LIVIN’ ON PURPOSE THE POWER OF DISCERNMENT by Eric Johnson The responsibility each of us has to live this life on and with purpose is an awesome obligation. It requires us to make decisions about what does and does not feed our soul. When we are in dark places and the road we are traveling seems long, arduous, and unforgiving, the central question we face often is: what do I do next? What frequently alludes many of us is the sober notion that our actions are born out of the hopes and fears in our hearts. There is no question that we are often facing circumstances that are not entirely of our making. We are not so much defined by the circumstances in which we find ourselves but we are always held to account for our responses. In this reality the power of discernment can often serve as our life line in overwhelming moments of grief, frustration, pain, bewilderment, and even anger. In its essence discernment is the ability to differentiate between what heals our spirit and what does not. In a spiritual sense discernment represents the effort to distinguish those things that draw us closer to the “Most High.” Discernment is a tool that we can use to evaluate the status of our spiritual health. It is not the magic of clairvoyance, where any of us can came to see the future. Discernment is not an ability that some us have and some us don’t. It is a sensibility that we can develop that connects us to an awareness of a greater appreciation for the role of purpose in our lives. Certainly, the power of discernment is not limited to spiritual contexts. We must also make discernments about people, things and circumstances in our lives that bring us chaos or peace. Living with purpose requires each of us to make judgments about the direction of our lives and to make course corrections that move us toward our desired destinations. None of the benefits offered by discernment are without struggle and effort. As a matter of living this life that is as it should be. It requires no work, grace, or discernment to look into the lives of others and assess their perceived lack of worthiness. In fact, every moment any one of us spends doing that takes us away from the valuable work we need to do to discover the where a bouts of our own spiritual nourishment. Each of us who draws breath in this life are beholden to forces that we are yet to understand, and more importantly we are subjected to a time line that is not of our making. If we spend our limited time here simply chasing the empty righteousness of the judgment of others then that too will be something for which we will have to account. It is without doubt that each of us is in need of the all the grace that we are afforded and as a consequence the power to discern is present to help each of us continue to move toward the light even on those occasions when we seem to be surrounded by the darkness. Discernment is not something that we can do for others, we can only do it for ourselves because we can only feel with our own hearts. We should be required to give maximum effort to realize our best selves and bring into our surroundings all the elements necessary to make it so. It is the only sure-fire way to discern our worthiness. We are all worthy of the power of discernment, but we are also required to do the work to have it. None of us are doing the work 100% of the time which is why grace exists for us all. However, the more work we do the better off we tend to be. Discernment is not the empty righteousness of the judging others as less than.
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