Teachings

The Inspiration of Saint Mathew (Michelangelo) 

Teachings about the experience of divine guidance can be found in the religious tracts, aphorisms, sayings and sacred poems of the world's spiritual traditions, and in the personal writings of the numerous individuals from many walks of life who have claimed to have had these experiences. Here is a small sampling of this wealth of information on the human endeavor to seek, receive, and follow guidance from a perceived divine source.

Ask, and it will be given you; seek, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives; and he who seeks, finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened. - Jesus (Matthew 7:7-8)

Not only the thirsty seek the water, but the water seeks the thirsty as well. - Jalal al-Din Rumi

It is not in heaven that you would say: "Who can go to heaven for us and bring it back so we can hear and do?" Neither is it beyond the sea, that you would say: "Who will go over water for us, and bring it back?" ....But the voice of God is so near to you. It is in your own heart and in your own mouth, for you to receive and act on it. - Deuteronomy 30:12-14

The Tao gives birth to all beings...nourishes them, maintains them, cares for them, comforts them, protects them, takes them back to itself, creating without possessing, acting without expecting, guiding without interfering. - Lao-tzu (Tao Te Ching, 51)

I am blind and do not see the things of this world; but when the light comes from above, it enlightens my heart and I can see, for the Eye of my heart sees everything; and through this vision I can help my people. The heart is a sanctuary at the center of which there is a little space, wherein the Great Spirit dwells, and this is the Eye. This is the Eye of the Great Spirit by which He sees all things, and through which we see Him. If the heart is not pure, the Great Spirit cannot be seen. - Wallace Black Elk

God acts within every moment and creates the world with each breath. He speaks from the center of the universe, in the silence beyond all thought. Mightier than the crash of a thunderstorm, mightier than the roar of the sea, is God's voice silently speaking in the depths of the listening heart. - Psalm 93 

You who see me in everything and everything within me will not be lost to me, nor will I ever be lost to you. - Bhagavad-Gita 6:30

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God...what is good and acceptable and perfect. - Romans 12:2

Humans are the most intelligent of beings, yet they change their attitudes in various unequal ways, because the real director is not present. If people would get the sense of the real director, then they would not be guided by the subjective psyche, but would spontaneously be on the Way. - Taoist master Fu-kuei-tzu (Cleary)

Hear counsel, and receive instruction, That thou may be wise in the rest of thy life. There are many devices in thy heart; but the counsel of the Lord, that shall stand. - Proverbs 19:20-21

Without an escort you are bewildered on a familiar road; do not travel alone on a way you have not seen at all; do not turn your head away from the Guide. - Jalal al-Din Rumi

Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God; for many false prophets have gone out into this world. - John 4:1

That which is Selfless, hard it is to see; Not easy is it to perceive the Truth. But who has ended craving utterly and has naught to cling to, he alone can see. - Buddhist Udana (80)

Meditate upon my counsels; love them; follow them; To the divine virtues will they know how to lead thee. I swear it by the One who in our hearts engraved the sacred Tetrad, symbol immense and pure, Source of Nature and model of the Divine. - Pythagoras (The Golden Verses)

Meditate on the Guide, the Giver of all, the Primordial Poet, smaller than an atom, unthinkable, brilliant as the sun. - Bhagavad-Gita 8:9 (Mitchell)

What is the purpose, do you suppose, of these inspirations--or, more correctly, of these aspirations-- which I have described, and of these messages which are sent by the soul from its innermost centre to the folk outside the Castle and to the Mansions which are outside that in which it is itself dwelling? Is it to send them to sleep? No, no, no. - St. Teresa of Avila

I am well aware that many will say that no one can possibly speak with spirits and angels so long as he lives in the body; and many will say that it is all a phantasy, others that I relate such things in order to gain credence, and others will make other objections. But by all this I am not deterred, for I have seen, I have heard, I have felt. - Emanual Swedenborg

The perfect knowledge of causes cannot be acquired without divine inspiration; since all prophetic inspiration derives its first motive principle from God the creator. - Nostradamus

It is Love calling to love; and the journey, though in one sense a hard pilgrimage, up and out, by the terraced moment and the ten heavens to God, in another is the inevitable rush of the roving comet caught at last, to the central sun....Like gravitation, it inevitably compels...every spirit to its own place. - Evelyn Underhill

We and God have business with each other; and in opening ourselves to His influence, our deepest destiny is fulfilled. The universe, as those parts of it which our personal being constitutes, takes a turn genuinely for the worse or for the better in proportion as each of us fulfills or evades God's demands. - William James

Help is always given to the human being; we are always surrounded by the help of God. The question is to realize it... - Irina Tweedie

Nature is an unlimited broadcasting station, through which God speaks to us every hour, if we only will tune in. - George Washington Carver

Now, beside God's laws, which are the same for all of us, there is also God's guidance and that is unique for every human soul. If you don't know what God's guidance for your life is, you might try seeking in receptive silence. I used to walk receptive and silent amidst the beauties of nature. Wonderful insights would come to me which I then put into practice in my life...to me, the beauties of nature were always the most inspiring, and so actually that was my time alone with God. It didn't last more than an hour, if that, and I got so much from it. - Peace Pilgrim

Truth lies within ourselves; it takes no rise from outward things, whatever you may believe. There is an inmost center in us all, where truth abides in fullness and to know rather consists in opening out a way whence the imprisoned splendor may escape than in effecting entry for light supposed to be without. - Robert Browning

It is in that inner peace and stillness that things begin to happen, and it was in that peace and stillness that I began to hear God's voice. . . . All can hear that still, small voice within. Try it. Be still and know that the I AM within you is God, the Beloved. Listen-then live by it. It really does work. - Eileen Caddy, Co-Founder of Findhorn

How does man live? Whichever way he may live, we need to remember that he is also lived by an authority or a power for which there are many names. And, above all, we must remember one thing, namely that whichever way man lives, he follows, whether he knows it or not, an inner commission that points beyond him. - Jean Gebser

I cannot doubt the existence of a guidance, which I dare to call divine, which can so invade one's soul as to set one's feet on wholly untried and unexpected paths. - Joan Mary Fry