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Prayer
Christ, may the life of God in me, this day, shine forth
By your holy Spirit, sharing life with all around,
As I live at peace with all creatures,
And may that life return to Praise your Name,
Through all whom it shines upon through me.
Amen.
Scripture: Colossians 3.9-11 (NRSV)
Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have stripped off the old self with its practices and have clothed yourselves with the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge according to the image of its creator. In that renewal there is no longer Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian [warlike, nomadic Indo-Iranian people in NE Europe], slave and free; but Christ is all and in all!
Story
A monk asked his abbot, “Father, why can you say that God could never love less the greatest of sinners than he loves the greatest of saints?” The abbot replied, “Son, for the seed of God is equally in all persons, even if it is hidden or revealed to varying degrees by one’s actions. Does the Sun shine less when hidden by the clouds, than on the cloudless day? Does the fog hanging over the waters in any way reduce the reality of the waters?”
Comments
The early Church Father Origen (b. 185) taught a common teaching in Christianity: the link between Creation and Christ. Origen articulated this connection as the logos [Eternal Thought, Reason, Word of God] of God being organically one with the logoi [words, expressions of the Word] of creation (John D. Zizioulas, Being As Communion). Therefore, in such an organic connection, each living person is a natural expression of the nature, or being, of the Creator. This truth alone is not sufficient, however, apart from the revelation of the Logos as a historical event; nevertheless, it appears true as a cosmological fact and provides ground for exploring how the Word, or preexistent Son of God, is of one teaching with Jesus Christ, or the Son of Man.
The biotic connection between Creator and Creature is pictured by Meister Eckhart (b. c. 1260) as a seed in us. He writes, “God’s seed is in us” (Praying with Meister Eckhart, ed. Wayne Simsic, “Companions for the Journey”). And we are responsible to tend that seed so that it grows “to be God [fully God-like].” Neglect of the seed keeps it from growing toward the light and to full size. Eckhart quotes Origen as noting that the seed is indestructible: “Because God himself has sowed and planted and given life to this seed, even though it may be overgrown and hidden, it will never be destroyed or extinguished completely; it will glow and shine, gleam and burn, and it will never cease to turn toward God.” That is, there is that of God in all persons who seek God, like an echo seeking its source, even if the awareness of the person is oblivious to that seeking: for the seed is not dependent on the person, or that prior of God is not reliant on that after of the human being and his or her response.
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This helps explain theologically much harmful behavior. Theologically, we can seek God in either helpful or harmful ways. The seed within, when allowed to shine and grow, will lead us to nurture it helpfully in relationship with other persons and ourselves. Our relationships will be nurturing to the seed within. Otherwise, the need created by the seed will eventuate in seeking salvation in harmful ways and will lead to misuse of relationships for indulgent ends (cf. the New Testament word “flesh”): drugs, abuse, greed, gluttony, crime, harmful religion, slander, … Therefore, sin is a relational term and related to the misdirection of our need to nurture the seed within, that of God in each and all of us.
Salvation, then, is an act and process of removal, or better transformation, of that which conceals the seed within us and is, like sin, a relational term. Salvation is the only release from harmful behavior to helpful action. Salvation is not essentially the giving of something substantial or organic not already present within us. The seed, through creation, is already present, for to come from God something of God must be a part of us, even as a puddle of water made from the rain must contain the rain, even though the puddle is a puddle and not rainfall.
The seed is an expression of the Grace of God, is a grace of God within the divine energies. Jesus Christ shows to us and through His spirit enables us to live toward the full exposure of the glorious and beautiful seed, and that full and unhindered unveiling is the fullness of the image of Christ potential in us. The holy Spirit is the energy of Grace for the maturation of the seed within you and me.
Reflection
1. How do you sense the holy Spirit working in you for the full flowering of the seed within? Explain.
2. Do you see the holy Spirit working in your faith communion that the seed might grow and glorify (shine back toward) the Giver of the seed? Explain.
3. Relate the opening passage from Colossians and the annulling in Christ of biological differentiation to the previous two writings on synaxis, or the relational communion of the Body of Christ. How does such apply to your life and relationships? Church?
Spiritual Exercise
1. Give thanks for the persons who have nourished the seed within you. Bring each person to mind while you give thanks.
2. Give thanks for one person whom you sense God has placed in your life now to nurture the growth of the seed within. How has he or she nurtured the seed within? Bring him or her to mind while you give thanks.
3. Whom has God brought into your life for you to nurture the seed within that person? How are you called to do that? With the image of that person in mind, pray for him or her.
Consider, if you are not already, sponsoring a child through Compassion International. You can find out more about Compassion International by going to www.compassion.net to read about sponsoring, in the name of Jesus, children living in poverty. Thanks! Brian K. Wilcox
To contact Brian, write briankwilcox@comcast.net .
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