Unboxing Love

By Bob Hildreth

It's always been all about Love; it's just that we, as humans, get lost and so our souls ache.

What do we get lost in?

How do we get lost and how in the hell do we find that Love for ourselves and others?

There was a time when I felt like I was diving off a high diving board into an empty pool. The flight was cool, but the landing sucked beyond what I thought was possible. But one thing I learned through sucky landings is this: they are the start of one amazing journey. That's really the crux of this book. The journey toward a Love that makes my life a blast.

This book is not a religious text--it is a spiritual manifesto to describe the path that lead me out of religious abuse thirty-plus years ago and put my life on a whole new path.

What do we release for peace?

What do we hang onto for hope?

What happened to us to create the BS that so easily trips us up?

Find out by getting this book and taking your time to go through it. At the end of each chapter, it has several articles that I wrote on my journey. Take your time, answer the questions, and listen to the whisper. Want to chat about this book? Check out the website BeGraceFull.com or Facebook group, BeGraceFull.com. I am also always up for talking with groups.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Fulton Books, Inc.
• Release date: Dec 6, 2023
• ISBN: 9781639858422

Book preview

Table of Contents

Title

Copyright

How to Get the Most Out of this Book

Chapter 1: The Love Box Journey

Chapter 2: The Outcome of our God Box

Chapter 3: The Reasons for Expansion of Our God Box

Chapter 4: The Bigger Love

Chapter 5: The Destructive Power of Theology

Religion Will Give You a Box, Stay in the Box and Your Life Will Suck

About the Author

cover.jpg

Unboxing Love

Bob Hildreth

Copyright © 2023 Bob Hildreth

All rights reserved

First Edition

Fulton Books

Meadville, PA

Published by Fulton Books 2023

ISBN 978-1-63985-841-5 (paperback)

ISBN 978-1-63985-842-2 (digital)

Printed in the United States of America

Welcome! Now Suffer

Work sets you free.

—Sign above the gate at Auschwitz

Was it just me or are we working for a god who likes to see people suffer? Am I the only one who thinks that eternity with this being might absolutely suck? These two questions reverberated in my head as a young man, especially after my first wet dream. And so the mask was on tight, Resist the devil and he will flee. Tell that to my seventeen-year-old hard-on that I felt guilty about every morning. The guilt and the shame and the inability to get any real, workable truth about how to do anything about this was very real, full of condemnation, shame-based, and the greatest blessing and curse I could ever have had. The blessing came only after years of the curse, years of work that oddly enough never set me free.

This book invites you to an understanding or some ideas that saved my ass but only after a huge pain in that same ass was invited and continues to be removed. Okay, it was more like a baseball bat upside the head than an invite, but hey, it got me out of the gate and on a lifelong journey to freedom I never thought possible. The ideas I mention in this manifesto are just that—ideas. But they are ideas I have learned to have great rest in, and from that rest, I have found peace that I never knew when I was warming a church pew and telling others how to live right for a connection to God.

There are two things about these ideas that I want to disclose before you read:

I am not a theologian and have no desire to be—in my humble opinion, that's where religion gets so damn stupid. Spirituality calls for mystics who create paths to ideas that you have to rest in. Theologians try to tell you who, what, and where The Divine is all about, which leaves me asking, Who the hell are you or I to define The Divine? In short, my ideas may be wrong, but they have brought me tremendous peace here and now; and I believe that's what a Divine being who would sacrifice its only Son for me to have, peace, hope, love, and a great life here and now.

I do not go to church, mosque, temple, or any other religious buildings, but you can catch me live and my writings on BeGraceFull.com. Don't get me wrong, I know some people who do go to those places and are in fact spiritual, not many but a few. I do have some friends that come over for drinks weekly and others that we hang out and discuss our spiritual journeys together, and at the time of writing this, I was looking at buying an abandoned church—what can I say, I really like stained glass—to use as my office and a homeless shelter and a rehab center. But that's as close as I get to a church building.

With all that out of the way, let me cover one other thought: I am a believer (have faith or take rest in) an idea that mentions a lot of Christian Scripture. I also mention Buddhist meditation practices, along with other things I have learned along the way. This book represents my journey and my path that took me from my second, and so far, last psych ward for suicide attempts and other stuff—to where I sit now thirty years later. I am not here to offend you or to not offend you, but this I suggest, if you feel offended over something you read in this book, look within and ask why.

How to Get the Most Out of this Book

Slow down and take time to read, ingest, chew on, meditate on what is in here. At the end of each chapter are several devotional style writings that I hope you will do over several days. When I said above that this was an understanding that continues to grow, an invite that never ends, I meant it. For me, the why of that comes in the pain inside me. This pain and hurt is generational (been there for a long time) and serves a very specific purpose: to remind me of just how incredible this Perfect Love beyond human comprehension is. With this in mind, go slow, chew your food more, and if you have questions, get on our Facebook group, BeGraceFull.com, and let's talk.

Chapter 1

The Love Box Journey

The idea that man can define a Divine being while comforting on the surface is destructive to the soul, society, and every potential good thing that could be.

It was the school principal who had knocked on the door of my science class, and I heard my name mentioned. This was probably not a happy moment because, in 1975 America, when the principal could still give swats, I was somewhat well-known in his office. It's not that I was a juvenile delinquent, but rather that I could not understand one key element. And in fact, the main element that my life revolved around at that moment, for you see, at that very moment, Superman had a very aggressive cancer. My Superman had a very aggressive cancer, and while it ate him up physically, it ate me up religiously, which was the start of my healing.

Just a few minutes before that fateful knock on the door, my wonderful science teacher and coach had generously offered to allow me to skip the test everyone else in my class was taking after he noticed my bloodshot and swollen eyes.

Rough night? my compassionate teacher asked.

Yes, sir. We got back a little late, I replied.

Everyone in the wonderful little town of Artesia, New Mexico, knew we had gotten in late just