Ascension 2016, Water of Life

Ascension by Wm. Blake

Ascension

John 16: 24-33

[Hitherto you have asked nothing 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.

I leave the sense world again and return to the world of the Father, of which you say that it is the world of death.”

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.”

Clouds, NASA

Ascension

May 5, 8, 2016

John 16: 24-33

Water has the wonderful capacity to change forms easily. As solid ice, it floats. As a liquid, it flows downward to the lowest point it can find. As water vapor, it is invisible, a small amount occupying a vast space. Under the right conditions, the invisible vapor condenses into visible clouds and returns to earth as liquid rain.

Christ is the Water of Life. He took on a solid body in Jesus. At his death, he descended into the earth. At the Resurrection, he gave birth to his life form, sometimes visible, mostly not. At Ascension he became like water vapor – he expanded his nature and being into the entire biosphere of the earth. Like water vapor, he is invisible. But he is the Life that surrounds and penetrates both the earth and us. We breathe him in with every breath we take. Under the right circumstances, he condenses and becomes visible again.

Last Supper, Rosenkranz

One of those times is during the Act of Consecration, the communion service. At his Last Supper, he chose bread and wine to be forever the visible forms of his life. He chose bread to be his body, the form in which he appears. He chose the juice of the vine to be visibly his rejuvenating life, his life blood. And he offers them to us in communion so that we have the opportunity to take in his formative forces, his Life, in a conscious way. In this way, he walks the earth, in us. We may hear him in the words of the poet:

In a mist of light

falling with the rain

I walk this ground

of which [dead] men

and women I have loved

are part, as they

are part of me.  In earth,

in blood, in mind,

the dead and living

into each other pass,

as the living pass

in and out of loves

as stepping to a song.

The way I go is

marriage to this place,

grace beyond chance,

love's braided dance

covering the world.[1]

---

[1]  Wendell Berry in The Wheel

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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