Silence as opposed to noise

 We like to think that we hear God, especially when there is something fantastic happening. Some miracle or some equally gobstopping moment when we can point and say "there was God's presence". Indeed, often that is what we look for. Like Jesus and the possessed person (Lk 8:26-39). The moment that the spirits went into the Gadarene swine must have been spell binding. It is from these stories and others in the scriptures that we take our cue as to what we expect from God.  Building a picture of the fantastic that in today's world connects with the cinematic world of the Marvel Universe where grandiose miracles continue to occur. This world of fantasia hooks the general public and diverts them away from the reality of life. This is where our culture and civilisation is at with regards to expectations. Even back before COVID the then government's win was seen as miraculous or rather something spectacular which is beyond the normal.

There is so much turbulence in the world today that we are carried away with expectations of similar turbulence when God comes amongst us. Yet, when our friend Elijah goes out on to the mountain it is not the crashing and turbulence that calls to him but rather a still small breeze of a voice that calls out to him from amidst the tempest (1 Kings 19:12).  We often neglect our inward looking or setting aside time to be alone so that we can hear the voice of God in our lives. We bang about and expect God to speak above the noise of our own lives even while we tune out the noise that is around us, remember COVID, remember lockdowns, remember violence in the Ukraine, remember refugees... Once it falls from the news headlines it becomes nothing but background blather that we ignore like billboards on the side of the road. I know because I am the same, I get cranky with the number of posts about the environment or the Ukraine situation or COVID, etc. If we forget the consequential noise from our own society how will we ever come to know the still voice of God speaking to us in the everyday.

We listen to God in the stillness of the day

We are now past all the big bang liturgies as we move now into ordinary time. An ordinary time that we need to make more than ordinary as we move into our lives in the post resurrection life. If we fail to live up to the promptings of Christ then we fail to live up to our own Christian faith journey. It is now at the start of Ordinary time that we need to reset our inner lives, so that we may hear the still small breeze blowing through our hearts that is Christ and God's Spirit. It is in the coming months that we work out God's presence in our lives so that we can show God to those around us. It is when our imaginations should come to life in the reality of our everyday. The imaginations that come to us at Pentecost and we strive to fulfil in our imaginations of the Trinity. Only when we can be still can we begin to understand the message from God so that we can fulfil our call into the world. This paradox of movement and stillness is encompassed in the wind amidst the earthquakes and the fires of revelation on the mountain.

Our everyday is the earthquake and the fire. They are noisy. they are difficult to turn away from as they have a mesmerising effect on our lives. We are attracted to the bells and whistles that attend the concealer of God and those that offer gifts of life which lead to darkness and despair. Life is found in the movement of the stillness of God. Due to our perpetual motion in the daily noise of our lives we tend to miss the movement of God as we have no stillness in us. Eastern religions strive towards this stillness but for a different purpose, to eliminate all movement, where we must strive to become still and hear God moving around us so that we may follow God's quiet voice. The attraction of the noise over the silence is due to the fear we feel when confronted with silence. Silence comes across to us in the missed meeting, the missed opportunity as a silence of rejection, of being unwanted whereas the noise draws us in saying that we are wanted we are part of the music so to speak. This is the requirement of God to turn away from the noise of the Golden Calf to embrace the call of God that is not showy and not brazen but rather intimate and loving.

Moving towards multiplicity

 The Trinity is a dogma that is forged in the fires of controversy. It is not formulated in language that is consistent with the modern world and is an examination of or rather an attempt at explaining something in a language that is redolent of medieval world views and Greek philosophy. Yet it is a founding principle upon which the Christian faith stands which has not been changed nor truly examined other than to try and explain it in modernistic terms. Perhaps that is to unkind, yet if we think about the theological investigations and verbiage around the topic most of it is constrained by the very thought of what is being discussed, the Trinitarian formulation, and not by going back to first principles. It has perhaps become a cage within which the Christian faith survives but also prevents that same faith from thriving and compatible with an ever evolving multiplicity of pathways into the future.

If we are to truly expand our faith boundaries why are we confining our thinking by relying on the structures of the past or should we rather build on a deeper bedrock. Yes, let us understand the formulation but rather than re-iterate what has been stated devise a new formulation that makes provision for our modern world view. At this time of year preachers are constrained to bring an understanding of the Trinitarian doctrine to their own flock through the use of such things as the clover leaf, clock face, mother / daughter / sister, or other such analogies to bring about understanding. In the same breathe our denominations explode outwards as they magnify one over the other in their worship experience (Jesus over the Spirit / Father, the Spirit over the son / Father and of course in limited places the Father over the Son / Spirit). It is easier for us to conceive of a singular rather than a plural singular or it is easier to worship a plural over a singular plural. Individuality is for us the key and anything above one is just confusing unless it is broken into oneness. This distinctiveness is a draw back for many as they have trouble with the philosophical concepts that the Trinitarian formulation raises.

Is Trinity only singularity?

If, we look carefully at our Hebraic roots buried in the Bible we can see that there is a discrepancy regarding singularity of worship of a sole God. Rather, it is a God that is worshipped over other Gods that is acceptable and promoted, whilst acknowledging the presence of other Gods (Ps. 82). Strict monotheism only becomes a feature of the faith journey after the exilic period. Our inheritance of which moves towards the strict dichotism we have in the modern era that it has to be the right or the left, God or Evil, etc.  This leaves no space for both / and. Early Christian life was filled with difference in understanding prior to the imposition of ordered thought. In grappling with this early difference in God - thinking, Tertullian and others out of Africa formulated our Trinitarian aspect, which has perhaps caged our growth into and understanding of a God for whose likeness we were given in creation. An understanding which some suggest has been uplifted from the sagacity of African thought in the communal spaces of I am because you are and you are because I am. So can we retain an understanding of God that is uniquely part of us (God Immanuel) (Rom 8.12-17) and yet is so far beyond our understanding that we struggle to define and describe. Did the originators of the formulation believe it would be the only means of God-talk or did they expect it to evolve as our thought and world views evolved?

In this world we are surrounded by networks of relational activity that connect us to the past, present and future of those close and far away. We do not live in singularity but in multiplicity. God's presence springs up not in familial lineage down the years but more like an out of control rhizome of connectivity that springs up where the gardener (our dogma, formulas and neat garden solutions) least expects. Setting our thoughts, bodies and communities afire with difference and change that inspires. Others suggest that we begin to re-read our faith journey and re-interpret our understandings on the backs of twisting elastic threads, not singularities of particulate material, that cause paradoxical jumps and communications across vast unsupported space. A more elastic understanding that inhabits God consistent with a modern view of particle physics and cosmological understandings. It is not constrained by ancient mores of thought but expands our understanding beyond rigidity.

The ultimate act of communication

 Pentecost (Acts 2:1-21), in more ways than one, initiates a period of change for the Church. In particular it begins the transformation of a group of people cowering away from the rest of the community in doubt, fear and insecurity (Jn 20:19-23) into an autonomous movement within the Jewish faith system that would eventually evolve into its own established faith group. We often concentrate on the wonders of the Spirit's presence and the movement out into the world with little consideration with regards how this was managed. The Spirit incited a change in behaviour of the disciples to such an extent that they appeared to many as if they were drunkards in the early hours of the day. A change that eventually went on to challenge existing forms of faith and the way people acted within the community. Unfortunately even in the modern day these changes are so extraordinary that they are both overlooked and looked down upon as not being part of the modern psyche. The journey of faith is based on the premise of change in one's life and behaviour which is then communicated to those around us in community.

To change oneself so drastically and then to be able to communicate that change to the community around you is both profound and prosaic. It is profound in the sense that it is a deep ability granted by the Spirit to engage in a manner that is both acceptable and engaging to those who have not been affected by the Spirit. It is prosaic because it involves the use of our own skills and abilities to communicate in an everyday means without clouding the reception of the message being given with intangible meaningless thoughts. Just think about how this played out in the ecstatic moments in the early hours of the day in Jerusalem when everyone heard the message of redemption and peace in a language that they understood despite being from different parts of the world. Place oneself within a place where there is a number of different languages being spoken and you can quickly become disconnected or you sharpen your focus to those conversations / words that are being spoken in a language that you understand.  In South Africa, worship services within the Anglican church can become very confusing if you are not paying attention as anything up to 11 languages can and will be used within the one worship service.  You may find yourself next to a person praying the Lords prayer in Zulu on one side and Setswana on the other while you are trying to pray in English.  Each person hears their own language and responds within that language.  The true gift that is given here at Pentecost is the gift of communication.  The ability to transmit the Christian message within the confines of another's cultural and language norms.  If we want to do this in the normal fashion we have to spend hours, months and days just trying to fathom the internal structure and grammar of the language.  It is the one thing that we are often poor at giving praise for especially to those who have a facility for language. We often do not even think or operate on the fact that this is a gift from God which needs to be truly praised.

The Spirit blazes in our hearts changing our lives

In the normal course of events our words and our idioms lose a portion of our thought as they go through the process of translation. The other language / culture colonises ours in ways that may lead to misunderstanding of our intent.  In the same way our content is not only conveyed in language but also in tone and in the physicality of gestures and body positioning.  Again in different language and cultures proponents will tell you how different gestures mean different things.  Each of us reads these arcane signs so that they have meaning for us but that meaning may be as diverse as our very lives and our cultural upbringing.  No wonder it appears to be a babble of noise that leads to misunderstanding in the world especially for those who do not belong to the faith community as we speak of love and act in a manner that interprets love differently for each one.  In order to be clear and ensure our message is not misinterpreted by the translation how are we to deliver the message that we need to communicate.

The disciples all spoke and yet the same message was delivered.  The intent was the same for all of them.  They came out of the same place and were embedded within the same reality.  We nowadays do not.  We need to go back to basics we need to be reminded of the message as we turn to Christ and remind ourselves the "I am the way, the truth and the life." (Jn. 14.6).  This is the message that needs to be mirrored in our totality as it was in the disciples.  The act of communication was communicated in terms of their lives.  They acted, spoke and lived in Christ and God.  Their communication was complete as all heard and believed.  They heard intellectually, they heard physically and they heard their faith.  This is how the message becomes realised and is communicated to those around us.  It is only when we act physically in concert with living and speaking the Gospel will we be able to communicate the Gospel message.  This is when the Spirit grabs us, this is when there is growth and renewal, this is when we energise and worship; forgetting ourselves, our needs, our wants.

Following Christ along the way

  Christ ascends into the heavens at the end of the Gospel and in Acts. Two very different stories both ending with Christ ascending. How do we relate to this ascension knowing as we do that there is little way up there that we can point to as being heaven? In Ephesians the writer talks about Christ being set above everything (Eph. 1:21) perhaps a style of thinking that leads us towards seeing a person or somebody so far above us that he/they rule everything. A concept of a world view that is plagued by emperors and empires, kings and kingdoms, etc. Yet if we examine the Gospel we do not see anything about lordship but rather about love and understanding which has more akin to a certain amount of equal integration as opposed to lordship. In this case is ascension as simple as it is made out o be or is there something deeper to take away for us today.

It would be perhaps of use to think about ascending and what that means for us. Do or can we, at some stage, come to a time when we too can ascend? If we were to think in Buddhist terms perhaps we would be thinking of the concept of samsara or enlightenment, an understanding that is beyond us but is attainable with a lot of hard work. Or is ascension only the preserve of the Christ and if so what does it imply for our daily lives? In the modern genres of fiction and fantasy there are a number of what are known as cultivation progression series were the proponent of the story struggles through innumerable challenges and slowly becomes better as time progresses until they ascend to towards godhood or perfection. In the end Christ comes close to God or rather sits at God's right hand following the struggles of life which sort of fits the progression novels' premise as the proponent struggles to become as close to perfection as possible.

So for us perhaps the question that should arise is: what is our end goal here? What do we see for ourselves as being the epitome of the Christian journey and the end point, be it at the end of our lives or during our lifetime? Christ shows us the way, Christ dies for us showing us the way, Christ lives again to show us the way, Christ ascends to show us the way towards God. As followers of Christ I would suggest that we are doing a poor job as we appear not to have got beyond trying to follow the way as Christ showed us in his life let alone the love that was demonstrated as he died. Christ's way is the way of change of ourselves from selfishness to selflessness. It is not an easy road to travel as it means consistent sacrifice of ones self for the good of the other. It means ascending beyond the pettiness that is in built in our reactions within our ordinary lives. Christ's life, death and rising again tell us in the reality of the world we need to live and die before we can attain new life. These things must occur before we can even think of ascending beyond that which we believe is normal and finding ourselves close to God or rather finding ourselves as Christ to those around us.

Are we ready to follow the ascended Christ?

We are so scared of death in the current age that we forget the reality that death is a part of life. This then holds us back from becoming aware of how important death is to our lives. However we feel about the characters of the Lion King perhaps the most important understanding is the circle of life. Change in our circumstances implies the death of something as we have to change to grow in faith, in life, in our own understanding of our circumstances. Christ shows us the way through death into newness of life but beyond that he also shows that in accepting these things we grow so much more as we grow and come closer to God's presence. However, it all starts from within ourselves as we accept the challenge of changing towards being more Christlike and for some this will mean dying to our present and rising to the glory of God's presence.