Sunday, November 10, 2019

3rd November Trinity 2019, Clarion Call


Trinity November
Rev. 3, 1-6, (Sardis) 

Angel of Sardis, Tiffany
And to the angel who penetrates the congregation of Sardis write: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.

3rd Nov Trinity
November 10, 2019
Revelation 3: 1-6


William Morris
In the fairytale of Sleeping Beauty, the twelve good fairies bestow their gifts on the child at her christening. Before the twelfth fairy can offer hers, a thirteenth, angry at not having been invited, storms in and predicts the child’s death at fifteen. The last twelfth fairy cannot undo the curse but can soften it. She changes the death sentence into a sleep of a hundred years.

The writer of the Revelation also demonstrates this activity of past predictions reaching into a future life. For the letters to the seven congregations are actually addressed to the seven ages of humankind’s development. The letters are an assessment of each age, their strengths, and their weaknesses. Today’s letter to Sardis, the fifth one, is aimed particularly at our present age. The warnings are a matter of life and death. “One says of you that you live, and yet you are dead.” Rev 3:1  For we human beings have indeed been asleep for a long time, unaware of those spiritual beings that constantly surround us as we sleepwalk through our lives. If we continue in what John calls our illusion and addiction to what the senses convey of the material world, then our own souls and spirits will indeed die.

The cure for this sleep, this sickness unto death, is to wake up. For our souls and spirits live and are fed through wakeful consciousness; their very nature consists of conscious awareness.  In humankind’s childhood, we received the gifts and blessings of the divine world, because we were open and receptive. But then we fell into a long sleep, in which we no longer received the gifts, no longer even remembered the givers. The time of sleep and forgetfulness is over. Humanity needs to wake up.

In the fairytale, when the hundred years were over, the prince passed through
Giambatista Basile
the thorny hedge that protected the sleeping kingdom and awakened the princess with a kiss. In our time, the Prince of our soul is kneeling beside our sleeping spirits, waiting for us to wake up out of our own freedom and initiative. If we refuse, the awakening will come but will appear as doom, fearful, and frightening.

John’s letter to the fifth age is a clarion call. Wake up and live! Wake up and converse with your Prince! Live in loyalty to the Spirit who loves you.

This conversing with the spirit of love we call prayer. An early mystic wrote:

The Holy Spirit has compassion on our weaknesses,
and though we remain impure, He often comes to visit us.
When He finds our spirit praying to Him in love,
He immediately dispels the marauding horde of thoughts
that keep it hobbled. And then he bids it forward
to the delicious works of spiritual prayer.

When the angel of the Lord arrives,
he scatters by his word alone
every force that acts against us,
and brings to our spirits that light
that shines without deception.*

*Evagrios of Pontos, “Effusions on Prayer,” in Love’s Immensity; Mystics on the Endless Life, Scott Cairns, p. 55.

Sunday, November 3, 2019

2nd November Trinity 2019, Seed Sized

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 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 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 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 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.”


2nd November Trinity
November 3, 2019
Revelation 1: 1-20

The writer of the Revelation struggles to put into words what he hears and sees in the spirit. Through his words, he creates a picture for us. Through his word-picture, we see the One he sees, hear the One whose voice he hears.

The altar is a kind of re-creation of what John saw. Like John, we are here in the spirit on the Lord’s Day. We see the seven lampstands in the seven candles. And amongst the burning candles is a picture of the One we hear about in John’s vision:

clothed in a billowing garment…
eyes like a flame of fire…
face shining like the sun in full radiance.

The picture painted above the altar is a kind of stand-in, over and against the day when we are able to see the Living One himself there, face to face. For He is indeed there at the altar, amidst the candles. And during the consecration, the transformation, He changes himself in yet another picture. At the altar we are offering to him what He needs in order to transform himself into yet another form, so that there we receive him, clothed in snow-white bread on a silver paten, shining in wine in a golden chalice.

We hear his words as we listen to the Gospel. We gaze at him pictured among the seven candles. We unite with him as he offers himself to us in bread and wine.

In bread and wine he makes himself small, seed sized, so that we can take him into our Selves; so that he can grow in us; so that we may be his community.



Friday, November 1, 2019

All Saints, Nov 1, 2019

1 Thessalonians IV, 13-18

(But) we do not want to leave you ignorant, brothers, about those who have
fallen into the sleep of death, so that you do not distress yourselves as those others do, who have no hope. For as we know in our hearts that Jesus died and has overcome death through resurrection, so also will God lead with him those who have fallen asleep in Jesus. For we tell you this in the word of the lord, that we who are living and are remaining for the revelation of Christ's presence will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord, himself will come down from heaven at the shout of command, at the archangel's call, and at the sound of the trumpet of God, and those who have died in Christ will be the first to rise; afterward we, the living, who are left, will be caught up together with them in a cloud to the meeting with the Lord in the realm of the air. Therefore, encourage one another with words such as these.

All Saints Day
Evelyn De Morgan
November 1, 2019
1 Thessalonians 4: 13-18

We know the story of how the archangel Gabriel announced to Mary that she would bear God’s son. There is another story that after Gabriel had left, a dark angel, whom Mary recognized as the angel of death, remained behind.  This angel told her that, carrying souls across the threshold of life, he was every man’s faithful companion, be they young or old.

The angel said that even God’s son would have to know death, indeed that He was born so that he would die. These words pierced Mary’s heart like a sword. Filled with grief’s sorrow, Mary could not understand.

So the angel of death took her invisibly to a place where an old woman lay dying. After standing there a while, they heard the woman tell her grieving husband that although she had seen the dark angel of death again, she was no longer afraid to go with him; for a smiling child with shining eyes was with him. The child had touched the angel’s dark wings, and they had begun to shine in all the colors of the rainbow. This was the most beautiful thing she had seen in all of her life.*

Christ came into earthly life, as we do, with death as His faithful companion. With His superabundant life, He transformed this companion of ours, so that by the time of His own death, the angel of death had been changed into a being of beauty and knowledge, a glory that serves ongoing Life even in death. When those who have died look back on the moment of their death, they see it as the most beautiful and inspiring event of their existence.

Sombart
One of the tasks humankind now faces is to find and face the angel of death while still alive here on earth. When our courage overcomes our fear of death, when we take courage and face him, we see that Christ, shining, is holding his hand, touching his wings and turning them into the multicolored beauty of our hope and knowledge of the living world of the spirit. When we face them, we see the faces of all who have walked across the threshold of death with Christ and the transformed angel.

The angel of death gives us the gift of knowledge and understanding on earth.  May those who have gone before us, who have beheld Christ and his companion, send us their inspiration.  May our thoughts, our feelings, our devotion live in the shining life of the Christ Spirit into the times to come.

* from a story titled, “Mary and the Angel of Death,” by Georg Dreissig, in Das Gold der Armen, (The Gold of the Poor) Urachhaus

Sunday, October 27, 2019

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,…*



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

Sunday, October 20, 2019

4th Michaelmas 2019, Battle for Truth


4th Michaelmas Sunday
Revelation 19, 11-16 (adapted from Madsen)

Queen Mary Apocalypse
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.

4th Michaelmas
October 20, 2019
Revelation 19: 11- 16

In our unsettling times, it can be hard to hear the message in today’s reading. Its tone seems strong, harsh even. But a closer reading can reveal a pattern of truth.

Schongauer
This tone is a kind of mask. It is the face of the archangel Michael that the Christ being wears at the moment, the earnest expression that threatens the adversarial powers who intimidate humankind. The reading reassures us that He, who judges justly and battles for truth is the guiding force in the evolution of our humanity.

He is pictured as wearing a cloak dipped in blood, with an iron shepherd’s staff. This is a picture for the iron in our blood, which keeps us strong, upright and moving decisively forward. This iron is strengthened yearly by our breathing of the meteoric iron in the atmosphere as the earth moves through the late summer meteor showers. With it comes an infusion of heavenly intent.

His two-edged, discerning sword—the creative Word of God—strikes down the nations, perhaps not so much because they need punishing, but because each nation has its season. A nation rises and falls according to what the human evolution toward love needs at any given time.

Mystic Winepress
He treads on the winepress containing the wine of God’s will. This ‘wrath’ of God’s will is transformational, regenerative, perhaps like a furious cleaning that creates order. This will of God separates out impurities, creating a purifying essence, a healing wine.

We are being reminded that it is time for the old and no longer useful in us to be discarded; that we need to join the warriors in white; for we are to press the essence of our lives, our love, into a nourishing drink in support of what the angels are trying to accomplish with us.  





Sunday, October 13, 2019

3rd Michaelmas 2019, Sun-Child



3rd Michaelmas 

Revelation 12: 1-17

Benjamin West
And a momentous image was unveiled in the world of spirit: a woman, clothed with the radiant power of the sun, the moon under her feet, her head adorned with the crown of the twelve stars of heaven. And she is with child and cries out in the labor and pain of giving birth.

And at the same time, a second image was revealed in the heavens: a great fiery-red dragon with seven heads and ten horns. On its head, it has seven crowns and its tail is sweeping a third of all the stars in heaven and dashing them onto the earth. And the dragon is standing before the woman about to give birth so that when she bears the child he can devour it. And she bore a child, a son ”who would shepherd all nations with a rod of iron.” And the woman’s child was caught up to God and to his throne. And the woman fled into the wilderness where she has a place that God keeps ready there, so that they can take care of her for days numbering one thousand two hundred sixty.

And a war flared up in the spirit world. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon. And the dragon fought in the midst of his own angels, but he was not strong enough, and there was no longer any place for them in heaven. Down came the dragon, the giant, the serpent, the evil one called both Satan and the devil, deceiver of all the world. Onto the earth, he came hurtling down, and all his angels with him.

And I heard a great voice in heaven, saying:
Bernard Eyb

Now can begin the working which proceeds from our God—
The power to heal the world,
The power to transform all being,
The power to draw everything into godly being.
Arisen is the spirit leadership of his Christ.
Overthrown is the accuser of our brothers,
He who accused them night and day before the countenance of God.
They have overcome him through the blood and the sacrificial power of the Lamb
And by the divine Word to which they bore witness.
They did not love their own lives too dearly, nor did they fear death.
Therefore, rejoice you heavens
And all who lodge therein!
But woe to the earth and the sea:
For the Adversary has come down to you,
And he seethes with measureless fury,
For he knows that his time is short.

And when the dragon recognized that he had been cast onto the earth, he began to persecute the woman who had borne the son. Then the woman was given the two wings of a great eagle so that she could fly into the desert to her appointed place, where she is to be nourished for a cycle of time, for cycles of time, and for half a cycle of time, far from the face of the serpent.

And the serpent opened his mouth and spewed out a river of water after the woman so she would be swept off her feet by the river. But then the earth came to the woman’s assistance; it opened its mouth and swallowed the river which the dragon spewed from his mouth. And the dragon burned with fury against the woman. He stormed away to make war on the rest of the woman’s seed, people who keep to the divine world aims and who are united with the destiny and witnessing of Jesus. As I saw this I was standing on the sandy shore of the sea.


3rd Michaelmas
October 13, 2019
Revelation 12: 1-17

Rosenkrantz
In grand and mysterious pictures, this reading from the Revelation to John places before our souls a kind of mirror.

In this mirror, we see the woman clothed in the sun, crowned with stars, the moon under her feet. This is a picture of the great heavenly soul of all mankind. In the realm of sleep, from the heavenly realm of night, all of humanity has collectively labored to bring forth the shining, innocent Son of Humanity. In and from the realm of the stars, all of humanity has labored to make manifest this shining being who would shepherd all the nations.

But, of course, the opposition appeared. Its seven crowned heads are the devouring negative spiritual forces that have ever sought to threaten humanity’s great soul and to prevent the birth. But the Son of Man was indeed born. He was not destroyed, nor was humanity’s soul. And Michael expelled the dragon from the world of the stars, from the night world. Humanity’s soul and all the good it brings forth are safe in the realm of night.

The dragon of the destructive soul forces can now only work on earth through our day being. Now he tries to destroy human souls on earth one by one. But we have been given the wings of the eagle, the far-seeing power of thought, of insight and oversight. These wings help us rise above the threat of negative forces within the soul. And our very earthly constitution, woven of wisdom, the secret, helpful will-forces connected with our bodily nature, these will-forces help swallow and neutralize our flooding passions. No feeling, however strong and negative, lasts forever.

 
Roland Tiller
The dragon, the old enemy of mankind, continues his ancient war upon humankind by attacking individual human souls. But Christ, the Son of Man, with Michael, his defender, has the power to heal the world; He has the power to transform all being, the power to elevate everything into godly being. Through the Christ-power of love, Michael holds the dragon beneath his feet. He helps us raise all earthly being into heavenly heights. He draws forth from our hearts the power to carry the earthly contents of the day into the divine regions of the purified night. Through Michael, our soul’s days, too, can now bring forth the heart’s bright Sun-child, here on the earth.

Sunday, October 6, 2019

2nd Michaelmas 2019, Endless Chaos


2nd 3rd or 4th Michaelmas
Paul’s Letter to the Ephesians, 6:10-19 (adapted from Madsen)

What it comes to in the end is this: grasp the power that streams to you in the experience of Christ in the soul and in the powerful regency of his pure spiritual strength.

Put on the power of God as one puts on full armor, so that you may stand against the well-aimed attacks of the adversary. For our struggle is not to fight against powers of flesh and blood, but against

spirit beings mighty in the stream of time,
against spirit beings powerful in the molding of earth substance,
against cosmic powers whose darkness rules the present time,
against spirits who carry evil into the realms of the spiritual world.

Therefore take up the full armor of God, that you may be able to stand your ground on the day when evil unfolds its greatest strength and victoriously withstand it.

Stand firm, then, girded with the truth, like a warrior firmly girded. Connect yourself with all in the world as is justified in the spiritual world, and this connection with the spirit will protect you like a strong breastplate.

And may Peace stream through you, down to your feet, so that on your path you spread peace, as the message that comes from the realm of the angels.

In all your deeds have trust in God. This trust will be like a mighty shield; with it,  you can quench all the flaming arrows of the evil one.
Take into your thinking the certainty of Christ’s healing deed. It will protect your head like a helmet.

And the spirit, which has become living in you, you shall grasp as one grasps a sharp sword. The sword of the spirit is the working of the Word of God.

May this armor clothe you in all your prayers and supplications so that in the right moment you raise yourself in prayer to the spirit, and at the same time practice wakefulness in inner loyalty.

Feel yourself united in prayer with all other bearers of the spirit—also with me, Paul, so that the power of the word will be given to me when I am to courageously and openly bring the knowledge of that holy mystery which lives in the message of the gospel.

2nd Michaelmas

October 11, 2015
October 6, 2019
Paul’s Letter to the Ephesians, 6:10-19

When we ship out a package containing something valuable, we know to pack it well. We give it layers of protection so that it can withstand the shocks and drops and weight of the shipping process.

In this reading, called The Armor of God, it is clear that we are being sent out in the midst of a battle against spiritual adversaries. And like the valuable beings we are, we are to be wrapped in layers of protection. We are to receive and bear protective armor. We are to put on the firm protection of truth; shielded by trust in God, and of the knowledge that Christ heals. The only weapon we hold is the sword of spiritual discernment, using the weapon of discernment according to Christ’s Word.  Yet we are not being called upon to attack the adversaries, nor to destroy them. Our part in the battle is a defensive one. We are to endure, deflect their attacks, and remain standing, inwardly upright.

Through the wearing of this armor of truth, trust, and discernment, we are called upon, not to thrash about and flail with our weapons. We are called upon to become protected vessels that contain and pour out peace, a peace that reaches down into the way we walk in the world. It is a peace that streams out from us so that we ourselves become messengers of the good news from the realm of the angels. As Adam Bittleston says:
Rosenkrantz

We need in the strife of our day
The eternal Peace of the Word of God.
Seeking this Peace with our whole being
On the path which leads from the nightmare
Of endless chaos,
Into the order of heaven
And to the Father of all things—
We shall meet Michael
Who reveals how Christ
Awakens Man
That he may serve God.[1]



[1] Adam Bittleston, Michaelmas II, in Meditative Prayers for Today, Buy here