Voluntarily Involuntary

There are many things you and I do voluntarily: taking a walk, listening to music, going to church, to name a few. There are some activities that are involuntary, but that I can control. I can hold my breath – but only for a short period of time. Actors can train themselves not to blink. Other things are reflexively involuntary. The sneeze comes to mind, mostly because it is ragweed season and I find stifling a sneeze impossible without pinching my nose. And sneezing is one activity that I cannot make myself do voluntarily. I suppose I could sniff pepper or such but sneezing on my own is not happening. There has to be a causal agent to trigger the sneeze response.

I was thinking about the spiritual life and whether there are involuntary actions, the spiritual sneeze as it were, that happen. Or that because of my free will, I have to voluntarily train my involuntary response. For instance, could I train myself to think and act in a certain way so that I would have an involuntary, automatic response to life’s situations and personal encounters? Is it possible that you and I can, through spiritual direction and exercise, think and act with the mind of Christ? Can I voluntarily decrease my self-centeredness to the point where Jesus, increasing within me, acts without impediment? And so without my self-interests and biases I can voluntarily allow Jesus to act within me such that my actions are involuntary acts of charity – love. It would be like sneezing. I would see a person in need, an injustice in society, the sin within myself, and then I could sense the spiritual sneeze coming. And, unless I voluntarily pinch the Jesus response off, I act spiritually involuntarily as Christ – in and through love. I have tried to pinch off both the physical and spiritual sneeze, each time it has adverse effects.

It is curious that the ragweed and stewardship seasons arrive at the same time in the Fall. Both create a trigger for a sneeze; one physical the other spiritual. I cannot control my physical sneeze; it is totally involuntary. But I can control, voluntarily, how I will spiritually sneeze. My stewardship is not controlling my money, but rather voluntarily asking Christ to act and think within me, and to think and act involuntarily as the Holy Spirit moves me. The problem is that often I can feel the Jesus sneeze coming, but I still try to stifle it when it is not convenient, or fear pinches off Christ working within me. My generosity is directly proportional to how much I voluntarily allow the involuntary Jesus spiritual sneeze to happen.