Thursday, May 16, 2024
(click here to listen to or read today’s scriptures)
A day in the life with Jesus
I give them the glory you gave me, so that they may be one, as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they and their world may know that you loved them even as you loved me.
My friend has a new “theology,” a way of understanding God that invites her to accompany God through one moment after another of her life, rather than resisting God and holding herself back.
This understanding of God’s own life helps allow her to let the last moment(s) go and embrace the next. And there’s less worry getting to the moments in the future.
How is she doing with this “theology?” God’s been doing this “letting go” thing for a long while, and so God is better at it than she is. But that’s OK – she says so, and God says so. Take your time and breathe. Take God’s time and let it settle on you.
As usual Henri Nouwen has something to say about this. Be still and wait:
Maybe I have been living much too fast, too restlessly, too feverishly, forgetting to pay attention to what is happening here and now, right under my nose. Just as a whole world of beauty can be discovered in one flower, so the great grace of God can be tasted in one small moment. Just as no great travels are necessary to see the beauty of creation, so no great ecstasies are needed to discover the love of God. But you have to be still and wait so that you can realize that God is not in the earthquake, the storm, or the lightning, but in the gentle breeze with which he touches your
My friend’s name is not Elijah, but like her, Elijah learned the art of waiting. Sit there in your cave and wait for the still small voice. Even if the voice of God says, yet again, the same thing it said the last time, and the time before that, those same words mean something different every time.
WAIT. Don’t rush anything. Imagine sitting before an icon of Jesus, maybe a little scary, left side different from the right, one of those magical Rublev-and-other paintings that have graced the homes and churches of orthodox Christians since the time of Christ. Like the one in my own bedroom:
Henri suggests some visualization while we’re sitting in the cave, staving off the imagined dangers of the black space behind us. Don’t think about the snakes or the lizards or the bears. He is thinking about what he calls “contemplative prayer:”
Contemplative prayer can be described as an imagining of God’s Son, Jesus, a letting him enter fully into our consciousness so that he becomes the icon always present in the inner room of our hearts. By gazing at Jesus, walking on the earth, we give him loving attention and we “see” with our minds and hearts how he is the way to the Father. Jesus’ life and work is an uninterrupted union with and contemplation of his Father. We, as followers of Jesus, try to enter into the same disposition. We welcome the discipline of contemplation, taking time regularly to enter into the life of Jesus to contemplate the incredible bond between Jesus and the Father. And we trust that in, through, and with Jesus, we, too, may live and bask in God’s unconditional love.
My friend wanders between her Mary and Martha selves, as do we all. Nothing to change there, but to wonder as you wander. Enjoy the chores, as Brother Lawrence did. And enjoy the quiet moments at Jesus’ feet, washing them with the precious perfume reserved until now for the moment of your death.
Let the love with which you love me be in them, and I in them.
 (Acts 22, Psalm 16, John 17)
(posted at www.davesandel.net)
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