Do Whatever He Tells You

Second Sunday After Epiphany – Year C

Isaiah 62:1-5                                                   
Psalm 36:5-10                         
1 Corinthians 12:1-11
John 2:1-11

The season of Epiphany celebrates the revelation of Jesus' ministry to the world.  What would this ministry be like? Who would it serve? How would it impact people?  The wedding at Cana set the stage for this most amazing ministry, laying a foundation that would capture the hearts of many people, while inflaming the pride and hatred of others.

Usually when we think of the story of the wedding at Cana, we think about how Jesus turned the water into wine.  But a closer walk through this story reveals quite a lot more about what's to come from the ministry of the Son of Man.  Consider these:

·         Jesus, the Messiah, was not above participating in social events or mixing with the crowds.  Yes, he often spent time alone in prayer, but he also realized that he would reach people at the intersections in their lives – work, celebrations, meals, informal gatherings, festivals, and funerals.  He attended these events, and didn't intentionally make the hosts or guests feel uncomfortable. He would be involved with people in their everyday lives.

·         Jesus entered into people's troubles, whether they were life or death matters, or as simple as the embarrassment of running out of wine at a wedding celebration.  he was there to help.  And if he convinced people of his good and loving intentions on small matters, maybe they would be open to him on larger ones, too.

·         Jesus showed us that although he is the center of all healing and help, he works through others to get the job done.  At the wedding, he (and his mother, in this case) enlisted the servants to help with the wine shortage issue.  We, too, must keep focus on the love and compassion of  God as we ace life's trials and troubles, but we must remember that as the body of Christ, he works through the various gifts of all the people.

St. Paul writes in his letter to the Corinthians that, "...there are varieties of gifts but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of services, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who activates all of them in everyone.  To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good."

Some people can help us heal from physical wounds or illnesses, some can help us heal from emotional wounds, some can help to feed us, or clothe us, or teach us, or build us homes and roads.  We are one body in Christ, and must learn to live together – for the common good.  The idea of being independent from other people is an illusion, and the source of many of our society's ills.

·         Jesus had the power to change water into wine.  On a number of occasions during his ministry, Jesus demonstrated his power over nature: walking on water, walking through walls, feeding thousands of people with a few loaves and fishes – and even John the Evangelist wrote, "He was in the beginning with God.  All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being." (John 1)

So, he certainly had the power to change water into wine.  But within the words of this story we see more clearly exactly how he did it.  In keeping with the way he prefers to accomplish things, he worked through other people. 

Notice first that Jesus' mother said to the servants, "Do whatever he tells you."  A good piece of advice for anyone, to be sure.  The servants then turned their attention to Jesus, awaiting his instructions.  "Fill the jars with water," he told the servants, which they did.  "Now, draw some out, and take it to the chief steward."  So they took it to the steward who tasted it and declared it to be very good wine.   

Perhaps we could look at this situation and see what can happen when someone listens to Our Lord, and does what he asks.  Any situation (water) can be made better (wine) if we can all work together for the common good.  Maybe all he was trying to point out is that when we come together to help someone else out, things will get better in some way.

The wedding at Cana gave Jesus an opportunity to demonstrate what was to come with his ministry: his teachings were meant to bring people together for the common good; to meet people at their point of need, wherever that may be; to help people through other people, regardless of the need.  We are all one family, under one God, members of the same body.

Reflection Questions

1. How do you think the world would change if we all lived together for the common good?

2. Have you ever had any water-to-wine life experiences?
 
3. How can you become more aware of the needs of others around you?

4.Who can you reach out to for help if you need it?

Great Expectations

Baptism of the Lord – Year C

Isaiah 43:1-7
Psalm 29
Acts 8:14-17
Luke 3:15-17, 21-22

GREAT EXPECTATIONS

For centuries the people of Israel had been waiting for the coming of a Messiah who would lead their nation to a place of safety and power, ridding themselves of all oppressors and enemies. The prophecies of scripture foretold of his coming, and now this man, John, emphatically claimed that the time had come.

The people were filled with great expectations, since this was to be a glorious time – a victory for the Righteous God. They wondered if John himself was the Messiah. But John made it clear that he was not the Messiah that the people hoped to see, but that "one who is more powerful than I is coming." John knew that his role was to prepare the way for the Messiah; John must decrease while Jesus must increase.

John further emphasized this difference in power as he said his baptism was of water, but that the Messiah's baptism would be one of the Holy Spirit and "fire." Fire, in this sense, refers to a deep and abiding passion – an undauntable commitment to the proper understanding and acceptance of God's love and compassion. The Messiah "burns with passion" regarding this core essence of God.

What do the readings from today tell us about this core essence of God? Isaiah can barely contain himself as he hits on the high points:

• In the fullness of life and eternal nature of our souls, we have nothing to fear. "Do not fear, for I have redeemed you..." and, "Do not fear, for I am with you..." John the Baptist may have tried to scare people into salvation, but Jesus was more apt to attract them through love, to awaken the goodness inside each person.

• God has a deep, abiding, personal interest in each one of us. "I have called you by name, you are mine...I will be with you...Because you are precious in my sight, and honored, and I love you..." He knows each one of us intimately, and cares for us; He made us, He formed us.

• It's God's intent to bring us all back home to Him some day, one way or another: "I will bring your offspring from the east, and from the west I will gather you; I will say to the north, 'Give them up,' and to the south, 'Do not withhold; bring my sons from far away and my daughters from the end of the earth...' "

John interjects a comment about the wheat and the chaff, often interpreted as either a person would end up as "wheat" and be saved into God's barn, or that a person would be considered as "chaff" and burned in the unquenchable fire. (Luke 3:17) But Jesus knew that every person is part wheat (goodness) and part chaff (egocentric). Both wheat and chaff are part of the same plant. As part of God's plan to bring every one of His children home, He will indeed separate the wheat part of us from the chaff part of us, cleaning us up where needed. The wheat part will be brought home, and the chaff part destroyed.

Today, we respond to these great expectations we have of Jesus' love for us by passionately fulfilling our Baptismal vows. We continue in the apostle's teaching, resist evil, seek and serve Christ in all persons, strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being. And we do this in our own unique way, in the way that God made us, and in the place that He's put us, moment by moment.

Reflection Questions

1. Do you have these same great expectations about God's love for you?

2. What do your Baptismal vows mean to you?

3. How can you develop a closer relationship with God in your life?

4. How can you share your relationship with God with other people?

Eternal Fire and the Royal Crown

I was reading the Letter of Jude the other night as a Compline meditation, and I came across the phrase, "eternal fire" used in a threatening way. It wasn't the first time I encountered this phrase, as it appears in similar forms in other epistles, but it was the first time I stopped to think a little more about it, and tried to discern why every time I read it I felt that there was something wrong with the way I was seeing it.

The image that comes to mind with this phrase is a fire that burns us forever - adding to that ever-present threat of eternal punishment against misbehavior (non-conforming?) in this life. This interpretation is not consistent with the loving, compassionate, merciful God that I've come to know through experience.

So, either God is not the loving, compassionate, merciful God that I think He is, or we are looking at the phrase "eternal fire" incorrectly.

Let's consider the sentence, "The king wears a royal crown."

The king, and the crown, are two separate things. The crown itself is mostly metal, cloth and jewels. By itself, there is nothing really royal about it.

What makes the crown royal? Certainly not the crown itself, but rather the status of the king. Since it's the king's crown, the crown gets its royalty from the king, not from itself. So the word royal in this case better describes the source of the royalty, rather than something that comes from the crown itself like, "shiny" or "beautiful." The adjective royal describes a transient property rather than one that emerges from the thing described.

This same treatment of the adjective royal can be applied to the adjective eternal in the phrase "eternal fire." The word eternal is not so much a characteristic of the fire as it is the source of the fire. Since God is the only true eternal being, eternal fire in this sense means "God's fire" just like royal crown really means king's crown."

Now, if God is indeed loving, merciful, and compassionate, then somehow this fire must also have these same characteristics. The fire is not a fire that punishes throughout all eternity, but one that cleanses. It will remove (burn off) all the pieces of the false self that surrounds our soul, our true selves; things like false pride, prejudice, illusions, hatreds, fears, anxieties, guilt and shame - any spiritual ill that prevents us from being who we truly were made to be.

God wants to reclaim us for Himself - not destroy or torture us. "Fire" is a metaphor used to describe whatever actions He may take to prepare us for this homecoming, done in a spirit of love, compassion and mercy.

"I came to cast fire upon the earth; and would that it were already kindled!" (Luke 12:49)

A Key to the Kingdom

In I Kings 19 we read that Elijah took refuge in a cave on Mt. Horeb, his life being sought by Queen Jezebel after he destroyed the prophets of Baal. In the cave, Elijah lamented that the people of Israel forsook their covenant with God. He felt alone and depressed.

God called to Elijah, telling him to come out of the cave and "stand on the mountain before the Lord." God wanted to make a connection with Elijah, but knew that Elijah had to be in the right place mentally, before that would happen. God will continually call to us, too, regardless of where we are or what condition we're in, but he won't be able to communicate with us until we are in the right state of mind, listening to the right thing.

Verses 11 and 12 of I Kings 19 speak of the things that we might usually believe contain the messages of God: powerful winds (current cultural norms and the tide of public opinion?), earthquakes (calamities in nature?), and fire (passions and desires of the mind such as power, greed or popularity?).

But an old adage warns, "Prominence does not guarantee validity." Just because something is in our face regardless of which way we turn, doesn't make it right. The voice of God does not speak through the majority of people, natural disasters or the collective ego of any group. The voice of God is heard through the heart - the still, small voice that Elijah heard once he was able to put all those other distractions aside. Once he let them pass, he could hear the still, small voice - the gentle breeze.

God may gain our attention with some event or happening, but we can't make a true connection with him until we look inward to our own heart. Paul reminds us of this in Romans 10: 8 as he quotes from Deuteronomy, "The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart." Jesus mentions the same thing as he described the coming of the kingdom of God in Luke 17:20-21, "The kingdom of God does not come with observation; nor will it be where they say, 'See here!' or 'See there!' For indeed, the kingdom of God is within you."

How can we "leave our cave," put the noisy distractions aside, and come to a place where we can listen to the ear of our heart? Certainly, the distractions of this world are many, and they are strong. But stronger still is our own ability to practice present moment mindfulness - shedding any images of the past that trouble us, and fears and worries of the future that grab our attention - enabling us to see what is before us clearly, and to hear what is coming from our heart. This is one key to the kingdom.

We gain present moment mindfulness through practice - lots of it. We live each moment with "piercing eyes" and "piercing ears," really seeing and listening to what is going on around us, seeing and hearing deeply. We take time to be in the present moment, savoring each sight, sound and touch we are experiencing. We ask ourselves questions: "What am I really seeing right now?", "What am I really hearing right now?", "What am I really feeling right now?"

We learn to discern between distractions and truth. And after a while, we begin to see life as it really is. We come to realize that God's love is permanent and that physical things and situations are impermanent, and that all things are really connected in some manner. We come to realize that if we had been born and lived the life of the other person we are talking with, we might be exactly as that other person is right now.

Present moment mindfulness brings with it a greater understanding of life, and that nurtures deeper compassion and love for others and for this world. It helps us to shed the dysfunctional egos that envelop our souls. It is then that we are actually hearing the still, small voice of God coming from the kingdom in our heart.

On Being a "Born Again" Christian

The presence of the kingdom of God is clearly all around us - we can see signs of the Creator in His animals and His plants, and in the stars and the clouds moving through the sky. If we really look, we can see His work everywhere. Scripture tells us that the kingdom of God is within us, too. (Luke 17:21)

The kingdom of God may be all around me, even inside me, but I don't always feel it or live like it is there.

Nicodemus, a Pharisee, came to Jesus with this same concern. He said to Jesus, "We know you are a teacher come from God; for no one can do these things that you do unless God is with him." Embedded in his statement is the question he wanted to ask: "How can I get God to be with me - how can I be in the kingdom of God?"

Jesus answered him by saying, "Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God."

Nicodemus, taking this literally (and thereby missing the lesson) responded to Jesus, "How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born?" Jesus answered, "Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, 'You must be born again.'" (John 3:1-7)

The kingdom of God is certainly within each of us, and we can find it there when we look deeply into ourselves, putting aside the busyness of daily life, and quieting the noisy ego that is placing continuous, unreasonable demands on our time and psyche.

But to realize the fullness of this kingdom, to ignite it, to experience the richness of it, I suggest to you that we need other people to bring it to life. The kingdom doesn't work well alone. Yes, it works easier when we are with people of like mind; friends, partners, groups, networks, communities, churches, neighborhoods - for Jesus points out that "wherever two or three are gathered in my name, I am there also." (Matthew 18:20) It erupts in love when people meet and are able to connect at a heart-to-heart level. Maybe you've felt this at times in the past when you're with the right people, and where there is nothing in the way of deep understanding and knowing of each other.

But the kingdom can also be brought to life when we're facing a person we may be having difficulty with, someone who is frustrating us, or with whom we are in conflict. We can activate the kingdom of God even in these situations. How? By being born again.

For me, being born again is the act of deeply looking into the heart, history and hopes of the person I'm with. It's being able to put myself aside for awhile, and live the life of the other person to the point that it almost feels as though I was born that other person. I visualize myself as having been born in his or her life, growing up as they did, in the conditions that she or he had. If I've listened deeply to them, and I've looked deeply into their heart, I'll understand better where they're coming from, I'll gain a sense of why they're thinking the way they do, and I'll understand better what they're facing in life. I may realize that I would have ended up exactly as they have if I'd been born when and where they had been born.

With this deep understanding I gain about the other person, compassion begins to grow in me. I learn to accept who they are. With understanding, compassion and acceptance comes love. Who I thought was an enemy becomes a brother or sister. I see that I am indeed connected with them, and am like them in many ways. We are told to love our enemies, because as soon as we do, they are no longer our enemies. We enter the kingdom of God when we reach this level of understanding.

Being born again means taking the time to deeply listen and deeply see the other person as though we were that person. This takes patience, and time. It means asking questions instead of telling. It means observing rather than showing. It takes humility and a good sense of self. Being born again takes practice. I need the practice. Today I will begin to try to practice this better.

How many times must we be born again? Well, that depends on how many times we interact with another person. Could be quite a lot! We aren't born-again Christians because we claim to be born-again Christians. We're born again Christians because we are born again, and again, and again... (Think of all the birthdays we can celebrate!)

By being born again we can see the kingdom of God, not only in ourselves, but in the other person as well.

"Do not fear, little flock, for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom." (Luke 12:32 )

"Seek the kingdom of God, and all these things shall be added to you." (Luke 12:31)

Parable of the Mustard Seed

In just a few months I'll be moving further into retirement. (Hurray!) My darling spouse has asked me to do more of the cooking since I'll have extra time on my hands, and that's OK because I actually enjoy cooking.

To improve my culinary skills, I watched a couple of cooking shows on TV yesterday. Oddly enough, both shows talked about using mustard as an emulsifier to bind water and oil together. Without the mustard, oil and water naturally separate, not wanting to be together at all.

Then, listening to the readings in church this morning, I once again heard the parable of the mustard seed:

"The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field. The mustard seed is one of the smallest of seeds, but when it is grown, it is greater than the herbs and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and nest in its branches." Matthew 13:31-32

It occurred to me that the mustard seed could represent our own mindfulness, our consciousness, our awareness of the present moment. If we can properly nurture this to grow in our own field ("our life"), we'll bring with it a greater knowledge and action of the loving Holy Spirit within us, in all that we do, think or say. By doing this, we can bring peace; we can dialogue about our differences instead of debating them. We can learn to see that the different ways people think are opportunities for ourselves to grow and learn. We can drop our prejudices and illusions. We can begin to blend the oil and water of life into a common understanding through the Presence of God in our lives. We can learn to unite instead of divide.

This may be one of the smallest of ideas, one of the littlest things we can do each and every moment: to deeply listen to the other person, to deeply see what is really going on, to deeply think about what we're about to say or do before we do it. But it's also the very thing that can grow large, and be inviting to others (represented by the birds of the air).

Just like any other skill, we need to practice our mindfulness to make it as effective as possible. Let's start right now! Pass the mustard, please...

The Holy Spirit and Mindfulness

Romans 8:26-39 contains a wealth of discussion material, all of it reinforcing the fact that God is rich in love, mercy and compassion. Sometimes this message gets overshadowed by the tasks and issues we're dealing with in day-to-day life, but it is a true and good message nonetheless.

"Likewise the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit makes intercession for us with groanings which we don't always understand. Now He (God), who can search our hearts, knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because the Spirit makes intercessions for us according to the will of God. And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose."

The Holy Spirit is the active, loving movement of God in our lives. This Presence is known by different names and phrases such as Holy Spirit, the Breath of Life, Advocate, Ruach, Chi, and others. People throughout time and all over the world have described this active Presence in their lives. The Holy Spirit lives within us, and serves as our Guide when we tap into its Presence.

But because of our human ability to mentally live in either the past, present or future, we don't always make the connection with the Spirit and enjoy all the relationship s/he has to offer. The Holy Spirit is Presence, and this means we must be in the Present Moment to make the connection. If we decide to live in the past or the future, we live there alone. And how do we attain this Presence in the present? Well, the answer to this question is the same as the answer to the question, "How do we get to Carnegie Hall?" The answer: "Practice, practice, practice."

"To be called according to His purpose" means to fully leave in the Present Moment - not dwelling in the past or being overly concerned with the future. Life happens now. The Spirit is in the Now. So the key is to practice present moment awareness, sometimes referred to as "mindfulness." When mindfulness is in you, so is the Holy Spirit. It is then that you can fully understand what you are to do in each moment, regardless of the task at hand.

Being mindful is to know what is going on around you as well as within you at any moment. We must learn to live life slowly, experiencing each and every moment - the sounds, the colors, the faces, the conversation, the feelings, the thoughts. As monastics, we begin spiritual formation slowly, so we learn how to live. And once we get better at it, we learn to go even slower. And eventually when we become masters, we practice life as slowly as possible. If we trip, or drop something, or feel frustrated, or miss something, or feel that life is moving too fast, then life is moving too fast. Slow it down. Return to the present.

Senses: What are you seeing? Hearing? Touching? Tasting?
Thoughts: What are you thinking right now? Why?
Actions: What are you doing right now? Why?
Feelings: What are you feeling right now? Why? Is it you or your ego?

The Holy Spirit will always guide you according to the love of God. God is love - what else can He do? If we truly live each and every moment in the presence of the Presence, it will eventually work out for His good. Practicing mindfulness may be one of the more important spiritual disciplines we ever do.