Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Interviews for Unity Institute



I am writing this from a hotel in Lee’s Summit, Missouri, waiting for both the roads and an acute sinus infection to clear.  The interviews for Unity Institute were yesterday at the height of the blizzard, three of them, two teams of ministers and a psychologist, who pretty much went through our internal landscapes with a steam shovel and a pickaxe.  Afterwards, the current group of ministerial students, who have been giving us marvelous support and prayer, went through the last part:  what happens if we are redirected, i.e., we cannot go to Unity Institute at this time.
Now, none of the three of us know the results. We were confident immediately after the interviews, but as the day wore on, much less so. The team has made their decisions, we’ve already heard that they wouldn’t need an extra day, but they won’t tell us the results until we are safely home (and not in their faces) on Monday. Because of the blizzard, we and the review team wound up taking dinner together last night at Unity Inn, but it was uncomfortable. The team wouldn’t meet our eyes, and so we know at least one of us has been redirected.
Oh, God, let it not be me.
What the ministerial students were so wise as to say is that a LOT of people get redirected to work on internal “stuff,” and that many of the current crop of students and quite a few working ministers have been redirected at first, some several times, and eventually made it through. The other piece about what they had to say was that in every case they heard about, the redirection was right; that there were issues that had to be worked on, or there were things that had nothing to do with them; those people had seen parents or immediate family members pass away that – had they not been redirected – they would not have been able to be with them in their final days. The upshot – and, as sick as I am, lets go for the upshot – is that Spirit always knows, even if we don’t at the time, and that our path is as its going to be, and be the best for both us and the people and congregation we are to serve. We are ALL bound to serve; it just remains to see in what capacity.
We were, I believe, authentic and transparent. And if our transparency results in a redirection and we can’t go to seminary right away, that is life in Spirit.  I guess the point is that sometimes God redirects our life; but it is never a mistake to Spirit, even when we don’t particularly want to go where God/Spirit leads us. We will find our way, our version of how to serve in the greatest capacity we have to deliver. When you think of how each person – you, me, that person at the bustop over there – truly is God inside, even if we are not manifesting it particularly well at the moment, you can see there is a Grand Pattern. We retain the ability to have free will within it, yes, but somewhere we fit in.
The three of us remain dreamers, guiders, lovers of this blessed humanity and the people we serve. Yes, we serve you, wherever, whenever, and however God leads us to do that.  

2 comments:

  1. Congratulations Gwen, I know you wanted this. Do remember it is easier to get into something than get out of it. Which is to say this is a new beginning!

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