Ascension
John 16:22-33
So you have to suffer pain now. But I will see you
again, and then your hearts will be filled with joy, and no one can take that
joy from you. Up to now, you have not prayed in my name. Pray from the heart,
and it will be given to your heart, that your joy may be fulfilled.
All this I have given to your souls in imagery. But
the hour is coming when I will no longer speak to you in pictures but will tell you openly and unveiled
about my Father, so that you can grasp it in full, knowing consciousness. Thus
will I proclaim to you the being of the Father. On that day, you will ask out
of my power and in my name. And no longer will I ask the Father on your behalf.
For the Father himself will love you
because you have loved me, and have known in your hearts that I have come forth
from the Father. I have come forth from the Father, and I have come into this
world.
 |
| Stephen B. Whatley |
Then Jesus’ disciples said, “Now you are speaking
in clear thought and without imagery. Now we know that all things are revealed
to you and that you do not even need to have anyone ask you questions. This makes
us believe that you came from God.”
Jesus answered, “Do you now feel my power in your
heart? Behold, the time is coming and has
already come, when you will be scattered, each to his own loneliness. You will
then also leave me alone. But I am not alone, for the Father is eternally
united with me.
All this I have spoken to you so that in me you may
find peace. In this world, you will have
great fear and hardship. But take courage. I have overcome the world.”
Ascension
May
21, 2020
John
16: 24-33
Observe a rosebush over time, and you will see how
its leaves appear with
rhythmic frequency—one set, a pause for the rise of the
stem, the next leaf, another rise. The leaves appear as pulses of the rose’s
life, as beats of the heart of its life, ascending heavenward.
Our prayer life is like that. Prayer creates a
living form in the garden of God. Christ advises us to pray from the heart. We
can imagine that praying from the heart creates a kind of rose tree in His
garden. As we pray, we are regularly sending out the leaves on this spiritual
rose tree. As we pray, the stems rise higher. As we pray, Christ and his angels
guide and tend and nurture what we create, drawing us upward.
Like the rosebush, sooner or later, the
intervals between the leaves become shorter, the leaves more compressed. The
time of transition, of the great change, is near. Christ knows how it is. “In
this world, you will have great fear and hardship.”
 |
| Charles Andrade |
And as we labor through the transition, something
new begins to happen. Amid the deepest trials, the heart blooms. The roses of
peace appear, opening to the light of the Spirit Sun. And Christ, the Spirit Sun,
in turn, sends His encouragement: “All this I have spoken to you so that in me
you may find peace. In this world, you will have great fear and hardship. But
take courage. I have overcome the world.”
And in the
light of his encouragement, our hearts blossom forth roses of peace, their
fragrance rising like incense to fill the atmosphere around us.
