Today’s text
Mark 1: 40-42
A man suffering from a virulent skin-disease came to him and pleaded on his knees saying, 'If you are willing, you can cleanse me.' Feeling sorry for him, Jesus stretched out his hand, touched him and said to him, 'I am willing. Be cleansed.' And at once the skin-disease left him and he was cleansed.
Reflection
What would you know if all you ever knew about God was this short text? What is given to you here?
I frequently asked this when teaching people how to meditate with the Bible. I encourage them to listen to what is said to and in them as they let the words and images come alive within them.
If all you ever had of the Scripture was this story, what would you know?
More than can be written here, frankly. For, the soul of God is on display in Jesus outstretched hand and in his words, “I am willing.’
Healing, making the broken whole--this is the desire of God. This is what God wants to do. No, this is who God is, the substance of divine Being.
The nature and heart of the Loving Mystery of God is compressed into one action, Jesus outstretched hand touching the untouchable, healing the discouraged and broken, consoling the broken hearted and loving those who imagine love is beyond them and always will be.
The heart of God becomes incarnate and walks the earth in our brother, Jesus, and what do we see?
Not fire and brimstone, not anger and judgment but utter compassion for a wounded humanity. We see the desire to reach into the depth of our souls and make whole all that is broken.
Our place in the story is kneeling at the feet of Jesus, bearing the wounds of our lives and begging, “If you want to, you can make me whole. You can cleanse me and make me new.”
We hunger for that newness to wash over us again. We want to live and breathe and smile the purest joy of gratitude for our lives and for being able to feel the fullness of divine love.
As we put ourselves at Jesus’ feet, humbly seeking from the fountain of life and love, we know. We know he is willing, so willingly we return again and again to seek the love that makes us whole.
I wonder about the look on Jesus’ face as he saw the man fall at his feet. He looked with compassion at him, we are told. When I imagine that, I see his face looking at me with the compassion that is the face of God.
Pr. David L. Miller
http://prayingthemystery.blogspot.com/
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Friday, February 10, 2012
Wednesday, February 08, 2012
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
Today’s text
Mark 2:1-5
When he returned to Capernaum, some time later word went round that he was in the house; and so many people collected that there was no room left, even in front of the door. He was preaching the word to them when some people came bringing him a paralytic carried by four men, but as they could not get the man to him through the crowd, they stripped the roof over the place where Jesus was; and when they had made an opening, they lowered the stretcher on which the paralytic lay. Seeing their faith, Jesus said to the paralytic, 'My child, your sins are forgiven.'
Reflection
Moments come when time freezes and revelation appears.
The story stops when Jesus glances up and sees a man being lowered from the roof of reeds.
He doesn’t see the man, who is still above him. He doesn’t see his face or his condition. He sees the others, the paralytic’s friends who have taken this step.
They hold ropes fastened to the stretcher, which they carefully lower lest the stretcher tip throwing their friend to the ground with a thump.
This image is transparent to their souls, and this is what Jesus sees.
He sees their faith, and his mouth falls open in that universal ‘ohh’ that occurs at the sight of telling beauty.
I remember when I first saw the turquoise wonder of Lake Victoria, a freezing pearl framed by the Canadian Rockies. I remember the first time I stood on a Sudanese hill and surveyed a gentle bend in the Nile River as it pushed its way north.
I felt that “ohh,” but much more I feel it when I encounter beauty of soul.
It takes one’s breath as love or hope, faith or generosity of surprising magnitude startles you into the awareness of the wonder that lives in the human heart, a beauty that lies dormant waiting to be awakened so that it may grace the world.
That is what you saw Jesus, and it moved you just as it moves me.
You saw their faith, certainly their love for the paralytic, too, but it is their faith that most moved you.
Theirs was the faith that dares to believe there is a power of grace and love alive on this earth that can generously give healing to bodies and souls. They believed the power of this grace and love--the power of an all-generous God--filled you.
They trusted what was in you, the passion of your heart.
The beauty of their hearts touched the beauty of your own. Their faith and the loving power in you were not two different things but the presence of one thing--the divine Spirit.
And that Spirit made them your true brothers, whom you recognized with a word of joy, “ohh.”
May I see such beauty this day … and awaken also that word of joyous surprise in you.
Pr. David L. Miller
Mark 2:1-5
When he returned to Capernaum, some time later word went round that he was in the house; and so many people collected that there was no room left, even in front of the door. He was preaching the word to them when some people came bringing him a paralytic carried by four men, but as they could not get the man to him through the crowd, they stripped the roof over the place where Jesus was; and when they had made an opening, they lowered the stretcher on which the paralytic lay. Seeing their faith, Jesus said to the paralytic, 'My child, your sins are forgiven.'
Reflection
Moments come when time freezes and revelation appears.
The story stops when Jesus glances up and sees a man being lowered from the roof of reeds.
He doesn’t see the man, who is still above him. He doesn’t see his face or his condition. He sees the others, the paralytic’s friends who have taken this step.
They hold ropes fastened to the stretcher, which they carefully lower lest the stretcher tip throwing their friend to the ground with a thump.
This image is transparent to their souls, and this is what Jesus sees.
He sees their faith, and his mouth falls open in that universal ‘ohh’ that occurs at the sight of telling beauty.
I remember when I first saw the turquoise wonder of Lake Victoria, a freezing pearl framed by the Canadian Rockies. I remember the first time I stood on a Sudanese hill and surveyed a gentle bend in the Nile River as it pushed its way north.
I felt that “ohh,” but much more I feel it when I encounter beauty of soul.
It takes one’s breath as love or hope, faith or generosity of surprising magnitude startles you into the awareness of the wonder that lives in the human heart, a beauty that lies dormant waiting to be awakened so that it may grace the world.
That is what you saw Jesus, and it moved you just as it moves me.
You saw their faith, certainly their love for the paralytic, too, but it is their faith that most moved you.
Theirs was the faith that dares to believe there is a power of grace and love alive on this earth that can generously give healing to bodies and souls. They believed the power of this grace and love--the power of an all-generous God--filled you.
They trusted what was in you, the passion of your heart.
The beauty of their hearts touched the beauty of your own. Their faith and the loving power in you were not two different things but the presence of one thing--the divine Spirit.
And that Spirit made them your true brothers, whom you recognized with a word of joy, “ohh.”
May I see such beauty this day … and awaken also that word of joyous surprise in you.
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, February 07, 2012
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
Today’s text
Mark 9:2-4
Six days later, Jesus took with him Peter and James and John and led them up a high mountain on their own by themselves. There in their presence he was transfigured: his clothes became brilliantly white, whiter than any earthly bleacher could make them. Elijah appeared to them with Moses; and they were talking to Jesus.
Reflection
Much is made of mountain top experiences. Too many sermons are preached urging us not to stay up there too long, lest we confuse the mountain top with reality.
But if you don’t mind, I am going to stay here, on the mountain top with Jesus, as he shines brilliantly white, glistening like crystal waters in mid-day sun.
I like who I am when I stand in this presence. I like what I feel and how I see.
I want nothing but to be with him and know that he is all I need. I sense, no, I am certain that life is to stand in the circle of the light shed from his apparition.
There is no fear there, no worries about self, no fears of life and death, even of one’s own death, for the brilliance of his shining reveals that all is life in him, awakening the joy of eternal life within one’s own being.
The mountain top is the place where life is awakened in the soul. It is not a flight from reality, but an elevation into the eternal life for which we were made and for which we are intended.
It is the place where God gives that which God most hungers to give--the divine life of the Holy Trinity, that dancing play of love and joy in which we simply know (finally) ourselves and the loving beauty of God.
The mountain top is not a flight into illusion but the only place we know what is most real and true.
What some call ‘real life’ is a drab imposter. Reality is what we see in the light that shines from the face of Jesus.
Pr. David L. Miller
Mark 9:2-4
Six days later, Jesus took with him Peter and James and John and led them up a high mountain on their own by themselves. There in their presence he was transfigured: his clothes became brilliantly white, whiter than any earthly bleacher could make them. Elijah appeared to them with Moses; and they were talking to Jesus.
Reflection
Much is made of mountain top experiences. Too many sermons are preached urging us not to stay up there too long, lest we confuse the mountain top with reality.
But if you don’t mind, I am going to stay here, on the mountain top with Jesus, as he shines brilliantly white, glistening like crystal waters in mid-day sun.
I like who I am when I stand in this presence. I like what I feel and how I see.
I want nothing but to be with him and know that he is all I need. I sense, no, I am certain that life is to stand in the circle of the light shed from his apparition.
There is no fear there, no worries about self, no fears of life and death, even of one’s own death, for the brilliance of his shining reveals that all is life in him, awakening the joy of eternal life within one’s own being.
The mountain top is the place where life is awakened in the soul. It is not a flight from reality, but an elevation into the eternal life for which we were made and for which we are intended.
It is the place where God gives that which God most hungers to give--the divine life of the Holy Trinity, that dancing play of love and joy in which we simply know (finally) ourselves and the loving beauty of God.
The mountain top is not a flight into illusion but the only place we know what is most real and true.
What some call ‘real life’ is a drab imposter. Reality is what we see in the light that shines from the face of Jesus.
Pr. David L. Miller
Thursday, February 02, 2012
Thursday, February 2, 2012
Today’s text
Mark 1:29-31
And at once on leaving the synagogue, he went with James and John straight to the house of Simon and Andrew. Now Simon's mother-in-law was in bed and feverish, and at once they told him about her. He went in to her, took her by the hand and helped her up. And the fever left her and she began to serve them.
Reflection
A portrait of my desire … and of the church appears here. The woman rises. We don’t even know her name, but she is us, or at least me.
I feel a gentle smile as she rises from her mat and goes about her business, quietly serving with unhurried grace. There is no trace of anxiety or concern for approval in her. I sense no concern in her for how she is perceived or with whether anyone notices what she is doing.
But she is notices. She is aware, quietly mindful of her quiet motions as she goes about her hospitality for the needs of her visitors. Gentle joy lights her face as she attends to them.
She is given to that which has been given her to do and to be. She lives what she is. In this simplicity, there is the joy of being that manifestation of grace that God fashioned her to be.
Her soul is quiet, at peace, having known the Spirit of Love lifting her into herself, She lives this self not worrying whether it is enough just to be who she is, giving what she has been given to give.
Only Love, which is to say only the Divine Spirit can do this in a human heart.
This points the way for me and for all.
Her gentle grace draws me. The peace she exudes, her quiet givnen-ness to the grace in her is my desire.
She has no thought of success or failure, of ‘making it’ or of proving herself to some judge, and so many judges hold sway over our souls. There are judges from our past or present, judges outside of us and those terrible judges that inhabit our minds.
On our very best days, we are like the woman, free from the judges and the anxieties they provoke. Then we grow weary or troubles come, and the judges take over our minds. I begin to live as if it is not enough just to be and to give what God has put in my soul.
This is no way to live, of course. It is not real life at all.
And it’s so much less than the quiet, gentle light I see on the woman’s face as she serves, Jesus having lifted her into life. She is a portrait of The Spirit of Life seeks to awaken in human hearts, mine and yours.
And that is what the church is: a communion of hearts having been lifted by the Divine Spirit of Love in Jesus, sent to live out the mystery and goodness of what is in them.
Pr. David L. Miller
Mark 1:29-31
And at once on leaving the synagogue, he went with James and John straight to the house of Simon and Andrew. Now Simon's mother-in-law was in bed and feverish, and at once they told him about her. He went in to her, took her by the hand and helped her up. And the fever left her and she began to serve them.
Reflection
A portrait of my desire … and of the church appears here. The woman rises. We don’t even know her name, but she is us, or at least me.
I feel a gentle smile as she rises from her mat and goes about her business, quietly serving with unhurried grace. There is no trace of anxiety or concern for approval in her. I sense no concern in her for how she is perceived or with whether anyone notices what she is doing.
But she is notices. She is aware, quietly mindful of her quiet motions as she goes about her hospitality for the needs of her visitors. Gentle joy lights her face as she attends to them.
She is given to that which has been given her to do and to be. She lives what she is. In this simplicity, there is the joy of being that manifestation of grace that God fashioned her to be.
Her soul is quiet, at peace, having known the Spirit of Love lifting her into herself, She lives this self not worrying whether it is enough just to be who she is, giving what she has been given to give.
Only Love, which is to say only the Divine Spirit can do this in a human heart.
This points the way for me and for all.
Her gentle grace draws me. The peace she exudes, her quiet givnen-ness to the grace in her is my desire.
She has no thought of success or failure, of ‘making it’ or of proving herself to some judge, and so many judges hold sway over our souls. There are judges from our past or present, judges outside of us and those terrible judges that inhabit our minds.
On our very best days, we are like the woman, free from the judges and the anxieties they provoke. Then we grow weary or troubles come, and the judges take over our minds. I begin to live as if it is not enough just to be and to give what God has put in my soul.
This is no way to live, of course. It is not real life at all.
And it’s so much less than the quiet, gentle light I see on the woman’s face as she serves, Jesus having lifted her into life. She is a portrait of The Spirit of Life seeks to awaken in human hearts, mine and yours.
And that is what the church is: a communion of hearts having been lifted by the Divine Spirit of Love in Jesus, sent to live out the mystery and goodness of what is in them.
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Today’s text
Mark 1:29-31
And at once on leaving the synagogue, he went with James and John straight to the house of Simon and Andrew. Now Simon's mother-in-law was in bed and feverish, and at once they told him about her. He went in to her, took her by the hand and helped her up. And the fever left her and she began to serve them.
Reflection
Healing comes we know that what is in Jesus is also in us.
It comes when the divine Spirit that moves Jesus’ compassion and power awakens the divine Spirit within us.
Healing is this awakening.
The divine Spirit of love and power resides in us. Its seeds are planted in our creation. It is breathed into us by virtue of our humanity. In the beginning, God breathed life into creation, our holy texts tell us.
This means every human soul is alive with the Spirit, the breath of God, the One who is love and power, mercy and compassion, whose will is life for all that is.
Such is the Spirit that makes us alive, but most often it is buried or caged within our fears and prejudices that it no longer flows freely through our bodies and souls, animating our actions and feelings.
Momentary emotional states--fear, threat, stress and the pains of woundedness--hide the essential truth of our existence from awareness. We live believing these fleeting feeling states are our reality, our truth--that this is who we are.
Confusion results: First, I am my fear, then my joy. I am my victory and then my defeat, my success and then my sadness and stress.
Hidden beneath this illusion is my reality. I am a manifestation of the life and love of God. My breath is the breath of the Immortal and Immeasurable One. This always remains, hidden deep in our interiority, waiting its awakening.
Awakening comes in the presence of One who is filled and animated by the Divine Spirit. This is not strange or even unusual. We have felt it. We come alive and are freed to give ourselves to the tasks of our lives (like Simon’s mother-in-law) when we are in the presence of someone or something in whom we feel the Divine Spirit of love and freedom.
The Divine Spirit enlivens us when we are in the presence of the Presence.
Some blessed souls manifest the Presence more fully and beautifully, awakening life in others. They are graces, sacraments of God’s life stirring us to the life and joy God intends.
The Spirit of the Loving Wonder comes to fullest human expression in our brother Jesus. This is what makes him Son of God, Messiah and Savior. When we come into his presence--or his presence comes to us--his Spirit awakens the Spirit within us.
Then it is: the fever of life leaves us, and we come alive.
Pr. David L. Miller
Mark 1:29-31
And at once on leaving the synagogue, he went with James and John straight to the house of Simon and Andrew. Now Simon's mother-in-law was in bed and feverish, and at once they told him about her. He went in to her, took her by the hand and helped her up. And the fever left her and she began to serve them.
Reflection
Healing comes we know that what is in Jesus is also in us.
It comes when the divine Spirit that moves Jesus’ compassion and power awakens the divine Spirit within us.
Healing is this awakening.
The divine Spirit of love and power resides in us. Its seeds are planted in our creation. It is breathed into us by virtue of our humanity. In the beginning, God breathed life into creation, our holy texts tell us.
This means every human soul is alive with the Spirit, the breath of God, the One who is love and power, mercy and compassion, whose will is life for all that is.
Such is the Spirit that makes us alive, but most often it is buried or caged within our fears and prejudices that it no longer flows freely through our bodies and souls, animating our actions and feelings.
Momentary emotional states--fear, threat, stress and the pains of woundedness--hide the essential truth of our existence from awareness. We live believing these fleeting feeling states are our reality, our truth--that this is who we are.
Confusion results: First, I am my fear, then my joy. I am my victory and then my defeat, my success and then my sadness and stress.
Hidden beneath this illusion is my reality. I am a manifestation of the life and love of God. My breath is the breath of the Immortal and Immeasurable One. This always remains, hidden deep in our interiority, waiting its awakening.
Awakening comes in the presence of One who is filled and animated by the Divine Spirit. This is not strange or even unusual. We have felt it. We come alive and are freed to give ourselves to the tasks of our lives (like Simon’s mother-in-law) when we are in the presence of someone or something in whom we feel the Divine Spirit of love and freedom.
The Divine Spirit enlivens us when we are in the presence of the Presence.
Some blessed souls manifest the Presence more fully and beautifully, awakening life in others. They are graces, sacraments of God’s life stirring us to the life and joy God intends.
The Spirit of the Loving Wonder comes to fullest human expression in our brother Jesus. This is what makes him Son of God, Messiah and Savior. When we come into his presence--or his presence comes to us--his Spirit awakens the Spirit within us.
Then it is: the fever of life leaves us, and we come alive.
Pr. David L. Miller
Friday, January 27, 2012
Friday, January 27, 2012
Today’s text
Mark 1:23-27
And at once in their synagogue there was a man with an unclean spirit, and he shouted, 'What do you want with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are: the Holy One of God.' But Jesus rebuked it saying, 'Be quiet! Come out of him!' And the unclean spirit threw the man into convulsions and with a loud cry went out of him. The people were so astonished that they started asking one another what it all meant, saying, 'Here is a teaching that is new, and with authority behind it: he gives orders even to unclean spirits and they obey him.'
Reflection
Astonishment holds no interest for me. I don’t care about it. I don’t wonder in amazement that Jesus did startling things. Nor do I spend a moment trying to understand how he acted with such power or even to believe that he did.
The same is true of rationalizations about what was really happening. Was it demon or some form of mental illness or maybe epilepsy that seized this poor fellow?
None of this captures my interest. The questions bore me and waste the time of any who care to take them on.
What matters to me is what happened to the man. What did Jesus do for him?
This answer is not hard to find … or to want for yourself.
He freed him to live.
He took away the bondage that kept his heart and mind--not to mention his body--from running free as the wind, from sucking up each daily breath with gratitude and joy. He released him from the angry rants that drove all human communion and consolation far away.
He restored him to the ordinary graces of human community where we live and love, struggle and fear, sin and forgive, laugh and cry, suffer and die.
With an angry voice, he drove away the hindrance that kept human souls from throwing their arms around him to receive as a brother, a friend, a soul worth knowing loving.
He ripped away the barrier to loving acceptance and grace, so that he might know the simple sacramental joy of being human and sharing the love that God is.
Jesus did for him the same thing he hungers to do for us.
So speak to our bondage, Jesus. Drive off the demons of our fears and wounds, the burdens of our failures and sins and restore a community of love among us that we might truly live.
For by experience I know … this is what you do and who you are.
Pr. David L. Miller
Mark 1:23-27
And at once in their synagogue there was a man with an unclean spirit, and he shouted, 'What do you want with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are: the Holy One of God.' But Jesus rebuked it saying, 'Be quiet! Come out of him!' And the unclean spirit threw the man into convulsions and with a loud cry went out of him. The people were so astonished that they started asking one another what it all meant, saying, 'Here is a teaching that is new, and with authority behind it: he gives orders even to unclean spirits and they obey him.'
Reflection
Astonishment holds no interest for me. I don’t care about it. I don’t wonder in amazement that Jesus did startling things. Nor do I spend a moment trying to understand how he acted with such power or even to believe that he did.
The same is true of rationalizations about what was really happening. Was it demon or some form of mental illness or maybe epilepsy that seized this poor fellow?
None of this captures my interest. The questions bore me and waste the time of any who care to take them on.
What matters to me is what happened to the man. What did Jesus do for him?
This answer is not hard to find … or to want for yourself.
He freed him to live.
He took away the bondage that kept his heart and mind--not to mention his body--from running free as the wind, from sucking up each daily breath with gratitude and joy. He released him from the angry rants that drove all human communion and consolation far away.
He restored him to the ordinary graces of human community where we live and love, struggle and fear, sin and forgive, laugh and cry, suffer and die.
With an angry voice, he drove away the hindrance that kept human souls from throwing their arms around him to receive as a brother, a friend, a soul worth knowing loving.
He ripped away the barrier to loving acceptance and grace, so that he might know the simple sacramental joy of being human and sharing the love that God is.
Jesus did for him the same thing he hungers to do for us.
So speak to our bondage, Jesus. Drive off the demons of our fears and wounds, the burdens of our failures and sins and restore a community of love among us that we might truly live.
For by experience I know … this is what you do and who you are.
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Tuesday, January 26, 2012
Today’s text
Mark 1:21-22
They went as far as Capernaum, and at once on the Sabbath he went into the synagogue and began to teach. And his teaching made a deep impression on them because, unlike the scribes, he taught them with authority.
Reflection
Sometimes you just know, and knowing … you speak with simplicity and power. Words ring true, with truth arising not from books or reading but from the depth of a soul that feels life and pain, hope and the Love who is God.
Such was your soul, Jesus. All that is human--all that is in us--was felt and treasured, cherished and held at the depth of your heart, where your human heart and the heart of the Divine Mystery met.
You spoke of what you knew, not what you learned; of what you felt, not what others thought you should say. There was no need for others to authenticate your words or meaning, for they flowed from that point where your soul and the soul of God were one.
I know that point. I have been there; most of us have at one time or another. And I know when I feel someone is speaking truth that appears when all artificiality is stripped away, and we say what we are, what we truly see and know.
But only love, immortal and immeasurable love allows us entry into such depth of soul where truth is known and true authority is found. Only when we can look at our lives and hearts, our failures and fears with love … and not denial or the desire to escape … do we arrive at the place where truth … where God is found.
You lived in that place, Jesus. Embracing the realities of your life and ours, welcoming the lives of needy, craving human souls into the love you knew within, you brought human experience and the experience of God together--and you spoke what you felt and knew … so that we might know what you know, and speak with the authority found only in loving.
Pr. David L. Miller
Mark 1:21-22
They went as far as Capernaum, and at once on the Sabbath he went into the synagogue and began to teach. And his teaching made a deep impression on them because, unlike the scribes, he taught them with authority.
Reflection
Sometimes you just know, and knowing … you speak with simplicity and power. Words ring true, with truth arising not from books or reading but from the depth of a soul that feels life and pain, hope and the Love who is God.
Such was your soul, Jesus. All that is human--all that is in us--was felt and treasured, cherished and held at the depth of your heart, where your human heart and the heart of the Divine Mystery met.
You spoke of what you knew, not what you learned; of what you felt, not what others thought you should say. There was no need for others to authenticate your words or meaning, for they flowed from that point where your soul and the soul of God were one.
I know that point. I have been there; most of us have at one time or another. And I know when I feel someone is speaking truth that appears when all artificiality is stripped away, and we say what we are, what we truly see and know.
But only love, immortal and immeasurable love allows us entry into such depth of soul where truth is known and true authority is found. Only when we can look at our lives and hearts, our failures and fears with love … and not denial or the desire to escape … do we arrive at the place where truth … where God is found.
You lived in that place, Jesus. Embracing the realities of your life and ours, welcoming the lives of needy, craving human souls into the love you knew within, you brought human experience and the experience of God together--and you spoke what you felt and knew … so that we might know what you know, and speak with the authority found only in loving.
Pr. David L. Miller
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Today’s text
Mark 1:14-18
After John had been arrested, Jesus went into Galilee. There he proclaimed the gospel from God saying, 'The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is close at hand. Repent, and believe the gospel.' As he was walking along by the Lake of Galilee he saw Simon and Simon's brother Andrew casting a net in the lake -- for they were fishermen. And Jesus said to them, 'Come after me and I will make you into fishers of people.' And immediately they left their boats and followed him.
Reflection
I think it was your smile. That was why they came … immediately.
These words say nothing about your mood, Jesus. They offer no descriptions of the look on your face as you spoke. But I see you, and I see a smile.
Joy flashes through you as you invite these men to follow you into a new way of seeing and being, into the reality you hunger to reveal--the rule of the God who loves all that is made … and me.
I can’t know why these first followers dropped what they were doing to follow you. But I feel your joy. I see your joy, a smile. Physical pleasure passes through you as you invite your first followers to come and see what you are all about.
I know a gentle joy as your words roll around in my head, and I imagine the scene by the lake. It is just before dawn. A new day is about to break. You walk by, asking these common souls to follow along and to see it, to have their minds and hearts awakened to a radiant vision of God’s loving desire for every living thing.
You invite them to open their eyes to see and trust that this reality is near. It will change them. No longer will they look at world as a place of struggle for daily bread, a veil of contradictions and disappointments in which you are on your own, where the best you can do is to maximize your pleasures.
This is not life, not living. Living is to see the Incomprehensible One pouring the divine soul into the narrowness of earth, into the confines of human hearts, into ordinary and otherwise forgettable moments. The Loving Mystery who is God is near, coming to fill all that is with all that he is.
Repent of your tarnished and cramped vision of life and trust that it is true. Come, follow and see. Your mind will expand; your heart will grow a few new rooms where hope and love can breathe. You will find the reason you are alive.
Little wonder you smiled Jesus. You knew, you saw, you felt the kingdom of God’s rule. It filled you. So invited them to come, see and learn to live.
I have no idea what those fishermen saw in the moment you called them. But I see and feel your joy, your smile, and I know what draws me and why I arrive at Sunday worship with joy.
I want to know what is behind your smile. I want to see what you saw and feel what you felt as you invited them to follow. I want a piece of the joy that flashes through you as you invite them to come along for the ride. I want a piece of this for myself, and I know … you are only too glad to share it.
Pr. David L. Miller
Mark 1:14-18
After John had been arrested, Jesus went into Galilee. There he proclaimed the gospel from God saying, 'The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is close at hand. Repent, and believe the gospel.' As he was walking along by the Lake of Galilee he saw Simon and Simon's brother Andrew casting a net in the lake -- for they were fishermen. And Jesus said to them, 'Come after me and I will make you into fishers of people.' And immediately they left their boats and followed him.
Reflection
I think it was your smile. That was why they came … immediately.
These words say nothing about your mood, Jesus. They offer no descriptions of the look on your face as you spoke. But I see you, and I see a smile.
Joy flashes through you as you invite these men to follow you into a new way of seeing and being, into the reality you hunger to reveal--the rule of the God who loves all that is made … and me.
I can’t know why these first followers dropped what they were doing to follow you. But I feel your joy. I see your joy, a smile. Physical pleasure passes through you as you invite your first followers to come and see what you are all about.
I know a gentle joy as your words roll around in my head, and I imagine the scene by the lake. It is just before dawn. A new day is about to break. You walk by, asking these common souls to follow along and to see it, to have their minds and hearts awakened to a radiant vision of God’s loving desire for every living thing.
You invite them to open their eyes to see and trust that this reality is near. It will change them. No longer will they look at world as a place of struggle for daily bread, a veil of contradictions and disappointments in which you are on your own, where the best you can do is to maximize your pleasures.
This is not life, not living. Living is to see the Incomprehensible One pouring the divine soul into the narrowness of earth, into the confines of human hearts, into ordinary and otherwise forgettable moments. The Loving Mystery who is God is near, coming to fill all that is with all that he is.
Repent of your tarnished and cramped vision of life and trust that it is true. Come, follow and see. Your mind will expand; your heart will grow a few new rooms where hope and love can breathe. You will find the reason you are alive.
Little wonder you smiled Jesus. You knew, you saw, you felt the kingdom of God’s rule. It filled you. So invited them to come, see and learn to live.
I have no idea what those fishermen saw in the moment you called them. But I see and feel your joy, your smile, and I know what draws me and why I arrive at Sunday worship with joy.
I want to know what is behind your smile. I want to see what you saw and feel what you felt as you invited them to follow. I want a piece of the joy that flashes through you as you invite them to come along for the ride. I want a piece of this for myself, and I know … you are only too glad to share it.
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Today’s text
From a sermon by St. Leo the Great (pope, 391/400-461)
The Lord has made known his salvation; in the sight of the nations he has revealed his justice. This came to be fulfilled, as we know, from the time when the star beckoned the three wise men out of their distant country and led them to recognize and adore the King of heaven and earth. The obedience of the star calls us to imitate its humble service: to be servants, as best we can, of the grace that invites all men to serve Christ.
Reflection
It is easy to imagine the wise men, three … or however many there may have been, trekking across dry, rugged landscape on their camels. The figures are well known from children’s books and engraved figures that sit on our tables or beside the Christmas tree.
They are symbols, surely, of the human heart’s hunger for home, for the soul’s desire to taste and see something transcendent. The wise men travel in search of something that awakens the heart. They want, they need to feel the illumination of being in touch with life’s center.
They journey in search of the center of their hearts, hoping to see and touch something that awakens greatest depth of warmth and love, something that will penetrate that untouchable central point in their souls so they might feel truly alive and well, fully whole and loved.
They go step by step, slowly, not jumping quickly to end. Each little step on the rocky road of the journey must be seen and considered, lived, loved and attended to with such care as they have.
Each one must be lived and not avoided. And they never know which step will be the one that brings them to their journey’s goal, to the manager, where the heart finds it has arrived home at the feet of the Love that called them on this journey in the first place.
Neither do we. So we, when wise like they, attend to each step, hoping the next step or three will bring us again to our goal, to the manager, where the heart’s need and the heart of God meet.
Pr. David L. Miller
From a sermon by St. Leo the Great (pope, 391/400-461)
The Lord has made known his salvation; in the sight of the nations he has revealed his justice. This came to be fulfilled, as we know, from the time when the star beckoned the three wise men out of their distant country and led them to recognize and adore the King of heaven and earth. The obedience of the star calls us to imitate its humble service: to be servants, as best we can, of the grace that invites all men to serve Christ.
Reflection
It is easy to imagine the wise men, three … or however many there may have been, trekking across dry, rugged landscape on their camels. The figures are well known from children’s books and engraved figures that sit on our tables or beside the Christmas tree.
They are symbols, surely, of the human heart’s hunger for home, for the soul’s desire to taste and see something transcendent. The wise men travel in search of something that awakens the heart. They want, they need to feel the illumination of being in touch with life’s center.
They journey in search of the center of their hearts, hoping to see and touch something that awakens greatest depth of warmth and love, something that will penetrate that untouchable central point in their souls so they might feel truly alive and well, fully whole and loved.
They go step by step, slowly, not jumping quickly to end. Each little step on the rocky road of the journey must be seen and considered, lived, loved and attended to with such care as they have.
Each one must be lived and not avoided. And they never know which step will be the one that brings them to their journey’s goal, to the manager, where the heart finds it has arrived home at the feet of the Love that called them on this journey in the first place.
Neither do we. So we, when wise like they, attend to each step, hoping the next step or three will bring us again to our goal, to the manager, where the heart’s need and the heart of God meet.
Pr. David L. Miller
Thursday, December 29, 2011
Friday, December 29, 2011
Today’s text
From a sermon by Saint Leo the Great (pope, 391/400-461)
Christian, remember your dignity, and now that you share in God’s own nature, do not return by sin to your former base condition. Bear in mind who is your head and of whose body you are a member. Do not forget that you have been rescued from the power of darkness and brought into the light of God’s kingdom.
Reflection
The greatest dignity of the human soul is to bear the nature and substance of God--to know oneself as part of the body of God, sharing in God’s life. I know this dignity and joy and would know it fully, which is why I am here, writing again.
In you, Holy One, I live and move and have my being. I come here to consent to you one more time, as I do again and again. I acknowledge you as the Maker and Lover of my being.
Thank you for my life, for the breath I breathe that it not my own, but gift. Thank you for the love that is Love, which is to say … You, which I bear in my tiny heart.
I come here again to allow your immensity greater access to my little life. I come so that you might fill me with the love that is your nature and substance.
This filling appears to be a lifetime project. I pretend to be more advanced in this process than I am, but I am constantly a beginner. That’s all I will ever be.
I know the immensity of your fullness of the Love you are, only to feel cold and unfulfilled the next hour.
I see again the image that appeared at Christmas. I see all that is surrounded by you. I see how you contain us--and everything, every world, every cell, every leaf and snowflake. You encircle and envelop us like the air, like the rays of the sun, like the waters of sea.
I see your silent immensity, a constant flow of liquid love, seeking entry into the narrow confines of our being that you may flow into and through us.
Your substance seeks entry that you may seep--or rush!--into the interior of who and what we are … that we may become what you are, fully sharing your nature. And in precious moments, the Love you are fills me, and I taste your nature as it becomes the substance and of my own heart.
Then, it is, that I know my dignity as a bearer of the Divine Wonder. Then, it is, that all that is in me--struggles and failures, sin and confusion, even the longing ache of my unfulfilled life--are washed away.
All that is left is the joy of knowing you.
Pr. David L. Miller
From a sermon by Saint Leo the Great (pope, 391/400-461)
Christian, remember your dignity, and now that you share in God’s own nature, do not return by sin to your former base condition. Bear in mind who is your head and of whose body you are a member. Do not forget that you have been rescued from the power of darkness and brought into the light of God’s kingdom.
Reflection
The greatest dignity of the human soul is to bear the nature and substance of God--to know oneself as part of the body of God, sharing in God’s life. I know this dignity and joy and would know it fully, which is why I am here, writing again.
In you, Holy One, I live and move and have my being. I come here to consent to you one more time, as I do again and again. I acknowledge you as the Maker and Lover of my being.
Thank you for my life, for the breath I breathe that it not my own, but gift. Thank you for the love that is Love, which is to say … You, which I bear in my tiny heart.
I come here again to allow your immensity greater access to my little life. I come so that you might fill me with the love that is your nature and substance.
This filling appears to be a lifetime project. I pretend to be more advanced in this process than I am, but I am constantly a beginner. That’s all I will ever be.
I know the immensity of your fullness of the Love you are, only to feel cold and unfulfilled the next hour.
I see again the image that appeared at Christmas. I see all that is surrounded by you. I see how you contain us--and everything, every world, every cell, every leaf and snowflake. You encircle and envelop us like the air, like the rays of the sun, like the waters of sea.
I see your silent immensity, a constant flow of liquid love, seeking entry into the narrow confines of our being that you may flow into and through us.
Your substance seeks entry that you may seep--or rush!--into the interior of who and what we are … that we may become what you are, fully sharing your nature. And in precious moments, the Love you are fills me, and I taste your nature as it becomes the substance and of my own heart.
Then, it is, that I know my dignity as a bearer of the Divine Wonder. Then, it is, that all that is in me--struggles and failures, sin and confusion, even the longing ache of my unfulfilled life--are washed away.
All that is left is the joy of knowing you.
Pr. David L. Miller
Thursday, December 22, 2011
Thursday, December 22, 2011
Today’s text
From a treatise against the heresy of Noetus by Saint Hippolytus (priest, 170-235)
God gave utterance to his voice, engendering light from light, and then he sent his own mind into the world as its Lord. Visible before God alone and not to the world, God made him visible so that the world could be saved by seeing him. This mind that entered our world was made known as the Son of God.
Reflection
All the world came into being through you, in you and for you, O Christ. There is nothing that does not bear the mark and resemblance of you who are before time and beyond imagination.
Yet, you are as close as the goodness flowing through the beauty of all things, each thing revealing the mind of the Maker.
You are the mind of God, the intelligence and intention of the Infinite Source of Being, the Loving Mystery, the Eternal Wonder my naming cannot catch or fathom.
The immensity of your heart, O God, dwells in this child, this infant Christ, a peasant’s child. And that heart embraces all creation. It reaches out to see all that is made and to love it, to delight in it, to treasure it, to bless it, to desire fullness of life for all it sees.
I do not believe Jesus understood the mysteries of science, the depth of the farthest galaxies or the intricacies of the grass and flowers that spoke to him of the wonder of God.
Being the mind of God did not mean he possessed superior knowledge beyond that of any other peasant of his day. He was and remained human.
But truly so, in ways we are not, except in the blessed flashes of graced moments.
What he knew, O Lord was you. He had your mind, he was your mind, and your mind is a mind of love that hungers for the earth to sing its beauty and every human soul to bubble with joy.
This is your mind, O God, the mind that is in Christ--and in me.
You, Christ, are the Son of God for you stand in constant communion with the Mystery who is love, the Source who is infinite, the grace from whom springs every beauty of creation. God is how we name this wonder, whose mind you are.
In revealing the mind of God, you also show us also ourselves. You show us the person we become when, in those flashes of graced moments, your mind is born again in us, in moments when we feel the rush of love and gratitude for life and all that lives, when we are amazed at beauty, moved beyond ourselves to compassion and angered by all that wounds and disfigures created goodness.
So come, Lord Jesus. Let us look upon you again as you rest in Mary’s lap. Open our eyes to see that you are the loving beauty of the Father. And in seeing, may the mind that is in you be born again in us that we, like you, might be truly human.
Pr. David L. Miller
From a treatise against the heresy of Noetus by Saint Hippolytus (priest, 170-235)
God gave utterance to his voice, engendering light from light, and then he sent his own mind into the world as its Lord. Visible before God alone and not to the world, God made him visible so that the world could be saved by seeing him. This mind that entered our world was made known as the Son of God.
Reflection
All the world came into being through you, in you and for you, O Christ. There is nothing that does not bear the mark and resemblance of you who are before time and beyond imagination.
Yet, you are as close as the goodness flowing through the beauty of all things, each thing revealing the mind of the Maker.
You are the mind of God, the intelligence and intention of the Infinite Source of Being, the Loving Mystery, the Eternal Wonder my naming cannot catch or fathom.
The immensity of your heart, O God, dwells in this child, this infant Christ, a peasant’s child. And that heart embraces all creation. It reaches out to see all that is made and to love it, to delight in it, to treasure it, to bless it, to desire fullness of life for all it sees.
I do not believe Jesus understood the mysteries of science, the depth of the farthest galaxies or the intricacies of the grass and flowers that spoke to him of the wonder of God.
Being the mind of God did not mean he possessed superior knowledge beyond that of any other peasant of his day. He was and remained human.
But truly so, in ways we are not, except in the blessed flashes of graced moments.
What he knew, O Lord was you. He had your mind, he was your mind, and your mind is a mind of love that hungers for the earth to sing its beauty and every human soul to bubble with joy.
This is your mind, O God, the mind that is in Christ--and in me.
You, Christ, are the Son of God for you stand in constant communion with the Mystery who is love, the Source who is infinite, the grace from whom springs every beauty of creation. God is how we name this wonder, whose mind you are.
In revealing the mind of God, you also show us also ourselves. You show us the person we become when, in those flashes of graced moments, your mind is born again in us, in moments when we feel the rush of love and gratitude for life and all that lives, when we are amazed at beauty, moved beyond ourselves to compassion and angered by all that wounds and disfigures created goodness.
So come, Lord Jesus. Let us look upon you again as you rest in Mary’s lap. Open our eyes to see that you are the loving beauty of the Father. And in seeing, may the mind that is in you be born again in us that we, like you, might be truly human.
Pr. David L. Miller
Wednesday, December 21, 2011
Wednesday, December 21, 2011
Today’s text
From a commentary on Luke by Saint Ambrose (bishop, 337/340-397)
You are blessed because you have heard and believed. A soul that believes both conceives and brings forth the Word of God and acknowledges his works. Let Mary’s soul be in each of you to proclaim the greatness of the Lord. Let her spirit be in each to rejoice in the Lord. Christ has only one mother in the flesh, but we all bring forth Christ in faith.
Reflection
I am fascinated by this mystery. You whom heaven and earth cannot contain dwells also within this heart of mine in light and love, in peace and purpose--and sometimes in frustration.
Frustration comes when I fail to express the heart of Christ in words and deeds of blessing. It comes when my fingers do not return often to these black keys to praise you, Holy One.
It comes when I turn from the depth of my heart to the details of the day, failing to see and seek what is in my heart. For your heart resides here within my own. It is known in the hunger to bless and the eagerness to proclaim that you are love--and that this love is what we most need to know and feel.
Frustration come when anxious chatter and furious figuring obscures the grace that we know and are when we gather around your word and open our hands to receive simple bread and words of blessing.
This grace is what matters among us. It is all that really matters to me. All else is distraction, the annoying clatter of faithless worry.
You live in this heart, and you are not all comfort and peace. Sometimes you are a prod, a frustration, an irritant that demands attention and expression.
Long ago you became my life and joy, a joy I know when I name your love and share your presence. Tension and disquiet build when even for a day or two I don’t say what I see and feel, blessing another soul with the love you are within me.
Then you become an uncomfortable presence. The discomfort disappears only when I do acts of blessing or speak words of love and praise of you who are the highest and best, the most lovely and wonderful--and yet who dwells within.
Did I give you birth by having faith? I cannot claim any merit in my own faith. I am not entirely sure how I got it other than by the example of parents and the witness of teachers, pastors and friends, old and young.
This faith is not something other than you, my Lord. My faith is you, present within, trusting the Eternal Father in me even as you trusted and called out to the Loving Mystery during the days of your earthly pilgrimage.
How, then, do I ‘bring forth Christ in faith,’ giving you birth again in my flesh? How do any of us do so if our faith is your presence already within? What can we do? What is your call?
Perhaps it is just to return to the places of your presence--to your word, to the worshiping community, to the voices of your grace.
Return again and again and listen. Listen for the Love who awakens love within--and trust that this is the eternal love of God who is pleased to dwell in you.
Each time this happens, each time Love is born within, Christmas comes again.
Pr. David L. Miller
From a commentary on Luke by Saint Ambrose (bishop, 337/340-397)
You are blessed because you have heard and believed. A soul that believes both conceives and brings forth the Word of God and acknowledges his works. Let Mary’s soul be in each of you to proclaim the greatness of the Lord. Let her spirit be in each to rejoice in the Lord. Christ has only one mother in the flesh, but we all bring forth Christ in faith.
Reflection
I am fascinated by this mystery. You whom heaven and earth cannot contain dwells also within this heart of mine in light and love, in peace and purpose--and sometimes in frustration.
Frustration comes when I fail to express the heart of Christ in words and deeds of blessing. It comes when my fingers do not return often to these black keys to praise you, Holy One.
It comes when I turn from the depth of my heart to the details of the day, failing to see and seek what is in my heart. For your heart resides here within my own. It is known in the hunger to bless and the eagerness to proclaim that you are love--and that this love is what we most need to know and feel.
Frustration come when anxious chatter and furious figuring obscures the grace that we know and are when we gather around your word and open our hands to receive simple bread and words of blessing.
This grace is what matters among us. It is all that really matters to me. All else is distraction, the annoying clatter of faithless worry.
You live in this heart, and you are not all comfort and peace. Sometimes you are a prod, a frustration, an irritant that demands attention and expression.
Long ago you became my life and joy, a joy I know when I name your love and share your presence. Tension and disquiet build when even for a day or two I don’t say what I see and feel, blessing another soul with the love you are within me.
Then you become an uncomfortable presence. The discomfort disappears only when I do acts of blessing or speak words of love and praise of you who are the highest and best, the most lovely and wonderful--and yet who dwells within.
Did I give you birth by having faith? I cannot claim any merit in my own faith. I am not entirely sure how I got it other than by the example of parents and the witness of teachers, pastors and friends, old and young.
This faith is not something other than you, my Lord. My faith is you, present within, trusting the Eternal Father in me even as you trusted and called out to the Loving Mystery during the days of your earthly pilgrimage.
How, then, do I ‘bring forth Christ in faith,’ giving you birth again in my flesh? How do any of us do so if our faith is your presence already within? What can we do? What is your call?
Perhaps it is just to return to the places of your presence--to your word, to the worshiping community, to the voices of your grace.
Return again and again and listen. Listen for the Love who awakens love within--and trust that this is the eternal love of God who is pleased to dwell in you.
Each time this happens, each time Love is born within, Christmas comes again.
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
Today’s text
From a letter by Saint Leo the Great (pope, 391/400-461)
But through this wonderful blending the mystery of new birth shone upon us, so that through the same Spirit by whom Christ was conceived and brought forth we too might be born again in a spiritual birth; and in consequence the evangelist declares the faithful to ‘have been born not of blood nor of desire of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.’
Reflection
Be born in us, O Lord. This is my prayer as Christmas comes near. Be born again in the dark mystery of my heart. Illumine my soul with the light of your loving presence.
Be born in me that my coldness might be overwhelmed by your warmth,
that my confusion might be washed away by the certainty of a love that always was and always will be,
that my mortality might be filled with your immortality,
that my narrow heart might be expanded by the immensity of your all-encompassing, unfailing compassion.
Let Christmas come and banish all sadness. Let every soul see the cold winter world drenched in sunlight. Fill us with the joyful awareness that the golden rays of your divine love are filling every dark corner of creation.
Be born us. Raise us from the lethargy of grief, from preoccupation with what we have lost and from anxious fears of what we must face. Let us feel your love deep within that we may know that you are in us.
Then we shall know that you are greater than every sadness, stronger than the anxieties that erode our joy and more powerful than the forces of death that steal hope and cloud the future.
Make my soul like bright winter morning. I gaze out the back window of the house. The sun pours joy on the patio. It may be cold, but the world is clothed in light, joyous light, hilarious light. It laughs and plays.
It seeks out every cold corner. It does not force its way in, but silently rushes forward at unimaginable speed, lest the darkness get away and hide somewhere beyond its reach. But there is no such place.
You are light, O Lord, the light of onrushing love. And your light lives within me, or how could I know you? How could I be moved to praise you, to hope for you, to call out for you?
My prayer has long since been answered. You already have been born in me. And what is born in me--in us--is light, the light of eternal day, the joyous light of winter mornings playing on the patio.
It comes and reminds me that you, who come in Jesus, indwell my soul, seeking out every dark corner, every fearful place, every sadness over loss, every wound that hinders joy and purpose, every doubt that you, my Lord, are something less than all-embracing love.
And when my heart knows this, you are born again, not in Bethlehem, but in this soul, which is your holy purpose--and my great joy.
Pr. David L. Miller
From a letter by Saint Leo the Great (pope, 391/400-461)
But through this wonderful blending the mystery of new birth shone upon us, so that through the same Spirit by whom Christ was conceived and brought forth we too might be born again in a spiritual birth; and in consequence the evangelist declares the faithful to ‘have been born not of blood nor of desire of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.’
Reflection
Be born in us, O Lord. This is my prayer as Christmas comes near. Be born again in the dark mystery of my heart. Illumine my soul with the light of your loving presence.
Be born in me that my coldness might be overwhelmed by your warmth,
that my confusion might be washed away by the certainty of a love that always was and always will be,
that my mortality might be filled with your immortality,
that my narrow heart might be expanded by the immensity of your all-encompassing, unfailing compassion.
Let Christmas come and banish all sadness. Let every soul see the cold winter world drenched in sunlight. Fill us with the joyful awareness that the golden rays of your divine love are filling every dark corner of creation.
Be born us. Raise us from the lethargy of grief, from preoccupation with what we have lost and from anxious fears of what we must face. Let us feel your love deep within that we may know that you are in us.
Then we shall know that you are greater than every sadness, stronger than the anxieties that erode our joy and more powerful than the forces of death that steal hope and cloud the future.
Make my soul like bright winter morning. I gaze out the back window of the house. The sun pours joy on the patio. It may be cold, but the world is clothed in light, joyous light, hilarious light. It laughs and plays.
It seeks out every cold corner. It does not force its way in, but silently rushes forward at unimaginable speed, lest the darkness get away and hide somewhere beyond its reach. But there is no such place.
You are light, O Lord, the light of onrushing love. And your light lives within me, or how could I know you? How could I be moved to praise you, to hope for you, to call out for you?
My prayer has long since been answered. You already have been born in me. And what is born in me--in us--is light, the light of eternal day, the joyous light of winter mornings playing on the patio.
It comes and reminds me that you, who come in Jesus, indwell my soul, seeking out every dark corner, every fearful place, every sadness over loss, every wound that hinders joy and purpose, every doubt that you, my Lord, are something less than all-embracing love.
And when my heart knows this, you are born again, not in Bethlehem, but in this soul, which is your holy purpose--and my great joy.
Pr. David L. Miller
Monday, December 19, 2011
Monday, December 19, 2011
Today's text
From the Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation of the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965)
He sent his Son, the eternal Word who enlightens all [people], to dwell among [human beings] and make known to them the innermost things of God. Jesus Christ, the Word made flesh, sent as a man to [all people] speaks the words of God, and brings to perfection the saving work that the Father gave him to do. To see him is to see the Father also.
Reflection
I wonder about the work the Jesus the Christ was given to do. What is that work?
Many of the ways Western Christianity has emphasized in recent centuries make no sense to me. They never did. As a boy, I heard the idea that God sent Jesus to be strung up on a cross to pay the price of human sin, so that God, the Father, might be satisfied.
It made no sense. It God less forgiving than I was, and anything that does that must be mistaken.
This traditional “atonement theology” burns at the heart of virtually all conservative preachers and movements. It is at their core. But if to be Christian one must believe that this is Jesus work, well, I am not a Christian.
But I am, profoundly so, and I am more so as the years go by.
But this year again I come to the cradle of Bethlehem with the same question: How does this child, this Jesus help me? How does he help anyone? What difference does he make for those who are dying … or watching a loved one fade away? What does he mean for people I know who may be losing their little daughter? And what difference does this child make in a world where a billion or more are hungry today, or even starving?
Jesus is born to peasant parents with no prospects that they or he will amount to much, just more child in a world of poor children. The only thing that has changed in this regard is there now are far more poor children.
So what difference does Jesus “work” make; what work does he do?
The grand theories of theologians hold scant hold on my mind and less on my soul. They do not excite the imagination or touch the heart.
What does, however, is standing close to manger of Jesus and imagining that this child is the eternal desire of God for me and for all.
God’s eternal desire is to unite the great and uncreated divine heart with our created hearts, so that the Infinite Source of loving joy might pour through us. The loving and infinite God, who is everywhere as present, seeks to unite the created soul with the eternal heart of God--and has been doing so since before the beginning of time. All progress in humanity and grace is the product of such divine effort and presence.
This was God’s desire, an eternal desire, which has nothing to do with human sin and imperfection.
God’s great heart always seeks to give itself away for the sake of creating free and full communion of love and joy between himself and the created order. This is not the result of sin and human error. It is the eternal desire of God whose will is and always was love, and love wants but one thing--to unite with the beloved.
In Jesus, the eternal divine desire is fulfilled; the union of God’s heart and a human heart appears most clearly. And I see--no, I feel--that this child, this Jesus, shows me the union of Heart with heart, of Love with love, of Divinity with humanity, the union God is working to make happen in me … and in all.
When I look again at the child, when with shepherds I draw near the manger, listening again to the story … a love is awakened. I should say Love is awakened. God is born again in me. The heart of God is awakened in the narrow confines of my heart.
And at one and the same moment, my humanity and the great heart of the Divine Wonder dance with joy.
Pr. David L. Miller
From the Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation of the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965)
He sent his Son, the eternal Word who enlightens all [people], to dwell among [human beings] and make known to them the innermost things of God. Jesus Christ, the Word made flesh, sent as a man to [all people] speaks the words of God, and brings to perfection the saving work that the Father gave him to do. To see him is to see the Father also.
Reflection
I wonder about the work the Jesus the Christ was given to do. What is that work?
Many of the ways Western Christianity has emphasized in recent centuries make no sense to me. They never did. As a boy, I heard the idea that God sent Jesus to be strung up on a cross to pay the price of human sin, so that God, the Father, might be satisfied.
It made no sense. It God less forgiving than I was, and anything that does that must be mistaken.
This traditional “atonement theology” burns at the heart of virtually all conservative preachers and movements. It is at their core. But if to be Christian one must believe that this is Jesus work, well, I am not a Christian.
But I am, profoundly so, and I am more so as the years go by.
But this year again I come to the cradle of Bethlehem with the same question: How does this child, this Jesus help me? How does he help anyone? What difference does he make for those who are dying … or watching a loved one fade away? What does he mean for people I know who may be losing their little daughter? And what difference does this child make in a world where a billion or more are hungry today, or even starving?
Jesus is born to peasant parents with no prospects that they or he will amount to much, just more child in a world of poor children. The only thing that has changed in this regard is there now are far more poor children.
So what difference does Jesus “work” make; what work does he do?
The grand theories of theologians hold scant hold on my mind and less on my soul. They do not excite the imagination or touch the heart.
What does, however, is standing close to manger of Jesus and imagining that this child is the eternal desire of God for me and for all.
God’s eternal desire is to unite the great and uncreated divine heart with our created hearts, so that the Infinite Source of loving joy might pour through us. The loving and infinite God, who is everywhere as present, seeks to unite the created soul with the eternal heart of God--and has been doing so since before the beginning of time. All progress in humanity and grace is the product of such divine effort and presence.
This was God’s desire, an eternal desire, which has nothing to do with human sin and imperfection.
God’s great heart always seeks to give itself away for the sake of creating free and full communion of love and joy between himself and the created order. This is not the result of sin and human error. It is the eternal desire of God whose will is and always was love, and love wants but one thing--to unite with the beloved.
In Jesus, the eternal divine desire is fulfilled; the union of God’s heart and a human heart appears most clearly. And I see--no, I feel--that this child, this Jesus, shows me the union of Heart with heart, of Love with love, of Divinity with humanity, the union God is working to make happen in me … and in all.
When I look again at the child, when with shepherds I draw near the manger, listening again to the story … a love is awakened. I should say Love is awakened. God is born again in me. The heart of God is awakened in the narrow confines of my heart.
And at one and the same moment, my humanity and the great heart of the Divine Wonder dance with joy.
Pr. David L. Miller
Friday, December 16, 2011
Friday, December 16, 2011
Today’s text
From a treatise Against Heresies by Saint Irenaeus (bishop, second century C.E.)
The Spirit prepares man to receive the Son of God, the Son leads him to the Father, and the Father freeing him from change and decay, bestows the eternal life that comes to everyone from seeing God. As those who see light are in the light sharing its brilliance, so those who see God are in God sharing his glory, and that glory gives them life. To see God is to share in his life.
Reflection
Seeing is all I want on most days. I want to see God. I want to be moved by the presence of the Holy One. This vision transports me beyond daily anxieties to a different space, a transformed consciousness in which fear cannot exist and daily anxieties cannot be found.
For the duration of this blessed vision of the Blessed, nothing else matters. Life’s purpose is clear, and the heart is at rest because it has arrived home. We see the loveliness we seek, the beauty from which we came. We experience the wonder toward which we move, until the day we fall asleep in the arms of the Blessed Mystery you are, my Lord.
Thank for you this vision, this awareness.
Through these tears, I move back through my week and see again where I have seen you. Sometimes I have seen with physical vision only because my spiritual eyes were blinded by anxious preoccupation with daily concerns.
I saw you on Wednesday, at a funeral. I stood and spoke, remembering a holy moment between me and a dying man.
He spoke his need for faith and hope, and I knew what to say. “Remember. Remember all the grace and beauty you have seen and known in your days, all the love you have given and received.”
Small pictures, I said; each one is a snapshot of the great love with which you are loved, a love stronger than death. Every graced moment is the Spirit leading us to the Son who is God’s eternal Word, spoken in time. Each one is a gift of eternal life right here and now, for those with eyes to see, each a share in God’s glory
Look and see, I said. And if I had held a mirror to my face, I would have seen the face of my brother, Jesus, calling him to the Father, for I had become the face of the Eternal Glory. I had seen light, and for a blessed moment shined with its brilliance.
There is no pride in this, only humility and the joy of being a small part of a great and holy purpose, a tiny flame in the immensity of God’s heart.
Thursday I saw you, again, My Lord, in an old woman’s wrinkled face. She had just turned 90, though she looks younger. There were many hard days in my life, she said to friends. But looking back, she continued, I know how good my life has been, what a wonderful life I have had.
There was no regret in her words or her eyes, only gratitude. She had seen your light in her life, and now in the shadows of old age, she shared its brilliance, your brilliance.
She saw you, and in seeing she shared in the life you are. And so did I.
May it happen again today. This is my prayer.
Pr. David L. Miller
From a treatise Against Heresies by Saint Irenaeus (bishop, second century C.E.)
The Spirit prepares man to receive the Son of God, the Son leads him to the Father, and the Father freeing him from change and decay, bestows the eternal life that comes to everyone from seeing God. As those who see light are in the light sharing its brilliance, so those who see God are in God sharing his glory, and that glory gives them life. To see God is to share in his life.
Reflection
Seeing is all I want on most days. I want to see God. I want to be moved by the presence of the Holy One. This vision transports me beyond daily anxieties to a different space, a transformed consciousness in which fear cannot exist and daily anxieties cannot be found.
For the duration of this blessed vision of the Blessed, nothing else matters. Life’s purpose is clear, and the heart is at rest because it has arrived home. We see the loveliness we seek, the beauty from which we came. We experience the wonder toward which we move, until the day we fall asleep in the arms of the Blessed Mystery you are, my Lord.
Thank for you this vision, this awareness.
Through these tears, I move back through my week and see again where I have seen you. Sometimes I have seen with physical vision only because my spiritual eyes were blinded by anxious preoccupation with daily concerns.
I saw you on Wednesday, at a funeral. I stood and spoke, remembering a holy moment between me and a dying man.
He spoke his need for faith and hope, and I knew what to say. “Remember. Remember all the grace and beauty you have seen and known in your days, all the love you have given and received.”
Small pictures, I said; each one is a snapshot of the great love with which you are loved, a love stronger than death. Every graced moment is the Spirit leading us to the Son who is God’s eternal Word, spoken in time. Each one is a gift of eternal life right here and now, for those with eyes to see, each a share in God’s glory
Look and see, I said. And if I had held a mirror to my face, I would have seen the face of my brother, Jesus, calling him to the Father, for I had become the face of the Eternal Glory. I had seen light, and for a blessed moment shined with its brilliance.
There is no pride in this, only humility and the joy of being a small part of a great and holy purpose, a tiny flame in the immensity of God’s heart.
Thursday I saw you, again, My Lord, in an old woman’s wrinkled face. She had just turned 90, though she looks younger. There were many hard days in my life, she said to friends. But looking back, she continued, I know how good my life has been, what a wonderful life I have had.
There was no regret in her words or her eyes, only gratitude. She had seen your light in her life, and now in the shadows of old age, she shared its brilliance, your brilliance.
She saw you, and in seeing she shared in the life you are. And so did I.
May it happen again today. This is my prayer.
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, December 13, 2011
Tuesday, December 13, 2011
Today’s text
From a discourse On the Contemplation of God by William of Saint Theirry (abbot, 1075/1080-1148)
We hold you dear by the affection you have implanted in us. You are the one supremely good and ultimate goodness. Your love is your goodness, the Holy Spirit proceeding from the Father and the Son! From the beginning of creation it was he who hovered over the waters--that is, over the wavering minds of men, offering himself to all, drawing all things to himself. By his inspiration and holy breath, by keeping us from harm and providing for our needs, he unites God to us and us to God.
Reflection
Are you hovering near, Great Spirit? Do you inhabit this quiet space where I wait for words to come out of the nothingness and flow through my fingers?
If so, come with all the love that you are--the love that ever flows between Father and Son at the heart of the Holy Trinity. Come so that my wavering mind may be drawn to you and my still heart may flow with the warmth of your goodness.
In the beginning, you hovered over the watery chaos of what was to be creation, a universe billions of stars that burn in the cold dark of space. But this morning I cannot think of their multitude or the wonder of yawning light years of dark space.
For reasons I do not know, I think again and again of a small grove of birch trees along 75th Street. I see again the huge yellow moon hanging over the dark wooded ridge high behind them, a quarter mile or so. The moon glistened on pale patches of snow beneath the birches, reflecting gentle white light on the trucks, as I drove home.
Right then, I knew you. I don’t know how or why, unless it is that every beauty and wonder in this world has the tendency to awaken thoughts of you as Ultimate and Loving Source.
But sometimes such scenes awaken faith and sometimes they do not. It is not automatic. On this average ride home from the office, wonder happened in my heart and my mind leaped into awareness that love lies at the heart of this crazy world. The earth in its wonder leaps from the heart of an impenetrable Loving Mystery, who speaks in the glisten of snow in reflected moon light.
The Holy Spirit hovers over the wavering minds of men and women and calls them home. In that moment, as I drove home, you brought me home. For home is awareness of you as Love, a love which manifests in the sacrament of the world, in the reality of life, and my Christian faith says, in the face of my brother Jesus.
Pr. David L. Miller
From a discourse On the Contemplation of God by William of Saint Theirry (abbot, 1075/1080-1148)
We hold you dear by the affection you have implanted in us. You are the one supremely good and ultimate goodness. Your love is your goodness, the Holy Spirit proceeding from the Father and the Son! From the beginning of creation it was he who hovered over the waters--that is, over the wavering minds of men, offering himself to all, drawing all things to himself. By his inspiration and holy breath, by keeping us from harm and providing for our needs, he unites God to us and us to God.
Reflection
Are you hovering near, Great Spirit? Do you inhabit this quiet space where I wait for words to come out of the nothingness and flow through my fingers?
If so, come with all the love that you are--the love that ever flows between Father and Son at the heart of the Holy Trinity. Come so that my wavering mind may be drawn to you and my still heart may flow with the warmth of your goodness.
In the beginning, you hovered over the watery chaos of what was to be creation, a universe billions of stars that burn in the cold dark of space. But this morning I cannot think of their multitude or the wonder of yawning light years of dark space.
For reasons I do not know, I think again and again of a small grove of birch trees along 75th Street. I see again the huge yellow moon hanging over the dark wooded ridge high behind them, a quarter mile or so. The moon glistened on pale patches of snow beneath the birches, reflecting gentle white light on the trucks, as I drove home.
Right then, I knew you. I don’t know how or why, unless it is that every beauty and wonder in this world has the tendency to awaken thoughts of you as Ultimate and Loving Source.
But sometimes such scenes awaken faith and sometimes they do not. It is not automatic. On this average ride home from the office, wonder happened in my heart and my mind leaped into awareness that love lies at the heart of this crazy world. The earth in its wonder leaps from the heart of an impenetrable Loving Mystery, who speaks in the glisten of snow in reflected moon light.
The Holy Spirit hovers over the wavering minds of men and women and calls them home. In that moment, as I drove home, you brought me home. For home is awareness of you as Love, a love which manifests in the sacrament of the world, in the reality of life, and my Christian faith says, in the face of my brother Jesus.
Pr. David L. Miller
Friday, December 09, 2011
Friday, December 9, 2011
Today’s text
From a sermon by Saint Peter Chrysologus (priest, 380-450)
In all the events we have recalled, the flame of divine love enkindled human hearts and its intoxication overflowed into men’s senses. Wounded by love, they longed to look upon God with their bodily eyes. Yet how could our narrow human vision apprehend God, whom the whole world cannot contain? But the law of love is not concerned with what will be, what ought to be, what can be. Love does not reflect; it is unreasonable and knows no moderation, Love refuses to be consoled when its goal proves impossible, despises all hindrances to the attainment of its object. Love destroys the lover if he cannot obtain what he loves; love follows its own promptings, and does not think of right and wrong … It is intolerable for love not to see the object of its longing, That is why whatever reward they merited was nothing to the saints if they could not see the Lord.
Reflection
I love you Lord for the way your people reach across 16 centuries and touch my heart. What have I in common with a soul from so long ago? And could I hold in common with one the church has name ‘saint?’
Nothing, it would seem, yet Peter’s words tell me that I am not alone. Other hearts have longed and long still for the fulfillment of their love, eager to see the One they love, the One who is Love.
And as he said, there is no moderation in such love. It never finds complete satisfaction but always pushes for more.
Oh, there are moments, of course, when the soul gazes into the early winter snows or looks into the faces of children and is seized by the awareness that a boundless loving beauty stands at the heart of all life.
The elevation of heart that occurs in such moments transports us beyond anxiety and fear, and a ‘Julian’ feeling washes through the soul, as we know with that old saint that all is will and all shall be well. But the moment passes.
And even in the moment of transport to higher awareness of life’s center and meaning, we know there is more. There is always more, and we want it. We are never quite satisfied.
You are the More, Holy One, the One immoderate love hungers to see and know, that we might touch and experience totally union with you. We hunger to be enraptured, so that nothing that is us is outside of you. It is an immoderate desire stirred by your immoderate desire for us.
The state of enrapture is known in this life, even by the likes of me because you are gracious love and give yourself even to the unworthy. Even now, as tears fog vision of these black keys while washing obstruction from the eyes of my heart so that I know you as that total love that gives peace passing all understanding.
I wonder: What was it like for Saint Peter Chrysologus 16 centuries ago? He speaks words that leap the great gulf of time to touch me and tell me that I stand in an ancient line of those who knew your love and wanted more, find final fulfillment.
I can’t get inside of his experience, but his words (golden words, which is the meaning of his name, Chrysologus) move me into awareness of you who inspired them. And I know Peter is my true brother, brothers in longing … to see you.
Show yourself to the eyes of our hearts in this holy season.
Pr. David L. Miller
From a sermon by Saint Peter Chrysologus (priest, 380-450)
In all the events we have recalled, the flame of divine love enkindled human hearts and its intoxication overflowed into men’s senses. Wounded by love, they longed to look upon God with their bodily eyes. Yet how could our narrow human vision apprehend God, whom the whole world cannot contain? But the law of love is not concerned with what will be, what ought to be, what can be. Love does not reflect; it is unreasonable and knows no moderation, Love refuses to be consoled when its goal proves impossible, despises all hindrances to the attainment of its object. Love destroys the lover if he cannot obtain what he loves; love follows its own promptings, and does not think of right and wrong … It is intolerable for love not to see the object of its longing, That is why whatever reward they merited was nothing to the saints if they could not see the Lord.
Reflection
I love you Lord for the way your people reach across 16 centuries and touch my heart. What have I in common with a soul from so long ago? And could I hold in common with one the church has name ‘saint?’
Nothing, it would seem, yet Peter’s words tell me that I am not alone. Other hearts have longed and long still for the fulfillment of their love, eager to see the One they love, the One who is Love.
And as he said, there is no moderation in such love. It never finds complete satisfaction but always pushes for more.
Oh, there are moments, of course, when the soul gazes into the early winter snows or looks into the faces of children and is seized by the awareness that a boundless loving beauty stands at the heart of all life.
The elevation of heart that occurs in such moments transports us beyond anxiety and fear, and a ‘Julian’ feeling washes through the soul, as we know with that old saint that all is will and all shall be well. But the moment passes.
And even in the moment of transport to higher awareness of life’s center and meaning, we know there is more. There is always more, and we want it. We are never quite satisfied.
You are the More, Holy One, the One immoderate love hungers to see and know, that we might touch and experience totally union with you. We hunger to be enraptured, so that nothing that is us is outside of you. It is an immoderate desire stirred by your immoderate desire for us.
The state of enrapture is known in this life, even by the likes of me because you are gracious love and give yourself even to the unworthy. Even now, as tears fog vision of these black keys while washing obstruction from the eyes of my heart so that I know you as that total love that gives peace passing all understanding.
I wonder: What was it like for Saint Peter Chrysologus 16 centuries ago? He speaks words that leap the great gulf of time to touch me and tell me that I stand in an ancient line of those who knew your love and wanted more, find final fulfillment.
I can’t get inside of his experience, but his words (golden words, which is the meaning of his name, Chrysologus) move me into awareness of you who inspired them. And I know Peter is my true brother, brothers in longing … to see you.
Show yourself to the eyes of our hearts in this holy season.
Pr. David L. Miller
Wednesday, December 07, 2011
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
Today’s text
From a treatise on The Ascent of Mount Carmel by Saint John of the Cross (priest, mystic, 1542-1591)
By giving us, as he did, his Son, his only Word, he has in that one Word said everything. There is no need for further revelation. … God has spoken so completely through his own Word that he chooses to add nothing. Although he had spoken but partially through the prophets, he has now said everything in Christ. He has given us everything, his own Son. …[God says] Fix your eyes on him alone for in him I have revealed all and in him you will find more than you could ever ask for or desire.
Reflection
I have heard what I need to hear. I know what my heart needs to know. I await no further word of life’s meaning, unfolding its mysteries. That Word has been spoken in time and space--and in me.
Simple hearts rest it this Word without seeking great understanding, knowing this Word of ultimate grace and presence is enough and always will be. Sophisticated minds plumb its depths and never reach the bottom. There is always more to be known of this Word. It remains as inexhaustible as the Love who speaks it, and always will.
Sometimes, it is enough for me to be simple and simply trust, neither needing nor wanting depth of understanding. My heart rests totally at peace, simply knowing a final word of love has been spoken over my life, no, over all life, a Word that encompasses every pain, every loss, every sorrow, every broken dream and promise.
All of it is encased, embraced and encompassed in that single Word, in Christ.
In Christ God has spoken, a clear and unmistakable ‘yes’ to the human race and more. The Word is spoken in creation, through the means and substance of created matter, and it is spoken to all that is, all that ever was or ever will be. It is a Word, a word of promise and deliverance, spoken to the rocks, the rivers and everlasting hills as much as it is to me, a human soul
For, all that exists came to be in Christ--in him, through him, for him. He is the Word in which God says all we need to know. In him created matter and divine substance combine to reveal the beauty God intends and will work in and through all that is.
In this Word, divine reality and created substance unite, and God speaks the uninhibited, joyous communion of God and creation, the holy union God is working in me and all that is.
In this Word, God speaks unfettered love for all that is, a love that takes all that is into itself for the sole sake of a love spoken in a Word, a single life, the life of my brother Jesus.
Pr. David L. Miller
From a treatise on The Ascent of Mount Carmel by Saint John of the Cross (priest, mystic, 1542-1591)
By giving us, as he did, his Son, his only Word, he has in that one Word said everything. There is no need for further revelation. … God has spoken so completely through his own Word that he chooses to add nothing. Although he had spoken but partially through the prophets, he has now said everything in Christ. He has given us everything, his own Son. …[God says] Fix your eyes on him alone for in him I have revealed all and in him you will find more than you could ever ask for or desire.
Reflection
I have heard what I need to hear. I know what my heart needs to know. I await no further word of life’s meaning, unfolding its mysteries. That Word has been spoken in time and space--and in me.
Simple hearts rest it this Word without seeking great understanding, knowing this Word of ultimate grace and presence is enough and always will be. Sophisticated minds plumb its depths and never reach the bottom. There is always more to be known of this Word. It remains as inexhaustible as the Love who speaks it, and always will.
Sometimes, it is enough for me to be simple and simply trust, neither needing nor wanting depth of understanding. My heart rests totally at peace, simply knowing a final word of love has been spoken over my life, no, over all life, a Word that encompasses every pain, every loss, every sorrow, every broken dream and promise.
All of it is encased, embraced and encompassed in that single Word, in Christ.
In Christ God has spoken, a clear and unmistakable ‘yes’ to the human race and more. The Word is spoken in creation, through the means and substance of created matter, and it is spoken to all that is, all that ever was or ever will be. It is a Word, a word of promise and deliverance, spoken to the rocks, the rivers and everlasting hills as much as it is to me, a human soul
For, all that exists came to be in Christ--in him, through him, for him. He is the Word in which God says all we need to know. In him created matter and divine substance combine to reveal the beauty God intends and will work in and through all that is.
In this Word, divine reality and created substance unite, and God speaks the uninhibited, joyous communion of God and creation, the holy union God is working in me and all that is.
In this Word, God speaks unfettered love for all that is, a love that takes all that is into itself for the sole sake of a love spoken in a Word, a single life, the life of my brother Jesus.
Pr. David L. Miller
Sunday, December 04, 2011
Monday, December 5, 2011
Today’s text
From the Proslogian by Saint Anselm of Canterbury (bishop, 1033-1109)
Lord most high, what shall this exile do, so far from you? What shall your servant do, tormented by love of you and cast so far from your face? He yearns to see you, and your face is too far from him. He desires to approach you, and your dwelling is unapproachable. He longs to find you, and does not know your dwelling place. He strives to look for you, and does not know your face.
Reflection
The metaphor of exile is fitting to describe the feeling of those who hunger for God. We long for the One to whom we intuitively know we belong. We crave union with the Love from whom we feel separation, knowing no final peace on this earth until our tormented love is satisfied.
Saints and writers of every age have written of this experience, Christians, Jews, those of other faiths or of no faith at all. Awareness burns in the human heart, unsettling us, a restless knowledge that we are not at home until we are united with … something … someone.
We feel cut off from that mystery to which (to Whom) we ultimately belong. For the person without faith in God, this restlessness is an inescapable existential condition, the normal condition of the human heart living in a world in which one can never find the peace that the human heart is moved to seek for reasons it does not understand.
Although we find no peace here, we still want it, and we either live with the dis-ease of not having what we want, or we try to kill the desire with substances of constant busy-ness. We might tell ourselves that the unknown something we want is an illusion we had best ignore. Eat, drink and be merry, but don’t kid yourself: your hunger for final fulfillment is a false hope; it is chasing after the wind. You will never catch it.
But for the person of faith the yearning for the One to whom we belong is a search for home. It is the desire to return from the wandering of exile where we feel alone and lost, forgotten and perhaps forsaken, for we feel far removed from the One in whom rest and peace is found.
The Great Soul who is God, the One who loves and creates sentient beings out of an abundant store of love, creates us in order to share the boundless store of divine life and love with us, we who have life and love only by God’s gift.
God has fashioned our small souls so that in our exilic wanderings our hunger might moves us to seek to be reunited with the Mystery from whom we came, to return and find the holy union with the place, the Person, the home for which we have long searched, wondering at times whether it is even real.
It is, of course. It is real as are you, Loving and Holy Mystery. The pains of our wanderings through life are a great grace. They whisper in our ears that we belong to a Greatness which we cannot begin to imagine, the greatness of You, who made us for yourself.
So let us not run from the pain of our exile, nor kill or drown out the desire that moves us to search and long for union with the One who is always more. Our pain is a tormented love, moving us to search and watch for our Beloved, who continually draws us to the place where we might find oneness with the Source of our Being--and there, finally, to see the face of our Lord, face to face.
Pr. David L. Miller
From the Proslogian by Saint Anselm of Canterbury (bishop, 1033-1109)
Lord most high, what shall this exile do, so far from you? What shall your servant do, tormented by love of you and cast so far from your face? He yearns to see you, and your face is too far from him. He desires to approach you, and your dwelling is unapproachable. He longs to find you, and does not know your dwelling place. He strives to look for you, and does not know your face.
Reflection
The metaphor of exile is fitting to describe the feeling of those who hunger for God. We long for the One to whom we intuitively know we belong. We crave union with the Love from whom we feel separation, knowing no final peace on this earth until our tormented love is satisfied.
Saints and writers of every age have written of this experience, Christians, Jews, those of other faiths or of no faith at all. Awareness burns in the human heart, unsettling us, a restless knowledge that we are not at home until we are united with … something … someone.
We feel cut off from that mystery to which (to Whom) we ultimately belong. For the person without faith in God, this restlessness is an inescapable existential condition, the normal condition of the human heart living in a world in which one can never find the peace that the human heart is moved to seek for reasons it does not understand.
Although we find no peace here, we still want it, and we either live with the dis-ease of not having what we want, or we try to kill the desire with substances of constant busy-ness. We might tell ourselves that the unknown something we want is an illusion we had best ignore. Eat, drink and be merry, but don’t kid yourself: your hunger for final fulfillment is a false hope; it is chasing after the wind. You will never catch it.
But for the person of faith the yearning for the One to whom we belong is a search for home. It is the desire to return from the wandering of exile where we feel alone and lost, forgotten and perhaps forsaken, for we feel far removed from the One in whom rest and peace is found.
The Great Soul who is God, the One who loves and creates sentient beings out of an abundant store of love, creates us in order to share the boundless store of divine life and love with us, we who have life and love only by God’s gift.
God has fashioned our small souls so that in our exilic wanderings our hunger might moves us to seek to be reunited with the Mystery from whom we came, to return and find the holy union with the place, the Person, the home for which we have long searched, wondering at times whether it is even real.
It is, of course. It is real as are you, Loving and Holy Mystery. The pains of our wanderings through life are a great grace. They whisper in our ears that we belong to a Greatness which we cannot begin to imagine, the greatness of You, who made us for yourself.
So let us not run from the pain of our exile, nor kill or drown out the desire that moves us to search and long for union with the One who is always more. Our pain is a tormented love, moving us to search and watch for our Beloved, who continually draws us to the place where we might find oneness with the Source of our Being--and there, finally, to see the face of our Lord, face to face.
Pr. David L. Miller
Saturday, December 03, 2011
Saturday, December 3, 2011
Today’s text
From a biblical commentary by Saint Ephrem (deacon, 306-373)
About that hour no one knows, neither the angels nor the Son. It is not for you to know times or moments. He has kept these things hidden so that we may keep watch, each of us thinking that he will come in our own day. If he had revealed the time of his coming, his coming would have lost its savor; it would no longer be an object of yearning for the nations and the age in which it will be revealed. He promised that he would come but did not say when he would come, and so all generations await him eagerly.
Reflection
Just so, yearning, not satisfaction, remains the larger part of our lives.
We are always oriented and drawn to something more, hoping that the goodness we have known is but a part, a sample of what will be. We also yearn that the injustice and suffering, which is part of every time and every life, will pass away like a bad dream in the dawning light of our Lord’s eternal morning.
St. Paul counseled that it is a holy and good thing to be content with what the possessions and wealth one has. But contentment with what we have known and experienced of Christ is a sickness unto death. It invites a sleepy lethargy, pathetic apathy, depression and timidity.
To be content with what we know and feel of Christ turns us from the grace he is eager to share. We no longer meet each day, no, each new moment and encounter with the hope that the face of the person before us may turn transparent to that Love who seeks our hearts. It deadens the mind to the possibility that we might glimpse signs of the kingdom of God’s peace breaking into our daily routines, stirring our hearts to gratitude for the One who is ever at hand, always near.
To be content with such fragments of Christ’s reign, as we now experience on earth, turns us from the plight of the poor and those who suffer injustice. It makes us content with the status quo so that we become a friend of death, no longer challenging the powers and injustices that feed poverty and starvation while protecting the rich, not to mention our comfortable lifestyles.
The suffering of this age and every death we see should stir us to pray, ‘Come Lord Jesus,’ moving also to watch and not lose heart. For Christ promises to come, and we should be eager for his appearance. We have seen and felt the pains he has promised to erase, when he comes to make all things new and wipe every tear from our eyes.
We are eager for his appearance not only because of our own and the world’s pains, but because we have seen the graciousness of his love in our brother, Jesus.
We have witnessed his coming in a thousand ways and places, a thousand days and faces where the One who is Love shows his beauty and awakens the same gracious loveliness within our hearts that it may flow from our hands and our words.
All this should well move us to be eager for Christ’s every appearance, looking for him in all the places of our lives. For he who is … is pleased to come to you.
Pr. David L. Miller
From a biblical commentary by Saint Ephrem (deacon, 306-373)
About that hour no one knows, neither the angels nor the Son. It is not for you to know times or moments. He has kept these things hidden so that we may keep watch, each of us thinking that he will come in our own day. If he had revealed the time of his coming, his coming would have lost its savor; it would no longer be an object of yearning for the nations and the age in which it will be revealed. He promised that he would come but did not say when he would come, and so all generations await him eagerly.
Reflection
Just so, yearning, not satisfaction, remains the larger part of our lives.
We are always oriented and drawn to something more, hoping that the goodness we have known is but a part, a sample of what will be. We also yearn that the injustice and suffering, which is part of every time and every life, will pass away like a bad dream in the dawning light of our Lord’s eternal morning.
St. Paul counseled that it is a holy and good thing to be content with what the possessions and wealth one has. But contentment with what we have known and experienced of Christ is a sickness unto death. It invites a sleepy lethargy, pathetic apathy, depression and timidity.
To be content with what we know and feel of Christ turns us from the grace he is eager to share. We no longer meet each day, no, each new moment and encounter with the hope that the face of the person before us may turn transparent to that Love who seeks our hearts. It deadens the mind to the possibility that we might glimpse signs of the kingdom of God’s peace breaking into our daily routines, stirring our hearts to gratitude for the One who is ever at hand, always near.
To be content with such fragments of Christ’s reign, as we now experience on earth, turns us from the plight of the poor and those who suffer injustice. It makes us content with the status quo so that we become a friend of death, no longer challenging the powers and injustices that feed poverty and starvation while protecting the rich, not to mention our comfortable lifestyles.
The suffering of this age and every death we see should stir us to pray, ‘Come Lord Jesus,’ moving also to watch and not lose heart. For Christ promises to come, and we should be eager for his appearance. We have seen and felt the pains he has promised to erase, when he comes to make all things new and wipe every tear from our eyes.
We are eager for his appearance not only because of our own and the world’s pains, but because we have seen the graciousness of his love in our brother, Jesus.
We have witnessed his coming in a thousand ways and places, a thousand days and faces where the One who is Love shows his beauty and awakens the same gracious loveliness within our hearts that it may flow from our hands and our words.
All this should well move us to be eager for Christ’s every appearance, looking for him in all the places of our lives. For he who is … is pleased to come to you.
Pr. David L. Miller
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