Deliverance from Evil

Sitting in Quaker Meeting yesterday I had a rare (religion-related) insight. I say “rare” because I’m fairly certain that there are so many people in Meeting on any given First Day who are focusing so much more directly and concentratedly on communicating with God than I am, when I am more likely to be thinking about things like this (an oldey but favey of mine from 5+ years ago on my old blog).

It struck me that while we spend so many hours and so much of our life in Meeting trying to learn important messages from God, some of the most important lessons, like compassion and tolerance and loving unconditionally, can be best learned, not from God, but only from our interactions, and often the most painful interactions, with other human beings.

And those challenges, not just experiencing those tough interactions with people, but learning how to address the pain and anger with compassion, tolerance and love, come no more easily to us than picking up a banjo and playing an intricate melody. It takes a lot of practice.

And even then, speaking...ok, writing...as someone who has been taking banjo lessons for almost 2 years and is barely much better than when I started, practicing sure doesn't make us perfect...it only makes us better.

But then, maybe it was God who sent me that message.