Holy Nights, January 4, 2015, Healing Goodness

Holy Nights

1 Corinthians 12:31- 13:13

Strive to make the best out of the gifts of grace working together. Yet I will show the way that is higher than all others.

If I speak out of the Spirit with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, then my speaking remains as sounding brass or tinkling cymbal. And if I had the gift of prophecy and could speak of all the mysteries and could impart all knowledge and, further, had the power of faith that removes mountains, yet am without love, then I am nothing. And if I were to give away everything that is mine, and lastly were to give away even my body for burning, yet am without love, then all is in vain.

Love makes the soul great;

Love fills the soul with healing goodness;

Love does not know envy;

It knows no boasting;

It does not allow falseness;

Love does not harm that which is decent.

It drives out self-seeking.

Love does not allow inner balance to be lost.

It does not bear a grudge.

It does not rejoice over injustice.

It rejoices only in the truth.

Love bears all things,

Is always prepared to have faithful trust.

It may hope for everything and is all-patient.

If love is truly present, it cannot be lost. The gift of prophecy will one day be extinguished, the wonder of languages cease, clairvoyant insight come to an end. Our insight is incomplete, incomplete is our prophecy.

But one day the perfect must come, the complete consecration – aim; then the time of the incomplete is over.

When I was still a child, I spoke as a child, and I felt and thought as a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me.

Now we still see things in dark outlines, as in a mirror. Some day we will see everything face to face. Now my insight is incomplete, but then I shall stand in the stream of true insight, in which recognizing and being recognized are one.

We find permanence that bears all future within it in the exalted triad:

In faith

In hope,

And in love.

But the greatest of these is love.

Holy Nights

January 4, 2015

1 Corinthians 12:31- 13:13

On the altar we still see the words: Peace on earth to all of good will. What is it that makes us into people of good will? That which turns our will toward goodness, that which makes our will beneficial, is Truth.

Lies create ill will; they literally create a will that becomes ill, sick and ailing. Truth creates wellness. Truth creates good will, healthy will. And a truthful good will creates love.

Love does not allow falseness

Love does not harm what is decent

It drives out self seeking….

Love does not rejoice in injustice, only in the truth.[1]

This is an old idea. Psalm 15 says:

Lord, who can be trusted with power,

and who may act in your place?

Those with a passion for justice,

who speak the truth from their hearts;

who have let go of selfish interests

and grown beyond their own lives;

who see the wretched as their family

and the poor as their flesh and blood.

They alone are impartial

and worthy of the people's trust.

Their compassion lights up the whole earth,

and their kindness endures forever.[2]

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[1] Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians 13:5, 6

[2] (The Psalms, translations by Stephen Mitchell)

Holy Nights, December 28, 2014, Grow Me

Philippians 2: 5 – 16

December 28, 2014

Be imbued with the same state of mind that also filled Christ Jesus himself: For, although he was of divine nature and form, he chose not to lay claim for himself to be equal to God.  Rather, he emptied himself in offering and took on the form of a servant. In human form he took on body and he showed himself in the form of a man throughout his whole life. Humbly and selflessly he submitted to the laws of earth-existence, even to the experience of the death on the cross.

Therefore God has also exalted him to the highest heights and given him the name which is above every other name. 

In the name of Jesus the knees of all beings should bow, in the heavens, on the earth, and in the depths of existence. And so that the Father, the Ground of all existence shall be revealed, every tongue should acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord!

Therefore, my dear friends, just as you always did—listen to the voice of the spirit, not only when I am with you, but now all the more since I am far away from you. Work with anxious effort and trembling expectation, to the end that the realm of healing power may open to you. For it is God who awakens the will in you and who brings about the fulfillment, so that everything can become good.

Do not let yourselves be held back in that work by sluggishness of the will or by restless thoughts which make you indecisive. , Only so can you live, without blemish and falseness, as pure, “children of God in the midst of a dissipated and twisted humanity.” You are to shine among human beings like bright stars in the sky by keeping to the Word of Life.

Holy Nights

December 28, 2014

Philippians 2: 5 – 16

The sky can be filled with clouds. They can obscure the light of the sun. But above the clouds, the sun continues to shine forth its brightness, illuminating the clouds themselves.  Even when the sun sets, seeming to be swallowed up by darkness, it is nonetheless shining, continuing to illuminate the earth.

Christ, the Light of the World, the Sun-God, entered the form of the human being. Gradually his brightness was clouded over by the human constitution, until finally, like the sun at the end of the day, His light seemed to disappear into the darkness of death. Yet He continued to shine in the depths. He is the seed that will grow the earth into a new sun, a new star.

Since then, Christ has entered the form of all human beings. He dwells in us as a Light-Seed, as the potential for us to become shining miniature suns. He hopes we will hear his voice calling us, as the voice within that says: Become! Develop! Grow me within you!

He is waiting for us to cultivate Him in the depths of our souls, in the hearts of our communities, to grow His being in us.

“For [as Paul says] we are to shine…like bright stars in the sky by keeping to the Word of Life.”

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Holy Nights 2013-14, Inner Sunlight

Holy Nights

John 15: 9-17

[Jesus said:]

As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you – abide in my love. If you take my aims into your will, then you will abide in my love, just as I have taken the aims of my Father into my will and abide in His love. These words I have spoken to you that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete.

This is the task I put before you, that you love one another as I have loved you. No man can have greater love than this, that he offer up his life for his friends. You are my friends if you follow the task that I give to you. No longer can I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I call you friends because I have made known to you all that I have heard from my Father. You did not choose me, but I have chosen you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should live on after you, so that what you ask the Father in my name He should give it to you. This I say to you out of the fullness of my power – love one another.

Holy Nights

January 5, 2014

John 15: 9-17

We are fortunate here in this part of the world to have a strong winter sun. Even when the air is cold, we can get warm by stepping out of the shade.

The heavenly Father continuously showers His love upon us. Outer sunlight is a physical manifestation of the light of His love. Jesus asks us to stand and stay with Him within the spiritual sunlight of His own and Our Father’s love. For He want to warm us and bring us joy.

The sunlight is also a manifestation of the Father’s Life; for with the sunlight, rays of life pour down and cause all things to live.

And He sets us a task—that we transmit that inner sunlight to others; that we be warm and objectively loving; that we give of our life forces. Standing in the light of the Son’s love, we will never run out of life to give; for we will have connected ourselves to the Source of Life, the Source of Love Himself.

Fra Giovanni said in 1513:  Life is so generous a giver, but we, judging its gifts by their covering, cast them away as ugly or heavy or hard. Remove the covering, and you will find beneath it a living splendour, woven of love, by wisdom, with power. Welcome it, grasp it, and you touch the Angel’s hand that brings it to you. Everything we call a trial, a sorrow, or a duty: believe me, that angel’s hand is there; the gift is there, and the wonder of an overshadowing Presence. Our joys, too: be not content with them as joys, they too conceal diviner gifts.

  Life is so full of meaning and of purpose, so full of beauty—beneath its covering—that you will find that earth but cloaks your heaven. Courage, then to claim it: that is all! But courage you have; and the knowledge that we are pilgrims together, wending through unknown country, home.

  And so, at this Christmas time, I greet you; not quite as the world sends greetings, but with profound esteem, and with the prayer that for you, now and forever, the day breaks and the shadows flee away.[1]


www.thechristiancommunity.org

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[1] FRA GIOVANNI, A Letter to the Most Illustrious the Contessina Allagia Dela Aldobrandeschi, Written Christmas Eve Anno Domini 1513 

Holy Nights 2009, Give Light

Holy Nights

1 Corinthians 12:31- 13:13

Strive to make the best out of the gifts of grace working together.

Yet I will show the way that is higher than all others.

If I speak out of the Spirit with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, then my speaking remains as sounding brass or tinkling cymbal. And if I had the gift of prophecy and could speak of all the mysteries and could impart all knowledge and, further, had the power of faith that removes mountains, yet am without love, then I am nothing. And if I were to give away everything that is mine, and lastly were to give away even my body for burning, yet am without love, then all is in vain.

Love makes the soul great;

Sanz-Cardona

Love fills the soul with healing goodness;

Love does not know envy;

It knows no boasting;

It does not allow falseness;

Love does not harm that which is decent.

It drives out self-seeking.

Love does not allow inner balance to be lost.

It does not bear a grudge.

It does not rejoice over injustice.

It rejoices only in the truth.

Love bears all things,

Is always prepared to have faithful trust.

It may hope for everything and is all-patient.

If love is truly present, it cannot be lost. The gift of prophecy will one day be extinguished, the wonder of languages cease, clairvoyant insight come to an end. Our insight is incomplete, incomplete is our prophecy.

But one day the perfect must come, the complete consecration – aim; then the time of the incomplete is over.

When I was still a child, I spoke as a child, and I felt and thought as a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me.

Now we still see things in dark outlines, as in a mirror. Some day we will see everything face to face. Now my insight is incomplete, but then I shall stand in the stream of true insight, in which recognizing and being recognized are one.

We find permanence that bears all future within it in the exalted triad:

In faith

In hope,

And in love.

But the greatest of these is love. 

Holy Nights

January 4, 2009

1 Corinthians 13:1-13

In this part of the world we have the beautiful vista of the sunrise over the mountains. At first the light silhouettes their dark massiveness. But as it climbs higher, the light begins to illuminate them. When it reaches its zenith, all is flooded with light and warmth.

Sanz-Cardona

The human being is like a morning landscape. The solidity of the body is a silhouette against the light of the spirit. But from a deep memory of the body’s origins in realms of warmth and light, we can experience the body’s hope of its future transformation, its future flooding with light.

The soul itself, too, dimly knows its own origins to be from other realms. On earth it must experience the daily round of darkness and sleep again and again. Yet because of the steadfastness of the sun’s daily rising and setting, and rising again, the soul can have a deep trust and faith in its own return to the light realms of its origins.

And buried deep between our souls and our bodies lies that mysterious realm we call our life force. Of all our make-up, this part of us is most directly connected to the sunlight itself. And like the sun, it is radiant with light, a light that is warm and life-giving, a light that will ultimately transform the whole landscape of our human constitution. For here, where life illuminates soul, is where love dwells. Here, in the realm of the life force, lies the possibility of developing a love that lives like the sun, which shines on all alike; a love that, like the sun, radiates in steady balance; a love that does not exist in order to illuminate itself.

Hope in the future and faith in the progress of humanity are two supports for the soul. But on top of these two supports is the living altar of love. It is love that enlarges and enlightens our soul. It is love that fills the soul with the light and warmth of healing goodness. It is love that is our gift of offering to our fellow human beings, our gift of offering to God.

The poet says:

It happens all the time in heaven,

And some day

It will begin to happen

Again on earth—

That men and women…

Who give each other

Light, …

Will sincerely speak, saying:

“My dear,

How can I be more loving to you’

How can I be more

Kind?”[1]

www.thechristiancommunity.org

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[1] Hafiz, “It Happens All the Time in Heaven”, in Tonight the Subject is Love, Daniel Ladinsky, p. 45.

Holy Nights 2010, Chalice of Healing

Holy Nights

1 Corinthians 12:31- 13:13

Strive to make the best out of the gifts of grace working together.

Yet I will show the way that is higher than all others.

If I speak out of the Spirit with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, then my speaking remains as sounding brass or tinkling cymbal. And if I had the gift of prophecy and could speak of all the mysteries and could impart all knowledge and, further, had the power of faith that removes mountains, yet am without love, then I am nothing. And if I were to give away everything that is mine, and lastly were to give away even my body for burning, yet am without love, then all is in vain.

Love makes the soul great;

Love fills the soul with healing goodness;

Love does not know envy;

It knows no boasting;

It does not allow falseness;

Love does not harm that which is decent.

It drives out self-seeking.

Love does not allow inner balance to be lost.

It does not bear a grudge.

It does not rejoice over injustice.

It rejoices only in the truth.

Love bears all things,

Is always prepared to have faithful trust.

It may hope for everything and is all-patient.

If love is truly present, it cannot be lost. The gift of prophecy will one day be extinguished, the wonder of languages cease, clairvoyant insight come to an end. Our insight is incomplete, incomplete is our prophecy.

But one day the perfect must come, the complete consecration – aim; then the time of the incomplete is over.

When I was still a child, I spoke as a child, and I felt and thought as a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me.

Now we still see things in dark outlines, as in a mirror. Some day we will see everything face to face. Now my insight is incomplete, but then I shall stand in the stream of true insight, in which recognizing and being recognized are one.

We find permanence that bears all future within it in the exalted triad:

In faith

In hope,

And in love.

But the greatest of these is love. 

Holy Nights

January 3, 2010

1 Corinthians 12:31 - 13:13

Paul describes love as a soul’s way of being and acting. He describes love as verb.

He speaks of the loving soul’s open spaciousness, a soul aligned with truth, balanced and patient. A loving soul foregoes meanness and selflessly supports decency. In other words, a soul filled with love is full of good will.  Love’s antitheses—spiteful envy, arrogance and selfishness—bespeak a soul whose will is ill, a soul in need of healing.

Love works as a healing force, both the love we receive, but more importantly, the love we generate and give.

The mystery of the Act of Consecration of Man, the communion service, is that demonstrates the process of learning how to love. First we receive God’s love by hearing, receiving a portion of the life of Christ in the Gospel. Then we undertake to make a real offering. We gather our purest thoughts, our most Christened feelings, and our most energetic will, and we pour them into the chalice along with wine and water, offering them all to the Father as a chalice of healing. Our modest, meager act of love toward Him is made strong and potent by Christ’s love joining ours. In Communion, the love we offered to the Father returns to us multiplied, as the gracious, peaceful love that Christ embodies in the bread and wine that enters us. We receive the healing medicine for our will’s illness.

This is an enactment, a kind of foreshadowing of what will one day be achieved. Right now we can only enact love partially, in outline, as in a mirror. But one day we too will, in good will, work face to face with the Master of Love, in Whom recognizing and being recognized are one. 

www.thechristiancommunity.org

Holy Nights 2010, Be Still

James 1:2-18

Whenever you face trials of any kind, consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, because you know that the inner strength of patience grows in you through the testing of your faith. But this patient perseverance must lead to fulfillment so that you may become mature and whole human beings, not held back in any respect. If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask it of God, who gives generously to all without reservation and without reproaches, and what he asks for will be given to him. Only he must ask out of a believing heart, not with a doubting soul.  A doubter is like a wave of the sea, moved and thrown hither and thither by the wind. Such a man should not think that he is able to receive anything from the Lord. Such a person is divided and unstable in all his ways.

Arild Rosenkrantz

A brother or sister who considers himself among the lowly may pride himself on his greatness; whoever is rich may be proud of his lowliness. since he will perish like a flower in the grass. When the sun rises with scorching heat, it makes green grass wither and the flower drops off. The beauty in which it appeared to us perishes. So also human wealth will fade away along Man’s paths.

Blessed is the one who perseveres under trial and withstands the temptation, because, having stood the test, that person will receive the wreath of life that the Lord has promised to those who love him.

When tempted, no one should say, “I am being led into temptation by God.” For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he lead anyone into temptation; Every temptation that a human being experiences arises out of his own cravings and desires, which lure and entice him. When human desire once has conceived, then it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, brings forth death.

Do not be deceived, my dear brothers and sisters. Every truly good and perfect gift descends to us out of the higher world from the Father of the heavenly lights, in whom there is no alternation and no phases of light and darkness. Out of his cosmic will, he called us to life through the truth-bearing Word. We were to be the first fruits among his creatures.

Holy Nights

January 2, 2010

James 1: 2-18

When a wheel is in motion, any given point on the rim is for a while above, and for a while below, bearing the full weight. And then it is above again. Progress, motion forward creates this dynamic.

The world of time is created in the progress of the great wheel of the circling seasons. Our own lives are an example of the motion of the greater wheel of life. For a while we are lifted up. Then we descend to bearing a heavy load. This is a prelude to our rising again.

James in his letter reminds us that our progress in life, with its ups and downs, depends on our patient endurance and our perseverance. This perseverance is a result our wholehearted, undoubting trust in God’s beneficent purpose. Eventually our load-bearing progress will lead us to our goal. We will be mature and whole human beings. We will take our place dancing in the heavens with the Father of Lights.

The poet T.S. Elliot expressed this thought:

Angel of Hope, Iris Sullivan

I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope

For hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait without love

For love would be love of the wrong thing; there is yet faith

But the faith and the love and the hope are all in the waiting.

…..

So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing[1].

www.thechristiancommunity.org

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[1] T.S. Eliot, The Four Quartets

New Year's Eve 2009, Offering Light

New Year's Eve

Genesis 1: 1-8

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

And the earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep; and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters.

Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light.

And God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness.

And God called the light day and the darkness he called night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day.

Then God said, “Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters.”

And God made the expanse, and separated the waters which were below from the waters which were above the expanse; and it was so.

And God called the expanse heaven. And there was evening and there was morning. A second day. 

And God said, “Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear.” And it was so. God called the dry ground “land,” and the gathered waters he called “seas.” And God saw that it was good.

Blake

Then God said, “Let the land produce vegetation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit with seed in it, according to their various kinds.” And it was so. The land produced vegetation: plants bearing seed according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening, and there was morning—the third day.

And God said, “Let there be lights in the vault of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them serve as signs to mark sacred times, and days and years, and let them be lights in the vault of the sky to give light on the earth.” And it was so. God made two great lights—the greater light to govern the day and the lesser light to govern the night. He also made the stars. God set them in the vault of the sky to give light on the earth, to govern the day and the night, and to separate light from darkness. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening, and there was morning—the fourth day.

And God said, “Let the water teem with living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the vault of the sky.” So God created the great creatures of the sea and every living thing with which the water teems and that moves about in it, according to their kinds, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. God blessed them and said, “Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the water in the seas, and let the birds increase on the earth.” And there was evening, and there was morning—the fifth day.

And God said, “Let the land produce living creatures according to their kinds: the livestock, the creatures that move along the ground, and the wild animals, each according to its kind.” And it was so. God made the wild animals according to their kinds, the livestock according to their kinds, and all the creatures that move along the ground according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good.

Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.”

Blake

So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.

God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”

Then God said, “I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. 30 And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds in the sky and all the creatures that move along the ground—everything that has the breath of life in it—I give every green plant for food.” And it was so.

God saw all that he had made, and it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning—the sixth day.

New Year’s Eve

December 31, 2009

Genesis 1:1-8

  

God’s very first act of creation was to generate light. At first diffuse, He separated the darkness out and gave the light form in sun, moon and stars. And finally He created the Light-Form of the Human Being. We are created as an image of God. Like God, the human being is a creator.

Iris Sullivan

Tonight, at the midnight hour, at this generation of a new year, our noblest thoughts and highest hopes are given a particular power. Normally what we think and strive toward is received by the angels and the archangels, the angels closest to us. They work as best they can with what we offer them, to help bring the future into being. But on New Year’s, the portals to the heavenly staircase are, for a moment, thrown open. Our noblest thoughts rise all the way up to the highest hierarchies. They in turn, give our offerings a particularly strong power to become reality. At New Year’s, the light of the future begins to take form.

Strange to think that perhaps God needs what we have to offer, in order to create the future; that He invites our creativity. In the words of Nelly Sachs,

  

…Perhaps God needs the longing, wherever else shall it dwell,

….And perhaps is invisible soil from which roots of stars grow and swell -

….Perhaps in the sky of longing worlds have been born of our love -

….Around us already perhaps future moons, suns, and stars blaze in a fiery wreath.[1]

www.thechristiancommunity.org

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[1] Nelly Sachs, (Translated by Ruth and Matthew Mead, in A Book of Women Poets from Antiquity to Now, ed. by Aliki and Willis Barnstone)