2024-01-28 A Meditation on Receptive

“25 Now there are also many other things that Jesus did. Were every one of them to be written, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.” (Jn 21:25 ESV)

Tapping into the unknown the Christian is some brand of inspired. Awake, receptive, there is a strange proclivity to Hope, and in this Hope to Brandish, to Bask, to Behold things others would dismiss as so much promenading or exultation. Unapologetic we Hope for a sliver of that divine bread and wine to nourish our souls. Unfazed we Dare pray for a Revelation: good deeds accumulate, yet take time O Christian to play the game called Expectation. Expect some brand of newness, of post-mourning happiness, of Intervening love, inspiration, beholdenness, cherished status.

All these things are the Reward sublime, unseen by the hoi polloi of spiritual matters, the casually peering in, those weak in matters of the unseen. We stand amazed and beguiled, warmed strangely and simply peace and hope in our present frame of mind, body, and soul.

And then to the neighbor or friend who reminds us with a passing observation: do not grow weary of giving thanks for another day, another clean-thinking or sober-walking self-mastery. We know the unknown, as a daring call to prevent what is dastardly and ill-willed. The unknown can Disturb the Christian as well, existential Encounters that cause butterflies in the stomach or effects more ill, panicky escapism, distrust of the spiritual and placement of our trust in the physical.

There is no time for the dishonesty around Man’s actual estate, broken and faltering, ungrateful or complaining, be well O Man, O Woman, in cocoons strange and beautiful, abodes for the sojourner and passing traveler, oases or nurturing embraces: here, and not in our fanciful ambitions, is the ear to the ground and the smile to reassure, to communicate some stasis of peace to any onlooker, we are found and finding out, just what sublime and invisible deeds marvelous are going on in the spirit-realm. Expect things more vast than our own understanding, even weaned and diligent, patient and progressive, to eek out this accomplishment (yesterday thought to be impossible) or that solemn comprehending state. We comprehend yet in no way replace the Hearing Ear and the Waiting Soul. Who finds sanctuary and joy in what is Received rather than in what is Gifted Over. Who finds storyline and beauty ongoing and meticulous: some things are only for the humbled heart, only to be looked-on by the curiously patient or unambitious. For we were trained at the breast of a Greater Good, to abide on that simple feast and fast called Otherness, called Intervention, called Inbreaking. We learned what is so obnoxiously obvious on the good days: be patient, O Man, even through the frustrations and murmured doubts; murmur no longer, don’t you see how easy a yoke and patient a duty has alighted upon you? Yet crash course in life teaches that we pray simply for courage when that day comes on which we shall say “mountains, fall on us” (Lk 23:30)!

In other words the Christian soldier has what can only be called in all solemnity a grin, a mark or sign, that strange and wonderful things are going on in her or his heart. They can simply attest to a Divine Storyteller who has healed or weaned us off the illicit juice, or off the patent placement of our trust in some cup of coffee or sugars or fattened blase concepts. All this is a parable, for we bend the head down to labors only in having overcome our distracted panicky or nervous disposition: we can focus only in tandem with putting to rest some fears or matters of daily concern, people we care for yet cannot “fix” or “satisfy”, the inner self-hatred or sense of having always made a mess of things, the platform we think is what we deserve, a platform of compromise and wilting self; our self no longer wilts in public if we gain a simple end to the needs and—it all sounds so simple—be peace and believing under our Jonah-like tree, fig tree or what have you.