3rd November Trinity 2016, The Great Suffering

3rd November Trinity

Durer, Adoration of the Lamb ,Metropolitan Museum

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,

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

3rd November Trinity

November 13, 2016

Revelation 7: 9-17

The word 'suffer' has two meanings. One meaning is to mourn, to fell sorrow or regret over loss. The second meaning is to 'undergo', to endure patiently, to allow.

Grunewald Crucifixion

In the reading today, we hear about those who have undergone the Great Suffering. They are those who on earth have patiently endured life's losses. One existential loss we all suffer under is our lack of an immediate awareness of God and his angels. We long for a lost paradise. This is a trial certainly, but a suffering to be endured for a purpose. This very lack of awareness is the basis for our freedom of choice. We can choose to rail against our fate. Or we can decide to patiently endure this condition of separateness. And eventually, our suffering will bear fruit. For pain and suffering properly endured are purifying. Through suffering endured, our life garments are washed clean of egotism.

Master of the Holy Trinity, Mosoc

Pain and suffering create organs of perception. Our inner eye opens to the great suffering of others. They open to the great suffering of the divine on behalf of humanity. We become aware that the divine world needs our help, our active participation. Our acknowledgment, our praise and honoring of the great divine work of World Karma strengthens God's purpose in the world. 

Those whose eye is opened can, like Job, begin to see. They can begin to say, The Lord gives, and the Lord takes back. May the name of the Lord be praised.*

*Job 1: 21
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2nd November Trinity 2016, Cannot Forget You

2nd Trinity November

Rev. 3, 1-6, (Sardis)

And to the angel who penetrates the congregation of Sardis write:

Angels of Seven Churches, Tiffany

Thus speaks he who has power over the seven creating spirits of God and over the seven stars: I know the consequences of your deeds, for one says of you that you live, and yet are dead. Awaken and strengthen what remains in you, that is otherwise about to die, for I have not found that your works possess reality before my God.

Remember how you were once receptive for all the workings of the spirit, and for all words which came from the spirit. Care for them in your soul in inner loyalty. Change your heart and mind.

If however, you do not awaken, I will come over you suddenly like a thief, and you will not know at which hour I will come over you.

But you have some names in Sardis whose souls have not been darkened by illusion and addiction to the senses. They will walk with me in white garments, for they are worthy of them.

He who overcomes, he shall be clothed with white garments, and I will not wipe out his name from the Book of Life. I will speak out his name and acknowledge him before my Father and his Angels. He who has ears to hear, let him hear what the spirit says to the churches.

Angel of Sardis, Tiffany 

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2nd November Trinity 

Nov 6, 2016

Rev. 3, 1-6, (Sardis)

Whenever a group of people come together regularly and voluntarily, there is an angel who takes an interest in their working. What the members of the group do together enables the angel connected with them to work in a wakeful, creative and inspiring way.

The strong words of the Son of Man in this reading are directed at the angel of the congregation. He says that the angel is about to die, that is, to fall unconscious. The angel's works do not possess full spiritual reality.

This causes us to ask how the creative power of the angel and the members of the congregation work together. For in their essence, they are bound together.

Individual in the congregation, the names of souls, are themselves to be conscious, awake and receptive to the creative workings of the spiritual world and the promptings of their angel. They are to remember and remain loyal to the inspirations they have received in the past. They are not to allow their relation to the sense world to darken their perceptions of the spirit.

It is then that the individuals who join in congregation can nourish and refresh the community's angel. We might hear the angel's voice in a poem by Rolf Jacobsen

I am one you have loved long ago.

I walk alongside you by day and look intently at you

and put my mouth on your heart

but you don’t know it.

I am your third arm and your second

shadow, the white one,

whom you don’t have the heart for

and who cannot ever forget you.*

*Rolf Jacobsen, "Guardian Angel" transl. by Roger Greenwald http://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/390357.html

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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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4th Michaelmas 2016, Loyal

2nd 3rd or 4th Michaelmas Sunday

Revelation 19, 11-16

And I saw the heavens opening up. And behold, a white horse! And the rider who sat upon it is called faithful and true, who judges justly and battles for justice. His eyes are like flames of fire, and his head wears many crowns, inscribed with a name which no one knows but he himself. The cloak that covers him has been dipped in blood, and he is known by the name “Word of God”.

And the warriors of the sky ride behind him upon white steeds, clad in clean, white linen. And he has a sharp-edged sword coming out of his mouth with which to subdue the nations, and he will shepherd them with a staff of iron. He treads on the winepress holding the wine of the wrath of the will of God, the ruler of all.

And written on his cloak and on his thigh is the name: King of all kings, Lord of all lords.

2nd 3rd or 4th Michaelmas Sunday

October 23, 2016

Revelation 19, 11-16

Here in the North, we are descending into the cold and dark time of the year. Yet as we cross the threshold into darkness, an image lights up. It is an image of light and fire, painted in colors of red, white and gold. The white horse, and white linens, the red of blood and wine, the gold of flame and crowns.

Like the woman clothed with the sun, this too is an image of humanity. It is the image of an ever enlarging humanity led by the rider in white, wearing the many crowns of nations and of lives.

He is a leader who reigns from within the body. He rides the white horse of a purified intelligence. He will cover us with the white linen of his truth and justice. His staff of iron will strengthen our blood and our inner resolves, pressing out all of our selfishness and greed.

He is faithful, loyal to his own mission of helping humanity. He leads us in our battle against the adversaries of our true human nature. The very colors express our true humanity: the white of clear pure thinking, the gold of a loving heart, the red of a will devoted to God and to humanity. He leads. He asks us to follow. 

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