The other day I was texting with a friend about funding—no surprise there—and the conversation shifted.

“As a side note,” I wrote, “I think G-d has a special cloth we’re cut out of, one that’s woven with mitzvah—good deeds, kindness, compassion—to better the world.”

She responded, “Tikkun Olam… we’re healing the world, one little piece at a time…”

I paused, soaked in her words, and replied, “That’s the only way I can think about what we do. It doesn’t always make sense, but somehow it works.”

Her final text came back: “Great point. I really appreciate that! And am honored to be part of your ‘we.’”

I ended simply: “I’m just honored.”

I am blessed to have a circle of friends who walk different paths, but walk in the same direction. Sometimes we must step outside our familiar “Christian” circles to grasp a greater sense of restoration. A Buddhist friend of mine once wrote a song called Praises for the World—you can find it on YouTube. Recently, Pope Leo XIV, in a video message to the Network of Universities for the Care of Our Common Home, encouraged university leaders “to be builders of bridges of integration between the Americas and with the Iberian Peninsula, working for ecological, social, and environmental justice.”

You’ve heard the words restoration and proximity used by Mar Enoch and Mar Abrahim. You may still be pondering what they mean. In the Gospel of Thomas, Saying 77, Jesus declares:

“I am the light that is over all things. I am all: from me all came forth, and to me all attained. Split a piece of wood; I am there. Lift up the stone, and you will find me there.”

The Apostle Paul echoes this in Acts 17:28 (NKJV):

“In Him we live and move and have our being, as also some of your own poets have said, ‘For we are also His offspring.’”

So what’s the point?

Too often, Christians focus solely on the restoration of humanity and our nearness to “the end of things,” while neglecting what John saw in Revelation 21:

“Now I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away.”

We see “a new heaven” with one eye open, but forget “a new earth” with the other. New here is not “fresh off the assembly line,” but restored—as in “go to settings, restore to manufacturer settings.”

If mitzvah, praises for the world, and being builders of bridges for ecological, social, and environmental justice have not yet been split open in you, then we have missed the meaning of restoration and proximity we as Christians so desperately seek.

📖 Drawing from Scripture and centuries of theological tradition, Ashe explores:

• The three levels of faith: children, young men, and fathers (1 John 2)

• The three realms of the Tabernacle: Outer Court, Holy Place, and Holy of Holies

• The difference between initial salvation and spiritual maturity

• The role of the Holy Spirit as a down payment — and the call to go beyond

• How true transformation means losing borrowed faith to gain your own revelation

🔔 This sermon is a call to those who are no longer satisfied with surface-level faith. It challenges us to go from 30-fold to 100-fold, from religion to relationship, and from the earnest of the Spirit to the fullness of divine union.

🕊️ Whether you’re discovering Ashe for the first time or returning to a beloved voice of spiritual wisdom, this message will stir your soul and deepen your desire for God.

👉 Subscribe to The Proximity Portal for more teachings that blend ancient faith, personal growth, and prophetic truth.

🗣️ Let's Go Deeper — Join the Conversation

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In this video, Ashe unpacks the profound reality of God as the mono philanthropus Theos—the only God who truly loves humankind—and what it means that this love led God to bestow His identity, image, likeness, essence, and energies upon humanity, enabling us to share in what He is.

Central to Ashe’s message is the “greatest gift”: human will. In his clear, powerful voice, he reveals how God’s granting of free moral agency empowers us to choose life or death, good or evil, God or the devil. This freedom, Ashe teaches, is “the true beginning of God’s divinity released into mankind,” showing how each choice we make is an act of enacting the nature of God within and among us.

Explore how these universal truths about divine love and human agency formed the bedrock of Ashe’s bridge-building ministry, inviting us into deeper participation in the divine life while honoring our radical freedom.

“The light of the body is the eye: therefore when thine eye is single, thy whole body also is full of light; but when thine eye is evil, thy body also is full of darkness. Take heed therefore that the light which is in thee be not darkness.” — Matthew 6:22-23

There is a man who sits in the highest seat of earthly power, and around him gather those who claim to follow the Prince of Peace. They speak of light while walking in darkness, and call this walking holy. They have made an idol of their politics and baptized it with the name of Christ. But what does it mean to have a single eye, and how do we know when the light within us has become darkness?

Jesus spoke these words not to confuse us, but to clarify the most fundamental truth about the human condition: we cannot serve two masters. The eye that is single sees clearly because it is not divided, not torn between competing loyalties, not blinded by the glitter of earthly power. The single eye sees what is, not what we wish to see, not what serves our purposes, not what makes us comfortable.

But watch now how the eye becomes evil, how light transforms into darkness. It happens when we decide that the ends justify the means, when we convince ourselves that our cause is so righteous that any weapon will do. It happens when we look upon actions that would horrify us in any other context and call them blessed because they serve our political purposes. The eye that was meant to see clearly becomes clouded with calculation, with compromise, with the terrible arithmetic of power.

Yesterday, missiles fell like rain upon a distant land, and the very people who claim to worship the One who said “Blessed are the peacemakers” found reasons to celebrate. They spoke of strength and necessity, of protecting the chosen people and fulfilling prophecy. But where in this rhetoric is the voice that said “Put up your sword”? Where is the heart that wept over Jerusalem? The light that should illuminate our path has become darkness, and how great is that darkness.

This is not about foreign policy or the complexities of international relations. This is about the state of the soul that claims to follow Christ while cheering for violence. This is about the terrible price we pay when we allow our faith to be captured by our politics, when we trade the narrow way for the broad highway of worldly success.

The single eye sees that power corrupts, that violence begets violence, that the kingdoms of this world are not the kingdom of God. The single eye sees that when we bow down to earthly authority, when we make excuses for the inexcusable, when we call evil good and good evil, we have lost our way. We have become the very thing we claim to oppose.

But there is still time to turn back. There is still time to ask ourselves what we have become, what we have traded away, what we have allowed to be done in our name. The light is still there, dimmed but not extinguished, waiting for us to choose it over the darkness we have embraced.

The question is not whether the man in power is one of us or merely useful to us. The question is whether we are still who we claim to be. The question is whether we have the courage to let our eye be single, to see clearly, to call things by their right names. The question is whether we love the light more than we love winning.

For if we do not, then we are indeed full of darkness, and how great is that darkness. But if we do, then there is still hope for us, still a chance to be the people of light we were called to be. The choice, as it always has been, is ours.

James Baldwin would have said: “Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.” The time for facing is now.