The Mystical Love Of God

1 Corinthians 13

I have new glasses. One doesn't know how blind one is until one gets new glasses.  Things are sharper, clearer, fuller in colour and shape. I notice things I had previously missed. It is easy to go through life with limited sight and think that is all there is.

 

Paul is often described as a lawyer, a writer who focuses on the actions involved in being a disciple of Christ, a moral theologian more interested in the law than in the spiritual essence of our faith. Nothing is further from the truth.

 

Paul is a mystical theologian charged with connecting the mystical with the practical, but never by diminishing the mystery or power of love. His encounter with Christ was a mystical disruption so powerful it rendered him blind, a metaphor for his realisation that the truth he had followed and enforced was a truth without sight, without the mystical power of love, of God who is nothing but love. The generosity of God can only be described as unconditional love, and by definition the one who is generous is love.

 

1Cor 13 is used to reinforce the qualities of creaturely love. We read it at weddings, at funerals, baptisms and almost any event when Psalm 23 is also read. We have reduced this passage to the banal, the pedestrian hope for something more than lust, greed, manipulation and violence. Somehow we have taken the truth out of this passage and dumbed it down to mean little more than a recipe for relationships.

 

It is not.

 

In this passage Paul is speaking of God. Love is God, God is love. God generously gives us life, maintains it, remains engaged and never leaves us. Why? because we enter this world having exited the Godhead where silence is love, to live in the noise of the ordinary as words of love. We are birthed in the waters of love as Gods word spoken into the world and an oasis of love remains at our centre, no matter how hard we attempt to obliterate it through our ego driven existence. We return to the Godhead, not simply when we die, but in each step i we take to let go of all we gather to ourselves as our identity.

 

It is right to think of this passage at all the key life moments for we are to become God, to become love incarnate in the physical world in which we live. It is not right to reduce this passage to the lowest common understanding. God was incarnate in Jesus and Jesus was love in relationship to his world, his place, his culture and the people he encountered. God is no less incarnate in us and we are to strive for being as selfless love in our world, our place, our culture, and amongst the people we encounter.

 

Meister Eckhart calls us to an "action without doing", a being that is empty of the need to do, allowing God who is closer to us than we are ourselves, to flow through us into the world. Like Paul, he pleads for us to get ourselves out of the way of the hesed, or unfailing love who is God, and allow love to flow in and out of us freely and without restrictions. Eckhart reminds us that God becoming incarnate does not diminish the Godhead. Jesus is all of God in the world yet the Godhead remains as it was, is and always will be, one and complete.

 

This passage calls for us to lower the barriers of self and to let go of those possessions (psychological, spiritual and physical) that we hold onto as evidence of our existence, giving us the illusion of autonomy. It asks us to detach from everything and attach to no thing, the only thing that matters, to God who is love.

 

A man, maybe a woman, was walking along the edge of a very high cliff admiring the view. Suddenly the edge gave way and they plunged earthward at a great pace. Somewhere in the midst of this they cry out, 'God, save me!' And they were a brought to an abrupt stop by a branch from a withered old tree sticking out from the cliff that catches in their belt. They are left gently bouncing up and down. When they get their breath back, they realise they are only half way down, or is it half way up? Not knowing what to do, they ask God for help again. Back comes a deep heavenly voice, 'let go of the branch!' They look up, they look down and then cry out, 'Is there any body else up there?'

 

Paul asks us to do the same in this passage, to let go, just as he had to of, all that makes sense of our life and to trust in the dark void, the mystery of love. We are to let go of the stuff the world convinces us we need, approval of others, possessions to define us, degrees to make us more worthwhile, emotions and actions we are addicted to. If we are to deconstruct the system which allows 60plus people to have the wealth of 3.7billion we are to let go of our addiction to what they are selling, the illusion of happiness through wealth, power and violence. 

 

If we are to deconstruct the system that diagnoses and labels people with illnesses only curable by big pharma drugs we have to let go of our need to find a reason for our sadness, disappointment and disillusionment with our lives. There is a great video doing the rounds on the web in which people are urged to ask their doctor about the curative qualities of nature as a possible cure for their illnesses. In a similar way Paul is prescribing detachment as the means to discover abundance.

 

He says when we let go and attach ourselves to nothing it won't look the way it is, you won't be able to discern the length, the breadth, the depth, the beauty and the subtleties of God who is love, you will only have a sketchy understanding, a hazy picture with lots of snow and distortion, you will only have a dim understanding but it is enough. It will be a scary place, just as it was for the person caught half way down the cliff, asked to let go of the only thing apparently giving them hope.

 

Paul's promise, God's promise is that as we do, we come home, we return to where we were before we were born. We re-enter the unity of the Godhead and 'then We will know fully, even as We have been fully known.' This is not just a promise for after we leave this mortal coil, but for our life upon it. It is for Eckhart the experience of the virgin where virgin means someone who is detached from images, ideas, worldly illusions.

 

It is the essence of the incarnation where with Paul we can say 'it is no longer I that lives, but Christ, God's spoken word, who lives in me.'

 

You may say this is beyond us and it is, but what is beyond us is in us, for we only have our being in the generous love who is God and therefore there is no beyond. For we can finish with the great affirmation Paul leaves us with, "And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love." Amen

One Prank Phone Call

Over the last couple of weeks, our society has been challenged by one prank phone call.  Now I will declare my hand early here – I do not like practical jokes. I am uncomfortable with the idea of exploit someone for the benefits of others.I  avoided them in school, although I was often the butt of such jokes, I didn’t return the favour. It always felt like bullying to me, and still does.

The much publicised phone call to the London hospital where Catherine was recuperating, and the subsequent tragic death of one of the key players, has created a media storm and backlash which has exceeded all imagination. We all have an opinion on this, but I caution some reflection before we launch to hotly onto our soapboxes.

What was the sin the radio station committed? Did it break the law? Did it follow procedure? It is of little consequence if they did or didn’t, for following the law and due process often only sanctions immoral, or at best, amoral actions. Being inside the law or diligently in the process doesn’t mean it is right, true or moral.

The radio station sinned (we will use that word for that is what it is) by seeing those involved simply as a means to an end. They were objects to be manipulated for humour, advertising and ratings. The station never at any point saw the objects as people with feelings, emotions, frailities and flaws.  They were there to be used.

Their cynical use of the young announcers on a merry-go-round of tv interviews demonstrates a 'spin it faster than a Simpson washing machine' crisis management media policy and a disregard for the welfare of even their own people. Everybody involved in this deserves better, but better is not possible if you see every one as a means to an end – as an object for your to use as you please.

It saddened me to listen to a local FM station the day after the tv interviews was aired, to here the breakfast crew calling for people to ring in and ‘dob-in’ the mother who has been breast feeding their child the longest. It was the same network responsible for the prank phone call.

Paul in his letter to the Phillipians counters this idea of treating all things and peoples a objects by asking those he writes to to:

4Therefore, my brothers and sisters, whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, stand firm in the Lord in this way, my beloved. ²I urge Euodia and I urge Syntyche to be of the same mind in the Lord. ³Yes, and I ask you also, my loyal companion, help these women, for they have struggled beside me in the work of the gospel, together with Clement and the rest of my co-workers, whose names are in the book of life. ⁴Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. ⁵Let your gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is near. ⁶Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. ⁷And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. ⁸Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. ⁹Keep on doing the things that you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, and the God of peace will be with you.

•  ^‘5Let your gentleness be known to everyone.’

o   How are we to treat others – gently! The two women he refers to appears to have been estranged for some reason. They are good women but something comes between them. Paul says encourage them, be gentle and celebrate them and all that they have done.  Don't take sides and don't use this situation for your benefit.

• ‘The Lord is near.’

o   Why? Because we will be called to account. The judgement of God is not reserved for judgement day. Judgement does happen now. Our actions, attitudes and desires have consequences/judgements which become present in real time, as the radio station has discovered. We are judged by the consequences of what we do and how we think. If we objectify others we do them violence, and those who live by the sword are judged in the same way.

•  ^‘8Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.’

o   How do we get it right more times than not? By how we think, by what we concentrate on, what drives our thinking and our desires.  Paul antidote is simple.  Put the good stuff in and the good stuff will come out. Clean up how you think about others, about yourself and about your world by majoring on the ‘whatever is’ in Paul’s letter – honourable, just, pure, pleasing, commendable, excellence and praiseworthy.

• ^‘7And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.’

o   Peace of heart and mind is a rare commodity – sought by many, found by few, for few can think in the way Paul asks on their own.  On our own we lose heart and start to find the negative, to manipulate people to feel better, to shift the blame to others and more.  We are left with no space for peace for peace needs space to abound. We fill the space with anger, frustration, malice and greed and then wonder why we are full of unrest and anxiety.

o   Peace comes from thinking about the 'whatever’s' Paul introduces us to because these are the mind of Christ. If we can hold those at the forefront of our heart and mind, we begin to think and become like Jesus who was always other-centric – always thought of others. We are often self-centric, that is why tragedies such as the radio stunt gone wrong occurs. 

o   Peace comes when we are other-centric and find ways to include all within our compassion and care, even those who have made terrible mistakes, including those involved in this prank. Do we add to the violence by objectifying them as 'bad', 'irresponsible', giving voice to our anger, or do we open up ways of redemption for them?  Can we be gentle with them and remember they are human beings who, like us are flawed and 'sinful', and deserve the opportunity to redeem themselves? If we are other-centric, that is what we will do.

As we move through this Advent period and waiting for the coming judgement of the world in the shape of the Messiah, let us think on whatever is and search our own hearts for space to embrace the mind of Christ and the peace it brings. 

Where Do We Live?

Where do we live? Seems a silly question, the answer self-evident really. Yet again maybe it is not as simple as it first looks.

On the way to work up Frasers Drive is a sign for what I believe will be a new housing development – it’s slogan is ‘Aspire to New Heights’, it’s billboard says Altitude, and underneath is the word Aspire. A very grandiose promise for a humble housing development I would suggest, yet it says something about the world in which we live.

Ours is a world defined by what we possess, where we live, what we have achieved and where we have been. Where do you live is often the next question after what do you do in any casual social conversation. It is more than just fact finding, it is a means of identifying and defining who you are and whether you of a similar aspirational status as the one asking the question.

Our aspiratons define us. As we wander around the school we meet students whose aspirations are indeed grandiose and others more realistic and we engage in discussion about those aspirations. Encouraging, supporting and offering suggestions as appropriate. Aspirations are good and we need them but when they become unrealistic or simply inappropriate then they become a problem. Aspirations can be expectations, signs of entitlement and anything which gets in the way of that entitlement is deemed at the best negative and at the worst something to be destroyed. It is the reason why much of our society is affected by a form of depression which is best defined as disappointment because my aspirations, what I have aspired to, has failed to materialise.

Where do we live is then not a question of geographical but of attitudinal location – of where our head is at – what is important to us, how we see the world, where we stand in relation to God and others. It is about what reigns supreme in our lives This then defines what we live and strive for and how we do so.

One memorable moment in Borneo (there were many) occurred when we were walking along a bush track and were met by a wizened up, bent over toothless elderly lady. She was carrying a stick and some bags of groceries. There was nothing aspirational about her but she shone light into all of our lives as she shook hands and toothlessly smiled selemant pagi – good day. It was done with enthusiasm and sheer joy, so much so that it impacted one ach of us. Here was someone with so little in our terms who cherished the few moments of greeting in such a bountiful manner. It was unlike that which we may experience here.

At Paginatan there is a wonderful photograph of the Ring Lady standing with her hands together as I blessed the rocks for the new memorial. It is a picture of deep reverence and hope that is moving for its sheer simplicity.

For her and others that we met the mercy of God (or Allah) was such that each day was a day of abundance, of joy, of hope. There were no disappointments or a sense of entitlement, life was just life and lets enjoy it everyday. It is not a fatalistic approach to life but a life based on faith, hope and love. It is a life that is about simply getting on with what is there in front of you knowing that all that you do is hidden in the mercy of God.

Joel in his little book reminds the people of Israel that they are not in control. It is not their life. It is not about them. It is about God and he will provide all that they need and will bring in the ‘Day of the Lord” or in New Testament Terms, the kingdom of God. It is a promise of hope but also of judgement, it is not just all will be rosy but includes a need for repentance and forgiveness. And those unable to do that become the enemies of God and reap their rewards.

Paul reminds us clearly at the end of his life that living for God is about being poured out for others – a libation – a sense of complete giving not for ourselves but for others. It is a marathon race and it is to be struggled with all the way to the end. It is easy to be sidetracked and start to think about ourselves – what is in it for me? Yet there is no me in kingdom but it is the beginning of mercy. How we live is not for ourselves, how God sustains us is.

It is not about doing all the right things as the Pharisee in the Gospel reading thinks but like the tax collector it is all about the mercy of God. The Pharisee is the ultimate aspirational man. He lives in the world he has constructed for himself. It is “I-topia’ – my kingdom and he expects the rest of the world to accommodate him and his world view.

The publican is a little more realistic. He’s not a bad person, simply an ordinary garden-variety type eking out a living in the everyday and recognises his own ordinariness. His personal awareness is such that he knows he’s not the centre of the world, that he is not the sun around which all else revolves – he is simply who he is and he recognises God’s place in his world. God is the centre around which he revolves.

Where do we live? How life is defined is not by our aspirations or latitude but by our centre and our attitude. It is about what sits at our centre around which we revolve. If that centre is built on the sand of self then life can be precarious and fearful – the walls may fall at any time either by themselves or be pushed over by others, be that people or circumstance.

How do we keep our feet? By ensuring that our world is centred on the mercy and steadfastness of God.

Psalm 65 says it all and is a reminder that God is not only at the centre of our lives but of all creation and through his Son Jesus he is at the centre of his kingdom now and forever. As we share in the Eucharistic meal we are reminded in the great thanksgiving that God through his Son and then through his Spirit holds the world at all times in his hand – there is no place we can go to – physically, emotionally or spiritually – where God is not. And by participating in this meal we become God’s Kingdom in its entirety wherever we are.

Where do we live? You have to answer that for yourself and today is a good time to begin living in the centre of God.

Joel 2:23-32 Psalm 65, 2 Timothy 4:6-8, 16-18,Luke 18:9-14)