Hunger and Thirst

Blessed are they who hunger and thirst for righteousness,

for they shall be filled (Matt. 5:6).

 

I suspect that we shall all be filled with the things for which we hunger and thirst.  Many have said, "Be careful what you pray for; you might get it."  In other words, God will give us the deepest desires of our hearts.  The problem is that our hearts are not pure; what we are hungering for may not be what we need at the deepest level of our existence.  The "natural man," the one who tries to walk in his own strength, by the light of his own understanding, without guidance from the Holy Spirit, and without the light of God's grace, does not know what is truly good.  That is the story of the two trees in the Garden:  the Tree of Life (Wisdom) and the Tree of Knowledge--or what we can see, hear, taste, smell, and comprehend with our natural understanding. 

 

When Jesus taught in parables, not all grasped the meaning of what He taught.  The disciples came to Him privately:  "Explain to us the meaning of the parable," they asked.  "To you is given understanding of the kingdom of heaven," He told them.

 

As I continue in the Confessions of St. Augustine, I see the journey that all of us take from grasping with the intellect to hungering with the spirit for what we cannot reach with the body or the mind.  I see him failing for a long time to grasp the great truth and light for which his spirit hungered all his life.  But toward the end of the Confessions, I see one who has been grasped by the Lord; I see one whose hunger and thirst for the Divine is being both satisfied and increased at the same time.  I see someone whose prayer captures all that is in my heart.  I see purity, humility, and truth in his final prayers.  I am quoting excerpts below of his reflections before the Lord:

 

[He questions why he is writing what he wants to say to the Lord]:  not, of a truth, that Thou might learn [his desires] through me [for God already knows what is in his heart] but to stir up mine own and my readers' devotions towards Thee, that we may all say, "Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised."..for love of Thy love do I this.  

 

[Note:  the reason I love this reflection is that it expresses why I want to write -- for love of God's love, to stir up my own and my readers' devotions towards the Lord, to increase our hunger and thirst for the living God. And to that end, I ask always that my own heart be purified from other and baser desires -- to write for recognition (in truth, I really don't care who reads and who doesn't read my writings; that is entirely in the hands of God, for His purposes only) -- to write to be "right;" (at times, I write to sort out what I believe, what truth has been given to me, and to oppose those who teach things that are false (More on this later).  But, like Michelangelo chipping away at a marble block until his skill reveals the angel within it, the Lord continues to chip away at my own impurities until He reveals His own image therein.]

 

O Lord, my God, give ear unto my prayer, and let Thy mercy hearken unto my desire: because it is anxious not for myself alone, but would serve brotherly charity; and Thou seest my heart, that so it is...circumcise from all rashness and all lying both my inward and outward lips; let Thy Scriptures be my pure delights; let me not be deceived in them, nor deceive out of them.

 

O Lord my God, Light of the blind, and Strength of the weak; yea also Light of those that see, and Strength of the strong; hearken unto my soul, and hear it crying out of the depths.  For if Thine ears be not with us in the depths also, whither shall we go? whither cry?

 

Grant thereof a space for our meditations in the hidden things of Thy law, and close it not against us who knock. For not in vain would Thou have the darksome secrets of so many pages written; nor are those forests without their harts which retire therein and range and walk; feed, lie down, and ruminate.  Perfect me, O Lord, and reveal them unto me.  Behold, Thy voice is my joy; Thy voice exceeds the abundance of pleasures.  Give what I love: for I do love; and this has Thou given: forsake not Thy own gifts, nor despise Thy green herb that thirsts.

 

I love, love, love Augustine's hunger and thirst and the ways he expresses it.  And I love, love, love those who, like Augustine, hunger and thirst for righteousness, for I know the Lord is close to those who hunger and thirst for what only He can give them.  These are my brothers and sisters, my family.

 

So as not to overwhelm anyone with too much of Augustine's hunger and thirst, I will wait until tomorrow to continue his prayers.

The Pure of Heart

Blessed are the pure of heart, for they shall see God.

 

Last year, there were four teen-age suicides in my city.  Three of the students attended Long Beach High; the other one was a student at St. Stanislaus.  There were different "reasons" for all of the deaths, and as in most cases, no one really knows "why;" no one saw it coming in any of the cases.  By the time of the third death at Long Beach High, the entire school was in shock -- so much so that, according to the report of one student, there is no longer any bullying at all in the school, for any reason at all.  If someone begins to bully another student, all the others rush in to stop the bullying immediately.  There is a heightened awareness throughout the school of the loneliness and isolation experienced by some teens as they struggle with their identity and sense of belonging.

 

What is remarkable in the face of such tragedy is that it opened the eyes of some teens to "see" what they could not see before -- the suffering of those around them.  The student in my class who was reflecting on the phenomenon of four suicides among people he knew told me that at all four funeral services, a rainbow appeared.  The rainbows in every case were documented by cell-phone pictures of many teens who all saw the image.  Some of them were consoled by the rainbow, taking it as a sign that their friend was now at peace and in the arms of God.  Other teens scoffed, saying the rainbow at all four funerals was a coincidence.

 

My guess is that the ones who saw a sign of God's love in the rainbow were the same ones who later became more sensitive to the suffering of others around them.  The ones who "do not believe in signs" are probably the same ones who will continue bullying others if they are not stopped by their peers.  If they cannot see God, they cannot see other people either.

 

From the beginning of the Scripture story, there has always been a division between those who "see" God in history and in the times and those who do not---between the believers and the scoffers.  Not all of the Israelites, despite their election, were "pure in heart;" not all Christians, despite their call, are "pure in heart."  Purity of heart refers to those who love the Lord with their whole heart, their whole mind, and their whole strength -- and that purity leads to love of neighbor as well, as is clearly evidenced in the high school today. 

 

Of course, this kind of purity is a journey.  Few of us begin by loving God "with our whole heart."  Like Eve, we are drawn to the glittering beauty at first of many other things.  But in tasting the bitterness of the things that held out the promise of joy and pleasure, we begin finally to turn away from the emptiness of things that cannot satisfy us.  For most of us, there is some kind of awakening to the consolation of God, to the beauty of His love and compassion, at some point in our lives.  For most of us, as we turn to God, we find that He alone is all we have been searching for, that in Him is rest, friendship, goodness, peace, love, and joy.  And as we bond with Him, He shares with us the riches of His creation and of His friends -- all things are ours, because we are Christ's, and Christ is God's.

 

The teens in my class Sunday night were all grieving over the fact that their friends died without hope of a better future.  One of the biggest guys in the class -- built like a linebacker-- said, "Man, if they could only have believed in God, that He had a plan for their lives!"  This guy has begun to experience God in a whole new way this year, as he has followed the prompting of the Holy Spirit to give up Yearbook as his extra-curricular activity and to take up choir, something he still laughs about, given his build.  Yet, from the moment he joined the choir, he told me he "fell in love."  Now, five weeks into choir membership, he has been chosen to sing "Ave Maria" at a state exhibition in Jackson.  He has found his soul and his first love.  And all because he opened his soul to the leading of the Holy Spirit, as he himself acknowledges.

 

This young man is "pure of heart;" he now wants God to direct his life and to lead him in right paths, for he has discovered for himself that God's ways are not our ways, but they are the best ways.  He is an inspiration to me and to the whole class.  God has changed his life, and I suspect that now he will change the lives of others around him.

From the Beginning...

Someone who had gone through RCIA some years ago told me that he chose for his confirmation name the saint who when asked, "What then should we believe?" replied, "Believe what has been believed from the beginning."  The man who told me this story had formerly been a deacon in the Disciples of Christ Church; now he is a deacon in the Catholic church.  Unfortunately, I had never heard the name of the saint he referenced and do not now remember it.  But, like him, I do love the reply given:  Believe what has been believed from the beginning.

As I go back to the earliest writings of the church fathers after the Apostles, I find there the most beautiful, the most sound, the most inspirational teachings and reflections.  Until the fall of the Roman Empire in 476 (I think), most converts to the Christian way of life faced some kind of persecution from the state.  Their faith was not an empty one; it was rich, full of life, and worth dying for.  If they did not risk death, as toward the end of the Roman Republic, they did face the loss of livelihood and public respect, an issue that Augustine wrestled with before his baptism in 387 AD.

I love, respect, and admire the Church today.  I love the good works I see and read about -- the care of the sick and of society's most helpless; the excellence of education of our young people; the dedication of our priests, and the sacrifice and faithfulness of our bishops as they wrestle with the "gates of hell" that have penetrated the church today, etc.  But if the ordinary Catholic adult today were to be renewed in spirit and in truth, I think it might come from a sustained reading of the Fathers of the Church.  All of these men were reflecting on the Gospels as they struggled to define what we believe against all the heresies that consistently attacked the foundational truths of Scripture.  And as their writings were rooted and grounded in Scripture, they drew out "that which has been believed from the beginning."  It is not "doctrine" that has the power to save us, but the truth, the Truth that resides in Jesus Christ and which is elucidated in the Scriptures.

Jesus said, "You shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free."  Many people today, like Pilate, scoff at the idea that we can know truth: "What is truth?" he asked.  Relativism, the modern philosophy, holds that one man's truth is just as valid as that of another, that the great "virtue" is to shrug one's shoulders and to deny that anyone really knows Truth.  But even a cursory reading of the Gospel of John is like walking on solid ground after slogging through the muck for most of our lives.  There is no shifting sand of truth in the Gospels.  From the very beginning of Christianity, from the opening words of John's Gospel, the Truth shines forth with no equivocation: 

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  He was with God in the beginning.  Through Him all things were made; without him, nothing was made that has been made.  In him was life, and that life was the light of men. 

These words were intended to take us straight back to the beginning of Genesis:  When God began creating the heavens and the earth, the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.  And God said [ie--spoke the Word], "Light, Be!"  And Light was....and He separated the light from the darkness.

 If we make the mistake of reading these words as "history," as something that "once happened," we fail to know the truth.  What God "did," He "does."  Even now, at this moment, He speaks His eternal Word (His Light, His Truth) into the formless and empty darkness of souls living in chaos.  Even now, His Spirit "hovers" over the surface of the deep, and He says, "Light, Be!"  He sends His Word in the flesh, that we not be overwhelmed with His brightness, and be afraid, but rather be drawn to  Him through compassion and love:  No longer do I call you servants, but friends.  His Light shines in the darkness even now; if we fail to receive the Light, we continue to walk in darkness, but to all who receive Him, He gives the power to become children of God.  If we do not receive Him, we cannot become the children of God, but continue to live according to the flesh.

Why will people not receive what has been believed from the beginning?

Breathing Together*

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, a French scientist-priest, called for a revolutionary "conspiracy of love" over half a century ago.  The root meaning of "conspiracy" is "to join spirits" or "to breathe together."

Throughout history, people have tried to remake society by changing its outward form and organization.  The "Arab Spring" going on today in the Eastern nations is a good example of revolution, just as the American Revolution was.  The problem with most violent overthrows of government, however, is that the radicals then split into separate factions and fail to 'breathe together' to form a new organization that works.  Soon, there is a new dictatorship or regime as oppressive as the one formerly overthrown.

Spiritual conspirators, however, first undergo radical shifts within themselves, shifts that enable them to find inner strength and a larger wisdom.  As they awaken to new possibilities within themselves, they begin to recognize the same transformation occurring in others around them.  For most people, they do not first join a group and learn "spiritual lessons" and then change.  Rather, there is either a sudden (as in the case of St. Paul) or a gradual awakening to new spiritual depths.  As they follow the gentle nudge or the sudden jolt of this spiritual awakening, as they learn to walk in new paths, their eyes are gradually opened to the same process going on in people around them.   They find themselves "breathing together" with others on the same spiritual wavelength, even without knowing how it is happening.

The process begins in almost every case, not by consulting the authorities or any "how-to" book, but by some kind of opening to the Divine Presence -- a Presence Who is a Person and Who calls forth in us some kind of new creativity, or release, of our own spirit.  In this Presence, we suddenly or gradually discover a loving embrace, a freedom to be ourselves, and a new kind of knowledge or enlightenment.  As we learn to "breathe in" or "inspire" this Presence, as we learn to "breathe with" this Divine Spirit, as we learn to love in a non-hostile and safe environment, as we learn to walk on ground that does not shift beneath our feet, we gain confidence and courage.  Soon, we are no longer afraid of ourselves or of others, and we are ready to learn "breathing together" not only with the Divine Presence, but with others around us.

There is no school or manual that can teach us "how to do" this kind of conspiracy.  We learn it from the Master Teacher, or not at all.  None of us can set out to be Master Teachers for others.  You learn it from your relationship with God; I learn it from my own unique relationship with God.  He is the bond of unity between us; He Himself teaches us to breathe together in Him.  There are no shortcuts.

When I attend church, or a bible study, or a prayer group, there is no guarantee that everyone there has first experienced "breathing together" with God.  Some are present, but hope that nothing will upset or disturb the equilibrium of their lives.  But there are some who want to heal, to learn to forgive, to love unconditionally.  Some are present, hoping to find something more than the physical and mental world offers them. Some want to find meaning in their lives; they long for deep friendships and for union with God. They want wisdom more than "ideas."  And if I want to connect with these people on a spiritual level, there is no better place to begin than in church.

First, though, I have to allow God to "guide my feet into the way of peace."  I have to want Him to direct my paths and lead me.  If there is no church as a starting place, I have to cultivate a relationship with God first, trusting that He will "lead me in straight paths for His Name's Sake."  We have to trust the Good Shepherd to lead us beside still waters and into green pastures. 

Some years ago, I met someone who came just a couple of times to a bible study I attend.  Instantly, we began to "breathe together;" somehow, we recognized one another from the start as of one spirit and one mind.  Since then, our lives have touched lightly only once or twice, but each time, we come away refreshed, renewed, re-strengthened.  Our "breathing together" indeed helps us to re-connect with the Divine Presence as well as with one another. 

When we meet others who breathe on our wavelength, it helps us to live up to our own best potential.  In Man's Search for Meaning, Viktor Frankl tells the story of the loving connection he felt with his wife through his internment:

As my friend and I stumbled on for miles, slipping on icy spots, supporting each other time and time again, dragging one another up and onward, nothing was said, but we both knew: each of us was thinking of his wife.  Occasionally I looked at the sky, where the stars were fading and the pink light of the morning was beginning to spread behind a dark bank of clouds.  But my mind clung to my wife's image, imagining it with an uncanny acuteness.  I heard her answering me, saw her smile, her frank and encouraging look.  Real or not, her look was then more luminous than the sun which was beginning to rise.

 

Though Frankl had nothing left, though he and his wife were separated physically, he knew the spiritual presence of one who loved him beyond all measure. And that spiritual presence was more real to him than his material and physical circumstances. 

 

Scripture tells us that God is love, and those who dwell in love dwell in God.  If we learn to dwell first in God, we learn to love one another.  There is a rhythm to love, but we cannot learn it on our own; it must be taught to us by "inspiration" or "breathing in" of the Divine Presence. 

 

* Note:  the basic ideas on this page, as well as the term "breathing together," comes from the introduction to Kything: The Art of Spiritual Presence by Louis M. Savary and Patricia H. Berne (Paulist Press: 1988).   I have interwoven my own reflections and commentary into their foundation.

How Does He Do That?

You worship a living God, not some idolatrous, man-made image.  Your relationship with Me is meant to be vibrant and challenging, as I invade more and more areas of your life.....(Jesus Calling, Feb. 17).

 

God never ceases to amaze me with His nearness to my daily life, and with His ability to answer the question or conundrum of the day.  Yesterday, I brushed off the comment following the previous day's blog, because I knew it really wasn't a question as much as an attack on the logic of Christian belief.  The comment was this:  "According to some Christians, Abraham wasn't saved because he did not know Jesus Christ." 

 

Amazingly, however, God did not brush off the statement.  Last night, as I was reading St. John Chrysostem's commentaries on the Gospel of John, the very page where I resumed reading was this:

 

"And the world knew Him not."  By "the world" he here means the multitude, which is corrupt, and closely attached to earthly things, the common, turbulent, silly people.  For the friends and favorites of God all knew Him, even before His coming in the flesh.  Concerning the Patriarch, Christ Himself speaks by name, "that your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day, and he saw it, and was glad" (8:56).  And concerning David, confuting the Jews, He said, "How then doth David in spirit call Him Lord, saying 'the Lord said unto my Lord, 'Sit Thou on My right hand' (Matt. 22:42; Mark 7:36; Luke 20:42).  And in many places, disputing with them, He mentions Moses; and the Apostle mentions the rest of the prophets; for Peter declares, that all the prophets from Samuel knew Him, and proclaimed beforehand His coming afar off, when he says, "All the prophets from Samuel and those that follow after, as many as have spoken, have likewise foretold of these days." (Acts. 3:24).  But Jacob and his father, as well as his grandfather, He both appeared to and talked with, and promised that He would give them any and great blessings, which also He brought to pass.

 

For me to be reading St. John's commentaries at this point is amazing.  Two days ago, I finished the book I had been previously reading and after paging though the vast library on my Kindle, I decided to resume where I had left off reading in the commentaries some several months ago.  Last night, after reading the above passage, I put down my Kindle to worship the God Who is near to us in all our ways.  And I thought about Moses and Elijah, who spoke easily and comfortably with Jesus at the time of the Transfiguration.  And I thought about how time is a human constraint, but eternity is "now."  In eternity, we do not wait for things to happen in time, but all is present "now." 

 

Of course Abraham, Moses, David, and Elijah knew/know Jesus Christ.  Of course they conversed with Him and recognized Him in the spirit, even before they entered eternity.  And what does that say about all the questions we repeatedly ask about the "poor pagans" who have never heard of Jesus Christ?  Will they not also know and recognize the One they love in the Spirit if their hearts seek God?  Jesus told the woman at the well, "God is Spirit, and the true worshippers of God worship in spirit and in truth."  And in that realm, there are no limitations of time and space, the ones that worry men, but do not worry God at all.  He knows who are His, and He is able to save them in His own way.

The Sabbath Rest

It's time to re-set our biological clocks; it's time to refresh our minds from the weekday routes.  The Sabbath is the "sign of the covenant" between God and mankind.  The word "Sabbath" means "stopping."  Of course, when one is responsible for farm animals or for children, there is no "stopping" in the sense of resting -- but there can still be a change of pace, a slowing down from "Hurry and eat your breakfast; you'll be late for school."

"Stopping" means taking time to allow our natural man -- our bodies, minds, and souls -- connect with the spirit that is in us.  It is a time to "see" what we cannot see all week -- the colors of the sky, the play of light on a leaf, a bird drinking from a dish in the back yard.  It is a time not to produce, but to receive what is given to us to enjoy.  It is a time to think deeply, or not at all; a time to open our spirits to the voice of the Eternal Spirit.  The Sabbath means church for some, a walk along the beach for others, a time to read something that stirs the heart, mind, and soul for more than material joys.

The Sabbath means a special meal to be shared with friends and family, and not to be rushed through.  It means an afternoon nap -- even though one may be retired and free to nap anytime during the week.  This nap is a celebration, not a necessity.  It says, "I am free; I am not a slave to any man or to any production or project."

The Sabbath means slowing down in order to connect the week's thoughts, projects, plans to those of God Himself:  "What do You think about that?" we ask.  Sometimes, He even answers us.  The Sabbath is recognition par excellence that "man does not live by bread alone"  -- or even by his own thoughts.  It is an opening of the deepest part of ourselves to something larger than we are; it is a drinking in of all the love and goodness we can hold, and in the process, of expanding our capacity for holding even more. 

When we open ourselves to receive Truth, we go far beyond our own limitations.  Man does not have Life within himself, but he does have the capacity to receive Life from his creator... The same is true of Truth; we do not have Truth within ourselves, but we do have unlimited capacity to receive the Spirit of Truth, if our hearts are pure.  During the week, we operate out of the Truth we have received, but on the Sabbath, we have the opportunity to increase our wisdom, knowledge, and understanding if we are humble enough to receive the Truth from the only One Who can give it to us. 

Those who will not "stop" from their own works, their own truth, their own wisdom are condemned to the limitations of their own experience.  But to those who honor the Sabbath, all these and more are given without limit. 

Be Thou a Blessing

Yahweh said to Abraham, "Leave your country, your father's family and the people you grew up with, and go to the land I will show  you.  I will make you the father of a great nation.  I will bless you and make your name great, and you will be a blessing to many nations" (Gen. 12:1-2).

 

C.S.Lewis tells us that many people believe that Christianity means that if we do good on earth, we will be rewarded in heaven, and if we fail to do good, then we will go to hell.  But Lewis says it's not at all like that.  Rather, every time we choose the good, we turn the central part of ourselves, the part that chooses, towards the good.  And every time we choose evil, we turn the central part of ourselves towards the evil.  In the end, we become in our core what we have chosen to be.

 

From Abraham to Revelation, the Bible is the story of God's choosing to bless people, whoever they are, so that they in turn can become a blessing on the earth.  If we recall The Lion King, we can clearly see those who bless the earth with fruitfulness, productivity, and joy, and those whose evil dries up the earth and causes famine throughout the land.  As I look around, I see people who are on their way to becoming what they choose -- for good or for evil.  They will either be a blessing to those around them, or they will become a curse to all who know them. 

 

In the story of Jacob, his very name given from birth meant "cheater," 'grabber," "usurper."  He lived up to his name by grabbing his brother's inheritance and his father's blessing by deceit.  But as he fled from his brother's anger, God met him on the way and made to him the same promise He had made to Abraham -- I will bless you, and you will be a blessing.  Jacob at that moment entered into a covenant with God:  If you will go with me, and provide for me, and guide me safely back to my father's house, I will give you a tenth of all you give me.  From that time on, Jacob walked with God, sat with God, and stood with God.  In other words, He lived his life -- but with God's companionship and partnership.  In the end, he blessed his brother Esau tenfold for all that he had taken from him. 

 

The way of the Lord is always the way of promise.  God steps into a person's life and makes a promise.  The person of faith is the one who accepts that promise and expects it to be fulfilled. (Richard Rohr: The Great Themes of Scripture- OT - p. 95).

 

It is not difficult to live one's life in the Presence and Partnership of God.  Basically, we walk with Him, sit with Him, and stand with Him.  And we allow Him to do what He will -- which will inevitably be a blessing for us.  He waters the land the walk on; He sits with us in peace and friendship; and He stands with us against the evil powers that threaten to invade our lives.  And because He is with us, just as he promised, our lives in turn become a blessing to many.

 



Not By Bread Alone

Not by bread alone does man live, but by every word that comes forth from the mouth of God

--Jesus to Satan, (Matt 4:4).

 

A remarkable similarity and an almost universal experience across the past 2014 years since the coming of Christ has been the "opening" of men's ears and hearts to hear the word of God within.  Actually, the experience goes all the way back to Adam and Eve, to Abraham, and to the Patriarchs of Israel, to all of the kings and the prophets, as well as to ordinary men and women.  And the word of the Lord inevitably changes people who hear it -- again, with remarkable similarity of experience.

 

As I read the Confessions of St. Augustine, I am amazed to find therein my own experience: from not hearing the word of the Lord to suddenly hearing and receiving the word in my heart.  Scripture at some point begins to resonate within, and my heart leaps at "hearing" the Voice of God.  Jesus told Nicodemus that unless we are born again of water and the Spirit, we cannot even see the kingdom of God -- and He further told the Pharisees that the reason they could not hear the words that God speaks was that they did not belong to God (that is, they had not been born again of God's own Spirit.)

 

I Cor. 2:9-14 is very clear:  No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him, but God has revealed it to us by his Spirit.  The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God....no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God.  We have not received the spirit of the world but the Spirit who is from God, that we may understand what God has freely given us....The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned.....but we have the mind of Christ.

 

Clearly, if Jesus tells the Pharisees that they do not "belong to God," and if Scripture tells us that the man "without the Spirit" cannot understand the things of God, the Holy Spirit is the Agent by which we grasp the word of the Lord.  It is His illumination that makes the words shine into our hearts.  As it says in the Psalms:  In your light, we see light.  We know we have received the "Gift of God" when the Word of God becomes alive to us, and begins to make "our hearts burn within us" as it speaks to us. 

 

Psalm 119 is the longest psalm in the Bible.  It is an acrostic based on the letters of the Hebrew alphabet, so that every verse of stanza 1 begins with "aleph," and so on through all the letters, one for each stanza.  The entire psalm is a hymn of praise and thanksgiving for the Word of the Lord, and for what it does for the person who embraces it.  Multiple synonyms are used for the "Word of the Lord" throughout the Psalm.  In the following excerpt, I have underlined all the expressions that refer to the inner teaching or instruction from the Spirit:

 

The law of the Lord is perfect;

it revives the soul.

The decrees of the Lord are steadfast;

they give wisdom to the simple.

 

The precepts of the Lord are right;

they gladden the heart.

The command of the Lord is clear;

it gives light to the eyes.

 

The fear of the Lord is pure,

abiding forever.

The judgments of the Lord are true;

they are, all of them, just.

 

They are more to be desired than gold,

than quantities of gold.

And sweeter are they than honey,

than honey flowing from the comb.

 

If someone desires wisdom, understanding, knowledge, and truth, it is his for the asking.  God obviously desires His Spirit to be poured out in all who seek for Him, that they may know Him and love Him, that they might enter into the dynamism/ energy-exchange of the Trinity of Persons.  If we look at the small excerpt of Ps. 119 above, we can see all the "benefits" that accrue to the one who loves the instruction/ teaching/ Word of God within ---the eyes of his soul and his body are enlightened; his heart is gladdened; his soul is revived; and his mind receives wisdom.  Truly, "Not by bread alone does man live, but by every word that comes forth from the mouth of the Most High!"





Freedom to Worship and Praise

I will free you from being slaves to them and will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with mighty acts of judgment....then you will know that I am the Lord your God who brought you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians (Ex. 6:6-7).

 

Let my people go, that they may worship me (Ex. 8:1).

 

No one can say, "Jesus is Lord," except by the Holy Spirit (I Cor. 1:3).

 

All my life, I went to church.  All my life, I loved God, and in fact, knew God.  He drew me to morning mass during the summer months when I was not in school.  He drew me often to the church during recess or lunch for a brief "touch base."  And He taught me to pray.  I loved to read the lives of the saints and to think about what it means to "love" God.  Still, with all of that, there was something missing, though I had little idea of what it was. 

 

I did not know what it meant to praise and worship God.  I was not free, as David was, to dance before the Ark of the Covenant and to make a fool of myself for the love of God.  I prayed, but did not praise.  As the problems of life piled up around my head, I was burdened with trying to solve them; I was weighed down, literally.  I even wondered where God was at times, or what He wanted me to do.  Thanksgiving from the heart was a real struggle for me, even though I could count my blessings.  I was spiritually shy and did not want to come across as a fanatic, so I would not speak to others about my faith, such as it was.  I would say I would pray for people, but most of the time did not -- I was too wrapped up in my own life.  And there was no way I could have said aloud, "Jesus is Lord."  That just seemed a bit too much for my retiring nature. 

 

What changed?  Two people at different times prayed for me to receive what they were calling "The Baptism of the Holy Spirit."  That sounded a bit emotional for my tastes, somewhat bordering on hysteria, but I submitted to prayer the first time, and even requested prayer the second time.  Both times, my reaction was anything but hysterical and emotional.  In fact, I had never felt so peaceful, so loved, in all my life.  And both times of prayer resulted in an outburst of prayer, praise, and thanksgiving to God at some later moment.  First came the deepest peace I had ever known; later, a release of some burden that had been holding me back -- and I began to sing to the Lord in a way I had never before known. 

 

With that release of praise, I could feel the weight slipping off my shoulders.  I began to know for the first time in my life a new leading, a new teaching from within -- a new Voice speaking to my inner man.  And, for the first time in my life, I began to read -- no, devour -- Scripture.  I had tried to read Scripture before, but it was just that -- me "trying" to read it.  Now, I could not stop reading it; I felt that I was reading the secrets of my own heart.  All of this change happened overnight, although over time, all of it also deepened and grew in strength. 

 

Of course, still not understanding the power of the Holy Spirit and not trusting in the reality of my experience, I began to worry that the experience would somehow fade into the background, that I would not be able to maintain this new freedom of worship, of praise, of thanksgiving, of prayer and study.  I asked my doctor, the first one who had prayed for me to receive the Spirit.  He laughed, "Yes," he said, "I too worried about that.  But you don't "have' the Holy Spirit; He "has" you, and He's not letting go, even if you walk away.  I receive the Baptism of the Spirit 14 years ago, and it continues to grow stronger and deeper every year."  Reassured that it was not up to me to "maintain" the Spirit, I began to relax.

 

And then, the Spirit brought me into contact with others who were also "free to praise and worship."  Together, I found my own experience told again and again, reinforcing its reality for me.  I found others who loved the Scriptures and who could hear the voice of the Shepherd:  "No longer will a man teach his neighbor, or a man his brother, saying, 'Know the Lord,' because they will all know me from the least of them to the greatest," declares the Lord.  "I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts..." (Jer. 31:32-34).

 

When we came together for praise and worship, we were all able to teach one another what the Lord was teaching each one of us.  I had never known such freedom to speak about the spirit; I had never known such freedom to walk with God and to talk with God -- and that freedom expressed itself with other people also. 

 

The prophecy of Isaiah is literally true:

 

The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is upon me,

because the Lord has annointed me to preach good news to the poor.

He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,

to proclaim freedom for the captives and release for the prisoners...

to comfort all who mourn,.....

to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes,

the oil of gladness instead of mourning,

and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of faintness.

 

They will be called oaks of righteousness,

a planting of the Lord for the display of His splendor.

They will rebuild the ancient ruins

and restore the places long devastated;

they will renew the ruined cities

that have been devastated for generations (61:1-4).

 

In my experience, it does take a special touch from the Spirit to release our own spirits to praise and worship, to the freedom to say, "Jesus is Lord."  Most people before that touch have no desire to say "Jesus is Lord," because He still is not "Lord" for them.  With the freedom given by the Holy Spirit, however, we are at last free to kneel with Thomas and say, "My Lord and My God." 

 

Those who worship the Father will worship in Spirit and in Truth.

The Search for God

Either God is God, or not.  Either God is everything, or God is, in fact, nothing. Religion has become so much a matter of playing in the in-between, calling God "God" when He is, in fact, not God to us.  He is just a religious image that people feel some vague obligation toward because they have been told that he saved them.  But they have not experienced his salvation the way the Israelites did.

Once you have experienced that salvation, once you have felt God's power in your life, once you have been touched by His love in your heart, then you know...the faithfulness that never fails.

 

God has no grandchildren.  Every generation has to be converted anew.  Every person has to experience the love and fidelity of God.  And every person has to make the choice for God, to decide to base his or her life on God's Word.  It is not enough to say that your mother is a Christian, that your father is a Catholic.  Until you come to that moment in your own life when you choose the God you will serve, you have not been converted. And the reason why the Scriptures do not speak to most Catholics in our own day is, quite simply, that they have never experienced this conversion.  Since they have not heard God's Word in their lives, they cannot respond to God's Word in the Bible (Richard Rohr: The Great Themes of Scripture - Old Testament. p. 44-45)

 

I would say that for most of us, the search for God begins where our own strength fails us.  Once we realize that we are hungry for the food that we ourselves cannot provide, we begin to look for answers to our deepest questions.  Once we realize that we are enslaved to something from which we cannot escape --- anger, lust, addictions, etc. -- we, like the participants in AA, begin to search for help from a "Higher Power."  And that is the point where God stoops to meet our need and to reveal to us His lovingkindness (hesed in Hebrew).

 

Deists imagine religion as the worship of a God they consider as great, powerful, and eternal.  But Blaise Pascal says that deism is "....almost as far removed from the Christian religion as atheism" (Pensees).  The Christian religion, according to Pascal, teaches two truths: that there is a God whom men can know, and that there is a corruption in their nature which renders them unworthy of Him:  "The Christian religion properly consists in the mystery of the Redeemer, who, uniting in Himself the two natures, human and divine, has redeemed men from the corruption of sin in order to reconcile them in His divine person to God."

 

But the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob, the God of Christians, is a God of love and of comfort, a God who fills the soul and heart of those whom He possesses, a God who makes them conscious of their inward wretchedness, and His infinite mercy, who unites Himself to their inmost soul, who fills it with humility and joy, with confidence and love, who renders them incapable of any other end than Himself. 

All who seek God without Jesus Christ, and who rest in nature, either find no light to satisfy them, or come to form for themselves a means of knowing God and serving Him without a mediator.  Thereby they fall either into atheism, or into deism, two things that the Christian religion abhors almost equally (Pensees).

 

It has been said that there are no atheists in foxholes; I cannot prove that, of course.  But, looking around at the things I am able to observe for myself, I can see the most vibrant, joyful, and faith-filled people are those who remain in AA and who reach out to help others climb out of the pit of addiction.  These people know the Source of their power, of their vibrancy, of their life and energy.  They no longer rely on their own power and strength, for they have experienced for too long their inherent weakness and insufficiency.  Looking up, and receiving the help they sought, they are now able to become a source of strength to others.  That, in a nutshell, is the message of Christianity, one that our churches have been slow to grasp.

 



Interior Landscapes

I watch Househunters International, and I have noticed how much people will pay for a "view" of almost anything -- the water, the mountains, the cityscape, a waterfall, etc.  Location is premium, because people always want to have their morning coffee while gazing at and communing with nature, to whatever extent it is possible.  The world outside us brings us peace.  There can be no doubt of that as we see more and more people give up high-paying jobs and the crush of city residence to move someplace where they can find peace in their surroundings.  Just watch the next edition of Househunter's and listen for the first comment when seeing a balcony overlooking anything other than a junkyard:  "We can have our coffee out here in the morning...."

Being close to nature makes us want to enter it -- to jump in the ocean waves, to stroll through the forest, to gaze at the sky.  We want to taste, feel, embrace, smell, soak up, be-at-one-with every dancing, joyful cell that nature affords us.  We want to camp under the stars, smell the fresh, clean and crisp air of the mountains, and surf the waves.  Peace! Joy! Love (union with)!  These are the things we were made for.  Somehow, we remember Paradise, our original home, and we laugh with delight to connect once again with our natural surroundings.

Mankind and the earth share the same DNA. [One of my friends says, "We are made of stardust!"]  But our present-day kinds of existence fail to connect us with our "home," as we collect our Starbucks from a drive-through window in the morning and attempt to enter the flow of traffic without spilling it all over our laps.  We drive through a maze of concrete ramps and exits until we arrive at work, where, if we are fortunate, there is a patch of green grass between the parking lot and our office cubicle.  The sky is above, but we often fail to catch a glimpse of it as we glance at our watch to see whether we are late for work. 

It is not realistic to think that we can all begin our day with a leisurely cup of coffee as we gaze out over the landscape from our balconies.  For many, if not most, people, that dream may never become a reality.  Young beach bums may surf the waves for a living, but for most people, that choice is not viable.  And yet, without connection, without spiritual renewal, our souls die, even as our bodies live. I recall one of my older students at Delgado, a black woman who grew up in Mississippi, and who could attend school only on rainy days; in good weather, she had to pick cotton in the fields.  With so much yearning in her voice, as we walked across campus one day, she said, "Every time I pass a bench under a tree (as she gestured to a nearby scene next to the pond), I would give anything to sit there and read."  Even to her mid-forties, this woman had never been given the opportunity to "commune with nature."  And her mind, soul, and body craved the experience.

But here's the thing I want to notice:  this woman had a beautiful interior landscape, one that spoke more eloquently than the words she verbalized.  As little contact as the two of us shared, I loved her as much as I loved my closest friends.  Our communion was not based on shared external experiences, for our life-experiences had been miles apart.  But within her spirit and within my spirit, there was a common ground of understanding --oceans of love, forests of peace, mountains of joy, a sky of goodness, etc.  We delighted in walking across the campus together, on our way back from class, even for a brief moment.  In five minutes, we could enter the interior landscape of the other and feel refreshed, renewed, re-energized.  God Himself was the "ground of our being," our interior landscape.  And somehow, He always manages to introduce His friends to one another.

Yesterday, I wrote that we are designed to enter into the interior landscape of the Trinity__ the eternal motion of love and exchange between and among the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  Just as I know what keeps people from entering into communion with nature on a daily basis, so also I know what keeps us from entering into our interior landscapes -- the only place where peace, love, and joy is to be found.  Thomas Aquinas observed that whatever is received is received according to the mode of the receiver, not the giver.  That is why two people "receive" the same experience so very, very differently.

All of us operate out of either a blessed or a cursed interior landscape--we see things not as they are, but as we are.  Jesus perceived the world and its people from the blessed consciousness of God's Presence Within; He felt as God; He wept as God; He relished and gathered as God.  The Pharisees, seeing His joy, sneered:  "Who does He think He is---God?" they asked one another.  At His baptism, He heard the voice of the Father: "This is my beloved."  As a result, that "belovedness" could flow from Him to everyone around Him.

As Ron Rolheiser points out in a recent article (March, 2011),  most of us cannot receive the love of God.  We cannot believe that God is "delighted" in us, that He actually wants to enter our interior landscape, as poor and dusty as it is.  He wants to enter our "inner city" and make of it a paradise, a place where He can walk with us in the cool of the evening.  The reason Jesus came was that He could not sit in heaven and wait for us to "clean up our act," and to be worthy of receiving the Father's love.   If He walked with us in our poverty, if we allowed Him access to our inner (cursed) landscape, He knew He could change us from within, making us fit temples for the divine life of peace, of goodness, of joy. 

St. Francis prayed, "Where there is hatred, let me sow Your love....."  Like Johnny Appleseed, he went through the beautiful Italian landscapes changing interior views.  Rolheiser's final paragraph is worth quoting:

Our negativity about others and the world speaks mostly of how bruised and wounded, ashamed and depressed, we are -- and how little we ourselves have ever heard anyone say to us: "In you, I take delight!"

Amazing Grace

Jesus did not come to earth in order to found another religion but to bring us new life, the life of God Himself, the life lived by the Holy Trinity: the communion between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. --from the homily by Msgr. Aldo Giordano to the Council of Europe, on Oct. 10, 2009).

 

Here is the entire message of Christianity in one sentence.  But, like the 10 Commandments, unfolding its meaning and implication takes -- and has taken -- a multitude of volumes and thousands of years of reflection.

 

I have written before of St. Seraphim revealing that the whole purpose of any religious practice is to acquire the Holy Spirit -- that is, the Spirit of Jesus and of the Father -- to enter into the communion of life shared by the Divine Trinity.  In order for us to receive that Spirit, our own spirits must be purified by the death of our 'natural' man, the man who "cannot receive or comprehend the things of God."  We must put on the Spirit of the Son, who receives all things from the Father.  We must, in the words of Scripture, be "alive to God." 

 

That gift was given to us in the Resurrection of Jesus as "the last Adam, the second man" (1Cor. 15).  In Him, we are set free from the works of the flesh, the way of life we learned as we grew up -- envy, hatred, bitterness, anger, lust, etc -- and we are given the fruit of the Spirit dwelling within -- love, joy, peace, patience, goodness, long-suffering, self-control, kindness.  This is not "human nature," but the nature of God in us.  Only then are we able to commune Spirit-to-spirit with God Himself.

 

John tells us that the Light of the world came into the world, but the world received it not because the "darkness has never comprehended" the Light.  Light and darkness cannot co-exist at the same time; one must drive out the other.  It may be possible to live "peacefully" next door to an angry person, but it is not possible to enter into communion with that person, spirit-to-spirit.  The spirits will repel one another.  This is the reason that Hitler tried to exterminate the Jews and any Christian that sympathized with the Jews.  This is the reason Communism had as its goal to wipe all Christian churches, but especially the Catholic church, off the map in any region it entered.

 

Communion with God and with the "world," in the Biblical sense cannot co-exist, or as Jesus put it, "You cannot love both God and mammon....you will either hate the one and serve the other, or serve the one and hate the other."  But here is the good news: once we begin  to worship God in spirit and in truth -- that is, to commune with God through the Holy Spirit -- we automatically begin to commune spirit-to-spirit with others who are in communion with Him also.  As we obey the first and greatest commandment, the second becomes automatic and 'natural' to us.  It is God's own love in us that loves our neighbor in us -- even the angry person next door.

 

Religion is simply the gathering of those who wish to commune with God, or who are learning to commune with God, as they share their stories with one another.  The story of Jacob, the "cheater," the "grabber" who walked with God long enough to "prevail with God and man" and who became "Israel" is our story too.  We all begin as the natural man, but as we walk with God and learn to hear His voice, our story changes.  We begin to walk one another home, to the One Who calls us "out of darkness into His marvelous light."

 



Seek My Face

One thing I ask of the Lord, and this I seek:

that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life,

to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to seek Him in his temple....

 

To you, O my heart, He has said, "Seek My Face!"

Your Face, Lord, I will seek (Ps. 27:4 & 8).

 

I awoke this morning thinking about the joy a child has in hide-and-seek.  I can just hear the scream of delight and the belly laughter from a small child when he/she discovers, or uncovers, the person for whom she has been searching.  What is it about this game that brings such joy?  I think it is the earnestness, or focus, of deliberately looking for one specific thing -- and then finding it. 

 

As life goes on, our search becomes less focused, more diffused, for the most part -- until we lose something vital or precious, something we really, really need to find:  our health, the car keys, a job, or even a lost child.  Until we search desperately, we don't know the joy of finding.  As long as we have everything we need on a daily basis, most of us don't need to search at all.  This is why Jesus noted how difficult it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.  But when we really need, and we are helpless ourselves to supply that need, the joy of receiving is overwhelming.  We are led into humble gratefulness, thanksgiving, and praise to the One Who supplied our need and Who answered our desperate plea.

 

As the Israelites moved through the wilderness toward the Promised Land, God allowed them to experience hunger and thirst, so that when He supplied their need, they would learn gratitude and praise.  In fact, the thing that concerned Moses the most before he died was that the Israelites would forget gratitude:

 

The Lord is bringing you into a good land--a land with streams and pools of water, with springs flowing in the valleys and hills; a land with wheat and barley, vines and fig trees, pomegranates, olive oil and honey, a land where bread will not be scarce and you will lack nothing; a land where the rocks are iron and you can dig copper out of the hills.

When you have eaten and are satisfied, praise the Lord your God for the good land He has given you. ...Otherwise, when you eat and are satisfied, when you build fine houses and settle down, and when your herds and flocks grow large and your silver and gold increase and all you have is multiplied, then your heart will become proud and you will forget the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.....You may say to  yourself, "My power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me" (Deuter. 8).

 

If you want to find a grateful person in America today, look for an immigrant, one who has not forgotten how hard life was in his native land, one who hungered and thirsted and who gave all that he had to seek a new existence in a free land.  That is a person who has found what he was seeking with all his heart, and who never forgets to be grateful.

 

If we want to experience the joy of finding, we have to know what it is we are seeking.  The very first time I read Ps. 27, over 40 years ago, I knew that it was my "lifetime Scripture."  I'm not sure I had ever heard that phrase before, but I was sure at that moment that Psalm 27 expressed my heart's desire -- to seek the Face of the Lord.  Before I read the words, I would not have known to express them, but seeing them on the page, my heart latched onto them:  this is what I want, I thought to myself: "I want to seek His Face."

 

We may not know what it is we want until it is revealed to us.  Scripture tells us that our hearts are "deep waters," not accessible even to our innermost thoughts.  But it also tells us that the Word of God is a "sword" that penetrates even to the division of spirit and soul, that uncovers the deepest thoughts of a man (Heb. 4:12).  If we do not know the "one thing" we seek, it is possible to ask the Lord to show us the secrets of our own hearts.  Those secrets, unfurled, will lead us straight to heaven.

 





Opening the Word

Today, I just want to quote at length from the introduction to one of my favorite books, The Great Themes of Scripture -- Old Testament, by Richard Rohr and Joseph Martos:

It is so hard for us as educated and sophisticated, scientific and technological people to come to know the power of the Word of God.  One reason for this is that we cannot let go.  We do not really trust and believe that the Lord will speak to us, and so we remain forever outside of the dialogue. 

If you go to the Scriptures seeking an onlooker's knowledge of God, you will never grow in true knowledge of God.  If you stand back from the Scriptures like a cool critic and force the Word to prove itself in your life, you will never know its power to change your life.

The Bible was written in faith and it can be understood only in faith.  We must seek first the Kingdom.  We must allow ourselves to be children.  We must ask for the gift of the Spirit.  When we approach the Bible with this kind of faith, the words leap off the page and the Word speaks to our hearts. 

Franciscan theology tells us that love precedes knowledge.  We truly know only that which we love.  When we stand back analyzing and coolly calculating, we can never truly come to know anything.  It is only in stepping out and giving ourselves to a person or to an experience or to a word that the person or experience or word can speak to us.  You have to make the leap of faith, that act of love, that act of self-gift if you want to hear the Word of God speaking to you.

I cannot prove to you with any kind of logic or by any bit of philosophy that the Bible is, in fact, the Word of God.  But I call you to step out and trust, to listen and say, "Lord, if you are in fact the Lord, then show yourself in my life and speak to my heart."  Only when we have trusted God, put Him first and allowed Him to be the Lord, have we in fact known the power of His word.  Only then have we seen the power in our lives (p.9).

I can think of absolutely no better way to begin studying the Bible than with this prayer and attitude.  In fact, Rohr's words are the best explanation I have seen of the dividing line between being able to read the Bible and not being able to read more than just a little at a time -- and that only with determination.