3rd St. Johnstide 2010, What You Are

St. Johnstide

Luke 3: 7-18

John said to the crowds coming out to be baptized by him, “You are sons of the serpent yet! Who led you to believe that you can avoid the decline of the old ways of the soul? Produce true fruits in keeping with a change of heart and mind. And do not begin excusing yourselves by saying, “We have Abraham as our father.” For I tell you that God can raise up sons for Abraham out of these stones. The ax is already poised at the root of the trees, so every tree that does not produce good fruit is felled and thrown into the fire.”

“What should we do then?” the crowd asked.

John answered, “Let the man with two tunics share with him who has none, and the one who has food should do the same.”

Tax collectors also came to be baptized. “Teacher,” they asked, “what should we do?”

John Preaching, Ghirlandaio

“Do not collect any more than you are authorized to do,” he told them.

           

Then some soldiers asked him, “And what should we do?”He replied, “Do not intimidate and do not accuse people falsely—be content with your pay.”

The people were waiting expectantly and were all wondering in their hearts if John might possibly be the Christ, the Messiah.

John answered them all, “I wash you with water. But one more powerful than I will come, the thongs of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will wash you with the breath of the Holy Spirit and with fire. His winnowing fan is in his hand to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn, while he burns up the chaff with unquenchable fire.”

And with many and various exhortations John preached the good news to the people. 

3^rd St. Johnstide

July 11, 2010

Luke 3: 7 -18

Living things change and evolve. If a plant never put out new leaves, never flowered or produced fruit and seeds, we would wonder if it had died. Evolution ultimately manifests in outwardly visible ‘deeds’.

John’s message about a change of heart and mind is an encouragement to us to keep on evolving. When the crowd asks him how to do this, he points to changes in behavior, to deeds done in the outer world. He encourages deeds of sharing, compassion and right relationship to our fellow human beings. He points to deeds motivated by social justice, by a respectful relationship to those who are not only our equals, but also toward those over whom we have authority.

Six centuries earlier, Buddha had brought this teaching to mankind in his eightfold path. John is exhorting us to take up this path again seriously, as a preparation for the One who fulfills all. By making our own inner and outer evolutionary steps, we will ‘make His paths straight’. Through transformative deeds, which demonstrate the transformation of our hearts, the ‘guilt-laden seed of mankind’ will be cleansed and made viable toward the future, and receptive to the Coming One.

For in the words of another ancient wise teacher, Lao Tzu: 

This is the profound, simple truth:

            You are the master of your life and death.

            What you do is what you are.

www.thechristiancommunity.org

3rd St. Johnstide 2012, Drops of the Sun

John in Prison

St. Johnstide

Matthew 11: 2-15

When John heard in prison about the deeds of Christ, he sent his disciples to ask him, “Are you the one who is to come, or should we expect someone else?”

Jesus replied, “Go back and report to John what you hear and see: the blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are awakened, and those who have become poor receive the message of salvation. Blessed are those who are not offended by my Being.”

When they had gone, Jesus began to speak about John. “Why did you go out into the desert? Did you want to see a reed swaying in the wind? Or was it something else you wanted to see? Did you want to see a man in splendid garments? Those in splendid garments are in the palaces of kings. Did you go to see a man who is initiated into he mysteries of the spirit, a prophet? Yes, I say to you—he is more than a prophet. He it is of whom it is written:

           

            Behold it well: I will send my angel before your face;

            He shall prepare the way of your working in the hearts of men

            So that your being may be revealed.

John the Baptist

The truth I say to you: among all who are born of women, not one has risen up who is greater than John the Baptist; and yet the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he. From the days of John the Baptist, and even more now, the kingdom of heaven will arise within human beings through the power of the will; those who exert themselves can freely grasp it. The deeds of the prophets and the content of the Law are words of the spirit that were valid [worked into the future] until the time of John. And if you want to accept it, he is Elijah who is to come. He who has ears to hear, let him hear.”

3^rd St. Johnstide

July 8, 2012

Matthew 11: 2-15

The sun can shine mightily. Yet the bird in the covered cage will not sing. The plant kept in the dark will not thrive. Uncover the cage, place the plant near the sunlight, and they respond to the light.

When John the Baptist asks from prison whether Jesus is the Messiah, the answer is not a simple yes or no. Rather Jesus points to the effects of his deeds. He has uncovered the soul-cages, brought human souls to the spirit light.

Not only those physically blind, but also soul-blind and soul-deaf can see and hear. Deadened souls are awakened. Weak souls can rise and move forward. The outcasts, the beggars for the spirit receive heaven’s healing richness.

The point is that the working of Christ was and continues to show itself as effective within human beings. “Through Him can the healing spirit work.”[1] And those who choose to follow the Christ path become those who, through Christ working in them, are also effective among their fellow human beings in a healing and uplifting way. 

We can hear in a poem by Hafiz how our souls relate to the Spirit-Sun:

I know the voice of depression

Baptism, Berry's Book of Hours 

Still calls to you.

I know those habits that can ruin your life

Still send their invitations.

But you are with the Friend now

And look so much stronger.

You can stay that way

And even bloom!

Keep squeezing drops of the Sun

From your prayers and work and music

And from your companions' beautiful laughter.

Keep squeezing drops of the Sun

From the sacred hands and glance of your Beloved…[2]

www.thechristiancommunity.org

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[1] From the Creed of The Christian Community

[2] Hafiz, “Cast All Your Votes For Dancing”, in I Heard God Laughing - Renderings of Hafiz by Daniel Ladinsky)

Picture by Rembrandt

3rd St. John's Tide 2014, God is Gracious

St. Johnstide

van der Weyden

John 3: 22-36

After this Jesus and his disciples came to the land of Judea. There he stayed with them and baptized. John also baptized; he was at Aenon near Salim, because there was much water there, and people came to him and were baptized. For John had not yet been imprisoned.

Then a dispute arose between the disciples of John and the Jews about the path of purification. And they came to John and said to him, “Master, he who came to you beyond the Jordan, to whom you bore witness – here he is, baptizing, and everyone is going to him.”

John answered, “No human being can grasp spiritual power for himself that is not given to him from the higher worlds. You yourselves can testify that I said, ‘I am not the Christ, but I have been sent before him.’

“He who has the bride, he is the bridegroom. But the friend of the bridegroom, who stands by and listens to him, he is filled with joy at the bridegroom’s voice. This joy of mine is now full. He must increase, but I must decrease.

He who descends from above, out of the spiritual world, is elevated above all beings of the earth. Whoever is only of the earth, whose being arises from the earthly, his word is also earthbound.

He who comes from the heavens is elevated above all who have arisen from the earthly. What he has seen and heard in the world of the spirit, to that he can bear direct witness, but no one accepts his testimony.

But whoever accepts his testimony, sets his seal to this: that God is true [truth] [that there is no higher truth than the reality of God]. Whoever God has sent, his words are filled with the power of divine thought, for God gives the spirit to human beings not according to human rules, but according to the creative power that he awakens in man.

The Father holds the Son surrounded in his love, and has given everything into his hands. Whoever trusts in the power of the Son within himself, he grows out of the earthly into timeless life.

Whoever cannot trust in the power of the Son within will not behold the world of life; rather the working might of the spirit world must one day burn him like a fire that will consume him.”

3^rd St. John’s Tide

Sombart

July 13, 2014

John 3: 22 – 36

John the Baptist came with a mission. He was to witness the incarnation of the Light of the World in Jesus at His baptism. He came to prepare souls to also be able to perceive Christ. He inaugurated a rite of purification, a ritual immersion, which allowed individuals to have their own unique spiritual experience. Some saw the quality of their own lives pass before them; others felt the glorious beings of the spiritual world.

As we hear in the reading, those following Jesus were also undergoing baptisms. John’s reaction to the ‘threat of competition’ is noteworthy.

John’s very name means ‘God is gracious’. God graced John with the opportunity to complete what he had come to do. He witnessed, indeed he helped midwife the incarnation of God’s Light and Love. And John speaks out of the meaning of his own name when he says that spiritual power is given as grace. He recognizes that his own day is beginning to decline while Jesus’s sun is rising. And so John graciously lets go the baton and passes it on.

God is gracious. He gives us our lives and sends us to fulfill our task. And when we have accomplished what we have come to do, when we have borne witness to our times and loved those whom we were sent to love, we send the Father our heart-warm thanks for the opportunity to be on the earth, doing what we do. As the poet says:

May the light of your soul bless your work

with love and warmth of heart.

….

May the sacredness of your work bring light and renewal

to those who work with you

….

May it release wellsprings of refreshment,

inspiration and excitement.

…..

May dawn find hope in your heart, ….

May evening find you gracious and fulfilled.[1]

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[1] John O’Donohue, For Work, in To Bless the Space Between Us, p. 146.