Look at your spiritual map, and find the red dot

By JALETTA ALBLRIGHT DESMOND

“You are here” the map at the mall tells us, with a small red arrow pointed at our exact location. Wouldn’t it be convenient if we had that directory in our spiritual lives, one that could tell us exactly where we are and where we are going?

Dr. Larry Crabb, a psychologist, speaker, and Bible teacher, first used this metaphor to make the point that to move forward in one’s spiritual journey, one must first know where one stands. You must find your red dot on your spiritual map.

I’ve heard a few interesting responses to this concept: “I feel like I’m in the sporting goods store, just playing around,” “I’m just stuck at the directory, going nowhere,” “I’m not even in the mall!”

Dr. Crabb explains that the first step in connecting to God is coming to him “just as you are.” To be authentic rather than try to be what you think you are suppose to be. He suggests that we should periodically find our “red dot,” and determine where we are at the moment, without holding back anything, without fear of judgment.

We need to be willing to look at the map and determine if we are in the mall, so to speak, or if we are still out in the parking lot, looking for a place to park. Are we stuck somewhere? Or are we moving around, experiencing the opportunities mapped out on the directory, exploring the places that God might take us or feasting on the spiritual food waiting on us in the proverbial food court?

You must know where you are to get where you are going. That is a basic concept, but one that we often ignore.

We rush around, we go to church on Sunday, we take a quick read of our sacred scriptures, we pray, and we volunteer. But do we sit down, alone, and consider: Where am I spiritually?

“Certain things can be learned in solitude that can be learned nowhere else,” says Dr. Crabb. “The Spirit indwells us. Only silence allows us to hear his quietest whisper, the voice in which he communicates the deepest life.”

Crabb suggests we simply start off telling God where we are, what we are thinking, and what we are feeling. We don’t have to dress it up in pretty words and holy phrases.

One morning I said, “God, I just want you to know that I feel really confused right now. I can’t even get my head around my thoughts and feelings. I have been so preoccupied with myself and not you. I am going to need some help today keeping focused on you in my prayer time and not making it all about me. I need some help sorting through all the clutter in my head. I just don’t feel motivated to push through these clouds today.”

Being omniscient, God already knew all of that, of course. But praying it made me more aware of where I was, spiritually speaking. It helped me locate my red dot.

In a way, Communion, the breaking of the bread, is a moment where we seriously consider our red dot. As we take the body broken for us and the blood spilled for us, it is a time to meditate on what we are doing with this gift of grace. How are we spending what was freely given? How are we building a bridge to the one who made it possible for us to connect with God? Is there something amiss in our life that might prevent us from genuinely communing with God?

We are told in the New Testament to stop, leave the communion table, and address that issue.

That’s pretty serious business. That apparently means we need to know where our red dot is in order to genuinely commune with God.

But we need no sacred ritual — no matter how important — to start the process of finding our red dot. We simply need to be quiet and commune with God in prayer. Look at your spiritual map, look for that red dot, find those words, “You are here” and, if you are doing this in a sincere effort to seek God, you are starting out right where you need to be.

Jaletta Albright Desmond is a self-syndicated columnist who writes about faith, family, and the fascinatingly mundane aspects of daily life. She lives in North Carolina with her husband and two daughters. Contact her at jdesmond@bdtonline.com.