Howard Hughes was once asked how much money was enough. He replied, "A little bit more." That is the story of our lives. Jesus told our story when he talked about the rich man who felt like he never had enough grain and goods. So he built bigger and bigger barns to store it all, until one day he died with full barns and an empty soul.
The story does not have to be about material goods. It can be about emotional security. It can be about friendship or family. It can be about respect. It can be about happiness. It can be about self-esteem. It can be about meaning and purpose. It can be about spirituality. It can be about truth. It can be about love.
We can never have enough. Therefore we are always searching for more. When we don't find it, we fill ourselves up with substitutes: food, alcohol, drugs, work, politics, or anything else that will help us forget what we can't find.
The Kingdom of God appears when you stop searching for more. God is enough. The end of the spiritual search is when we stop searching. It is when we know that if we keep searching, we will never find. The only way to find is to stop.
This is grace. Grace means you already have it before you ask, before you seek, before you knock. Grace is here now. There is nothing you have to do, nothing you have to find. Otherwise it would not be grace.
Searching is born of the emptiness that needs to be filled. But it can never be filled. It is infinite. There is not enough of what you are looking for to fill that space.
The story does not have to be about material goods. It can be about emotional security. It can be about friendship or family. It can be about respect. It can be about happiness. It can be about self-esteem. It can be about meaning and purpose. It can be about spirituality. It can be about truth. It can be about love.
We can never have enough. Therefore we are always searching for more. When we don't find it, we fill ourselves up with substitutes: food, alcohol, drugs, work, politics, or anything else that will help us forget what we can't find.
The Kingdom of God appears when you stop searching for more. God is enough. The end of the spiritual search is when we stop searching. It is when we know that if we keep searching, we will never find. The only way to find is to stop.
This is grace. Grace means you already have it before you ask, before you seek, before you knock. Grace is here now. There is nothing you have to do, nothing you have to find. Otherwise it would not be grace.
Searching is born of the emptiness that needs to be filled. But it can never be filled. It is infinite. There is not enough of what you are looking for to fill that space.
But when we stop trying to fill it and have the courage to live in that infinite space, we see that it is already infinitely full. It always was. We just didn't notice. We were too busy searching.
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Image is "Never Enough" by Theresa Horstman. Mixed media, acrylic. This piece is built from typewriter ribbon (center) taken from notes created while reading The Diary of Anais Nin series (both the first edition and the posthumous editions). The ribbon is stacked and glued together to create a thick mat, leaving only the edges and top layers readable.
_______________________________________
Image is "Never Enough" by Theresa Horstman. Mixed media, acrylic. This piece is built from typewriter ribbon (center) taken from notes created while reading The Diary of Anais Nin series (both the first edition and the posthumous editions). The ribbon is stacked and glued together to create a thick mat, leaving only the edges and top layers readable.
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