When the Sacred Pipeline Is Clogged, Sing with All Your Heart
Last week Brad was sent to a spiritual classroom. We were somewhere that looked like a blend of Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona:
We came to a neighborhood of large old houses. As we got out of the car, I noticed a house that was a block or so away. It was as big as a warehouse and had a metal roof. There were mountains surrounding us nearby, covered with saguaro cactus. We entered another old, two-story house that also had a metal roof. I wasn’t sure if we were visiting, passing through, or settling in.
A group of people then showed up and said they wanted spiritual guidance. They were sincere and clearly feeling the need for divine intervention and help. Hillary and I proceeded to teach them how to pray. Our emphasis, as always, was to not reduce prayer to words alone. We taught them how to pray with the right tone, rhythm, movement, and especially authentic sacred emotion.
One young man expressed sorrow, shame, and remorse for how he hadn’t conducted his life in ways more pleasing to God. He burst into tears and prayed for forgiveness, pleading to be reborn and for his life to be radically altered. Though he was sincere, his lament was too prolonged. I turned to Hillary and said, “He’s stuck in mourning. His spiritual pipeline needs to be unclogged.”
We told the man to go upstairs and enter the smallest room, describing it as a “washroom with old fashioned plumbing that has not been updated.” Then we told him to sing a hymn of joy in that small room. We added: “There’s a time to mourn and there is a time to give praise. Now is the time for you to make a joyful noise. Go upstairs and do it.”
He went upstairs and all we could hear was more weeping. The young man wailed as his prayers continued, but there was no song of joy in them. When we entered the washroom he said, “I feel too ashamed to sing. I am too pitiful, small, and broken to accept that I deserve to feel joy.”
I responded, “Sing anyway. Now is the time to make a joyful noise.” Reaching deep into my heart I sang, “Oh How I Love Jesus” with all the life force within me. This is a song I often turn to when I feel the need to unclog the pipeline and feel God’s current flow smoothly again. I sing it with all my might so it can blow out whatever is blocking the sacred emotion of jubilation from coming through.
As Hillary and I sang this song to the young man, others came upstairs and joined in the singing until there was so much joyful sound in the air that he could not help but sing with us. When the man sang with all his heart and soul it was like turning on a faucet of sacred emotion. It rinsed him clean and released him from sorrow and remorse. We sang until everyone felt the deepest and highest joy of joys.
I then went downstairs and saw my mother in the kitchen getting ready to cook a meal. I asked her if she could hear our singing above. She replied, “You can’t hear anything down here that goes on upstairs.” In that moment, I knew that everyone has to go “upstairs”—to the higher, holier “washroom”—in order to sing themselves clean of all worldly, downstairs troubles. Don’t be ashamed or wallow in self-pity for being lost. Go upstairs and sing anyway, doing so with all the lifeblood that is within you. Stuck emotion is profoundly cleared by an infusion and transfusion of divine joy, allowing the holy current to flow.
I woke up from the dream while singing the old hymn. I was in a true joy loop, amplifying what it feels like to be nearer and dearer to the divine love that steadily flows when we get over thinking we know anything, including whether we are worthy of joy. As I came back to myself and started to awaken, I heard these words spoken from on high:
“When you pray you send a ray of emotion to those who are around you. There is a time to convey sorrow and a time to sing with joy. Make sure you set a good example for others by changing from one emotion to another when it is time to do so—not too early, and not too late. Don’t stay stuck in sorrow and tears of rain, blocking the subsequent arrival of heavenly sunshine.”
“Go upstairs and get near the old-fashioned religious plumbing that brings the cleansing, freeing water and flushes away the know-it-all self. Holy elation is contagious and will spread to all who come to the upper room. Then go downstairs to the kitchen where the everyday cooking takes place. Go up and down the stairs like you are ascending and descending the rope to God, receiving the sacred ecstasy and heavenly current needed to go back down and fulfill your earthly mission.”
“I Know”
At the beginning of a journey up the divine rope or staircase, trickster will attempt to block you from feeling the need to “mourn,” that is, to face your mistakes, shortcomings, bad habits, misdirection, and laziness. It puts these words in your mouth: “I know.” Then your head is too full of pride and you are unable to spiritually climb. While you may think you know something because you recognize a truth upon hearing it, this is very different from owning the wisdom so it is embodied in your actions. The latter breakthrough requires more time, effort, and guidance from teachers. (You may even be thinking, “I know” right now as you read this.)
If you do get past the first roadblock of presumptive knowing and feel the mourning that brings the next new day, be aware that trickster comes back in a new disguise. Your mind will doubt whether you are worthy to climb from earthly suffering to heavenly joy. In truth, it is your spiritual unworthiness that helps you make the journey, but only if you hand it over to become a passport to board the glory train. Don’t cling to your shortcomings as a shame-name badge and excuse for remaining in a stuck condition.
Go Upstairs and Sing
There is as much ego in self-pity as there is in pride—both choices keep your eyes and ears on you and create distraction from the big room. Value the old-time spiritual plumbing that has not been “updated” by positive thinking evangelists and pushers of prosperity religion who miss how deeply felt sorrow helps give birth to the deeply felt need for jubilant, soulful prayer.
The answer to too much shaming and blaming is not to rescue the ego with platitudes of perfection and self-empowerment. The simple, pragmatic way out of the swing between self-inflation and deflation is through wholeheartedly singing holy songs. But first it’s good to feel the burn in order to authentically yearn for higher musical redemption. What’s required is the two-ness of a real truth reckoning and a surrender to sacred songs that are infinitely more powerful than your good versus bad thoughts and oughts. Too much wallowing and too much positive intention both lack the necessary tension required for an old-fashioned mystical, melodic release.
In trickster’s hands, your stains and pains can become an excuse for remaining stuck in sorrow. In God’s musical hands, a lamentful mourn and moan provide admission to the upper room. Go upstairs because only song can unclog the pipeline and allow numinous water to wash away both the pride and shame that make you too large and heavy to rise. Get over yourself and sing, but don’t do it with a maudlin tone. A holy song is meant to convey the joy and sacred ecstasy that come from the trembling embrace of divinity.
Now let’s go back downstairs, because Brad’s mother makes a mean fried chicken. And if you behave yourself, you might also get a slice of his grandmother’s pie.
-The Keeneys, August 5, 2019. Illustrations by Hillary Keeney
P.S. Here’s one of our favorite recordings of the hymn: