Month: October 2018

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Meditations

THE LIGHTHOUSE KEEPER

Suggested Scripture: Psalm 132: 1 – 18                                                                                                            John 8:12 – 20

Text Emphasis:  Psalm 132: 17……….Here (in my Dwelling Place) I will set up a lamp for my anointed one.

Psalm 132:17 “Here ( in my dwelling place ) I set up a lamp for my anointed one.

“Fear not, little flock, whatever your lot,
He enters all rooms, “the doors being shut,”
He never forsakes; He never is gone,
So count on His presence in darkness and dawn”.

Refrain:
“Only believe, only believe;
All things are possible, only believe;
Only believe, only believe;
All things are possible, only believe.”(2)

But what is the foundation of that ‘BELIEF, and where is that foundation laid? Can ‘Belief’ be dismissed as being just another academic pursuit, with a network of psychological roots in societal and familial influences, or is ” Belief” something more PRIMAL than that, something akin to the mystery of ‘a beating heart,’ or breathing lungs; something related to the mystery of LIFE itself?

Since earliest times human beings have wrestled with ‘beliefs,’ and how to express them in cognitive terms. Many theories, seeking to explain the unsolved mysteries of the natural world were unsatisfying. There were always new demands for further investigation.

The inclusion of ‘Deity’ in ancient Greek culture, as well as in the records of the Hebrew Prophets, very early, become a key component in the demands concerning ‘Belief. ” Belief” in the Olympian gods and the God of the Hebrew Prophets becomes indispensable in engaging with the unsolved mysteries of life.

Perhaps, then, we may not be too far afield, if in our inquiry into the genesis of “Belief,” we begin right there with a consideration of the God, of Whom the Hebrew Prophets concluded: ” In The Beginning God.” We may well discover that ‘Belief’ is a natal gift that binds humankind to God, to prepare them to live as His Children here on earth.

Many parents are completely surprised when their child speaks about God and heaven; often happening at the time when the child is just starting to talk. Is it unreasonable to conclude that such ‘tiny expressions’  of belief are not at all ‘ chance expressions’ but, may well be the tiny seeds that are meant by God to germinate into an expressive and revealing “BELIEF?”

A careful reading of Psalm 132 of the Old Testament may prove helpful in our inquiry of ” Belief.”

I acknowledge that far greater minds than mine have undertaken to enlighten others, concerning the mystery of God, and our belief about our relationship with Him. I offer no profound scholarly evidence in this matter. I submit only that which I believe to be true, and which has helped me in my faith’s journey!

It is noteworthy that Psalm 132 begins with the biographer of David, presenting him as trailing clouds of glory, into the presence of God. The biographer quotes David, “I will allow no sleep to my eyes, no slumber to my eyelids, till I find a place for the Lord, a dwelling for the Mighty One of Jacob.” We, therefore conclude that It is a previous encounter with God, that results in David’s cognitive response, in commitment and love towards God. It is equally God’s initiative that incites a similar reaction within the boundaries of distant communities. While in the fields of daily labor, there is felt a sense of urgency to respond to God’s Presence: “Let us worship at the Lord’s footstool.” (vs. 5-7)
It is thus made abundantly clear that the Holy One, Himself, is an integral part of this creation that uniquely bears His Image. And there is evidence that a spark of the Divine dwells in every human.

But there is yet more! Human beings never reach the state of being  ‘ finished products. ‘  As long as we are inhabitants ” of this vale of soul-making” we remain incomplete. Of all things in the created order, it is humans, alone, who remain in God’s workshop until the end.

The spark of the Divine within one’s spirit will always be subject to the fierce winds of opposition in the world. The spark could be subject to extinction if it were not for this one fact about God, made clear to David: ” Within My Dwelling Place, I have set up a lamp for you.” As it was for David, so it remains the truth concerning each one of us. The spark of eternity God gives to each child as a ‘Coming To Earth” gift, is from the lamp that God has set for us within  His Dwelling Place.

Every morning as we face a new day, the Divine Light Keeper replenishes the light within us, so that throughout our waking hours we may perform Heaven’s duty, to build the Kingdom of Heaven here on earth. Every evening, as the darkness claims the day, God tends to our lamp once more, so that in confidence and in peace we may lie down and sleep.

One day God will finally claim the spark that has served Him here on earth and will use it to supplement the light of our lamp that is always burning in our Father’s dwelling place.

A PRAYER TO FOLLOW THIS MEDITATION
O Jesus, Light Of The World,
Come, with Your searching rays, into my life this day.

Prepare me, that I may continue to build on the Foundation You have laid, for the fortress of Peace, in this noisy and frightening world.
Quicken my hearing, that I may hear the veiled threats of shrewd leaders, whose words and deeds move this world further away from ever resembling Our Father’s Kingdom.

Open my eyes, that I may see the evidence, that inside the restless, wandering crowds the promise is surviving still; that one day there will be ONE People, Under One God, Inhabiting One world, where justice and love reigns.

Open my mouth, so that I may overcome my timidity to speak the truth. Enable me to use my voice to amplify, with urgency, Your expression of the need for more laborers to come and join with us in the gathering of Your harvest.

Open my heart, so that with an enlarged capacity for faith, I may assure the world that:

Where there is hatred, Love will yet reign;                                                      Where there are tears, Joy will follow in the morning;                 Where there are injustices now, the star of Hope will never set;                Where there are people standing alone and afraid:  We will walk together as brothers and sisters towards God’s glorious Light.  And all for Your love’s sake, Amen.

HYMN:     BE STILL MY SOUL

https://youtu.be/pwkPsKe-39Y

 

EDITORIAL NOTES

1. To gain a deeper understanding of the meditation that follows, you are encouraged to begin with a careful reading of the suggested Scripture text.

2. Fear Not, Little Flock Lyrics by J. G .Dailey

3. Photo: “The Lighthouse” taken in ‘Friday Bay’ during a recent day on the bay, with Jody and Joanne Woolfrey, in Newfoundland.

 

 

 

Categories
Meditations UNCATEGORIZED

LISTENING WITH THE THIRD EAR

To appreciate fully the photo above one must first understand the deep emotions that led to its creation. The photo, ( auspices of my good friend, Bill Tibbo), is a memorial erected in the town of Grand Bank, Newfoundland, to commemorate the many heroic fishermen who lost their lives at sea. There is much more to this memorial than that which is visibly available at first glance. By engaging”The Third Ear” senses. one is transferred into the company of this figure ( mother, wife etc)  who spent hours upon the seashore following a storm at sea, searching for the first sign of a loved one’s return, in the days before communication technology was widely available.

_____________________________

To gain a deeper understanding of the meditation that follows, you are encouraged to begin with a careful reading of the suggested Scripture text. The editorial notes at the end may be helpful also.

Suggested Scripture: John 4: 43 – 54

Scripture Emphasis:
John 4:46-47 46 Once more he visited Cana in Galilee, where he had turned the water into wine. And there was a certain royal official whose son lay sick at Capernaum. When this man heard that Jesus had arrived in Galilee from Judea, he went to him and begged him to come and heal his son, who was close to death.

Theodore Reik, a psychoanalyst, wrote a book titled, ” Listening With The Third Ear,” in which he describes the extra sense he engages while listening to a client; hearing the hidden meaning in what is said, and then reading between the lines to discover what is not verbalized.
Engaging the sense of ‘The Third Ear”, may well awaken the critical faculty of empathy, and thereby provide an easier avenue for a client’s painful experiences to be explored.

My desire for us now is to experience an imaginary demonstration of this truth, using the incident of ‘the healing of the royal official’s son’ ( John 4). Throughout, we will let the din, which daily insults our hearing, come under the scrutiny of our personal ‘Third Ear Sense,’ so that we might share more fully in what lies behind the cloak of garbled expression.
We begin on the bustling Main Street of the fishing village of Cana, in the province of Galilee. The pungent smell in every town whose men” go down to the sea in ships, to carry on business upon on the deep’, hangs in the air. On this particular day, loud, angry voices echo through the narrow street that leads to the waterfront. Boats, usually on the fishing grounds, today, lie idle on the beaches. Their owners are jostling for a place in the long line-up of those waiting to discharge the responsibility of paying exorbitant taxes to a hated foreign government.  This arouses anger like nothing else. These were hard times for the people of Cana and the surrounding towns. Strenuous labor, scarcity of fish, and high taxes were more than enough to raise the ire of every man, to say nothing of their vocal protestations.

“Just look at Old Ichabod seated behind the desk there!” derided one angry protestor.
” Yeah, some fine, easy job it is, to be The ROYAL OFFICIAL, stealing a poor fellow’s bread, and after he lines his own pockets, and I dare to say his friend’s pockets too, he gives the rest to the ROMANS!” snarled a bystander
” Come on, and serve us, Ichabod, we have work to do. We are not all like you, sitting there licking your chops having feasted on our money!
Ichabod made no response, whatsoever! His face bore the signs of a man nearing the point of exhaustion.
“What’s wrong with you, Ichabod? Didn’t sleep well last night? Traveling from Capernaum to Cana, too much for you? Why not ask your Roman friends for an easier job?”And so throughout the morning, the raving insults continue. Praying silently to God, that nobody saw him, Ichabod quickly, and silently wipes a tear from his eye.

Ichabod remains silent, like one whose conscious self is absent from the present time and place. The pain in his heart grows more and more intense. He longs for nothing more than kindness, and that measure of decency, which one human being owes to another, especially when the vulnerability of being human must certainly be painfully on display. If only there were one human being in the crowd who had the skill of listening with the Third Ear, would he see it!   Then, perhaps there might be a contagion to share the anguish of the inextinguishable flames of love that raged in Ichabod’s heart?
Is there, in truth, no unseen common bond that binds one human being, to all others; a  kind of relationship that transcends the sound and fury of an immediate situation, and, which isolates, and compartmentalizes everyone?

There is a higher reality to which the “third ear sense “ belongs. It is that unique wisdom that feels another’s broken heart without a word being exchanged. It is to claim the identity of another human who is wrestling with the evidence, that all of his tested cisterns, in search of ‘Life-Giving Water, have failed. It is to hear the silent request, screaming in a deafening voice, begging to be loved.

Any attempt to gauge the degree of difference in the atmosphere that prevailed for Ichabod, as the tax-collector, and as Ichabod, the heartbroken suppliant is impossible. Not until SPIRITUAL existence claims preeminence over the natural reality, will we succeed in fully engaging in that which enables us to rise above the natural and animal sphere.

Ichabod encounters God in human flesh that day.Jesus is the absolute epitome of empathy. Jesus’ humanity reaches out to embrace the humanity of Ichabod. Before any verbal exchange even begins, Jesus feels the pain of a father watching the laboring breath of one dearly loved, and who fears that it may be his last breath! Jesus knew already, Ichabod’s anguish as he left home that morning, turning every second to look again at the house, where his dying son lay, fading into the distance! Love dictated that he stay, but duty demanded that he go!

Jesus was well aware of the heartlessness of the “me first” ideology, with its promotion of separation and blame, that ripped into Ichabod’s heart at the waterfront earlier.

It is an awakened “Spirituality” born of this encounter with the empathetic Jesus, that rescues Ichabod from the lasting effects of the heartlessness of his earlier experience; it is Ichabod’s awakened Spirit which results in the blessing of Salvation for his entire family, and the healing of his beloved son.

PRAYER TO FOLLOW THIS MEDITATION

O Pitying Christ, Listen to Your people crying.                                                                         Lord, send Your Spirit to this place.
Lord, listen to Your people crying.
Give us mercy, give us power, give us grace.

Jesus, the way that You dealt with that poor royal official is so awe-inspiring, that we desire to spend the day with You, so that the contagion of Your mercy, and compassion, and love might infect us.

There seems to be no end to the din of complaining about our ‘little systems’ that are fading away. Help us to  understand that all man-made systems eventually will “fade away, “having “had their day, they will cease to be.” Give to Your people, renewed faith in the miracle of our creation. The commonality that binds us all together is the dwelling of God’s Spirit within each person. It is His plan and His all-conquering Love that will result in the world’s Salvation!

Lord, Listen to Your people, Praying!  Lord, send Your Spirit to this place.
Lord, Listen to Your people Praying.
Send us Love, send us Faith, send us Grace. Amen

HYMN: What A Friend We Have In Jesus

https://youtu.be/4XRmGEbH0qs

 

EDITORIAL NOTES

  1. The reference in the PRAYER to ” Little Systems, Having their day….” is from the poem “ In Memoriam,” by Alfred Tennyson.
  2. Sincere appreciation is expressed to my good friend, Bill Tibbo, of Grand Bank, Newfoundland, for permitting me to draw upon his photographic skills for this and others of his great work.

 

 

 

Categories
"BRIGUS MY BRIGUS"

BIG DECISIONS

 

At the age of sixteen, I was wrestling with my future career choice. Would I be an engineer, or a teacher, or somehow learn how to deal with a persistent nagging in my spirit to be a minister?
Following summer school and completing the provincial Department of Education requirements, I began teaching the seventh grade at Clarenville Elementary School. While the experience was most satisfying, I decided not to continue in that profession. In the darkness of the night, when sleep just would not come “The Hound Of Heaven” would be in hot pursuit as I lay there.
Exposure to an entirely different academic discipline may “slow the hurrying pace of those feet that followed after!” For example, at Mount Allison University, I explored the possibility of an engineering degree! But even in the whisper of the wind, I felt the breath of God, and to feel the wind blowing my hair felt to me like the touch of His Hand!
Reluctantly, I postponed my dream of becoming an engineer for the immediate future and took the necessary steps to substantiate my claim that I was not meant to become a Minister.
At eighteen, I offered myself as a lay pastoral minister in the United Church Of Canada. I accepted an appointment to serve three far-flung congregations on the Pilley’s Island Pastoral Charge under the supervision of the Rev. Dr. A.J. Barrett of the Grand Falls United Church. I was all alone and scared, yet all the time, a haunting thought persisted that I was not alone! And I never felt more contented than I did now serving that incredible Pastoral Charge. Although I stayed with the congregations for a couple of extra years, I kept assuring myself that in the end,” this too will pass,” and engineering might yet be “the most satisfying of the three’ the presenting options.’

And then, one close, muggy evening in mid-spring, I had a more profound encounter with “The Chief. “I was scheduled to be the guest preacher at an ecumenical service on Good Friday Evening. A large congregation was present that night, contributing more to the church’s stifling atmosphere. With a pounding heart, and copious notes, carefully stacked in perfect order, I stepped into the pulpit to deliver the sermon. I had barely started on the delivery when a choir member somewhere behind me, deciding that a measure of cool, refreshing air might now be in order, proceeded to throw wide a window. In came the breeze, and away went my copious supply of sermon notes, and on came the makings for a severe panic attack. It was severe, particularly for a boy of eighteen years. Nevertheless, that very moment might have been the conclusive evidence I had been awaiting. Engineering loomed large at that moment as my future destiny!
As I stood there in the choking silence, my heart took the swiftest elevator to the soles of my feet. Then the most unforgettable experience of a lifetime was mine! I tell you, I was aware of another Presence in that pulpit with me that night! And in the quiet, I heard,
“My Son, don’t be afraid, we will do this together. Do you think that everything depends on you and your notes.”
“No, Lord, not on me,at all. Let this night be for Your Glory! I surrender all!
Some three years later, utterly unforeseen by me, I, once more, was to Pilley’s Island Pastoral charge. There now, I met the most fantastic person who became the love of my life. During my earlier years as the minister of her home Church’,  she was Nursing in Saskatchewan; therefore, we had never met. Now when I unexpectedly returned, she was there. We married a couple of years after and now have three beautiful daughters. I graduated from the Memorial University Of Newfoundland with a BA. Degree and from the Atlantic School of Theology, three years later, with the M.Div Degree. A Post Graduate degree in Divinity.
For over thirty years now, I have been honoured to serve as an ordained minister of the United Church of Canada, supported by the most wonderful family one could ever ask. This Ministry has always been a family adventure from the beginning.

To this latest hour, I cannot stand in the pulpit or perform the responsibilities entrusted to me without the knowledge that I never stand alone. “The Chief”, who so demonstratively rescued me that night so many years ago, still assures me: “Don’t be afraid, we will do this together.”
That journey is almost over now, but if I could, I would do it again without hesitation.

 

 

“The Hound Of Heaven” reference, I owe to the poet Francis Thompson and his poem of that same title.