Spiritual direction: The world is not as God wishes

There is a difference between understanding that God is in control and that all is within God's will, and thinking that humankind has designed for itself a world that God approves of or, in fact, that God "intended."

It is God's will that people know who he is, and so he sent the Prophets, and it is also God's will that people have freedom of choice in their own conduct. God wants people to live full and complete lives, guided by love for him and charity for each other, but he is not going to impose it. People have somehow fallen into an incorrect pattern of thinking which is that the way society and the world is now is an inevitable path through history. It is not. I can assure you that God "hoped" for a much better place on earth based on human's own choices than there is now. This has nothing to do with "obedience" by the way, but rather, whether or not people choose to live in a world where Godly morals, guidance and charity are the bedrock and foundation that informs all else.

I recently used an analogy of two walkers on different terrain, both going to the same destination of God, but having to deal with rough terrain with ample resources or smooth terrain but few resources. While their methods may differ according to their terrain they both understand God's will and seek to arrive at the same destination of God.

This analogy can be used in a different way, to describe how I view humanity on earth. I can see in the distance, though no one else can, the path that God wishes that humans took, particularly over the past fifty years. It shows a way that is above the ground, with progressing prosperity of faith in God, charity for others, and technology improvements apace with moral and ethical boundaries. While there are social ills and sorrows like disease and natural disasters, humans had used their technology and communication advances to be globally supportive and proactive in the mentoring and stewardship of all people in bettering their lives holistically and simplistically. Families would have remained the nucleus and bedrock of humanity, and healthy babies everyone's joy.

Instead humans have dug themselves a dark and twisty path in the ground. They have dug so low and so dark that they think that is the natural way of evolution of their great mentality and technical prowess. The rich and environmentally conscious have personal fluorescent lights. Those who are sad by the dark take drugs. Children do not thrive in the dank and dark so they are aborted, or not had, or left behind to fend for themselves. People who point up at cracks in the earth where the light comes in and say, "Let's find God again in the light" are smacked in the heads and called dummies, and mocked in the media. People write books that of course the path of humanity must be underground because Pluto once went through Scorpio. They buy many scented soaps and antibiotics because it is dank and rank down there. When the tunnel is too narrow and people get stir crazy they pull out a gun and shoot the people who are too slow or blocking their way. Because it is always dark people think it must always be time for sex. Pimps turn into tour guides.

People did not have to choose that path underground. There is nothing in people's genes or "fate" that made that choice inevitable. The temptations, yes, they are inevitable, because that is the broken and flawed condition of human nature that only worsens when piety diminishes. God is the source of all strength and goodness, and when people turn away from God (real God, not self help New Age book gods and goddesses) then humans are losing the strength to resist the cracks and flaws in human nature. When God is not their first focus together with charity of neighbor, technology and societal "advances" that were not in God's plan or inevitable become inevitable, because humans then actually narrow rather than broaden their choices. Within God all goodness is possible. Without God, soon the only place to live is in the dank dark underground because without the light of God humans can no longer think outside the dirty tunnel and their choices have become narrowed into a kind of law of underground jungle. Even good deeds and donations to good causes backfire because everyone is trapped in the tunnels and there is deadly ricochet.

I have to be honest, it is too late to be where humans should have been. But it is never too late to resolve to make a difference and find a better path above ground. If people could come to their senses and realize that the depressive and exploitative mindset of society is not inevitable, and could get themselves back in the light of God's day to day influence, they could get above ground again and see in the distance the path that was not taken. I can assure you that seeing the path and modeling what you can do after what should have been would have miraculous feeling restorative qualities and alleviate future suffering, even while the past cannot be changed. People who harp on the tragedies of the past are nuts. Temptation to do evil will never go away, and studying past examples just increases the inevitability of it, as people forget how to think and live differently than those who had erred in the past. You don't fix a car engine by studying many examples of broken parts that were not fixed.