Thomas Merton and the New Seeds of Contemplation

Recently, I find myself being fascinated by some of the Christian classics written by the early Christian fathers and mystics. Now I have begun reading this book called ‘The New Seeds of Contemplation’ by Thomas Merton, a Trappist monk who lived during the early nineties. After reading through five chapters or so, I find that there are so many spiritual insights in this book that can only come from a person who has spent much time meditating and pondering on God. I think these kinds of writings are becoming more and more a rarity nowadays with the advent of the Church Inc. where so much emphasis is placed on action rather than passion. We as Christians are now so caught up with busyness and the work of the church organization that we have lost the art of contemplation and silent reflection. On the other hand, I also think that separating ourselves from the world and living the life of the hermit to pursue God does not honor the fact that God has sent us into the world. Yet, writings such as those of Thomas Merton have inspired millions all over the world with their profound wisdom and insights.

So much depends on our idea of God! Yet no idea of Him, no matter how pure and perfect, is adequate to express Him as He really is. Our idea of God tells us more about ourselves than of Him.

For it is God’s love that warms me in the sun and God’s love that sends the cold rain. It is God’s love that feeds me in the bread I eat and God that feeds me also by hunger and fasting. It is the love of God that sends the winter days when I am cold and sick, and the hot summer when I labor and my clothes are full of sweat: but it is God Who breathes on me with light winds off the river and in the breezes out of the wood. His love spreads the shade of the sycamore over my head and sends the water-boy along the edge of the wheat field with a bucket from the spring, while the laborers are resting and the mules stand under the tree. It is God’s love that speaks to me in the birds and streams; but also behind of the clamor of the city God speaks to me in His judgments, and all these things are seeds sent to me from His will.

My chief care should not be to find pleasure or success, health or life or money or rest or even things like virtue and wisdom - still less their opposites, pain, failure, sickness, death. But in all that happens, my one desire and my one joy should be to know: “Here is the thing that God has willed for me. In this His love is found, and in accepting this I can give back His love to Him and give myself with it to Him. For in giving myself I shall find Him and He is life everlasting.”

How am I to know the will of God? Even where there is no other more explicit claim on my obedience, such as a legitimate command, the very nature of each situation usually bears written into itself some indication of God’s will. For whatever is demanded by truth, by justice, by mercy, or by love must surely be taken to be willed by God. To consent to His will is, then, to consent to be true, or to speak truth, or at least to seek it. To obey Him is to respond to His will expressed in the need of another person, or at least to respect the rights of others.

The requirements of a work to be done can be understood as the will of God. If I am supposed to hoe a garden or make a table, then I will be obeying God if I am true to the task I am performing. To do the work carefully and well, with love and respect for the nature of my task and with due attention to its purpose, is to unite myself to God’s will in my work.