1st Nov Trinity 2020, Don't Mind the Sparks

 

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November Trinity

Revelation 1:1-20

This is the unveiling of the being of Jesus Christ, which proceeds out of the divine world for those who would serve Him. To them shall be revealed what must of necessity happen in the future and which powerfully presses into world events. God formed this revelation in imagery and sent it through His angel to His servant John. And so John speaks as a witness to everything he saw, that is, to the Divine Word, and to the life of Jesus Christ, which serves as a testimony. Blessed are they who know how to read the prophetic words, and blessed are those who know how to hear them, and all who take what is written in this book into their souls; for time presses.

 John, to the seven congregations in Asia:

Grace and peace to you

From Him who is, and who was, and who is coming

And from the seven creating spirits before His throne

And from Jesus Christ.

By His witnessing, He is the archetype of trust.

He is the firstborn from the realm of death,

He is the leading spirit of the Kings on earth.

He has turned to us in love, and by the power of His blood

He has released us from the spell of sin which lay upon us.

He has established us as true kings and made us into priests

before the divine Ground of the World, His Father.

To Him belongs all light of the spirit and all power of soul from eon to eon. Amen.

See: He comes in the realm of the clouds.

All eyes shall see Him, also the eyes of those who pierced Him. And those down the ages will lament about Him. Yes. Amen.

I am the Alpha and the Omega,

Thus speaks the Lord our God, who is, and who was, and who is coming,

the divine ruler of the world.

I, John, your brother and your companion in all trials and also in the inner kingdom and the power of endurance which we possess through our oneness with Jesus: I was on the island of Patmos. There it was granted to me to receive a share of the divine Word and to bear witness to the sufferings of Jesus.

On the Lord’s Day, I was lifted up to the world of spirit and I heard behind me a mighty voice like the sound of a trumpet. It said: write what you see in a book and send it to the seven congregations: to Ephesus, to Smyrna, to Pergamum, to Thyatira, to Sardis, to Philadelphia and Laodicea.

And I turned to see Him whose voice was speaking to me. And as I turned, I saw seven golden lampstands, and amid the lampstands, a figure like that of the Son of Man:

clothed with a long billowing garment,

encircled round His breast with a golden band;

        His head and His hair shin

ing white like snow-white wool,

His eyes like a flame of fire,

His feet like burnished bronze glowing in a furnace,

His voice like the rushing of many streams of water.

In His hand He held seven stars;

from His mouth issued a sharp two-edged sword

and His face shone as the sun shines in its full radiance.

And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet and was as if dead. But He laid His right hand upon me and said: “Do not be afraid. I am the first and the last and the living one. I was dead, and look! I am living, and I bear the life of the world through all eons. Mine is the key to the realm of death and the shades. Write down what you see: what is now and what is to come.

The secret of the seven stars, which you see in my right hand, and of the seven golden lampstands is this: The seven stars are the picture in the spirit for the angels of the seven congregations, and the seven lampstands are the seven congregations themselves.”

1^st November Trinity

November 1, 2020

Revelation 1:1-20

Experienced bird-lovers can identify a bird on sight by its size and coloring. But even when they cannot see a bird, they can identify it by its song.

In the magnificence of this reading,
we both see and hear. The Risen Son of Man presents Himself, it is true, in a human form, but as a kind of human ‘bird’ with different plumage: snow white hair, eyes of flame, face of sunlight, glowing feet. He holds seven stars and a sword issues from His mouth.

The vision may be strange to us.

But His song is distinctly recognizable. His voice of Living Waters sings: I was dead, and look, I am living. I bear the life of the world…. Mine is the key that releases from the realm of death. And you are connected to me. For I hold the star of the angel of your congregation in my hand.

Christ, the great Phoenix, once destroyed, rises ever anew from the ashes. He is the new fire. And He is the living water. Perhaps we can hear Him say, in words adapted from the poet Rumi:

The Truth stands before me…

The voice of the fire says:

“I am fire, I am fountainhead,

Come into me and don’t mind the sparks.”*

 

*adapted from Rumi

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1st November Trinity 2019, Door of Being

November Trinity

Revelation 1, 1-20

This is the unveiling of the being of Jesus Christ, which proceeds out of the divine world for those who would serve him. To them shall be revealed what must of necessity happen in the future and which powerfully presses into world events. God formed this revelation in imagery and sent it through his angel to his servant John. And so John speaks as a witness to everything he saw, that is, to the Divine Word, and to the life of Jesus Christ, which serves as a testimony. Blessed is he who knows how to read the prophetic words, and blessed are those who know how to hear them, and all who take what is written in this book into their souls; for time presses.

John, to the seven congregations in Asia:

Grunewald

Grace and peace to you

From Him who is, and who was, and who is coming

And from the seven creating spirits before his throne

And from Jesus Christ.

By his witnessing, he is the archetype of trust.

He is the firstborn from the realm of death,

He is the leading spirit of the Kings on earth.

He has turned to us in love, and by the power of his blood

He has released us from the spell of sin which lay upon us.

He has established us as true kings and made us into priests

before the divine Ground of the World, his Father.

To him belongs all light of the spirit and all power of soul from eon to eon. Amen.

See: he comes in the realm of the clouds.

All eyes shall see him, also the eyes of those who pierced him. And men down the ages will lament about him. Yes. Amen.

I am the Alpha and the Omega,

Thus speaks the Lord our God

who is, and who was, and who is coming

the divine ruler of the world.

I, John, your brother and your companion in all trials and also in the inner kingdom and in the power of endurance which we possess through our oneness with Jesus: I was on the island of Patmos. There it was granted to me to receive a share of the divine Word and to bear witness to the sufferings of Jesus.

On the Lord’s Day, I was lifted up to the world of spirit and I heard behind me a mighty voice like the sound of a trumpet. It said: write what you see in a book and send it to the seven congregations: to Ephesus, to Smyrna, to Pergamum, to Thyatira, to Sardis, to Philadelphia and to Laodicea.

And I turned to see him whose voice was speaking to me. And as I turned I saw seven golden lampstands, and in the midst of the lampstands, a figure like that of the Son of Man:

clothed with a long billowing garment,

encircled round his breast with a golden band;

         his head and his hair shining white like snow-white wool,

his eyes like a flame of fire,

his feet like burnished bronze glowing in a furnace,

his voice like the rushing of many streams of water.

In his hand he held seven stars;

from his mouth issued a sharp two-edged sword

and his face shone, as the sun shines in its full radiance.

And when I saw him, I fell at his feet and was as if dead. But he laid his right hand upon me and said: “Do not be afraid. I am the first and the last, and the living one. I was dead, and look! I am living and I bear the life of the world through all eons. Mine is the key to the realm of death and of the shades. Write down what you see: what is now, and what is to come.

The secret of the seven stars, which you see in my right hand, and of the seven golden lampstands is this: The seven stars are the picture in the spirit for the angels of the seven congregations, and the seven lampstands are the seven congregations themselves.”

First November Trinity

October 27, 2019

Revelation 1: 1-20

During this dying time of year, we are immersed in the ebbing of natural life. Meanwhile, in the other hemisphere, spring is growing. An image for this is the old-fashioned sand clock or hourglass. The more time passes, the less sand there is in the upper chamber. In focusing on how little is left, however, we may fail to realize that the clock will soon be inverted. What poured down below will be turned over and become the content of what is above.

Last week we saw the image of Christ in the warrior garb of Michael. His truth, His justice, His loyalty to humankind’s development was demonstrated in His strength in the battle for human evolution.

Once the battle has been fought, the chains fettering humans to the earthly are severed. The clock can be inverted. And we see a mighty image of grace and peace. We see Christ shining in the light of lamps, of stars, of sun, in a fullness of radiant love. The One who sacrificed Himself, who died in battle, is birthed out of death. He is now master, not only of the heavens but also of the underworld. He holds the key to the realm of the dead. He is the hourglass itself.

 

He stands now among the seven lamps that the communities light with their prayers. Those who have died join in the praying. And in His hand, he holds the starry angels who guide those communities into the future. For there is always a future. It is the future that we are creating. And Christ stands at the doorway, is the doorway to that future. And so in the words of the poet, we ask:

door of being, dawn and wake me,
allow me to see the face of this day,
allow me to see the face of this night,
… take me to the other side of this night,
where I am you, we are us,
the kingdom where pronouns are intertwined,

…door of being, dawn and wake me,…*

 Visit our website! 

---

*Octavio Paz, in Sunstone/Piedra de Sol, translated by Eliot Winberger

1st November Trinity 2018, Angel of Hope

November Trinity

Revelation 7: 9-17

Next

Durer

I looked and saw a great crowd beyond anyone’s power to count, from every nation and all races and peoples and tongues standing before the throne and before the Lamb, draped in garments of white and with palm branches in their hands, and they shout with a great voice saying,  “Healing and help [salvation] to our God who sits on the throne and through the Lamb.”

And all the angels were standing in a ring around the throne and the elders and the four living beings, and they fell down in front of the throne upon their faces and adored God saying,

Yea, so be it. Amen. [To our God be blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and strength for an age of ages. Amen.”]

All the blessing power of the Word, that creating permeates the world, all the revealing might of the spirit, that enlightens the senses appearance, all the light of wisdom that leads us to true knowledge, the secret of transformation which gives worth to all being, that brings the world forward, and all the strength and power of the spirit –they belong to our God from aeon to aeon. Yea, so be it, Amen.

And one of the elders spoke up, asking me: “These people draped in garments of white, who are they and where did they come from?”

And I said to him, “Good sir, you yourself know.”

And he said to me:

These are the ones just come from the great Suffering. They washed their garments clean and made them shining white in the blood of the Lamb.

That is why they can stand here before the throne of God

And serve him day and night in his temple.

The One who sits on the throne shall settle down upon them [dwell upon them].

They shall not hunger ever again, nor thirst again;

The sun shall not bear down too hard upon them, nor anything burn them,

Because the Lamb, in the midst of the throne, will be their shepherd

And guide them to the springs of the water of life,

And God will wipe away each teardrop from their eyes.

1st November Trinity

October 28, 2018

Revelation 7: 9-17

To live on earth is to be exposed to pain. Some of us undergo a lifetime of suffering; others less so. But if we experience it ourselves, or witness it in those around us, we all undergo pain in this life.

Why do we have to suffer? What is the point of pain? Pain and travail can open us, break open our hearts. It allows us to find true compassion. Its purpose is to create organs of perception.

The eye was created by receiving arrows of light, holding them and letting them form it into an organ to receive and organize a world of images. Just so within the soul; a process that begins with pain ends in conscious seeing.

Holding and working with pain creates an eye in the heart that can receive and make meaning out of what surrounds us. It allows us to form images, to become more conscious of what or who, stands before us.

Inna Myalo

It can allow us to see that an angel of hope* is holding a glowing light in front of our heart; a light to lead and guide us through misery. A light that shows us the way to the place where we can wash our soul garments in Christ’s healing blood. A light that aligns our thinking with truth, steels our will with the strength of endurance, drenches our feeling with love.

And one day we will recognize how our pain and travail has brought us to stand before an even greater being: to stand before the compassionate and loving face of God, who himself went through the Greatest Suffering.

---

*Lorna Byrne, A Message of Hope from the Angels.

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1st Nov Trinity 2017, The Great Suffering

Durer

1st November Trinity
Revelation 7: 9-17

Next I looked and saw a great crowd beyond anyone’s power to count, from every nation and all races and peoples and tongues standing before the throne and before the Lamb, draped in garments of white and with palm branches in their hands, and they shout with a great voice saying,  “Healing and help [salvation] to our God who sits on the throne and through the Lamb.”
And all the angels were standing in a ring around the throne and the elders and the four living beings, and they fell down in front of the throne upon their faces and adored God saying,
Yes, so be it. Amen. [To our God be blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and strength for an age of ages. Amen.”]
All the blessing power of the Word, that creating permeates the world, all the revealing might of the spirit, that enlightens the senses appearance, all the light of wisdom that leads us to true knowledge, the secret of transformation which gives worth to all being, that brings the world forward, and all the strength and power of the spirit –they belong to our God from aeon to aeon. Yea, so be it, Amen.
And one of the elders spoke up, asking me: “These people draped in garments of white, who are they and where did they come from?”
And I said to him, “Good sir, you yourself know.”
And he said to me:
These are the ones just come from the great Suffering. They washed their garments clean and made them shining white in the blood of the Lamb.
That is why they can stand here before the throne of God
And serve him day and night in his temple.
The One who sits on the throne shall settle down upon them [dwell upon them].
They shall not hunger ever again, nor thirst again;
The sun shall not bear down too hard upon them, nor anything burn them,
Because the Lamb, in the midst of the throne, will be their shepherd
And guide them to the springs of the water of life,
And God will wipe away each teardrop from their eyes.

3^rd November Trinity
Oct 29, 2017
Revelation 7:9-17

To extract the juice from the grape, it must be crushed. The useless is removed and the pure, and its strengthening essence is released. The grape must, so to speak, suffer so that its essence can flow outward.

In the gospel reading, we hear of those who have just come from the great suffering. From time to time, we too are crushed. It is not because we are evil and deserve punishment; it is because we are ripe. Our essence is ready to be separated out from the non-essential, from the useless in us. Meister Eckhart* writes:

   When I was the stream, when I was the forest….there was nothing
   I could not
   love.

   It was when I left all we once were that
   the agony began, the fear and the questions came
   and I wept, I wept, tears….

Christ is present within our suffering. He suffers within us. He wipes our tears.  He helps us separate the bitter from the sweet. He washes us clean and clear in the wine-blood of his lovingkindness. He leads us to the spring of ever-transforming life.  As Meister Eckhart continues:
 
   So I returned to the river, I returned to

   the mountains. I asked for their hand in marriage again.
   I begged—I begged to wed every object
   and creature,

   and when they accepted,
   God was ever present in my arms.

   …For then I knew my soul—every soul—
   has always held
   Him.*

Our purest essence, at the center of our being, is lovingkindness. Our true nature flows outward, to comfort and strengthen others. Our true nature is wise and knowing. Our true nature willingly undergoes a transformation so that the world’s evolution moves forward. We are crushed so that our pure essence, the lovingkindness of Christ in us, can flow out into the world.

*“When I was the Forest,” in Love Poems from God, Daniel Ladinsky, pg. 91

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1st November Trinity 2016, Fire of Creative Love

1st November Trinity

Bowyer Bible

Revelation 1, 1-20

This is the unveiling of the being of Jesus Christ, which proceeds out of the divine world for those who would serve him. To them shall be revealed what must of necessity happen in the future and which powerfully presses into world events. God formed this revelation in imagery and sent it through his angel to his servant John. And so John speaks as a witness to everything he saw, that is, to the Divine Word, and to the life of Jesus Christ, which serves as a testimony. Blessed is he who knows how to read the prophetic words, and blessed are those who know how to hear them, and all who take what is written in this book into their souls; for time presses.

John, to the seven congregations in Asia:

Grace and peace to you

From Him who is, and who was, and who is coming

And from the seven creating spirits before his throne

And from Jesus Christ.

By his witnessing, he is the archetype of trust.

He is the first born from the realm of death,

He is the leading spirit of the Kings on earth.

He has turned to us in love, and by the power of his blood

He has released us from the spell of sin which lay upon us.

He has established us as true kings and made us into priests

before the divine Ground of the World, his Father.

To him belongs all light of the spirit and all power of soul from aeon to aeon. Amen.

See: he comes in the realm of the clouds.

All eyes shall see him, also the eyes of those who pierced him.

And men down the ages will lament about him. Yes. Amen.

I am the Alpha and the Omega,

Thus speaks the Lord our God

who is, and who was, and who is coming

the divine ruler of the world.

I, John, your brother and your companion in all trials and also in the inner kingdom and in the power of endurance which we possess through our one-ness with Jesus: I was on the island of Patmos. There it was granted to me to receive a share of the divine Word and to bear witness to the sufferings of Jesus.

On the Lord’s Day, I was lifted up to the world of spirit, and I heard behind me a mighty voice like the sound of a trumpet. It said: write what you see in a book and send it to the seven congregations: to Ephesus, to Smyrna, to Pergamum, to Thyatira, to Sardis, to Philadelphia and to Laodicia.

And I turned to see him whose voice was speaking to me. And as I turned I saw seven golden lampstands, and in the midst of the lampstands, a figure like that of the Son of Man:

clothed with a long billowing garment,

artist unknown

encircled round his breast with a golden band;

his head and his hair shining white like snow white wool,

his eyes like a flame of fire,

his feet like burnished bronze glowing in a furnace,

his voice like the rushing of many streams of water.

In his hand, he held seven stars;

from his mouth issued a sharp two-edged sword

and his face shone, as the sun shines in its full radiance.

And when I saw him, I fell at his feet and was as if dead. But he laid his right hand upon me and said:

“Do not be afraid. I am the first and the last, and the living one. I was dead, and look! I am living and I bear the life of the world through all aeons. Mine is the key to the realm of death and of the shades. Write down what you see: what is now, and what is to come.

The secret of the seven stars, which you see in my right hand, and of the seven golden lampstands is this: The seven stars are the picture in the spirit for the angels of the seven congregations, and the seven lampstands are the seven congregations themselves.”

1st November Trinity

October 30, 2016

Revelation 1, 1-20

Grunewald

We move into the dark time, toward the company of those who have died. The border between their world and ours becomes thin. And so we can more easily sense their presence. For our deceased loved ones still love us, are still united with us. Especially when we remember them, when we think of them in gratitude, they can be with us. They can continue to enrich our lives and perhaps even gently guide us.

Chief among those who have died and yet still live is Christ, the first-born in the realm of the dead. He is our ever-beloved, still alive in death, ever with us. We think of his ever-living presence so that He can be with us, enriching our souls, gently guiding us.

He is the ever-born Life, radiant with the light of the sun, blazing with the fire of creative love. He is our leader in the realm across the threshold of death. He is our guide in our congress with those who have crossed that threshold before us. The world beyond is no longer dark, for He who is the Light of Worlds now lives and works there.

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1st November Trinity 2014, Live In You

1^st November Trinity

Revelations 1, 1-20

This is the unveiling of the being of Jesus Christ, which proceeds out of the divine world for those who would serve him. To them shall be revealed what must of necessity happen in the future and which powerfully presses into world events. God formed this revelation in imagery and sent it through his angel to his servant John. And so John speaks as a witness to everything he saw, that is, to the Divine Word, and to the life of Jesus Christ, which serves as a testimony. Blessed is he who knows how to read the prophetic words, and blessed are those who know how to hear them, and all who take what is written in this book into their souls; for time presses.

John, to the seven congregations in Asia:

Grace and peace to you

From Him who is, and who was, and who is coming

And from the seven creating spirits before his throne

And from Jesus Christ.

By his witnessing he is the archetype of trust.

He is the first born from the realm of death,

He is the leading spirit of the Kings on earth.

He has turned to us in love, and by the power of his blood

He has released us from the spell of sin which lay upon us.

He has established us as true kings and made us into priests

before the divine Ground of the World, his Father.

To him belongs all light of the spirit and all power of soul from aeon to aeon. Amen.

See: he comes in the realm of the clouds.

All eyes shall see him, also the eyes of those who pierced him.

And men down the ages will lament about him. Yes. Amen.

I am the Alpha and the Omega,

Thus speaks the Lord our God

who is, and who was, and who is coming

the divine ruler of the world.

I, John, your brother and your companion in all trials and also in the inner kingdom and in the power of endurance which we possess through our one-ness with Jesus: I was on the island of Patmos. There it was granted to me to receive a share of the divine Word and to bear witness to the sufferings of Jesus.

On the Lord’s Day I was lifted up to the world of spirit, and I heard behind me a mighty voice like the sound of a trumpet. It said: write what you see in a book and send it to the seven congregations: to Ephesus, to Smyrna, to Pergamum, to Thyatira, to Sardis, to Philadelphia and to Laodicia.

And I turned to see him whose voice was speaking to me. And as I turned I saw seven golden lampstands, and in the midst of the lampstands, a figure like that of the Son of Man:

clothed with a long billowing garment,

encircled round his breast with a golden band;

        his head and his hair shining white like snow white wool,

his eyes like a flame of fire,

his feet like burnished bronze glowing in a furnace,

his voice like the rushing of many streams of water.

In his hand he held seven stars;

from his mouth issued a sharp two-edged sword

and his face shone, as the sun shines in its full radiance.

And when I saw him, I fell at his feet and was as if dead. But he laid his right hand upon me and said:

“Do not be afraid. I am the first and the last, and the living one. I was dead, and look! I am living and I bear the life of the world through all aeons. Mine is the key to the realm of death and of the shades. Write down what you see: what is now, and what is to come.

The secret of the seven stars, which you see in my right hand, and of the seven golden lampstands is this: The seven stars are the picture in the spirit for the angels of the seven congregations, and the seven lampstands are the seven congregations themselves.” 

1^st November Trinity

November 2, 2014

Revelations 1:1 – 20

Imagine being given two large seeds, a real one, and a cleverly made replica. Could we tell just by looking which one was real? Using all of our senses, could we distinguish between the living one and the merely material one? We could certainly test them by planting them and seeing which one sprouts.

Today there are many images and descriptions of people’s experiences of Christ Jesus. Perhaps not all of them correspond to the true, living, creating essence of His being. How can we tell the difference?

In His revelation to John, we have been given a true image of Christ. He bears a human form; yet one infused with fire. His head shines sun-white with the pure radiance of his thought. His breast is encircled with the gold of loving kindness. His eyes shine with the creative fire of love. His feet glow with the activity of purifying transformation. His hands hold the creative weaving of the seven-fold evolving nature of life. And his voice resounds with the life of living waters.

This is the true picture of Christ. And we can know that He is the true living one because he was planted in the earth and was born out of the realm of the dead. ‘I AM the Living One’, He says. ‘I AM the true seed. Plant me in your midst. Plant me in your hearts. Hear my life-giving voice in your congregations. Let me live in you.’

1st November Trinity, 2007, Soul's Sunlight

1^st November Trinity

Revelation 1, 1-20

This is the unveiling of the being of Jesus Christ, which proceeds out of the divine world for those who would serve him. To them shall be revealed what must of necessity happen in the future and which powerfully presses into world events. God formed this revelation in imagery and sent it through his angel to his servant John. And so John speaks as a witness to everything he saw, that is, to the Divine Word, and to the life of Jesus Christ, which serves as a testimony. Blessed is he who knows how to read the prophetic words, and blessed are those who know how to hear them, and all who take what is written in this book into their souls; for time presses.

John, to the seven congregations in Asia:

Grace and peace to you

From Him who is, and who was, and who is coming

And from the seven creating spirits before his throne

And from Jesus Christ.

By his witnessing he is the archetype of trust.

He is the first born from the realm of death,

He is the leading spirit of the Kings on earth.

He has turned to us in love, and by the power of his blood

He has released us from the spell of sin which lay upon us.

He has established us as true kings and made us into priests

before the divine Ground of the World, his Father.

To him belongs all light of the spirit and all power of soul from aeon to aeon. Amen.

See: he comes in the realm of the clouds.

All eyes shall see him, also the eyes of those who pierced him.

And men down the ages will lament about him. Yes. Amen.

I am the Alpha and the Omega,

Thus speaks the Lord our God

who is, and who was, and who is coming

the divine ruler of the world.

I, John, your brother and your companion in all trials and also in the inner kingdom and in the power of endurance which we possess through our one-ness with Jesus: I was on the island of Patmos. There it was granted to me to receive a share of the divine Word and to bear witness to the sufferings of Jesus.

On the Lord’s Day I was lifted up to the world of spirit, and I heard behind me a mighty voice like the sound of a trumpet. It said: write what you see in a book and send it to the seven congregations: to Ephesus, to Smyrna, to Pergamum, to Thyatira, to Sardis, to Philadelphia and to Laodicia.

And I turned to see him whose voice was speaking to me. And as I turned I saw seven golden lampstands, and in the midst of the lampstands, a figure like that of the Son of Man:

clothed with a long billowing garment,

encircled round his breast with a golden band;

his head and his hair shining white like snow white wool,

his eyes like a flame of fire,

his feet like burnished bronze glowing in a furnace,

his voice like the rushing of many streams of water.

In his hand he held seven stars;

from his mouth issued a sharp two-edged sword

and his face shone, as the sun shines in its full radiance.

And when I saw him, I fell at this feet and was as if dead. But he laid his right hand upon me and said:

“Do not be afraid. I am the first and the last, and the living one. I was dead, and look! I am living and I bear the life of the world through all aeons. Mine is the key to the realm of death and of the shades. Write down what you see: what is now, and what is to come.

The secret of the seven stars, which you see in my right hand, and of the seven golden lampstands is this: The seven stars are the picture in the spirit for the angels of the seven congregations, and the seven lampstands are the seven congregations themselves.”

1^st Sunday November Trinity

October 28, 2007

Revelation 1:1-20

The sun shines like a great globe in the heavens. It illuminates the sky and the earth, giving objects clear outlines, delineating light and shadow, shining on everything in an equally objective way. It draws growth upward. Its light is so intense that we cannot gaze at it directly.

Today’s reading unveils the dead and risen Christ as a being like the sun:

Head and hair shining white…

Eyes like a flame of fire…

Feet glowing…

Breast encircled with gold…

Face shining like the sun in its full power.[1]

The intense light of His being reveals all, both light and shadow, in an entirely objective way. In His light we see ourselves as the creatures of light and shadow that we are. Yet his gaze also contains another element. It is the fire, the living force and power of love. He shines on us in love, coming to our aid, banishing fear, helping us to rise and stand. Bathed in his light, objective but not judging, we are helped and healed, encouraged to grow.

Thomas Aquinas says:

Nothing in existence is turned away.[2]

The delight a child can know,

My Lord confesses He experiences

Whenever He looks at you.

God sees nothing in us

That He has not given.[3]

He is our soul’s sunlight. In Him we rise and grow.

www.thechristiancommunity.org

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[1] Rev. 1: 13-16

[2] Thomas  Aquinas, “The Mandate”, in Love Poems from God, by Daniel Ladinsky, p. 127

[3] Thomas Aquinas, “ Whenever He Looks at You”, Ibid., p. 132. 

1st November Trinity 2008, Spiritualizing Matter

1^st November Trinity

Revelation 1, 1-20

This is the unveiling of the being of Jesus Christ, which proceeds out of the divine world for those who would serve him. To them shall be revealed what must of necessity happen in the future and which powerfully presses into world events. God formed this revelation in imagery and sent it through his angel to his servant John. And so John speaks as a witness to everything he saw, that is, to the Divine Word, and to the life of Jesus Christ, which serves as a testimony. Blessed is he who knows how to read the prophetic words, and blessed are those who know how to hear them, and all who take what is written in this book into their souls; for time presses.

John, to the seven congregations in Asia:

Grace and peace to you

From Him who is, and who was, and who is coming

And from the seven creating spirits before his throne

And from Jesus Christ.

By his witnessing he is the archetype of trust.

He is the first born from the realm of death,

He is the leading spirit of the Kings on earth.

He has turned to us in love, and by the power of his blood

He has released us from the spell of sin which lay upon us.

He has established us as true kings and made us into priests

before the divine Ground of the World, his Father.

To him belongs all light of the spirit and all power of soul from aeon to aeon. Amen.

See: he comes in the realm of the clouds.

All eyes shall see him, also the eyes of those who pierced him.

And men down the ages will lament about him. Yes. Amen.

I am the Alpha and the Omega,

Thus speaks the Lord our God

who is, and who was, and who is coming

the divine ruler of the world.

I, John, your brother and your companion in all trials and also in the inner kingdom and in the power of endurance which we possess through our one-ness with Jesus: I was on the island of Patmos. There it was granted to me to receive a share of the divine Word and to bear witness to the sufferings of Jesus.

On the Lord’s Day I was lifted up to the world of spirit, and I heard behind me a mighty voice like the sound of a trumpet. It said: write what you see in a book and send it to the seven congregations: to Ephesus, to Smyrna, to Pergamum, to Thyatira, to Sardis, to Philadelphia and to Laodicia.

And I turned to see him whose voice was speaking to me. And as I turned I saw seven golden lampstands, and in the midst of the lampstands, a figure like that of the Son of Man:

clothed with a long billowing garment,

encircled round his breast with a golden band;

his head and his hair shining white like snow white wool,

his eyes like a flame of fire,

his feet like burnished bronze glowing in a furnace,

his voice like the rushing of many streams of water.

In his hand he held seven stars;

from his mouth issued a sharp two-edged sword

and his face shone, as the sun shines in its full radiance.

And when I saw him, I fell at this feet and was as if dead. But he laid his right hand upon me and said:

“Do not be afraid. I am the first and the last, and the living one. I was dead, and look! I am living and I bear the life of the world through all aeons. Mine is the key to the realm of death and of the shades. Write down what you see: what is now, and what is to come.

The secret of the seven stars, which you see in my right hand, and of the seven golden lampstands is this: The seven stars are the picture in the spirit for the angels of the seven congregations, and the seven lampstands are the seven congregations themselves.”

1^st November Trinity

Nov. 1, 2008

Rev. 1: 1-20

When God created us, he first created the human archetype. He said, “Let us make the human being in our image, after our likeness.” Genesis 1:26  We can barely begin to imagine the glory of that image of the human being in the heart of God.

On earth, when small children begin to draw people, they create stick figures. Only after many years of practice and development of talent could a person attempt to paint a depiction of the archetype of the human being in living color.

Today’s gospel paints a mighty rendering of the Divine Human Being. He is the archetype, the image of the Human Being spiritualized. This is why John struggles to describe him using so many similies – hair like snow, like wool, eyes like flames, feet like bronze glowing in a furnace. This spiritualized Divine Human Being calls himself the first and the last. He is the picture that harkens back to how God made us in the beginning. He is also the picture of what the human being will be at the end of time – light-filled, radiant like the sun.

We human beings are currently at the stick figure phase of our development. We are encased in matter, spiritually inept, childlike. But standing before us is the image of the goal of human evolution, the image of our spiritual maturity, the Son of Man. John calls him the archetype of trust and faith. He is the picture of God’s trust in humanity. Because of what Christ Jesus did, the divine world can have faith and trust in humanity. For God sent into human form Christ, who accomplished His mighty deed of death, resurrection and ascension. Christ fulfilled the great human archetype on earth. He achieved the spiritualization of the human form.

Because of Christ Jesus, humanity’s goal is again within reach for all of us. For whatever one human being achieves on earth becomes accessible to all of us. He embodies the promise that our work on our human development, our work in the spirit, our work of spiritualizing matter will one day bear fruit. This is the new belief, the new faith that the Divine world has in us. One day we too will join Christ in the Human Form Divine. One day we too will be light-filled, radiant like the sun.

 

St. Augustine pictured:

…an eternal day, consecrated by the radiating

resurrection of Christ, and prefiguring

…not of spirit only, but of the body, too.

There we shall rest and see, see and love,

love and praise. This is what shall be

in our exalted end without end.[1]

www.thechristiancommunity.org

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[1] St. Augustine, “The Eighth Day”, in Love’s Immensity, Mystics on the Endless Life, by Scott Cairns, p. 48.