Tag: equality

Unchangeable Harmony

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Spend your life trying to understand it, and you will lose your mind; but deny it and you will lose your soul.
~St. Augustine in his work “On the Trinity”

Here are two mysteries for the price of one —
the plurality of persons within the unity of God,
and the union of Godhead and manhood in the person of Jesus. . . .
Nothing in fiction is so fantastic as is this truth of the Incarnation.
~J. L. Packer from Knowing God

It is not easy to find a name that will suitably express so great an excellence, unless it is better to speak in this way:
the Trinity, one God, of whom are all things,
through whom are all things, in whom are all things. 
Thus the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit,
and each of these by Himself, is God,
and at the same time they are all one God;
and each of them by Himself is a complete substance,
and yet they are all one substance.

The Father is not the Son nor the Holy Spirit;
the Son is not the Father nor the Holy Spirit;
the Holy Spirit is not the Father nor the Son:
but the Father is only Father,
the Son is only Son,
and the Holy Spirit is only Holy Spirit.

To all three belong
the same eternity,
the same unchangeableness,
the same majesty,
the same power.
In the Father is unity,
in the Son equality,
in the Holy Spirit the harmony of unity and equality.

And these three attributes are
all one because of the Father,
all equal because of the Son, and
all harmonious because of the Holy Spirit.
–Augustine of Hippo, On Christian Doctrine, I.V.5.

The story goes that Augustine of Hippo was walking on the beach contemplating the mystery of the Trinity.  Then he saw a boy in front of him who had dug a hole in the sand and was going out to the sea again and again and bringing some water to pour into the hole.

Augustine asked him, “What are you doing?”
“I’m going to pour the entire ocean into this hole.”
“That is impossible, the whole ocean will not fit in the hole you have made” said Augustine.
The boy replied, “And you cannot fit the Trinity in your tiny little brain.”

I accept that my tiny brain, ever so much tinier than St. Augustine’s,  cannot possibly absorb or explain the Trinity–I will not try to put the entire ocean in that small hole.  The many analogies used to help human understanding of the Trinity are dangerously limited in scope:


three candles, one light

vapor, water, ice


shell, yolk, albumin


height, width, depth


apple peel, flesh, core


past, present, future.

It is sufficient for me to know, as expressed by the 19th century Anglican pastor J.C. Ryle:  It was the whole Trinity, which at the beginning of creation said, “Let us make man”. It was the whole Trinity again, which at the beginning of the Gospel seemed to say, “Let us save man”.

All one, equal, harmonious, unchangeable, bound together to save us from ourselves.

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The Stones Themselves Will Start to Sing: No Ends Nor Beginnings

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Bring us, O Lord God,
at our last awakening into the house and gate of heav’n:
to enter into that gate and dwell in that house,
where there shall be no darkness nor dazzling, but one equal light;
no noise nor silence, but one equal music;
no fears nor hopes, but one equal possession;
no ends nor beginnings, but one equal eternity;
in the habitation of thy glory and dominion,
world without end.
Amen.
~John Donne (1572-1631)

What seemed to be the end proved to be the beginning…
Suddenly a wall becomes a gate.
~Henri Nouwen from Gracias! A Letter of Consolation

It is a fault of infinity to be too small to find.
It is a fault of eternity to be crowded out by time.
There is no crack.
Where, then, is the gap through which eternity streams?

It is our lives we love, our times, our generation, our pursuits.
And are we called to forsake these vivid and palpable goods
for an idea of which we experience not one trace?
Am I to believe eternity outranks my child’s finger?

~Annie Dillard from Teaching a Stone to Talk

To peer past this earthly gate, I keep my eyes closed, trying to avoid the distraction of time and space, pursuits and passions.

Yet the infinity of an eternal God is beyond what I can imagine – He who is without beginning nor ending.

God was, is and ever will be.

I reach out despite my limited vision; I am told He is within my grasp.

This year’s Lenten theme for Barnstorming is a daily selection from songs and hymns about Christ’s profound sacrifice on our behalf.

If we remain silent about Him, the stones themselves will shout out and start to sing (Luke 19:40).

In His name, may we sing…

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Equality In The Air We Breathe, If Allowed to Breathe

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Let America be America again.
Let it be the dream it used to be.
Let it be the pioneer on the plain
Seeking a home where he himself is free.

(America never was America to me.)

Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed—
Let it be that great strong land of love
Where never kings connive nor tyrants scheme
That any man be crushed by one above.

(It never was America to me.)

O, let my land be a land where Liberty
Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath,
But opportunity is real, and life is free,
Equality is in the air we breathe.

(There’s never been equality for me,
Nor freedom in this “homeland of the free.”)

Say, who are you that mumbles in the dark?
And who are you that draws your veil across the stars?

I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart,
I am the Negro bearing slavery’s scars.
I am the red man driven from the land,
I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek—
And finding only the same old stupid plan
Of dog eat dog, of mighty crush the weak.

I am the farmer, bondsman to the soil.
I am the worker sold to the machine.
I am the Negro, servant to you all.
I am the people, humble, hungry, mean—
Hungry yet today despite the dream.
Beaten yet today—O, Pioneers!

I am the man who never got ahead,
The poorest worker bartered through the years.
Yet I’m the one who dreamt our basic dream
In the Old World while still a serf of kings,
Who dreamt a dream so strong, so brave, so true,
That even yet its mighty daring sings
In every brick and stone, in every furrow turned
That’s made America the land it has become.

O, I’m the man who sailed those early seas
In search of what I meant to be my home—
For I’m the one who left dark Ireland’s shore,
And Poland’s plain, and England’s grassy lea,
And torn from Black Africa’s strand I came
To build a “homeland of the free.”

The free?
Who said the free? Not me?
Surely not me? The millions on relief today?
The millions shot down when we strike?
The millions who have nothing for our pay?
For all the dreams we’ve dreamed
And all the songs we’ve sung
And all the hopes we’ve held
And all the flags we’ve hung,
The millions who have nothing for our pay—
Except the dream that’s almost dead today.

O, let America be America again—
The land that never has been yet—
And yet must be—the land where every man is free.
The land that’s mine—the poor man’s, Indian’s, Negro’s, ME—
Who made America,
Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain,
Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,
Must bring back our mighty dream again.

America!
O, yes,
I say it plain,
America never was America to me,
And yet I swear this oath—
America will be!

Out of the rack and ruin of our gangster death,
The rape and rot of graft, and stealth, and lies,
We, the people, must redeem
The land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.
The mountains and the endless plain—
All, all the stretch of these great green states—
And make America again!
~Langston Hughes from “Let America Be America Again” (1935)

When we remain silent in the face of injustice,
we loudly slap the face of God.
Because the person being abused
is the face of God.
~Ann Voskamp

What has changed in America since Langston Hughes wrote “Let America Be America” in 1935? How many angry generations have passed since then and how many more are to come?

When three generations stand side by side, with angry words and tear-streaked faces, admitting that nothing has changed, then things have to change.

We are withering together in our anger and our tears.

Our children should not be faced with the choice of putting themselves in harm’s way because they are not allowed to breathe the same air of equality as everyone else. They deserve breath because God breathed them into existence, like everyone else. Instead, we are destroying their future as they are suffocated in the streets.

It has never been about “making America great again.”

It is about let America be America, once and for all.

Preparing Through Parable: The Last Will Be First

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118E20F9-E1F3-4252-87A7-84CE4E745736

For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire workers for his vineyard. 2 He agreed to pay them a denarius for the day and sent them into his vineyard.

3 “About nine in the morning he went out and saw others standing in the marketplace doing nothing. 4 He told them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.’ 5 So they went.

“He went out again about noon and about three in the afternoon and did the same thing. 6 About five in the afternoon he went out and found still others standing around. He asked them, ‘Why have you been standing here all day long doing nothing?’

7 “‘Because no one has hired us,’ they answered.

“He said to them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard.’

8 “When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, ‘Call the workers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last ones hired and going on to the first.’

9 “The workers who were hired about five in the afternoon came and each received a denarius. 10 So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more. But each one of them also received a denarius. 11 When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner. 12 ‘These who were hired last worked only one hour,’ they said, ‘and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day.’

13 “But he answered one of them, ‘I am not being unfair to you, friend. Didn’t you agree to work for a denarius? 14 Take your pay and go. I want to give the one who was hired last the same as I gave you. 15 Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?’

16 “So the last will be first, and the first will be last.”

Matthew 20:1-16

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One of the first complaints one hears from children is “it’s not fair!”  Once they are old enough to know which piece of pie is bigger, or which cookie has more chocolate chips, suddenly it is all about injustice and inequality.

As adults, we’re no better.  We’re always comparing ourselves to others, wondering if we have been shortchanged somehow.

Yet when it comes to the generosity of God, there is no inequality or injustice.  All’s fair when the last comes first and the first come last.  We’re on the same footing, loved tenderly and justly and righteously,  and no one could ask for more than that.

May my eyes see, my ears hear, my heart understand. He prepares me with parable.

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Turn Aside and Look: God’s Image is on You

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coin

Some of you have probably heard me mention the simple conversation between Jesus and the one who was questioning him, trying to pit him against Caesar. And he looked at Jesus and he said, “Is it alright to pay taxes to Caesar?” (Mark 12:14-17) That is one question I wish so desperately Jesus had answered differently—then on April 15 you could be godly and rebellious at the same time!

Jesus, so brilliant in his response, he says, “Give me a coin.” And he took the coin and he says, “Whose image do you see on this?” The man says, “Caesar.” Jesus says, “Give to Caesar that which is Caesar’s, and give to God that which is God’s.”

The disingenuousness of the questioner is noticed in the fact that he did not come back with a second question. He should have said, “What belongs to God?” And Jesus would have said, “Whose image is on you?”

Give to Caesar that which belongs to Caesar; give to God that which belongs to God. God’s image is on you.
~Ravi Zacharias

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The whole concept of the Imago Dei (or)…the ‘Image of God’ is the idea that all men have something within them that God injected…

This gives him a uniqueness, it gives him worth, it gives him dignity.
And we must never forget this…there are no gradations in the Image of God.

Every man from a treble white to a bass black is significant on God’s keyboard,
precisely because every man is made in the Image of God.

One day we will learn that.

We will know one day that God made us to live together as brothers
and to respect the dignity and worth of every man.
– Martin Luther King, Jr. from his “The American Dream” sermon, July 4, 1965

 

uwsakura

Martin Luther King, Jr. spoke frequently of a hoped-for day when all people would be united as God’s children,  joined together by our joint creation as the Image of God.  Not one of us reflects God more than another but together form His body and His kingdom on earth.

Dr. King’s words and wisdom continue to inform us of our shortcomings over 50 years later as we flounder in our flaws and brokenness;  so many question not only the validity of equality of all people of all shades, but even doubt the existence of a God who would create a world that includes the crippled body, the troubled mind, the questioned gender, the genetically challenged, the human beings who never draw a breath.

Yet we are all one, a composition made up of white and black keys too often discordant, sometimes dancing to different tempos, only on rare occasions a symphony.  The potential is there for harmony, and Dr. King would see and hear that in his time on earth.

Instead we unite only in our shared tears, shed for the continued strife and disagreements, shed for the injustice that results in senseless killings, shed for our inability to hold up one another as holy in God’s eyes as His intended creation.

We weep together knowing a day will come when the Lord God will wipe tears away from all faces — all colors just as they are.  No gradations.

april2eve3

willdaff

Happiness Beyond Our Grasp

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butterflythistle

July 4 is not only the birthday of our independence as the United States of America.  It is the day we declared to the world:

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

No one had ever said it out loud before.  Historically there had been many a treatise written and wars won and lost about the right to live, and the right to freedom, but the right to pursue happiness?  Unprecedented– and so typically American.

Declaring it is one thing.  Making it so is quite another matter.  Happiness likes to elude our pursuit.

As the famous American author Nathaniel Hawthorne, born on July 4, wrote:

“Happiness is like a butterfly which, when pursued, is always beyond our grasp, but, if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you.”

Americans pay a steep price in our noisy and pushy pursuit of happiness.  Perhaps it is the larger mortgage for a bigger house, a wider flat screen TV, the latest tech device, unlimited access to 24 hour porn sites, the best recreational substance money can buy, or the tank of gas that will carry us just a little farther down the road in our big trucks, RVs and SUVs.  We try to buy our way to happiness with our charge cards maxed out and find ourselves in a deeper debt pit, putting our life and liberty in serious jeopardy.  Even the government itself, home of the brave and the free, has never been so deep in deficit spending.

Happiness cannot be purchased with plastic, but is bought through individual personal sacrifice, making sure others have what they need before we ourselves rest easy.  It is the selfish pursuit of selflessness.  And that is exactly why it is so elusive because inalienable rights don’t come naturally–they must be fought for and preserved daily.

Much blood has been shed by Americans to guarantee Life and Liberty for others, including citizens of other countries.  If the price paid through the sacrifice of hundreds of thousands of lives has resulted in more happiness, why do we still seem so unsatisfied and miserable?

Perhaps we have it backward, as Hawthorne suggests.  We can’t pursue happiness;  it will find us, like God’s grace,  when we least expect or deserve it.

Happiness certainly won’t be found in the fireworks that will be blown up today, or the food consumed, or the free flowing alcohol. It will be in a quiet moment of realization that we are truly blessed by this incredible place to live and raise our children, and that we need to work harder than ever to make it even better.   We will not be free until we stop allowing our appetites to dictate how we live our lives, but realize true freedom comes when we do what ought to be done to preserve equality, justice and liberty for future generations.

At that moment, in a public, no longer silent, prayer of thanks to the Creator addressed in our Declaration of Independence, can we know the Happiness that pursues us when we live in a forward thinking spirit of gratitude and sacrifice.

Happiness touches us, like a butterfly that lights upon us in our stillness,
in a moment of pure grace.

swallowtail2

Unchangeable Harmony

barnstormingblog1 Comment

fidalgobeach

 

“Spend your life trying to understand it, and you will lose your mind; but deny it and you will lose your soul.”
Augustine in his work “On the Trinity”

A story has been told that Augustine of Hippo was walking on the beach contemplating the mystery of the Trinity.  Then he saw a boy in front of him who had dug a hole in the sand and was going out to the sea again and again and bringing some water to pour into the hole.
Augustine asked him, “What are you doing?”
“I’m going to pour the entire ocean into this hole.”
“That is impossible, the whole ocean will not fit in the hole you have made” said Augustine.
The boy replied, “And you cannot fit the Trinity in your tiny little brain.”

I accept that my tiny brain, ever so much tinier than St. Augustine’s,  cannot possibly absorb or explain the Trinity–I will not try to put the entire ocean in that small hole.  The many analogies used to help human understanding of the Trinity are dangerously limited in scope:
three candles, one light
vapor, water, ice
shell, yolk, albumin
height, width, depth
apple peel, flesh, core
past, present, future.

image

ice211

eggshell2

appledew2

It is sufficient for me to know, as expressed by the 19th century Anglican pastor J.C. Ryle:

“It was the whole Trinity, which at the beginning of creation said, ‘Let us make man’. It was the whole Trinity again, which at the beginning of the Gospel seemed to say, ‘Let us save man'”.

All one, equal, harmonious, unchangeable, to our rescue.
“It is not easy to find a name that will suitably express so great an excellence, unless it is better to speak in this way:
the Trinity, one God, of whom are all things, through whom are all things, in whom are all things. 
Thus the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, and each of these by Himself, is God,
and at the same time they are all one God;
and each of them by Himself is a complete substance, and yet they are all one substance.

The Father is not the Son nor the Holy Spirit;
the Son is not the Father nor the Holy Spirit;
the Holy Spirit is not the Father nor the Son:
but the Father is only Father,
the Son is only Son,
and the Holy Spirit is only Holy Spirit.

To all three belong the same eternity,
the same unchangeableness, the same majesty, the same power.
In the Father is unity, in the Son equality, in the Holy Spirit the harmony of unity and equality.

And these three attributes are all one because of the Father, all equal because of the Son, and all harmonious because of the Holy Spirit.”
–Augustine of Hippo, On Christian Doctrine, I.V.5.

stainedglassgr

sunrise6316

No Gradations

barnstormingblog1 Comment

northeast3

Januarymorning16

The whole concept of the Imago Dei (or)…the ‘Image of God’ is the idea that all men have something within them that God injected…

This gives him a uniqueness, it gives him worth, it gives him dignity.
And we must never forget this…there are no gradations in the Image of God.

Every man from a treble white to a bass black is significant on God’s keyboard,
precisely because every man is made in the Image of God.

One day we will learn that.

We will know one day that God made us to live together as brothers
and to respect the dignity and worth of every man.
– Martin Luther King, Jr. from his “The American Dream” sermon, July 4, 1965

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photo by Lea Gibson

 

Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbor is the holiest object presented to your senses.
~C. S. Lewis from The Weight of Glory

 

Martin Luther King, Jr. spoke frequently of a hoped-for day when all people would be united as God’s children,  joined together by our joint creation as the Image of God.  Not one of us reflects God more than another but together form His body and His kingdom on earth.

Dr. King’s words and wisdom continue to inform us of our shortcomings 50 years later as we flounder in our flaws and brokenness;  so many question not only the validity of equality of all people of all shades, but even doubt the existence of a God who would create a world that includes the crippled body, the troubled mind, the questioned gender, the genetically challenged, the human beings never allowed to draw a breath.

Yet we are all one, a composition made up of white and black keys too often discordant, sometimes dancing to different tempos, only on rare occasions a symphony.  The potential is there for harmony, and Dr. King would see and hear that in his time on earth.

Perhaps today we unite only in our shared tears, shed for the continued strife and disagreements, shed for the injustice that results in senseless killings, shed for our inability to hold up one another as holy in God’s eyes as His intended creation.

We can weep together on this day, knowing, as Dr. King knew, a day will come when the Lord God will wipe tears away from all faces — all colors just as they are.  No gradations.

cherrydrops

cloudlayers

morning11016