We cannot GET there, we can only BE there

 From my daily meditation from CAC.  I rewrote almost the whole thing...

"...It's almost the only task of religion - to communicate not worthiness, but union; to reconnect us with our original identity "hidden with Christ in God"  The Bible calls the state of separateness sin...
the word sin has so many unhelpful connotations...for most of us it does not connote a state of alienation or separateness.  Instead it connotes naughty behavior and moral unworthiness.  But these are symptoms...disconnect people will do stupid and harmful things...we cannot ever become perfect or "worthy" but we can become reconnected to the Source. Sin describes a state of fragmentation - when the part thinks it's separate from the whole.  It's the loss of any inner experience of who we are in God.  That "who" is nothing we can earn or obtain, it's nothing we can accomplish or work up to.  We already have it! The biblical revelation is about awakening, not accomplishing...we cannot GET there, we can only BE there...but that is too good to be true...the ego makes it about achievement and attainment...At that point religion becomes a worthiness contest in which everybody loses...yet union with God is a revolution of the mind...a conversion...that deep and wonderous inner knowing - a whole new set of behaviors and lifestyle will surely emerge...I must first come to experience God's love, then I will - almost naturlaly - be moral"

I have reframed my understanding of this many years ago.  Yet I continually have to work to avoid falling into the old mindset of a more judicial view of sin, God, reward, punishment.  I'm not alone in my desire to have a God who is all about justive - reward the good, pushing the bad.  But, if I stay in that mindset long enough, inevitably it leads me to a hamster wheel of trying to be worthy of perfect love.  Because, if I have to earn it or be good enough for it, what is "good enough"? 

I can remember being as a kid, reflecting deeply on God and on myself and I genuinely concluded that, overall I'm a good person who cares about others and who does not hurt other people, so surely God will not cast ME into eternal hellfire.  I was pretty convinced, in this view of God, that I could coast along and just not hurt anyone purposefully, and God would be gracious enough to let me into heave when I died.  I believed that hell must be reserved for unremorseful murderers and the like. 

But, in that worldview, I was still separate form God entirely - relying on a benevolence I needed to believe in to deem me "good enough".  There was no connection to God, no belonging, not real flow of love, truth, encouragement, healing, identity.  I felt like I just had to figure out who God was and then also figure out I was and then try to outweigh more good than bad i my behavior so that some day I would receive reward and not punishment.

But that disconnection was already my punishment! I was separate from the psirit who created me and loved e fully abd was available to help e discover how I was uniquely designed. 

But once I invited THAT spirit in to invade my heart, mind, and soul - I experienced belonging and fullness and connection and discovery of truth and wisdom and direction.  And I experienced an unceasing outpouring of admiration, love grace...I experienced being completely seen and completely loved - no need to prove myself or to hide the things I was ashamed of.  In that connection, I could experience my worthiness and fullness and then simply live with a desire to STAY in that place of connection.  That leads to some shifts in behaviors - not because God condemns me, but because I want to be FULLY connected and some things cause me to disconnect.