Confronting Our Inner Dread

In my previous post I wrote about the fact that at the heart of our spiritual journey is the necessity of confronting our ‘inner dread’. In this post I want to look at what this entails.

To begin with we have to first ‘unlearn’ much of what we have been taught by our society in order to do so. This is especially so in our rationalistic society. It requires sailing into the uncharted waters of the mystery of our own being. We will find ourselves in darkness here; and will not be in control. Our society teaches us from young to be in control. Richard Rohr defines suffering as any experience where we are not in control. This cuts across physical, mental, emotional and spiritual reality. Surrendering to our inner mystery is therefore an experience of suffering.

The second thing is that movement into our inner reality inevitably confronts us with our past pain. We all have buried hurts; an accumulated reservoir of pain. We therefore do not want to go there.

A further issue is that part of embracing mystery is to recognize that we are involved in a vast spiritual struggle for control. It requires acknowledging that we have a spiritual adversary who wants to wound us; destroy us; and bring us under his control. He knows that our purpose is to manifest the image of God and live in union with God. He therefore does everything he can to prevent that from happening.

I recently read a book by Mark Stibbe called ‘I Am Your Father’, which was very profound. He holds that Satan’s primary strategy is to destroy fatherhood. He was originally Lucifer, God’s chief angel; but wanted to usurp God’s position and have total control. Here we see a manifestation of what sin is about. Through this rebellion he was cast out and became alienated from God. He became the first orphan; separated from his father. Stibbe contends that Satan (which means our ‘Adversary’) entered into an ‘orphan heart condition’; alienated from his father. His strategy is to bring all of mankind into this same state of being. Stibbe says that an essential role that a father plays is to give his children (male and female) their sense of ‘honour’. If they do not receive this the alternative is to become trapped in shame. At the core of their being they are riddled with guilt and shame; and left feeling useless and worthless.

Added to this John Eldridge says that Satan uses our earthly father to wound us at the exact point where our True Self is found. This is the place from where our true giftedness flows. By doing this he attempts to nullify our True Self and our giftedness. He tries to cripple us and ‘take us out’. In this process he also brings us into spiritual bondage. He gains a spiritual hold over us, without our realizing it.

 By using our father to do this he also achieves something else. We derive our initial image of God from our earthly father. We project our experience at the hands of our father onto our True Father. This effectively gives us a distorted image of God; and drives a wedge between us and our True Father. The flip side of this is also a factor. Our perception of who we are is a mirror image of who we believe God to be. If we have a distorted image of God, we will have a distorted image of who we are. It is a vicious circle.

 I believe that in the first seven years of their life a person has naïve access to their True Self. At that point they have not yet developed consciousness. They are perceived to be in a state of ‘innocence’ (they are ‘unwounded’). During this time however wounds do occur, especially the ‘father wound’ that they receive. They are not at this stage able to deal with these wounds. What happens is that their psyche, in order to protect itself, effectively ‘splits off’ the experience of these wounds. In order to anaesthetize itself from these wounds they become separated from the awareness of the psyche and become buried within the unconscious awareness of the person. The problem is that these wounds and the associated pain become ‘buried alive’ within the unconscious. They still continue to affect the person, but at an unconscious level.    

Eldredge says that we continue to be wounded again and again at the same spot that our father wound occurs. This reinforces the crippling effect of the initial wound. It is like an onion which has layer upon layer of wounds around the central core of the father wound. This cripples and immobilizes us.

These are the things that confront us when we enter into our inner world during contemplative prayer. When we move into silence and solitude these realities will inevitably emerge from the dark recesses of our inner being.  This will be difficult and painful. We can therefore only go there to the extent that we have received an affirmation of the love of our True Father for us. It also requires being led by the indwelling Holy Spirit; and being supported, encouraged and empowered to do so. If we do not have this guidance and support from our God-given Counselor it would normally be too painfull to confront our inner dread. However, doing so is essential if we want to move towards experiencing reconciliation, healing and wholeness. We have to literally fight for our freedom and inner wellbeing. The battle will be fierce; but victory is beyond words to describe.

Question for reflection:

·         Are you engaging in this battle?

·         If not, are you willing to do so?