Fearsome and Blessed

The city streets are lined with trees resting on their sides, waiting for pickup and travel to the composting piles. Christmas is "over"...we have made it through the days and nights of the season. We celebrated the birth of Jesus, the amazing gift of God's love enfolded in flesh which marks the intersection of incomprehensible divinity with humans. And now, for the people of God, the journey has just begun.

We walk in the dancing light of Epiphany. This light -- the continuing manifestation of Jesus as God in our midst -- is one that illuminates the darkness surrounding us. It dances -- moving to expose anything that obstructs the brilliance of God's loving, healing presence. It reveals whatever is essentially "true" about any situation, or any relationship, or any opportunity. It takes ordinary circumstances and transforms them into extraordinary visions, like a fractal image with layer upon layer upon layer -- perpetual movement of chaos into order and beauty.


Paul Tillich (20th century theologian) was facinated by the nature of truth and by the power it has to reveal the meaning of our experiences. He taught about the fluid nature of what is essential to our understanding of what is going on. We glimpse a point of truth (about another person, a situation or about ourselves). Then, as we reflect upon it, (trying to understand it or speak about it) it fragments. Our minds and our words are limited, and the moment we try to name what we have seen it is diminished.

You may notice that the Light of Christ seems capricious. It can make you dizzy with wonder. Perhaps that dizzy feeling is actually an indication that you are seeing things with the eyes of faith. Tillich said: "Faith is an act of a finite being who is grasped by, and turned to, the infinite." Faith compels you to stay with the Light as it moves. Prayer provides the center from which you trust its dancing revelations. As you pray and as you "wonder" as you wander through the world, you will perceive all things new. What seemed acceptable may now be seen as problematic. What was irrelevant moves into being imperative. What was impossible now is possible.

Everything is presented in new ways by the light of Christ. Our response to this light may, at first, be painful. In some ways we fear what we see about ourselves and each other. Fearsome Light.

Be Still!

 As we trust the light of Christ illuminating the darkness, we can see things differently.  We move in a different facet of existence, with a fresh hope and a new possibility.

Blessed Light!