GOD: An Autobiography, As Told to a Philosopher - The Podcast
GOD: An Autobiography, As Told to a Philosopher - The Podcast
258. From God to Jerry to You — Dharma, Swadharma & How God Reveals Your Personal Calling
In this week’s episode of God: An Autobiography, The Podcast, Jerry L. Martin explores one of the most practical and urgent spiritual questions we face: How do we know what we’re meant to do with our lives—and how do we tell when God is guiding us?
Drawing on the Hindu concepts of dharma and swadharma, Jerry explains the difference between our role-based responsibilities and our deeply personal calling; the tasks that “have your name on them.” From there, he turns to the heart of the episode: a clear, four-step method God gave him for recognizing divine communication in daily life.
You’ll learn how God speaks through prayer, dreams, intuition, hunches, insights, and inner signals, and how to prepare yourself to receive that guidance. Jerry breaks down each step—listening, heeding, openness of heart, and sensitive attunement—as a real spiritual practice you can begin using today.
Whether you’re discerning a big life decision or simply trying to stay more connected to the sacred in everyday moments, this episode offers an accessible, experiential path for SBNR seekers looking to deepen their relationship with the Divine.
Listen in as Jerry shares how your search for God meets God’s search for you, and how the relationship unfolds from there.
Other Series:
The podcast began with the Dramatic Adaptation of the book and now has several series:
The Life Wisdom Project – Spiritual insights on living a wiser, more meaningful life.
From God to Jerry to You – Divine messages and breakthroughs for seekers.
Two Philosophers Wrestle With God – A dialogue on God, truth, and reason.
Jerry & Abigail: An Intimate Dialogue – Love, faith, and divine presence in partnership.
What’s Your Spiritual Story – Real stories of people changed by encounters with God.
What’s On Our Mind – Reflections from Jerry and Scott on recent episodes.
What’s On Your Mind – Listener questions, divine answers, and open dialogue.
Stay Connected
- Read the book: God: An Autobiography, As Told to a Philosopher at godanautobiography.com or Amazon
- Share your questions and reflections: questions@godanautobiography.com
- Subscribe and listen free wherever you get podcasts
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Scott Langdon [ 00:00:17,220 ] This is God: An Autobiography, The Podcast — a dramatic adaptation and continuing discussion of the book God: An Autobiography, As Told to a Philosopher by Jerry L. Martin. He was a lifelong agnostic, but one day he had an occasion to pray. To his vast surprise, God answered — in words. Being a philosopher, he had a lot of questions, and God had a lot to tell him. Episode 258.
Scott Langdon [ 00:01:09,720 ] Welcome to God: An Autobiography, The Podcast. I'm Scott Langdon, and on this week's episode, we return to Jerry Martin as he continues to convey God's ongoing story in this series we call From God To Jerry To You | God: An Autobiography, The Podcast.'
Scott Langdon [ 00:01:23,680 ] It's God's deepest desire that we understand just how personal our relationship with God is and that we can get in touch with God when we listen and pay attention in every moment of our daily lives. But how do we do this? What's our role in this relationship? What's required of us in order that we can know God and God's will for our particular lives more fully? Well, here's Jerry with how God communicated that to him. I hope you enjoy the episode.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:02:00,530 ] You know, we all have to figure out for our lives, and, in fact, for each day: What should I be doing? What am I up to? I sometimes think, what is my calling? Do I have a calling? Or do I have a duty? And recently we've been talking on the podcast about the Hindu concept of Dharma.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:02:26,990 ] Which is very useful in figuring out what you should do, what you're called upon to do, because a lot of one's duties have to do with Dharma, as the Hindus call it.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:02:42,990 ] A kind of cosmic order that mainly shows itself through role responsibility. If you're a parent, there are certain duties, and so that kind of tells you... something about what you should be up to in your life in general, and tomorrow, perhaps. It's their birthday. And if you're a physician, you... have a set of particular responsibilities. Anyone who provides goods and services to anyone else has responsibilities. As citizens, we all have responsibilities.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:03:19,080 ] And those are, you might say, relatively generic. Anybody coming along could just say, 'Oh, you're... a citizen, a physician, a husband, a parent, a child, and you have responsibilities through all of these things.' Okay, that's great. Generic and useful because a lot of life is lived in terms of our roles, our relations to each other as defined by our social roles.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:03:48,990 ] On the other hand, it can't be the whole story because there's a more personal dimension than that, than just role responsibility. And that comes out in the Bhagavad Gita in the notion of swadharma, not just dharma: your duty; but swadharma: your self-duty, your personal duty.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:04:10,720 ] That's what needs to be figured out. What is my personal duty? Or quoting my wife Abigail, she often asks of a task, 'Does this have my name on it?' Well, which tasks have your name on them? Both in life that you're called to do something in maybe a whole career, and daily. What am I supposed to be doing today? What tasks have my name on them? And there's a kind of parallel distinction between... on the generic and the particular swadharma, self-duty, personal duty, is your particular calling.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:04:54,480 ] But in the notion of thinking about the divine reality itself, one can think about the large undifferentiated aspect of a divine reality, the divine reality that is ubiquitous, that is everywhere all the time. Many modes of spirituality, even of whole religions, emphasize that aspect of the divine. You might access it through meditation, for example, or contemplation, or in other ways that you're just relating. Much the way you relate to the air around you, just where you relate and the sky. Oh, there it is, and I'm taking it in.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:05:46,890 ] But in addition to that aspect of the divine, there's also a more particular aspect. Their particular moments, the divine, are especially present. At moments of death, at moments of love, at moments of life transitions, of Bar Mitzvah and coming of age, and falling in love and marriage and childbirth, and many other things that are very particular moments where God has told me that God is especially present. When someone dies, God is especially present at that moment. And then there's the question of how one is to relate to the particular aspect of God.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:06:35,390 ] You have a relationship to God. God is not just a generic presence, a kind of universal presence. But you have a relationship. And you want to know what God wants of you? And this, of course, relates to this notion of swadharma, or personal calling. What does God want you to do today in your life, and maybe your choice of a career, in your choice of a religion, perhaps, in your whether to get married, or in your choice of having a big family or not a big family, even where you should live your life, should you move to California, to some foreign land? I can't even think of one. But should you move there? Well, those are big decisions and big questions. And how do you know? And of course, I receive this tremendous gift of God speaking to me in a voice.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:07:43,320 ] And I didn't even have to figure out, what is this voice? Am I just daffy? No, the voice says, 'I am God.' I say, 'Who is this?' ‘I am God.’ And then tells me, when I ask God of Israel, ‘I am the God of all. I am the God of all.’
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:08:02,700 ] Okay, that gave me… and then God continued answering questions. And in fact, early on in my, as I tell about it in God: An Autobiography, the book, and there's parts of that in the podcast, early episodes, God started giving me orders, commands. Don't go to work today, do good. Go to work. Do this, don't do that. That seemed rather arbitrary, like going to boot camp and getting training in obedience. That's what it seemed like as I reflected on it, but you have this particular question, and I had a voice, but most people do not have a definite voice. Such that they wonder whether I get tape recorded even, because it seemed to be right out there. But it comes in other ways. And the very first time I asked, because I was asking God, why are You so hidden? And God said, I'm not hidden.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:09:06,700 ] And then there are many ways God is, I'm almost forgetting the other puzzling thing in that early prayer of why you're so hidden. I ask, is human recognition important to You? You know, why does the great God of the universe care whether you and I are paying any attention at all? And God says it's the essence of My being, something like that. It's vital to God. This is kind of, you might say, what God is. God is someone, a great, I say someone, not running around on two legs, but God is a... personal being.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin: Who lives the divine life in interaction with us.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:09:56,290 ] The first time I ever asked God if You're not hidden, how do You communicate, basically? And God says, this was the quote, God to Jerry. ‘I communicate through prayer, through dreams, through insights that seem like one's own thoughts, through hunches and intimations and intuitions.’
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:10:26,400 ] Well, that's a lot of different ways. You know, prayer, dreams, insights that seem like one's own thoughts, hunches, intimations, intuitions. It sounds almost as if anything might be a divine communication.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:10:41,650 ] And that's awfully wonderful. That's wonderful, and it seems to be true. You know, I take this to be true. And you can even have thoughts that just seem like your own, and really God is thinking through you. You're the instrument, you might say, in that moment of God thinking. You're sort of the radio picking up the divine signal.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:11:02,200 ] But it seems awfully open ended. And you need to try that, and it doesn't quite... Well if I think, I should move to the South Sea Islands one day, is that a divine input or is it not? Or is it I'm just fantasizing about swaying palm trees and the breezes off the ocean? And, there was, shortly after that, as this kind of conversation went on, God clarified in a way that I think is very helpful, that it's not just every stray thought, every stray impulse that comes upon you. Because you've got to prepare yourself in a certain way.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:11:48,660 ] And God says, and this again, quote God to Jerry, “People must learn to listen to the heed that requires... Openness of heart and sensitive attunement.”
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:12:07,850 ] Well, I sometimes feel that... You know, we need to pause over this. Let's focus on the words. People sometimes, I think, read the God book too casually. This is God speaking a new revelation. We should be paying the same attention to these words that people do in a Bible study or something like that. They try to parse it and figure out what exactly does this mean? What exactly are the implications? Why is this said first and then that second thing is said? So let's do that with this quote. Go over it again: “People must learn to listen, to heed requiring openness of heart and sensitive attunement to God.”
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:13:38,870 ] Okay. What does it mean? To listen. And we often say, to pay attention. And what this really means is don't be distracted by everything. You've got to get all the other things out of the way. I always talk about just getting the clutter out of the way. You need to listen with an unencumbered attention and undistracted attention so that you can focus. Some people, some traditions talk about being single-minded. You need to have your eye on the ball, your mind focused on what's coming to me? And so, as you run around, it may be, we all have busy lives, but in the midst of that busy life, there are moments where, something seems to be trying to get my attention. Someone says something to me, hey, this might be a message to me, that God is speaking to me through them. Or a thought as I'm going through the busyness. It kind of comes to me for a moment. Oh, I should be helping this neighbor who's going through a difficult time, and I'm busy. But wait a minute, I should pause and listen. If something is coming to me, I should pause and listen.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:14:59,010 ] And that's job number one. You're never going to get anywhere. You're not going to communicate with God or take in any communication if you aren't listening, if you aren't ears wide open and mind wide open and let things come in.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:15:16,340 ] And focus on them, listen to them. I guess what I'm trying to say is: Be calm. Don't rush off. But dwell on what comes to you and see what this seems to be saying. And then the second thing we're told, we've also learned to listen to heed.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:15:39,310 ] Well, what does it mean to heed? Well, it means that you're not just listening inertly, like idly playing, having the radio on as you're driving about, you're going shopping, but to heed means more like somebody listening to warning signals and getting prepared for action. So if something is coming through, and this requires you to be ready to respond. The whole nature of a divine communication is that it's something that calls for a human response.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:16:16,060 ] There's some, well, I just can't think of any exceptions offhand. That just seems to be the nature of it. God is not just playing music for you, you know, kind of diverting entertainment.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:16:30,570 ] If God is communicating to you, it's for a purpose, and you need to heed that purpose, and that means you need to be standing ready, like someone listening. Are there any fire alarms, or something. If there's been a forest fire near where you live, you're listening for every siren, every signal that might be coming through and you're listening with a readiness to act. And so, if I often speak about this in the context of loving, we're all supposed to be loving. But I speak of enacting love. It's not just enough. Love is not just a pitter-patter of the heart or a kind of attitude or a state of romantic bliss or something. It needs to be enacted. You've got to behave lovingly to the other person, and that means, at that level of human interaction, you need to listen to your love partner. I need to listen to my wife. And I need to heed— not just yada, yada, yada— okay, I listened, I can repeat back what she said. No, but be ready to respond.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:17:46,610 ] In human relations, a response called for is often emotional. To feel it along with her. If she's going through a difficult time or a neighbor, a friend is going through a difficult time that they tell you about.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:18:01,550 ] It’s often said, people sharing their suffering and pain with one another is a blessing because it gives us an opportunity to respond and to share that experience with the person and thereby to be enacting our love. And that gives us that opportunity. But God may be calling us for all kinds of purposes. We don't know. You don't know in advance, but people get called to the ministry, to the priesthood, to the rabbinate, and so forth. They get called sometime to a far-off place of religion or culture, to join the Peace Corps or something, or the military, ‘be all you can be’, as the slogan says. That varies from one person to another. But you need to listen, to heed, be prepared to act on it. And that requires the third thing I'm told in this statement from God.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:19:03,450 ] People must learn to listen and heed. That requires... openness of heart. Openness of heart. Which means you can't just be running around thinking, 'No, no, I've got to get the shopping done.' ‘No, no, I'm a salesman. I've got to sell more encyclopedias or something.’ No.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:19:25,050 ] Take in what comes to you. I mean, openness of heart means something about your emotional system. You can't be closed down.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:19:34,340 ] You have to be willing— to take in what somebody's telling you, to take it to heart. And if you have a thought that seems maybe like God trying to tell you something, you need to not be resisting it. You need to have your heart open. Maybe it's something. Somebody felt guided. He said, 'God laid a burden on my heart on a mission to India.’ And I said, 'Do you like the Indian people?'
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:20:11,380 ] And he said, 'I don't like people. I'm a deep introvert.’ And I guess he's an introvert like me, a bookish fellow. He'd be happy, you know, just staying at home doing his own study and thinking and praying, probably, since he's a religious guy. But no, he felt... 'God laid a burden on my heart.' I don't want to go to India. I hate going to India. That's how he talks about it. But he goes to India. And that is openness of heart, where you don't pre-censor what is going to come in. You can say it, and a lot of people do this with their own religiosity. It becomes a wall. And God can't tell them anything that isn't in there. Current religious understanding can't expand it beyond that. And that's a closed heart. And it's not very faithful. They often think they're the most faithful people, but what they're being faithful to is the idolatry of belief, the idolatry of a creed, of a kind of religiousism, some label.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:21:14,470 ] And that is not being faithful to the divine reality, to God. To be faithful to God, you've got to let God tell you whatever God has to say. And you got to take that in. With openness of heart. And then the fourth is sensitive attunement. To me, God says, sensitive attunement to the divine.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:21:42,000 ] I think we heard from somebody who wrote in using the very nice analogy of tuning in a radio station. You kind of get to try the dials, and there's a bunch of static, or sometimes two stations seem close to each other, and you're almost getting some weird blend of the two, a little of one and a little of the other.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:22:07,260 ] Tuning into the divine is very much like that. It requires, first of all, maybe listening to the radio. Everybody shut up, I'm trying to tune the radio. It requires some element of quiet. And quiet never just means absence of noise; it means a quiet spirit and not having oodles of tasks piled in your consciousness that you're facing. So you need to step back.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:22:35,210 ] And tune in. And, the sensitive attunement means (it's funny, it's a kind of spiritual discipline I go through each time I pray) I've got to step back from the other distractions of the day. And at first, I'm just being quiet, okay, trying to listen, trying to tune in.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:22:59,639 ] But it's only a little while before I feel, ah, now. Now I am tuned in, that is, it's sort of like your soul, your kind of inner self, getting settled. And, now, I'm here, and God is here with me. I'm now in a position where I am tuned in, and probably what I get now will be God's voice. And, if I have doubts, sometimes I come back and do it again, and I ask in prayer. Did I understand this correctly? He said such and such. That’s a way of checking up, check the dials, if you get funny readings. With any instrument, you know, your thermometer or something, or any of those devices on the car that tell you oil level and so forth. If you're getting weird results, you first go check the instrument.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:24:04,880 ] And maybe it's not. I had a problem years ago, I'd gotten speeding tickets. I didn't think I was speeding, but the speedometer wasn't working right. And so I didn't know I was speeding. And, well, that's a problem.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:24:22,820 ] Well, we get weird results in our own lives. Sometimes someone becomes a bit of a fanatic, well, that is the instrument. We are the instrument through which God works in the world, and certainly the instruments, our whole body, soul, and self is the instrument through which that's recording. We're like the radio. and you need to tap the radio or something, and it's got too much static. We have to keep ourselves, I often speak of, a clarified soul. Try to keep yourself all along, unencumbered enough, loving enough, open-minded enough, open-hearted enough, open-focused enough to be able to tune in, peaceful enough. And you practice it, and you practice it, you get better. And eventually, hopefully won't take that long, you'll field it off. Now, I have a sense of what God wants me to do. And you always have to remember, as difficult as it may seem at some moments, or elusive, if this is all new to you (you kind of wonder, what?), you can get there. You have to remember, while you're searching for God, God is searching for you.
Dr. Jerry L. Martin [ 00:25:49,740 ] While you're trying to reach the divine. The divine is trying to reach you. You'll probably meet somewhere in the middle. And you'll carry on your relation to the Divine from that point forward.
Scott Langdon [ 00:26:21,990 ] Thank you for listening to God: An Autobiography, The Podcast. Subscribe for free today wherever you listen to your podcasts and hear a new episode every week. You can hear the complete dramatic adaptation of God: An Autobiography, As Told to a Philosopher by Jerry L. Martin by beginning with Episode 1 of our podcast and listening through its conclusion with Episode 44. You can read the original true story in the book from which this podcast is adapted — God: An Autobiography, As Told to a Philosopher — available now at amazon.com, and always at godanautobiography.com. Pick up your own copy today. If you have any questions about this or any other episode, please email us at questions@godanautobiography.com, and experience the world from God’s perspective — as it was told to a philosopher. This is Scott Langdon. I’ll see you next time.