The 60-Second Sabbath: June 2017

The Case for Great Humility among Believers

We simply need to admit it:

All our concepts about God are wrong.

Yes, that includes yours.

Oh, we could soften it and say:

All our concepts about God are incomplete.

But I prefer the stronger incarnation:

All our concepts about God are wrong.

Just as our concept about another person is always wrong
because the concept can never be the other person;
the other person is always something other
than what we think
(though we may have some things right about that person, sure),
so too with God.

Once you've embraced that

(and I encourage you to do so now...
go ahead, do it now, say:

"All my concepts about God are wrong."),

then you will have advanced mightily
in the Christian (or any other) faith.
You will have grown.
You will have taken
a necessary step down,
a step down from arrogance into humility,
which is, paradoxically,
a step up,
because it's a step of maturity
a step up into greater faith.

You are now liberated
from the need to be right about God,
because you know,
as surely as you know your name,
that the idea of God you hold
isn't God,
that you don't have it right,
that you, along with everyone else,
are on the same journey of seeking, yearning, hoping.

Yes, it's humbling;
it's a liberating, joyful humbling.

All our concepts about God are wrong.

And God absolutely understands this,
and invites you into relationship just the same.

And those of you who haven't yet said it
(because I know you're out there),
repeat after me:

All my concepts about God are wrong.

Doesn't that feel better?

Text and image © 2017 by Dirk deVries. All rights reserved.
Visit PhotosByDirk.com for fine-art photography.
Visit The60SecondSabbath.com, where spirit and image merge.

Posted at 06:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

What Is and What Is Not

"What is,"
he said,
"and what isn't
are really much more the same
than one might imagine."

"Say what?" I asked.
I'd been scanning through a cookbook,
only partially attending.
"Something is...
but isn't?"
I asked.

"Yes, that's right."
He held out one hand, palm up:
"What is..."
He then help out his other hand:
"...and what isn't..."
He brought both palms together:
"Are really much the same."
He kept his hands together
as he placed them in his lap.
"You see?"

I didn't.
I wanted to,
as I so often do when he speaks like this,
but I didn't.
My face showed it.

He continued,
"It's like this is me"
    (holding up one hand)
"and this is you"
    (holding up the other hand)
"and we think I'm not you and you're not me,
but there are so many ways I am you and you are me."
(He brought both hands together again.)
"Though we have differences,
we share many things--
values, observations, pleasures, fears, intention, hopes--
we share most of our DNA,
the air we breathe,
the space we occupy.
You exhale, and I inhale...you,
    and you become part of me.
It is said that all of the atoms in the world
    are simply recycled;
we each include atomic material
that's been a part of every human being
    who's ever lived.
And it's all being recycled all the time...
    all the time.
Even after you die,
your "stuff" will be shared with the world,
    will become the world,
as all the world
    has become you.
Energy constantly passes between us.
I'm you, and you are me.
What you are, you also aren't."

I blinked a few times.

"Or try this:
Your dog dies,
and you think he no longer is.
You think he isn't.
But the fact that you can think of him,
can picture him,
can continue to love him even as you miss him,
can still, in your heart, hold and pet him,
well, he is as much as he isn't.
(Not to mention that his stuff
is now incorporated with your stuff.)
He still resides in your mind, your heart, your memory.
He isn't, but yet he is."

Now I was scowling and blinking,
signs my brain hurts.

"Or consider this orange,"
he said, picking it up off the counter.
"It is an orange.
What happens when I peel and section it,
    is it still the orange?
If I squeeze it,
    is the resulting juice the orange?
If I grind up the peel in the garbage disposer,
    is it still the orange?
It is and it isn't."

"Is there a point?"
I asked,
"Not to be rude,
but is this leading to something
that I might be able to grasp
is you said it outright?"

He sighed.
"I've been grappling with the pain of division
in the world,
in our country,
among families,
among friends,
and it suddenly seemed clear to me:

there are no individuals,
we are, together,
one single entity
brought into being by God;
we are creation,
not created beings within creation;
we are a single tree,
not a forest;
we are an ocean,
not a collection of water drops."

"Again," I said,
"the point?"

"When we destroy others,
we destroy ourselves."

"Ah," I said.

Text and image © 2017 by Dirk deVries. All rights reserved.
Visit PhotosByDirk.com for fine-art photography.
Visit The60SecondSabbath.com, where spirit and image merge.

Posted at 07:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Embracing Greatness

On the way to greatness,
to authenticity,
to becoming a person of recognizable character,
one stumbles and falls (repeatedly),
hurts others,
betrays one's own values.

Each time,
one faces the fork in the road:
to deny one's responsibility,
to blind one's self to the damage one has caused,
or to acknowledge it,
to admit the wrong and say, "I'm sorry."

The way to greatness,
of course,
involves the latter.

David, it is observed,
managed to break all 10 Commandments
in the course of four Old-Testament paragraphs.
    Not good.
But what sets him apart from other kings of Israel
is his admission, when confronted ( "You are the man..."),
    that he had sinned (badly);
his remorse was real and immediate,
and so was his apology,
    backed up by action.

For David,
it was a sudden, necessary, and humbling 180.

"Yes, I screwed up royally,
and I am sorry,
and I will do what I can
to make things better.

"I was wrong;
forgive me."

Now we remember David
    as a great king,
great because he is the king
    who saw his own weakness
    and owned it.

May we--
and all our leaders--
demonstrate such greatness.

Text and image © 2017 by Dirk deVries. All rights reserved.
Visit PhotosByDirk.com for fine-art photography.
Visit The60SecondSabbath.com, where spirit and image merge.

Posted at 06:34 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Now

There is only one time
to be happy,

and that time
is now.

Text and image © 2017 by Dirk deVries. All rights reserved.
Visit PhotosByDirk.com for fine-art photography.
Visit The60SecondSabbath.com, where spirit and image merge.

Posted at 07:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Words Matter

Sticks and stones may break my bones,
but words can crush my soul.

Words matter.

Thoughtless words,
    spoken in anger,
    spoken in frustration,
    spoken in envy,
    spoken in fear,
dishearten and discourage,
bring shame,
derail growth,
undermine faith,
destroy hope.

Thoughtless words,
spoken at home by parents,
spoken on TV by politicians,
spoken in classrooms by teachers,
spoken on playgrounds by children,
spoken by ourselves in the silent confusion of our own minds,
divide us,
destroy lives,
start wars,
disconnect us from the Divine.

Words matter.
Use them kindly.
Use them sparingly.
Use them thoughtfully.

Thoughtful words,
spoken by parents,
presidents,
teachers,
children,
ourselves,
bring us together,
defuse hate,
build acceptance,
spread compassion,
embody the love of God.

Words matter.

Text and image © 2017 by Dirk deVries. All rights reserved.
Visit PhotosByDirk.com for fine-art photography.
Visit The60SecondSabbath.com, where spirit and image merge.

Posted at 07:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

For God's Sake!

"Oh, for God's sake!" we say in frustration
when something fails to go our way,
    or someone fails to measure up,
    or we make the same mistake
    for the seven-times-seventieth time...

Oh, for God's sake!

Bernard of Clairvaux urges us to

Love God, for God's sake!

meaning,
really,
simply,

for the sake of God,
love God,

not because it gets us something
or makes God happy,
but simply because of what and who God is.

And further, implicitly

Love self, for God's sake!

meaning,
really,
simply,
necessarily

for the sake of God,
love yourself,

simply because of what and who you are.

For God's sake, love!

Posted at 05:36 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Longing for God

We speak of our yearning,
our longing
        for God,
to live in and with the Divine,
      the Transcendent,
      our Source,
      the Headwaters of the River of Life.

Even more powerfully,
God yearns,
longs
        for us,
to live in and with the children of the Divine,
      the sons and daughters of the Transcendent,
      the companions of the Source,
      the outflow of the Headwaters of the River of Life.

More than we yearn for God,
God yearns for us.

Posted at 05:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Being Me

I have to be me.

I tried being other people;
it just doesn't work.

And really,
being me
is challenging enough.

Posted at 05:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Prodigal

Luke 15:22-24

You are this child--
this son,
this daughter,
the lost one,
the wanderer,
the missing,
the exile.

You are this child--
bruised,
soaked to the skin by the cold rains of uncaring autumn,
stumbling toward home,
trying to remember
    what home felt like,
      smelled like,
      what it meant.

You are this child--
fearful,
embarrassed,
stung by regret,
longing for what was,
knowing that what was
cannot be again...
cannot be.

You are this child
    unaware that someone waits for you,
someone who never stopped hoping,
        never stopped yearning for your return,
    never closed up your room,
      never donated your old clothes,
          your books and toys and childhood awards.

Someone waits
who never stopped believing in you,
always listened for news of you,
for the crunch of your footsteps on the gravel drive,
never locking the front door.

Someone waits
whose love could never flag
even if you chose not to return,
ever.

Someone waits
with champagne stored safely in the cellar,
steaks and lobster tails wrapped in foil in the freezer,
banners and streamers and noisemakers
stuffed in the bottom dresser drawer.

You are this child
hesitating in the street,
staring at the house,
seeing the door crack open,
watching, through tears,
as Love itself,
Love and Raw, Unfiltered Acceptance,
runs barefoot toward you,
grinning, laughing,
arms spread wide as the world...

You are this child,
and you are home.
You are the one we celebrate.
You are the one Eternity celebrates.