[photo from Gill Henwood – of the area near the Black Mountains, Bhutan]
Jesus prays in Gethsemane
On the night of his betrayal, Jesus took his disciples to the Garden of Gethsemane, near the Mount of Olives. He asked them to pray for themselves and then went to a place by himself. He prayed to his Father that he might be released from the trial and crucifixion ahead of him. But he also prayed that his Father’s will should prevail. The humanity of Jesus cried out and his anguish caused his sweat to fall like drops of blood. An angel from heaven came to strengthen him. His disciples were fast asleep. Then the Roman soldiers came to the garden to arrest him…. (St Luke’s Gospel Chapter 22: 39-53)
Gethsemane
This is his Passion. Darkness wraps around his very being, not a warming cloak but a shroud. Silence, punctured by friends snoring off the wellbeing of food, minds sloshed with wine. Alone with the shivers of the night, everything in him protests.
Sometimes, when we know our destiny, our minds close. Not this! No! Never! But our hearts are our undoing: our resolve begins; ends there. So he battles with his need to say ‘Yes’, for himself, for others, for us. How else can the world know what it is to be loved?
Kneeling on the damp ground, tense, numb, scared, uncertain, he waits. And the Father waits too as demons and angels whirl, stirring up the black air, a vortex of cosmic battle. Below them, sweat drops as blood. And still the Father waits, listening expectantly, daring to hope…
God wrestling desperately with God with everything – just everything – at stake. This really is the Passion. He sighs, deeply, calm descends. “Yes, let it be.”
The Father wraps his love around him – and so too around us.
Snowdrops photographed by Gill Henwood in her Lake District garden.
February tiptoes across a winter landscape, dressed in white array, luring us away from cold depression of dark, dank January, with dazzling brightness; promising the hope of Spring beyond.
Ah! What trembling beauty lays a carpet of expectant joy!
Hawkshead Church in early morning mist. Photo by Gill Henwood.
This photo was taken by my friend, Gill Henwood and is of Hawkshead Church emerging from the morning mist. This mist speaks to me of ‘revealing’, of something that will become clearer as the mist rises; of a beauty present but not yet fully defined.
Today is the time the Christian Church remembers the Conversion of St. Paul, the moment when all that clouded his mind and darkened his thoughts, were lifted by an encounter with the Risen Christ. We are told of it in the Book of Acts, chapter 9 verses 1 to 19.
Paul or as he was then known, Saul, a zealous Jewish Rabbi, had made it his mission to persecute Christians, those Jews who had chosen to follow the teaching of the Apostles about Jesus. He was responsible for the death and imprisonment of many and was thus thwarting the work of proclaiming the Good News of Jesus.
Something had to be done to stop him and it was the Risen Christ who did so. As Paul travelled along the road to Damascus, the Risen Christ appeared and light flashed around him. Paul was blinded by the light and fell to the ground. It was as if a dark mist enveloped him and in the darkness Jesus challenged him, Why are you persecuting me?’ Paul asked who he was and the revelation came to him that it was Jesus. Paul’s heart was converted but though his eyes were opened, he could still not see. First, his spiritual blindness had to be lifted; something Jesus arranged and then Paul became the great champion of Christianity he was destined by God to be.
For me there is something autobiographical in Paul’s famous passage in his first letter to the Corinthians, chapter 13. Having written his classic definition of ‘love’, He made the point that only love will carry us through to the heart of God and that is both our faith and hope. He referred back to his own lack of understanding of the power of God’s love (verse 8 following) and reminds us that on our spiritual journey we move, often haltingly, to a deeper knowledge of love, as God shares His divine love with us. At first our perception of God’s love is as if we are looking through a mirror dimly’ or as the King James Version puts it, through a glass darkly, but then, as God continues to reveal his Love to us, we shall one day meet Him as Love face to face.
Gill’s photograph of Hawkshead Church suggests to me another illustration of this. Our experience of God’s love for us, may seem at times to be as if we are looking through the mist of understanding. It contains all that will be revealed but we must let God work in our souls as he did in Paul’s. Then, slowly but surely, the mist will lift and the glorious vision will open our eyes and our hearts to a deep and abiding love. In the photo we already see the promise coming clearer. The scene contains all that needs to be revealed. So that is for us. If we open ourselves to the possibility of God lifting from us all that prevents His love to flourish, then it will become a reality.
The Conversion of Saint Paul
Brooding mist blurs edges of perception. Colours muted. A whisper of wind kisses the air rippling through the soul. Visibility impaired, a cloak of quietness drawn across the mind. Stilling all movement. Intentions passionately held, melt into deep darkness. Yet this is not the cause of fearfulness nor of despair. Out of the shadows, of seeing “through a glass darkly” there is a pinprick of growing light which slowly, perceptively, burns away the haze as new vision takes shape.
A Voice, crisp, gently directive, unfettered by illusion, beckons, touching eyes to see a wonder, “face to face.” The waypath is irrevocably changed.
Mr G's Ponderings 