A most excellent way

"For we know in part, and we prophesy in part.

But when that which is perfect is come,

then that which is in part shall be done away.

When I was a child, I spake as a child,

I understood as a child, I thought as a child:

but when I became a man,

I put away childish things.

For now we see through a glass darkly

but then face to face: now I know in part;

but then shall I know even as also I am known. "  

1 Corinthians 13: 9-12 KJV

I have always loved Paul's love chapter, 1 Corinthians 13, which offers us a glimpse of what divine love is like.  As a prelude, he writes, "and now I will show you a most excellent way,"  and by the end of that chapter, Paul has delivered on his word.

That "most excellent way" is a kind of spiritual praxis that points the way to God, within the person's inner realm, where we encounter a love so beautiful, so alive and ineffable that few have been able to describe it.  Yet, Paul does. While we have learned from prophets and wise people that God's wisdom is His love, the "way" to encounter God hasn't always been clear.  Mysteriously Jesus says that "He" is the way, but it wasn't always clear to me what He meant until I understood Paul's description.


Paul suggests the "most excellent way" is not through strict obedience to the old laws.  Loving your neighbor and giving to the poor, hungry, marginalized, and obeying the laws of the faith and the land, and living your life in dignity and integrity are all good, but not the most excellent way. They are all excellent, and for the most part, they are also very loving, but there is another way, that is even more excellent. 

Earlier in 1 Corthians Paul talks about the wisdom of God being hidden from the scholar and the wise of our world and revealed to the fool, to those who are like children, humble without ego or worldy pretension.  Those of us who are analytical, left-brained techie types, full of Harvard, Yale, Columbia, all running on high speed intellectual prowress, we may find Paul's most excellent way a bit of a challenge. 

God's wisdom is found in the wisdom of the heart, rather than the intelligence of the cerebral cortex, the "brain." The ways of the heart are superior to the ways of the intellect or brains. I think Paul is talking about something even beyond the wisdom of the heart. There is yet another way.

I suspect he is talking about an early Gnostic form of meditating. Meditation is difficult for brainy people because the brain chats on and on endlessly. In order to become utterly silent, we have to tune out the brain's voice to enter the silence and the void through which God's presence moves. Most of us can identify with the effort it takes to turn off that over zealous brain.

If you are familiar with meditation, you are well aware that you look into the inner world behind your eyes, breathing and concentrating.  Typically, you sit there, comfortably breathing, centering and allowing yourself to be silent for the hour.  You don't do anything, rather, you wait.  You wait for God or for God's grace to show up.  You keep your lamp lit through the breathing and you focus and you wait.  There are many stories in Jesus' parables that describe what that waiting is like, which is sufficent evidence that Jesus was also talking about meditation as the way to enter the kingdom of heaven.

If you are sincere in your effort to connect with God and are intentionally meditating, after awhile (decades!) you may (they say) actually see images moving as if behind a shade in your mind.  If you persevere, as the great Yogis, those images become clear as if the shade is lifted, entirely.  So, early in meditation "we see through a glass darkly,"  but when we are mature, seasoned meditators (or masters) we see "face to face."  That is "knowing and being known," Paul suggests. Yogis enter into an abyss of ineffable peace and joy, rich and alive. That experience is what it is to be really alive, they would say, adding they were "dead" before they knew what it was like to be in union (yoga) with the universal life force in meditation.  Some sit in meditation for whole days. 

So, Paul reveals to us what Jesus meant when he said He was the way. That most excellent way is meditation and Christ is met in meditation!!  We also will discover then, that God's realm is one of love, rather than law and judgement.  Now, that was really good news then, and most likely is for us today - to those who care.

The beautiful love chapter describes what that love is like through the eyes of someone who has entered into God's presence and returned to share the experience and its wisdom with us. As Moses came down from the Mountain with the 10 commandments, Paul describes what God's love is like.  It is not given as law, rules to obey and live by, but rather as a sketch of what love is like in the kingdom of heaven.  I suspect this chapter is really a revelation, a reflection of Heaven for fledgling disciples and believers. 

It is especially important because it is a kind of buried treasure in the Christian scriptures that suggest that early Christianity may have been more eastern than we ever really knew.

In this hauntingly beautiful treasure, West meets East, and we can all say "Om, Amen, Namaste" and wait together in the silence, in the dark, together breathing as ONE people, waiting for the light to dawn and the fog to rise. Then all together, regardless of religion or culture, we will all meet face to face, known and knowing each other, moving together in the love, immersed in the presence of God.