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So Jesus asked the twelve, ‘Do you also wish to go away?’ Simon Peter answered him, ‘Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life. (John 6:67-68)
Eternal Life? How dare anyone speak of it as if they
understood … anything. Except, of course, there are moments, experiences that
take us beyond ourselves, absorbing us in something much greater in which we
are truly there but the boundaries between our own hearts and a much greater
reality grow thin, then disappear, if only for mere moments as every fear,
worry and anxious thought evaporates in an all-embracing love in which we share
and of which we are a part.
That’s why I think of pinwheels. It been decades since I
held on in my hands, but I remember playing with them as a child and
fascinating my children a circus-colored pinwheel with stars and clouds, red
and blue, white and green, blowing on it so that it spun faster and faster until
the colors blended together into a whirl in which each individual color and
blade shared its uniqueness, a twirling color wheel more beautiful and
fascinating than any one of them individually.
Something like this happens in conversations and caring relationships
when people share what is in their hearts, listening, laughing and letting the
flow of the exchange carry them along without the need to steer its direction or
determine its conclusion. Joined in a love, a care, an atmosphere larger than themselves,
they become more truly themselves than anywhere else. Liberated from the need to
protect egos and reputations, they inhale freedom and love in a unity of hearts
with every breath.
I know it’s a leap, but … I wonder … is this why Peter answered
Jesus, ‘You have the words of eternal life.’
I have no idea what was in his mind or exactly what may have
moved him to speak as he did. But I wonder if he came to love what was happening
in his heart as he felt himself being drawn ever more fully into the love that
met people where they were and welcomed them as they are. Absorbed into the
flow of this love, I wonder if the thought of being anywhere else but with
Jesus felt like death and despair. I wonder if he felt a great love come alive
inside himself so that he felt more alive … and more himself … than he’d ever
been or ever imagined he would be.
I wonder if he wanted to let go of everything else and be caught
up in the twirling pinwheel of the Love in which he finally knew himself … and the
Love for which we are born.
I don’t know. But I wonder.
David L. Miller
