grew in closeness to God, I had marvelous lessons given to me. Here is what I call ten sacred truths or facts that emerged for me during that time and which convinced me that life is indeed a love story, a love story that cannot be defeated:

1. Love is who you are. A God of pure and absolute love created you and dwells within you, imbuing you with worth and filling you with love. This love is first awakened when you are loved by others. If you are never loved, then your true being lies unclaimed and undeveloped within, and you live a stunted, immature life, often reacting negatively or violently to the world around you. Remember this always. No soul is basically evil, for every soul is created in love, by love, and for love. Some may do evil things because of the evil done to them. But the way out is through the great discovery that God loves you fully and unconditionally and will give you the help you need to become who you came here to be and to do the work you came here to do. You contain within you all you need to do that work. It only awaits your acceptance. Love is who you are. It is your true inheritance.

2. Because you are basically love, then love is the only true answer you can make to life. You learn to love yourself when you know you are loved. Once you know that, you can begin the work of loving others. Before doing that, however, you must learn to love the persons, the people, the conditions, and the circumstances in your life that may have denied love to you. When you forgive, you give over to God everything that has hurt you. You release and let everything go that has given pain or caused resentment. Love is the only true answer that you can make to life.

3. When you find the love that dwells within, all you can do is worship and adore. Here is where you discover your deep love for God; a God who does not condemn you, who yearns over you with a love greater than that of any earthly parent, and who has placed within you the key that will set you free. Your freedom comes as you worship, adore, and offer thanks to God for all God has given to you.

4. Love to be complete must be more than just an inside emotional feeling. True love must be expressed in action as well as gratitude. Through love in action, through loving all others and all circumstances, through releasing your judgments, through working for peace and justice for all people, you become a conqueror who works miracles in the world. You become a true servant and minister of God.

5. As fear attracts evil events, love attracts good events. If you practice living consciously in a state of pure love, you will actually change the environment in which you live. The energy within you will be at such a high vibratory rate that it will not only heal the evil around you, it will create and set in motion good events. It is a demonstration of one of the principles of Buddhism: you must be the peace you want to see in the world.

6. Love does not press or force itself upon you; it must be sought. It must be wanted. More than anything, God wants you to know you are loved, for then you rise to your highest level of creation. But God never forces love upon you. You must first believe in it and want it before it can become yours. We are all free agents, free to choose who we want to be and what we want to do. God will not take that freedom from us, no matter what we do or fail to do. Likewise, God will not force love upon us; we must want it and seek it for ourselves.

7. Your only reality is your inward atonement with the love within you. It is the only way your life can become authentic and fulfilling. It is the only way you can transcend the darkness and the heartaches of life. Everything else in life is transitory and temporary, doomed someday to pass; only love is eternal. Deny it if you wish, but only love can set you free to be your highest and best.

8. Love supplies all you really need—light, joy, vision, strength. Through love, you become your truest and highest self, doing things you never thought you could do. No matter what dark or unjust situation in which you might find yourself, no matter what happens to you, you will find the strength to get through it, and in the process, you will grow more Godlike and loving. Here is the demonstration of the pearl theory: the rubbing friction of events brings out the deep inner worth and beauty of your soul, if you allow it.

9. Love teaches you to live from within out, rather than from without in. Instead of being a thermometer that registers the temperature outside, you become a thermostat that establishes the temperature in which things around you and others can flourish and grow. You cannot do this at first, but gradually you learn that what you have been given must be shared if you are to keep it.

10. Love turns your tormenting desires into creative power. Love transforms all suffering and pain into a wise and gentle teacher. Under its rule, you discover you are an eternal and timeless creature who is creating a new world for yourself and those around you. You bless the earth and all its creatures simply by being present in it. Love not only transforms you, it transforms your environment and the events happening around you.

Do not misunderstand me. I am not saying if you accept the ten precepts I have listed here, then you will have everything you want and that your life will instantly be perfect in every respect. Love is a process, a journey, a lifetime work. It does not guarantee material or financial success; it does not even guarantee a life of eternal bliss, for each day will present us with new challenges. Love is something we must work at as long as we are here. We came here to this earth to grow our souls into a greater likeness of God, and that work will go on as long as we are here. But each day, as we work at it, life becomes more joyous, more peaceful, and more fulfilling in every way.

Some religions teach that we each bring with us karma or debts from previous lifetimes. I don’t want to cloud the discussion with this issue, but if life is truly eternal, then it means we have lived before birth, just as we will live after death. The human soul is on an eternal path of migration back to God, its true and only source. When we have learned and achieved here all that we can, we will go on to new worlds and new learning somewhere else. But let us not concern ourselves too much with that. Our work is not to relive past lives or to plan future ones. Our only work is to live this life that we have right now as completely and fully as we can. And the only way we can do that is through love, through turning our life story into a love story and letting God’s love express itself through us.

The awareness that love creates within us is not so much a matter of possessing a body of information as it is a matter of having a loving and merciful heart. A merciful heart is not created by psychological effort, by memorizing ten religious precepts, or by having an active imagination. A merciful heart comes to us as we welcome ourselves into the reality of God’s great love for us.

There is something else that must be addressed in this matter of love and that is the dark guest, the shadow, which dwells within the soul of each person. Some might refer to this as the untamed ego within that demands attention, adulation, and adoration. More strongly pronounced in some than in others, this shadow is that part of the human psyche that resists being loved and therefore refuses to give love. I alluded earlier to this shadow as being the outgrowth of our not being wisely or fully loved. At some point, it may also be related to karma. No matter what, we must learn to welcome that dark guest inside that it may also be transformed by the power of a holy love.

Life is now and always has been a love story, a love story designed by God and portrayed in our own individual lives. It is love that transforms all our wilderness into places of safety and beauty.

One of the greatest stories in the Bible is the parable of the prodigal son told by Jesus (Luke 15:11-32). It is not only a story of the human condition; it is a story of the true nature of God.

A son has grown up in a rural and comfortable household where nothing is denied to him. At a certain age he decides he is missing out on all that life has to offer, so he asks his father if he can have his share of the inheritance early, so he can go to the city and experience all that life has to offer. His father gives him what he asks for, for he wants his son to be free to choose what he wants. The son then makes his way to the city where he indulges himself with every physical pleasure that is available. Eventually, he runs out of money. He finds himself in a status even lower than the servants that once waited on him. He is literally living in the gutter and starving to death. Finally, he reasons that if he goes back home and shows that he is properly repentant, his father might receive him back and let him work as one of the hired hands. He works out his speech carefully. Father, I have sinned against you, and am no longer worthy to be called your son. Make me one of your hired servants. As he makes his way homeward, he recites the speech.

The parable tells us that his father saw him coming down the road and ran down to meet him. He threw his arms around his broken, tired, and dirty son and kissed him. The son tried to get his speech out, but the father was not even interested. He called for fresh clothes to be brought for the son and for a grand homecoming party and feast to be held in honor of the one he had once feared might be dead but who had now come home.

An older son, who had dutifully stayed home, obeyed every commandment given by his father, and who had worked hard, saw what was happening for his runaway brother, and he was understandably angry and hurt. No party had ever been given for him. By all human standards, it was unfair treatment. So he refused to go to the feast for his brother.

His father found him, listened to the older brother’s complaints, and rather than condemning him for a narrow, uncharitable attitude, drew him into an embrace and said, Son, you have always been with me, you were never lost and everything I have is yours. But now that your brother has returned home, the one we feared was dead, it is right that we rejoice and welcome him back, for he who was lost now is found.

The parable ends there. We never know if the brothers were reconciled. I like to believe that they were. But what we do know is that the father’s love was so huge, so generous and all-encompassing that it embraced both of them, the dutiful son as well as the disobedient one. It was now up to the sons to make the father’s love theirs and to be reconciled to each other.

The parable not only gives us a picture of an all-loving God, it also tells us that life for each and every person is a love story. Part of that story we must write for ourselves, but the love of God remains unwavering and unchanging, waiting to be bestowed upon us when we are ready to receive it.

The story is told that H. G. Spafford’s hymn, It Is Well with My Soul, was written out of a great tragedy in his life. His wife and daughters were coming to join him overseas, when the steamer they were on sank in the middle of the Atlantic. His wife was saved, but his daughters died. He visited the approximate site where the ship went down, feeling he needed to have his own memorial service of mourning in that spot. These words surfaced in his mind as he stood on the deck of the ship:

When peace like a river attendeth my way,

When sorrows like sea, billows roll;

Whatever my lot, Thou has taught me to say:

It is well, it is well with my soul.

I offer it as one of the most profound truths I know. No matter what has happened to you, no matter what losses you have endured or what wrongs you have committed, no matter the crisis going on in our world today: at the deepest level