In the morning, while it was still very dark, Jesus got up and went out to a deserted place, and there he prayed. —Mark 1:35
Rev. Dr. Barbara Holmes (1943–2024) reflects on the desert experiences of Jesus and the early Christians:
Jesus’s ministry modeled the interplay between prophetic utterance, public theology, and intense spiritual renewal. He launches his three-year ministry from the desert wilderness, a place that will be the home of latter-day desert mothers and fathers. After an intense time of fasting, testing, and submission to the leading of the Holy Spirit, Jesus returns ready to fulfill his calling. These rhythms of activism and contemplation, engagement and withdrawal resonate throughout his life….
When Christianity began, it was small and intense, communal and set apart, until it found favor with the state. Those adherents who witnessed Rome’s public affirmation of Christianity in the fourth century realized that the contemplative aspects of the faith could not be nurtured under the largesse of the state. And so, in the fifth century, monasticism flourished in the desert as Christian converts retreated for respite and spiritual clarity. Although the desert mothers and fathers sought harsh and isolated sites, they soon found that they were not alone. The decision to retreat drew others to them. Communities formed as city dwellers came out to seek advice and solace. The historical model of contemplation offers the rhythm of retreat and return. It was in the wilderness that African contemplatives carved out unique spiritual boundaries.
Holmes describes how we can live out this desert legacy and wisdom today:
If the desert is a place of renewal, transformation, and freedom, and if the heat and isolation served as a nurturing incubator …, one wonders if a desert experience is necessary to reclaim this legacy.
One need not wonder long when there are so many deserts within reach. Today’s wilderness can be found in bustling suburban and urban centers, on death row, in homeless shelters in the middle of the night, in the eyes of a hospice patient, and in the desperation of AIDS orphans in Africa and around the world. Perhaps these are the postmodern desert mothers and fathers. Perhaps contemplative spaces can be found wherever people skirt the margins of inclusion. Perhaps those whom we value least have the most to teach.
We are in need of those values central to African [desert] monasticism and early Christian hospitality; they include communal relationships, humility, and compassion. Laura Swan sums up these virtues in the word apatheia, defined as “a mature mindfulness, a grounded sensitivity, and a keen attention to one’s inner world as well as to the world in which one has journeyed.” [1] Inevitably, the journey takes each of us in different directions; however, by virtue of circumstances or choice, each of us will at some point in our lives find ourselves on the outskirts of society listening to the silence coming from within. During these times, we realize that contemplation is a destination as well as a practice. The monastics knew this and valued both.
From our friend, Brad Jersak. BTW this is from his newsletter. You can sign up for it if you like
A social media friend, Luke Brunskill, was preparing a homily on the parable of the Prodigal Son (manuscript here) and contacted me ask whether there’s any of the early church fathers or mothers had noticed a death and resurrection in Jesus’ story. Not that I know of, but that’s speaking from gaps in my research.
Luke messaged me, saying, “I have been battling with the thought and feeling that there is repentance after death. That is how we ALL get to the Telos of God. I am tasked with speaking on the Prodigal Son this Sunday at church and this eschatological idea is popping up because the father twice calls the younger son ‘dead.’ Is my theology of the afterlife going crazy to imagine the shedding of sin and return to the Father in the afterlife?
Twice. That stopped me. Repetition in the Scriptures invites a second glance. So I double- and triple-checked Luke 15. Then I noticed:
- 17 But when he came to his senses he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired hands have bread enough and to spare, but here I am dying of hunger!
- 23 And get the fatted calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate, 24 for this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found!’
- 32 But we had to celebrate and rejoice, because this brother of yours was dead and has come to life; he was lost and has been found.’ ”
Had the prodigal literally died and come back to life? Well, it’s a parable, no nothing is read literally. But the fictional aspect of parables are nevertheless saturated with truth. As my friend Paul reminded me, some truth is so big—so universal—that only a myth can carry it. So the parable does not describe a particular Galilean family in first century space and time. We know it’s a story about everyone and about each of us. It’s about departure and waywardness, about getting hopelessly lost and finally dead. Why would we limit the parable to a this-life ultimatum when Jesus uses the language of death and dying three times and the reality of resurrection is mentioned twice?
We might say, “But of course he’s speaking metaphorically of our spiritual death through sin and our spiritual resurrection through repentance in this life.” Of course he is. But only now? Not after? Why not?
C.S. Lewis’ greatest book (in my opinion), The Great Divorce explores this very possibility. He imagines and names the place of the dead and damned “Grey Town,” from which people may yet board a bus and make their journey of repentance to “the High Countries.” The parallel in the parable becomes more obvious: Lewis’ Grey Town is for Jesus the Distant Country and the High Countries are called the Father’s House.
I suppose Luke (my friend) can conceive of the possibility that if the language of death and resurrection can point back to repentance and return in this life, then the reverse might be true as well: the practice of death and resurrection in this life might also point to the reality of repentance and return in the next. Of course, the sooner the better—better now than later (unless we’re as deluded as the younger brother when he headed out).
P.S. If we play with this idea enough to imagine redemption beyond death, then the resentment of the older brother only grows more obvious. His own confession is that he had wasted his piety on a lifetime of sacrificial ‘slaving’ outside the father’s house. He did not know the eternal life of fellowship with God. He was unplugged from intimacy and communion. How dare God welcome the hedonist home without punishment or payment?!
Even worse if he did so if his younger sibling had died of starvation first? It’s bad enough to let him in just before he died! How much worse if he were resurrected prior to his repentance! So much for Tertullian’s cruel schadenfreude (pain-joy) of the elect!
“At that greatest of all spectacles, that last and eternal judgment, how shall I admire, how laugh, how rejoice, how exult, when I behold so many proud monarchs groaning in the lowest abyss of darkness; so many magistrates liquefying in fiercer flames than they ever kindled against the Christians; so many sages philosophers blushing in red-hot fires with their deluded pupils; so many tragedians more tuneful in the expression of their own sufferings; so many dancers tripping more nimbly for the flames than ever before for the stage.” (Tertullian, De Spectaculis)
So much better to rejoice in the Father’s assurance, ‘Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours” and his call to celebrate and rejoice. How much more beautiful (and therefore true and just!) to align with the heart of the father who “saw him and was filled with compassion; ran and put his arms around him and kissed him.”
I’ve not yet found the depths of the parable with ever more careful visits to this ‘gospel in a nutshell.’ More to say next time!
