Clinging To The Rock

John3:8 The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit. (1)

Modern day science does much to satisfy our intellectual inquiry about the wind – the whys and the wherefores.
-But who can unravel the mystery of the cool evening breeze that seems like the brush of an angel’s wing on our bodies after a scorching summer day?

-Who will speak of the unseen hand in the gentle breeze that tousles one’s hair when he is all alone in his boat on the bay, and the crimson sunset is all around him, and the seagulls are calling?

Who can explain the loving transport of sons, fathers and brothers into the inner sanctum of one’s soul when fierce gales known too well by those who go down to the sea in ships threaten to harm them? (2)

I have listened to the sound of the wind and tried to understand the mystery that lies beyond it. When a person speaks it is not the mere sound of the words that are of the most significant importance; it is what the words are meant to convey: the thought, the idea, or some truth which continues long after the sound of expression has long vanished.

William Wordsworth  gives a poignant expression of this truth as he relates his admiration of Nature:

“I have felt
A presence that disturbs me with the joy
Of elevated thoughts: A sense sublime
Of something far more deeply interfused,
Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,
And the round ocean and the living air,
And the blue sky, and the mind of man;
A motion and a spirit, that impels all things,
All objects of  all thought, And rolls through all things”. (3)

Jesus urges Nicodemus to listen to the sound of the wind.
That is more than a verbal invitation to listen to the murmuring of the wind; Nicodemus (a scholar of The Jewish religious expression) knows that the Hebrew words for ‘wind’ and ‘Spirit’ derive from the same root. Therefore, Jesus is preparing Nicodemus for a deeper and more profound experience of The Spirit.

I have heard that wind!  It is entirely different from the wind that billows the sheets drying on a clothesline and sometimes uproots trees and flings the salt spray high into the air. This other wind gently touched my Spirit, and when I listened,  as I eventfully learned to do, the sound I heard was the sound of my name on the lips of God. This wind, the breath of God, is far more potent than the strongest gale that ever ripped its destructive path through forests or destroyed cities and towns. The Breath of God is the epitome of unconditional love.

The Breath Of God is even now whispering in each person’s life! It has power to transform your terror into calm, to cast your frightening storms and impregnable mountains into the sea of forgetfulness. (4) The breath of God at work in all creation results in the sparrow building its fragile nest on the altar of God for protection from the wind’s fierce fury. (5)  This wind is blowing for everyone, but everyone must hear it themselves!  I imagine Jesus’  conversation with Nicodemus went something like this: ‘I know that you have been seeking the power and glory of the transformed life. Nicodemus. But do not permit anything to distract you, like the empty noises of the wind. It is easy to become distracted by the sounds of this world that are no more than the vacant sound of the wind. I am with you, listen now to the sound of God whispering your name!

Prayer To Follow This Meditation

O God, Whose creative Spirit once hovered over the formless void to create this beautiful earth. Come closer to us now and create such beauty in us that the sound of our voices will blend in with all things that join in singing a Hallelujah chorus for the Glory of God and the hope of restoring beauty to Your whole creation once more. Amen
Editorial Notes

1. The Holy Bible. NIV. John 3:8 p.636
2.  The Holy Bible.NIV. see  Psalm:107: 23-31p.935
3. William Wordsworth. https://interestingliterature.com/2018/11/tintern-abbey-a-poem-by-william-wordsworth
4. The Holy Bible. NIV. See Psalm 46:1-3 p.870

 

Psalm 125: 2 – As the mountains surround Jerusalem, so the Lord surrounds His people both now and forevermore. (1)

This text creates powerful images of home for me! The most beautiful spot in all the world to me is girdled round by hills that end on either side of two massive headlands thrusting into an open sea. The village lies surrounded by hills except for that one window that opens toward the sea; that is the place of my boyhood.

As a youth growing up there, one of my favorite hymns was:

Ye fair green hills of Galilee,
That girdle quiet Nazareth,
What glorious visions did ye see,
When He who conquered sin and death
Your flowery slopes and summits trod,
And grew in grace with man and God? (2)

Perhaps, even then, so many years ago, I felt the mysterious strength of the hills and experienced something of the nearness of the Divine presence.

The writer of Psalm 125 joins our company to celebrate the mystery and majesty of the mountains; he offers the most beautiful metaphor ever: “Like the hills that surround Jerusalem, so God surrounds His people both now and always!”
There you have it! We are one with God! Nothing else matters if you know that!Without that knowledge of God, life is incredibly barren!

This same image that evokes such warmth in the secret places of our being also provokes our most severe criticism of the eternal. There emerges the strange dichotomy of a love-hate relationship. We demand to know: How can we be surrounded by God, shut in with the eternal, and still be in the presence of such sorrow, such devastation, such hatred, such inexpressible tragedy, such crippling fears?

Our inquisition stops when the shadow of a cross appears upon a barren hill. That unbelievable happening confounds us. It is not in some far-flung reaches of the kingdom, beyond the surveillance of God, some domain that the devil has managed to wrest from the ownership of God, that this deed takes place. But this execution is carried out in the same Jerusalem of which the Psalmist said: “As the hills surround Jerusalem, so the Lord surrounds His people both now and always.” It all happened within the encirclement of God’s everlasting arms. God permits the forces of evil to gather for their most vicious assault upon God’s sovereign rule. The forces will yet experience the victory of God: And He will reign forever and forever!

The arms that surrounded God’s people remained steadfast! God still embraced those who performed this deed. “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”

The Gospel sounds with clarity like a thousand silver trumpets on the frosty air of morn. Evil did not defeat Him! God is still in control! Evil is conquered and is taken a prisoner in the arms that remain stronger than even death itself. “Father, into Your hands I commend my spirit” Jesus prayed at last.

And, for us? Here is the experience the hymn writer, George Matheson, knew, and thousands of others like him:
O Love that wilt is not let me go,
I rest my weary soul in Thee;
I give Thee back the life I owe,
That in Thine ocean depths its flow,
May richer, fuller be. (3)

Is that not our only comfort forever? When the darkness of uncertainty overshadows, when we are tempted to be fearful for ourselves and those we love, when a thousand questions chase away the last signs of sleep, when we think about the child about to leave home for the first time and we ponder their preparedness for their new journey; where then shall we turn for comfort if not to the faith that tells us we can never drift beyond His love and care?It is not pedantic or childish to place them and ourselves in the hands of God, knowing that He will make known to all the clasp of His everlasting arms!

What if the far country extends its boundaries, tempting our sons and daughters beyond their endurance? Perhaps the enduring qualities of friendship may not be as dependable as once they were. We cannot bear to think of our children abandoned and alone, maybe hungry and cold. Temptations call even now from the doors of our homes. Now is the time to train ourselves and our children to be faithful and firm in the faith that we are never alone. It may appear that temptation and evil reign, but the victory is won by God.

Perhaps we have been negligent in proclaiming a Theology of Victory? We may not have fully understood the importance of David’s vision in the twenty-third Psalm: “(God) prepare(s) for me a table in the presence of my enemies” (4). Here there is celebrating the victory of God while in the company of the enemy. That is what needs to be happening in this hour! David’s vision is merely a shadow of the victory God has accomplished through Jesus Christ. If the hills of Jerusalem mirror the constant presence of God surrounding His people forever more, then the cross spans eons to bring that blessing to us. The victory of Jesus is for each one of us. The power of God’s spirit in Jesus challenges the world to look up and see that God’s arms surround us still and herein is our victory.The victory is already God’s! We need to appropriate it! We must proclaim it!

Our mission is to remind ourselves, our children, and the children of others, that the ultimate meaning of life impinges upon the discovery of God’s everlasting arms, epitomizing unconditional love. Jesus’s story of the prodigal son is as relevant now as  ever. “I will arise, and go to my Father.”

Finally, the text throws more than a few effulgent rays upon what one day will be the last mile of our life’s journey toward the everlasting hills. It will be the same hills; the same arms are waiting to give that final embrace! We travel from God to God, as Wordsworth reminds us. If we set out in the morning of life, seeking His presence to accompany us, in the future, when the way is rough and the testing is severe, we inadvertently discover His loving arms, and then we can be certain of them forever!

Concerning all this, St. Paul wrote, “Now we know in part, then shall we know even as we are known! When that day dawns and the shadows flee, may we know that we go to walk among hills well known to us, and there we will lie down and rest awhile!

Still, still with Thee, when purple morning breaketh, (5)
When the bird waketh, and the shadows flee;
Fairer than morning, lovelier than daylight,
Dawns the sweet consciousness, I am with Thee.

Alone with Thee, amid the mystic shadows,
The solemn hush of nature newly born;
Alone with Thee in breathless adoration,
In the calm dew and freshness of the morn.

Still, still with Thee! As to each newborn morning
A fresh and solemn splendor still is given,
So does this blessed’ consciousness awaking,
Breathe each day nearness unto Thee and heaven.

So shall it be at last, in that bright morning,
When the soul waketh, and life’s shadows flee;
O in that hour, fairer than daylight dawning,
Shall rise the glorious thought – I am with Thee.

(Excerpts from a sermon preached at Nashwaaksis United Church)
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1. Holy Bible, NIV. Psalm 125 :2
2. Eustace Rogers Conder, “Ye Fair Green Hills Of Galilee” #84 p71. The Hymnary: The United Church Of Canada.
3. George Mattheson, “O Love That Wilt Not Let Me Go”
vs 1 #84  p.71. The Hymnary. The United Church Of Canada.
4. Holy Bible. NIV. Psalm 23: 5
5. Harriet Beecher Stowe. “Still, Still With Thee” #539 p435.
The Hymnary. The United Church Of Canada