Mystic Musings… at Flickr

God is simply attempting the impossible within us, that we would be made perfect in one thing and one thing alone.  All endeavors within us are to this end–every prayer prayed, every book read, every Mass celebrated, every confession made, every burden born, every sorrow held out before Him–Love.  Oh friends, but we are not alone  in this task for love, only love shall lead the way, make a way, because He is the way.  Without Him we can do nothing.  What can we do friends?  Nothing, for the love He seeks to create in us is beyond our small frame.  Shall I will myself to lift the weight of the world?  With great effort, shall I leap over the moon?  If I try hard enough, shall I be an aquatic species?

I will breath a foreign air, but it is not found in the waters of the earth.  It is the wind of heaven, the wind of the Holy, the wind of cloven tongues of fire, the wind of the Holy Spirit.  I cannot generate this wind, I can only bow my head and cry, and let the God Who Is weep with love through my heart that has found love.  A love that is greater than the seas, the moon, the stars of heaven. A love that is demonstrated in time and space through the rending of His flesh.  A love that even now rends the heavens and breaths the breath of life over your soul ridden with burden, with the delight of the only begotten Son of the Father full of grace and truth.

A love that knows no boundaries except to boundlessly give Himself away, not as memorial, not as theological constructs, but as eminent presence, or what our intellect senses as love..  The first thing that came to the beloved when the Son of Man was lifted up was not scripture nor sacrament, but presence that makes scripture and sacrament worth wanting at all. Without the Holy Dove, the scriptures are simply man’s recollections of God.  Without the fire of the third person of God Himself the altar remains alone with bread and wine.  With the fiery dove, with uncreated light flowing from his Majesty, we behold the Lamb of God who take away the sins of the world.

The ancients called it the Shekinah Glory, the disciples called it cloven tongues of fire, our Lord called it the gift.  In fact, He said to His beloved that we should be glad that He was leaving, for unless He returned to the Majesty of heaven it would not come. Pentacostals called it the baptism of the Spirit, John of the Cross called it the living flame of love, I call it Heaven.  And when heaven touches down on a soul, it is transformed, yes, through scripture and sacrament, but never without the presence.  In fact the presence of the Lord comes through many means but it has one end, to fill you up. Sacrament is not the end, you are.  Scripture study is not to enlarge your intellect as much as to enlarge you.  The glory of the Kingdom is that the uncreated light of God dwells in you, the Spirit of the Lord fills you, the glory of the Lord encompasses you, even unto a first resurrection.  Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts, enkindle in them the fire of your love, and they shall renew the face of the earth!

Only a broken heart will make room for such a guest.  Only a soul that has found sin as darkness and modernity as vanity shall be able to contain such a gift.  Only those that are so tired of being tired, so ready for the good, the true, the beautiful, shall receive what  God is ready to give–the presence of the Lord, or love. Come in power Holy Spirit!