May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit, brothers and sisters. Amen: Pentecost Saturday
Look: Flight of the scarlet ibis, Jonathan Jagot - Source
About this photograph: This was the winning entry for the 15-17-year-old category in the Young Wildlife Photographer of the Year in 2015. Every time I look at this photograph, I imagine the tongues of fire from the Pentecost account in Acts becoming a flock of scarlet ibis searching out every son and daughter of God around the world. I hope you enjoy the photo, too.
Listen: Spirit of the Living God, Phil Wickham - Lyrics | Spotify | YouTube
I made us a new playlist for Pentecost! You can listen to it here: Holy Ghost: Pentecost 2022
Read: Psalm 75-76; Psalm 23, 27; Numbers 3:1-13; Galatians 6:11-18; Matthew 17:1-13
Prayer to the Holy Spirit:
Come, Holy Spirit,
fill the hearts of your faithful,
and enkindle in us the fire of your love.
Send forth your Spirit and we shall be created,
and you shall renew the face of the earth.
Amen.
Do: Throughout the week I'll be sharing excerpts from spiritual teacher Henri Nouwen as well as my own brief reflections about the way the Holy Spirit empowers us to live in peace, freedom, and power. Read, reflect, journal, and share your own responses with the rest of us in the comment section below.
You Are the Glory of God
With a smile John Eudes said, “Take this as a koan: ‘I am the glory of God.’ Make that thought the center of your meditation so that it slowly becomes not only a thought but a living reality. You are the place where God chose to dwell, you are the topos tou theou (God’s place) and the spiritual life is nothing more or less than to allow that space to exist where God can dwell, to create the space where his glory can manifest itself. In your meditation you can ask yourself, ‘Where is the glory of God? If the glory of God is not there where I am, where else can it be?’ "
-You Are the Beloved by Henri Nouwen
The Mosaic That Shows Us the Face of God
A mosaic consists of thousands of little stones. Some are blue, some are green, some are yellow, some are gold. When we bring our faces close to the mosaic, we can admire the beauty of each stone. But as we step back from it, we can see that all these little stones reveal to us a beautiful picture, telling a story none of these stones can tell by itself.
That is what our life in community is about. Each of us is like a little stone, but together we reveal the face of God to the world. Nobody can say: "I make God visible." But others who see us together can say: "They make God visible." Community is where humility and glory touch.
- Can You Drink the Cup? by Henri Nouwen
My whole life I've been taught the image of God as three-in-one, one-in-three. I learned the Trinity as one egg with three parts: white, shell, and yolk. Water as ice, liquid, and steam. Also, I think there was a metaphor using an apple? I'm grateful for that sort of teaching and the layers of understanding that were added as I grew up in the Church. But it wasn't until I served as a shepherd over a worship ministry that I began to ask questions. Questions like, "So what?" and "What difference does it make?"
Turns out it makes a world of difference. In the “three-person'd God” we are invited, commended even, into a mystery. Egg yolks and apple seeds aside, our most learned theologians can only barely imagine the wonder of "let us make man in our image". For myself, the invitation toward mystery looks a bit like the Ghost of Christmas Present lifting his robe and bellowing, "Come in and know me better man!"
Beautiful mystery, yes. Also, a beautiful community. The Psalmist tells us that God puts the lonely into families. He should know, he lives and moves and has his transcendent Being as one-in-community. He is a We.
This matters more than we imagine. If He is a We then how possibly can we think of ourselves solely as me? We must submit everything we do to mark ourselves a Christian to the power and beauty of this spiritual reality. Distinct as persons, yes. Made in the image of God as a man or a woman, in particular, and then as a unique person. Mysteriously and gloriously, this designed particularity never finds itself as an identity apart from the created Whole. This paradox transforms everything.
The answer to the question, "What difference does it make?": all the difference in the world. We submit every part of our lives -- individually and corporately--to the Three-in-One God. How we gather, how we pray, how we sing, how we make, how we intercede, how we eat, how we work and play together and alone. How we hear music, read books, return emails, browse Facebook, shop at the market, and weed our gardens. All of it comes under submission to the Three-person'd God.
Batter my heart, three-person'd God ; for you
As yet but knock; breathe, shine, and seek to mend ...
-- John Donne, Holy Sonnets XIV
Donne gives another poetic description for our three-person'd God as the "knotty Trinity". The poet-theologian seems to be saying this reality is beyond our intellectual grasping no matter how many metaphors we dream up but we are drawn to keep on trying. He reminds us that the work of communicating mystery is no banal task. Every day we have the opportunity to try again. The great Three-in-One captures our imagination, making the Trinitarian Presence irresistible to the working out over millennia. We are caught up as one part of the Whole. Paradoxically, we find true solace surrounded by an ancient and future communion.
As a newly-minted Anglican about a decade ago, I immediately relished the practice of marking myself with the sign of the cross. This physical discipline trains my ears toward the Trinity, crossing head to heart, left to right at the mere mention of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. It is an act of submission, an antidote to spiritual amnesia. Even that self-sealing motion is done as one in a whole. I know this because each week I learned my cues while I studied my worshiping community as subtly as possible, trying to sync my rhythm with theirs, with the Church in time before me and time to come.
Yes, it matters very much. It matters when we are gathered together and when we are scattered, sent out to reflect the image of our Three-In-One God to a world broken off from the Whole.
Peace, friends,
Tamara
p.s., If you'd find it helpful to have another person bear witness with you the work of the Father, Son, and Spirit in your life, that's what I do as a Spiritual Director. You can message me here or through the contact form at my Spiritual Direction webpage for more information: https://www.tamarahillmurphy.com/spiritual-direction