Saying “YES”

A brief and funny exchange happened when I startled a co-worker who exclaimed, “Jesus Christ!. ” I replied, “Sorry, no.” We both giggled. This prompted me to think about how this interaction related to the well-used George Fox quote: “Walk cheerfully over the world, answering that of God in every one.”*
Going through life with a cheerful nature, seeing the divine in everyone, whether it’s a friend or foe, a saint or mass murderer, is extremely challenging advice. It is something that causes people to dismiss as naïve. However, I found myself instead focusing on the word “answer.” To answer means it isn’t enough to see or recognize God in each other, as hard as that can be at times. It isn’t even that we hear that voice. Rather, we listen to something that of God is asking, something that we need to answer. I held this question during worship: How do I do this? How do I model and act from this place, not only with the pleasant daily interactions but with the more difficult people and never mind the people I think are totally abhorrent?
Toward the end of the hour, an answer came to me when I started to think about what question an entity or energy beyond my comprehension, something that transcends time and space, could possibly be asking this puny, flawed human. It occurred to me that what Spirit could be asking is: “Do you see me? Do you see me here in the part specific to this person that is unique and transcendent?”
And an additional question is: “And do you love me?” Maybe these are the ultimate questions, not only for the other people we meet as we go through life but also to the plants, the animals, even the grain of sand or mountain. “Do you see me, and do you love me?” Hopefully, someday, all of us will be able to answer that of God in everyone by always saying “yes” – yes, I see, celebrate, actively support and love that God in the unique spiritual essence inside you and each and every person, place, and thing.
While likely this idea raises counterarguments against what seems to be an overly simplistic and delusional idea, still what if all we need for the world we vision, the beloved community to be created, is acting from this simple answer: YES?
Addendum: It just so happens that this whole message is essentially what is said in the Shema, written in 630 BCE, and the central prayer in Jewish worship: “HEAR oh holy people, you are all part of God (Eloheinu) and God (Adonai) is One (echad). Love the one un-namable God, the God in each other, with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.”
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* Full George Fox quote: “Be patterns, be examples in all countries, places, islands, nations wherever you come, that your carriage and life may preach among all sorts of people, and to them; then you will come to walk cheerfully over the world, answering that of God in every one; whereby in them you may be a blessing, and make the witness of God in them to bless you.”