Spiritual Movement - Introduction

In my profession as a Geographic Information Systems (GIS) scientist, much of my time is spent in the observation of locations and events, and their spatial relationships, trends, and patterns. Understanding these conditions always paints a clearer picture and leads to truer understanding of the big picture. This 'nerdy' type of analysis has extended into my personal spiritual life. I have observed the inevitable trend of spiritual location and movement in my own life, and in the spiritual lives of others. Understanding these patterns, relationships, and more importantly, the causes of spiritual movement can aid in the goal of a spiritually constant life, and ultimate confident reunion with God.

Position is an intrinsic component of movement. Two positions become manifest when movement occurs; the position before, and the position following the movement. The second position is always higher or lower, ahead or behind, or better or worse than the first position - never the same. Otherwise movement did not really occur. When movement does occur, it is either in a positive or negative context. When positive, the results are inherently higher, further ahead, or in a better off condition than the previous position. When negative, the opposite is true; lower, behind, or worse previous to the movement.

I became aware of this concept in a spiritual sense when as a young teenager leaving the sweet innocence of youth; I found that my resistance to evil began to waver as I began yielding to worldliness. Fortunately, good parents, friends, and Sunday school lessons taught me enough to know that repentance was the way to begin again and make things right. But as I repeated the process of sinning and repenting, I began to feel a sense of guilt, and remorse, as if I were abusing the Savior's special gift of the atonement. One evening before bed, I drew a diagram in my journal of two bell curves on a graph. Time was the X variable along the bottom, and the degree of my spirituality was the Y variable along the left.  I was frustrated by the repeated peaks and valleys of my spiritual movement, and longed for spiritual stability. This graph and the deep concern I once felt was forgotten for 20 years until as an adult I saw the wisdom of it and began to see it in a deeper spiritual context.

The comprehensive spiritual graph of my life, if drawn today, would reveal periods of sin, discouragement, and apathy represented as spiritual lows, and periods of zeal, enthusiasm, and deep love for the gospel represented as highs at a grand scale. Further, it would reveal hundreds of ups and downs on a micro-scale. However, I think I can safely say that the general trend has been a gradual upward movement. 

Another spiritual graph exists in the scriptures. It comes from the greatest and most spiritually steady being of all time, Jesus Christ. This account originally given by the apostle John, and later revealed by Joseph Smith states of the Savior that "he received not of the fulness at first, but continued from grace to grace, until he received a fulness;"(see D&C 93:13). Though always the Savior and the only Begotten of the Father, this scripture indicates that all the powers and understanding that came with his divine role were not all bestowed at once, and like the spiritual understanding given to all of God's children had to be achieved line upon line, gradually. In my mind's eye, I can see the Savior's spiritual movement graph forming. His graph would certainly show a steady and likely very rapid increase in the direction of righteousness, with no dips and valleys of any kind, only upward and forward movement. Such steady and upward spiritual movement may seem impossible for mortals to mirror, but we should try. We are assured by the Savior himself a few verses later that if we keep his commandments, we "shall receive of his fullness, and be glorified in [him] as [he is] in the Father; therefore, I say unto you, you shall receive grace for grace" (see D&C 93:20). This verse gives me the hope of constancy and spiritual stability that I desired on my own spiritual graph as a young teenager, and which I still long for as an adult.

The movement discussed so far is real and exists in the lives of each of God's children. It happens each day, multiple times a day. The direction of our spiritual movement is delicately impacted by each choice we make. I have come to realize how quickly our directions can change, and have found the shifting directions to be triggered by the same common element of yielding to or resisting (blog post coming soon) to that which is right and what we know to be true. Joseph Smith said "the moment we revolt at anything which comes from God, the devil takes power (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, pg 181). At such moments of change, we begin walking on Lucifer's path, in his preferred spiritual direction - downward.

The scriptures are filled with powerful symbolic words describing spiritual movements, and when understood, can be a guiding light aiding us in a more spiritually constant, or grace for grace type of progression back to his presence, where we will hopefully receive his fullness.

The following subtopics are words from the scriptures that involve position or imply spiritual movement. I've found about 20 such movement words in scripture that I'll be writing about in the upcoming year.