Does it? Really?
I heard this statement a handful of times over the course of the birth of a long-awaited child in early February. It related mostly to the challenges of long distance travel, but as I kept hearing it, I kept wondering (to myself), “really?” Continue reading
The Trinity “means that God is not some remote, unknowable Deity, a prisoner in his aloofness or shut up in his solitariness, but on the contrary, the God who will not be without us whom he has created for fellowship with himself, the God who is free to go outside of
himself, to share in the life of his creatures and enable them to share in his own eternal Life and Love. It means that God is not limited by our feeble capacities or incapacities, but that in his grace and outgoing love he freely and joyously condescends to enter into fellowship with us, to communicate himself to us, and to be received and be known by us. Moreover, the doctrine of the Holy Trinity means that God does not surrender his transcendence in condescending to be one with us in Jesus Christ, but it does mean that the more we are allowed to know God in himself in this way the more wonderful we know him to be, a God who infinitely exceeds all our thoughts and words about him, but who in spite of that reveals himself tenderly and intimately to us through his Son and his Spirit.” —Thomas F. Torrance
The aim of man’s life is union (henosis) with God.
This participation takes man within the life of the three Divine Persons themselves, in the incessant circulation and overflowing of love which courses between the Father, the Son and the Spirit, and which expresses the very nature of God. Here is the true and eternal bliss of man.
Union with God is the perfect fulfillment of the “kingdom” announced by the Gospel, and of that charity or love which sums up all the Law and the Prophets. Only in union with the life of the Three Persons is man enabled to love God with his whole heart, soul, and mind, and his neighbour as himself.
A Monk of the Eastern Church
As with many of you I too have come to know God most significantly, and to the very core of my being, during the seasons of challenge and suffering that life inevitably seems to bring to us all. He has caught me, enfolded me, reassured me and calmed me just like the North Pacific is calm twenty feet below the surface in the midst of a winter gale. From the surface it appears unsurvivable, while just a few feet below there is not even the hint of a ripple. Richard Rohr says it well: Continue reading
The concept of retributive justice lies deep in us. If you do what is right, all will go well and you have nothing to fear. Conversely, if things go wrong it is because you have sinned, and if you had only tried harder, done better, been less of a screw up, heard God’s voice aright instead of in error, or – here’s the good one – had more faith (whatever the heck that means), then this never would have happened. From ancient man’s appeasement of the gods, through Israel’s understanding of their relationship to God and even their inclusion of the ancient story of Job in their canon, through the NT and to us today, this idea of retribution resonates deep within us. It reverberates with the innate human longing for justice. It is ‘just’ after all…except when it isn’t.
I have just learned of Ben Witherington’s tragic loss of his daughter, and here post his reflections on that sudden and unexpected death and his belief in a good God:
Having recently gone through the devastating experience of having our beautiful 32-year-old daughter die, completely unexpectedly, of a pulmonary embolism, I was determined from Day One (January 11, when she was found dead in her home in Durham, N.C.) to be open to whatever positive thing there might be to glean from this. I cling by my fingernails to the promise of Romans 8:28 that “God works all things together for good for those who love him….” Continue reading
“He who has seen Me has seen the Father.” (Jn14:7)
“In beholding the Son, we see the Father.” (Athanasius)
Emmanuel – God with us. Jesus Christ is “the embodiment of the whole being of God,” the “perfect and proportionate image of God.” In The Crucified God Moltmann comments that the doctrine of the Incarnation holds that “God is not only other-worldly but also this-worldly; he is not Continue reading
I can’t seem to stop thinking about this tonight. I did not know Sarah, but the news of her death today has for no apparent reason hit me hard. A world champion skiier, Canadian, a “fearless competitor who shaped her sport,” she suffered an accident during a training run in Utah last week. Just 29. A newly wed. I can’t stop thinking of that young man and his pain – Rory is his name…her parents…her sister… and seeing the pictures of her smiling so bright. So young. So very sad.
