Let it Be – The Beatles
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSSqHhAqxrk
Brian McLaren describes how the Holy Spirit empowers us to carry on Jesus’s work:
“It’s better that I go away so that the Spirit can come,” Jesus said. If he were physically present and visible, our focus would be on Christ over there, right here, out there … but because of his absence, we discover the Spirit of Christ right here, in here, within.
Jesus describes the Spirit as another comforter, another teacher, another guide—just like him, but available to everyone, everywhere, always. The same Spirit who had descended like a dove upon him will descend upon us, he promises. The same Spirit who filled him will fill all who open their hearts….
The Bible describes the Spirit with beautiful and vivid imagery: Wind. Breath. Fire. Cloud. Water. Wine. A dove. These dynamic word pictures contrast starkly with the heavy, fixed imagery provided by, say, stone idols, imposing temples, or thick theological tomes. Through this vivid imagery, the biblical writers tell us that the Spirit invigorates, animates, purifies, holds mystery, moves and flows, foments joy, and spreads peace….
At the core of Jesus’ life and message, then, was this good news: the Spirit of God, the Spirit of aliveness, the Wind-breath-fire-cloud-water-wine-dove Spirit who filled Jesus is on the move in our world. And that gives us a choice: do we dig in our heels, clench our fists, and live for our own agenda, or do we let go, let be, and let come … and so be taken up into the Spirit’s movement?…
In the millennia since Christ walked with us on this Earth, we’ve often tried to box up the “wind” in manageable doctrines. We’ve exchanged the fire of the Spirit for the ice of religious pride. We’ve turned the wine back into water, and then let the water go stagnant and lukewarm. We’ve traded the gentle dove of peace for the predatory hawk or eagle of empire….
In a world full of big challenges, in a time like ours, … we need to experience the mighty rushing wind of Pentecost. We need our hearts to be made incandescent by the Spirit’s fire. We need the living water and new wine Jesus promised, so our hearts can become the home of dovelike peace….
When we open up space for the Spirit and let the Spirit fill that space within us, we begin to change, and we become agents of change…. So let us open our hearts. Let us dare believe that the Spirit that we read about in the Scriptures can move among us today, empowering us in our times so we can become agents in a global spiritual movement of justice, peace, and joy.
Reference:
Brian D. McLaren, We Make the Road by Walking: A Year-Long Quest for Spiritual Formation, Reorientation, and Activation (Jericho Books, 2014), 203, 204, 205–206.
What David Robinson heard May 31, 2016 Listening to the Coach:
…Without my empowering Spirit, you only have a new list of things to strive for. That’s religion. Pharisees did a lot of that. So come to me, stay connected and I will lead you in all these things and you won’t have to strive. If you want to strive, because it’s built into you…. Strive only to maintain connection with me, and then just live out of what I show you.
Matthew 11:28-30 (NLT) Then Jesus said, “Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy to bear, and the burden I give you is light.”
| John Chaffee – Five on Friday |
1.
“The fact that millions of people share the same vices does not make these vices virtues, the fact that they share so many errors does not make the errors to be truths, and the fact that millions of people share the same forms of mental pathology does not make these people sane.”
– Erich Fromm, German Sociologist
It is probably a spiritual exercise or discipline to stay sensitized to wrongdoing or evil.
With a 24-hour news cycle and the tendency to pay more attention to things we interpret as existential threats, it makes sense that we would become desensitized to the world’s chaos.
Perhaps that is why it is important to have consistent church attendance. It helps remind us that we are not the only ones who want to see the world truthfully, acknowledge wrongdoing, and be collectively inspired to morally “aim up.”
We all know about vicious cycles, and how falling into a vice encourages us to fall into more vices.
Well, there is also the opposite: virtuous cycles. To be around people who “aim up” can be inspiring as well. One virtue builds upon another until a whole life constructed by virtues is an impressive monument to a life lived well.
I don’t know about you, but I sometimes find myself in disbelief. I find it so hard to believe that some vices are just acceptable now, or we just lightly brush them off as if they don’t cause serious harm or pain.
I am likely rambling now. So let me go back to the opening sentence here…
It is probably a spiritual exercise or discipline to stay sensitized to wrongdoing or evil.
2.
“For if medicine is really to accomplish its great task, it must intervene in political and social life. It must point out the hindrances that impede the normal social functioning of vital processes, and effect their removal.“
– Rudolf Virchow, German Physician
I do not think it is a far stretch for the average Christian to say that we should help one another to thrive.
The ideas of service, giving to the poor, hospitality, and the like are all wonderful ways of helping one another to do more than just survive.
What I think possibly challenges a fair amount of Christians is that as Christians we should also be thinking about the structures of a society, and asking if they need to be changed…
I firmly believe it is a Christian thing to protest systems that benefit from keeping people down, poor, homeless, illiterate, etc.
We are generally okay with how society is arranged as long as there aren’t “too many” people sacrificed. I am not saying this is good or even right. We are too accustomed to people being sacrificed for the well-being of those in the middle or even the top of a society.
The book of Exodus tells us that God does not approve of an arrangement that dehumanizes some (The Israelites) while keeping others as functional “gods” (Pharaoh).
If Yahweh does not approve of social structures that dehumanize and inhibit human thriving, why do we?
3.
“The false self is deeply entrenched. You can change your name and address, religion, country, and clothes. But as long as you don’t ask it to change, the false self simply adjusts to the new environment. For example, instead of drinking your friends under the table as a significant sign of self-worth and esteem, if you enter a monastery, as I did, fasting the other monks under the table could become your new path to glory. In that case, what would have changed? Nothing.”
– Father Thomas Keating, Trappist Monk
The topic of the True Self and the False Self is endlessly fascinating to me.
Perhaps that means I am at a point in my life where I am revisiting the topic of identity in a new way since being a teenager (according to Erik Erikson, that is when we begin to answer the question of “Who am I?”), or the topic of identity is simply a perennial one.
According to Thomas Keating, our False Self is constantly vying for more power and control, security and safety, and esteem and affection. Our True Self does not play those games; instead, it rests in the fact of being the Beloved of God and trusts with childlike faith.
What I find so profound here is that Thomas Keating realized that whether he was at a bar or in a monastery, the problematic habit of striving and comparison was the same. It is in this same way that we can hide from God in church. It is entirely possible to sit in a church pew and yet never actually be a transformed person who walks with integrity, vulnerability, and virtue. We are so good at it that we can even convince ourselves that we are “good.”
I think this touches on why I like the teaching of the True Self and the False Self. It doesn’t exactly answer any question. The teaching itself is like a holy question to be haunted by for the rest of our lives, a question that keeps us on our toes, a question that can convict us at any decade of our lives.
And that holy question is: “Am I being my True Self right now or am I being a lesser, False Self?”
4.
“If you label me, you negate me.”
– Soren Kierkegaard, Danish Philosopher
The human person is far too complex to be completely defined by terms such as conservative, liberal, Boomer, Millennial, Gen Z, American, young, old, musician, artist, lawyer, pastor, etc.
Every affirmation is equally a negation of something else. We are all walking contradictions and paradoxes.
Gee, thanks, Kierkegaard, for making things complex again.
5.
“Ultimately, your greatest gift to the world is being who you are – both your gift and your fulfillment.”
One of my struggles is the false belief that I want to be loved for what I know.
So, for a while, I strove to be loved for what I learned.
But that is safe.
What I really want is to be loved for being who I am.
That is risky.
The only thing I really have to offer that is worth anything is not what I have learned or can teach. The only thing I really have to offer is myself. Perhaps then, in the offering of myself, I can actually get what I truly want, to be loved for who I am.
I am sure that you have felt some combination or different arrangement of the same desire.
So here is an encouragement: just be yourself. Give yourself through whatever you do. It doesn’t matter if you are a pastor, professor, plumber, politician, or a penguin; the only gift you have to give to the world is the gift of being your True Self.
