A
Reflection for I Advent All
Saints’ Church, Southern Shores, NC November 17, 2016 Thomas
E. Wilson, Rector
The
Seer Prepares To See
The Hebrew Testament lesson for today is a vision
from the Prophet Isaiah of Jerusalem in the 8th Century BC. He had a
vision from God during the time of upheaval in 8th Century BC in the
Northern Kingdom of Israel and the Southern Kingdom of Judah. The nations are
surrounded by enemies, crippled by misrule, impoverished by corruption, and
bitterly divided between the poor and their rich exploiters, and yet God sends
a message for Isaiah to give to his people. A Prophet is a “seer”, one who sees
the messages of God. Visions are not simple memos sent; they are messages sent
within the context of images that are approached spiritually. If you try to do
it literally, you will be frustrated.
These visions are kept by the followers of the Prophets who suggest that
these visions might be of help to people and nations yet unborn in different
places and circumstance in the future.
My own theology is that God speaks in visions to us
all the time and to all sorts and conditions of people, but most of us ignore
them because we are too busy with our own agendas if it is day or dismiss them
as mere dreams that don’t make sense at night. I suggest that if we are to hear
God, we must take time to listen. Too
often our prayer time is devoted to telling God what he/she needs to do to make
us feel good. I walk my dog every
morning before the sun rises, and I walk slowly because 1) My dog like to sniff
everything and uses the time to search, and 2) I use the time to search and pay
attention to the stars and listen to the sounds of the ocean and the forest.
God uses the whole universe to speak to us of God’s love. When we become aware
of God’s overflowing love, then we are able to become a “seer”, one who sees
the world from God’s perspective.
At night, I don’t consider dreams to be “mere”. I
see them as the heart of God trying to get through to me when my conscious mind,
with its preoccupation with my own ego, is asleep. The messages I hear from God
by day or by night are not things like to diversify my investment portfolio.
God does not speak to me in prose, but more like poems without rhyme and meter
but instead with symbols and images.
Let me give you an example. I hear a fox cry in the
predawn darkness. I reflect on what the fox might be saying to me. I ask
myself, “If I were the fox, what might be my cry about?” I think of someone I love and the pain they
are in. I am reminded that I need to reach out to this person and share their
pain, so they won’t feel as if they are alone crying in the dark.
Looking at Isaiah’s vision, I would treat it as a
dream. Since he shared that dream with us and I am listening to hear God, I
will claim that dream as mine. If this were my dream and all the images and
people in the dream are part of me, then I would see that I am part of that
world being called to dwell in the presence of God, the house of the LORD,
which is not somewhere far away in time and space but right here and right now,
wherever I am or wander. If the nations dwelling with God are to beat their
swords into ploughshares and spears into pruning hooks, then I am to take my
anger and aggression and transform them into things that are used to harvest
God’s love. To whom am I feeling that
disapproval, or is it that part of me with whom I refuse to share my love? To
walk in the light of God might mean to shine light on my own darkness and claim
my shadow. Is it a message for me as a member of my country or my community or
church that I need to speak and share God’s vision of light in the darkness?
Paul writes a letter to the Romans - or is it also a
letter to us? Before I went to Seminary, I read a book by someone who had a
secretary type the Epistles and then send a chapter to him in the mail. He was
to read it as if the letter was from a friend and addressed to him. If it were
my letter; what is the darkness and what I am keeping in it?
What if the Psalm for today is to be sung to me as
if I were the House of the LORD, if I were Jerusalem in which Peace needs to
dwell within its walls?
What if Jesus in today’s Gospel lesson is telling me
his vision of the need to be fully aware of the presence of God in all things
and I am to pay attention?
We print the lessons in the bulletin so that you
might have time before the service to sit down in the silence and ask what is
God saying to you by these lessons before you hear them being read aloud. Because
I want to be faithful to take a Sabbath Day of rest on Friday, I post my
reflections and poems on the web with links to the lessons usually on the
Thursday before the Sunday so those who cannot be here can join us in
reflecting or for you to think about for a while before you come to the
service. My reflections and poems are not meant to be the last word, but an
invitation to a continuing dialogue.
I am not interested in your approval of my
work - I am too old to worry about anyone’s approval - but I am interested in
being part a community that actively listens to God. If we aren’t listening to
God in order to transform the world we live in so that God’s will be done on
earth as it is in heaven, then is this whole church stuff a waste of time and
money?
The Seer Prepares To See
Open
my gate that will visit and bless my garden.
Open
my door that you may enter giving pardon
Open
my shadows that all my fears might be set free
Open
my hope that darkness will ne’er overcome me.
Open
my pride that I need never from thee to hide
Open
my hurts so that forgiving I’ll be at your side
Open
my mouth that I might sing within your song.
Open
my heart that I rest beside you all the day long.
Open
my imagination that I might glimpse thy view.
Open
my will that I might be destined to follow you.
Open
my ears so that I may hear the cry in the night.
Open
my eyes so that I may see ocean wave’s sight.
Open
my lips that I might feel soft brush of thy kiss.
Open
my pores of skin to sense caresses of thy bliss.
Open
me that I might truly see.
.
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