Nothing comes from Nothing... and Vice Versa

That which is born will die. It is a universal law. Have you ever known it to be otherwise? That which comes into existence will one day cease to exist. Humans come into existence. Therefore one day we will cease to exist.

That which exists must have its source in what is eternal. How can it be otherwise? How else could it exist? As the von Trapps taught us in The Sound of Music, “Nothing comes from nothing, nothing ever could.”

The Scriptures speak of eternal life. If we have eternal life, then we must be – or be one with - that which does not die.  The ground of our being is eternal – the One who says, “I am who I am.”

The Scriptures teach that God spoke us into existence. We are the words of God – nothing more and nothing less. God formed us as his words and breathed into us the breath of life. We are divine speech - vibrations from the mouth of God, animations of his breath.

But we forget this reality until the Word of God awakens us and redeems us from our wordlessness. He tells us who we are. “You are the salt of the earth! You are the light of the world! Let your light shine!”

The secret of meaningful life is to hold this truth in faith. The key is to experience this truth in our lives - to be who we are. When we know who we are, our eyes are open to the world as it is. We see the Kingdom of Heaven around us and within us.

Nothing comes from nothing. Being comes from being. That is eternal life. That is abundant life now.

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Art is “de nihilo nihil,” crayon and pastel, Frank Baranowski

The Mind of Christ

“For ‘who has known the mind of the LORD that he may instruct Him?’ But we have the mind of Christ.” (1 Corinthians 2:16)

The apostle does not say we will have the mind of Christ. He does not say we should have the mind of Christ or can have the mind of Christ. He says unequivocally, “We have the mind of Christ.”

It is a reality now. He contrasts it to the old understanding of God voiced by Isaiah in the first half of the verse, in which the prophet assumes that we cannot know the mind of the Lord.

But now something is different. The coming of Christ changed things. Good Friday, Easter, and Pentecost changed us. We have the mind of Christ.

In other words, I am of two minds. I am doubled-minded. I have a mind of my own, and I have the mind of Christ.

Of the two, I prefer Christ’s mind. My mind is pretty muddled sometimes. My mind gets things wrong most of the time. I do not understand things. I misunderstand things. But Christ is God. He knows the mind of God. And we have the mind of Christ.

Psychiatrists talk about left-brain and right-brain thinking, referring to the two hemispheres of the brain, which process things very differently. The same is true of our Christ mind and our own mind. Christ views things from the perspective of eternity. He sees how everything works together in perfect harmony.

“Now He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God. And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.” (Romans 6:26-27)

The mind of Christ thinks God’s thoughts. It sees the world through God’s eyes. It feels with God’s heart.

Paul tells us elsewhere to “have this mind in you which was also in Christ Jesus….” We are invited to set aside our way of thinking and embrace Christ’s perspective – to be single-minded instead of our usual double-mindedness.

This is not far away or out of reach. It is not an ideal. It is our natural spiritual state here and now. For we have the mind of Christ.

(Art is stained glass window at Central Christian Church, Orlando, Florida)

The Wreath Police

I have been cited for a serious social infraction. This time it is not a moving violation ticketed by a local police officer or a state trooper. (Thank goodness! I have enough of those!)

This time I was sitting at a community meal in the basement of the church when I was informed of my offense. Two local members of the “wreath police” informed me that I still had a Christmas wreath hanging on our front door.

Apparently it is a serious faux pas in this community to have Christmas decorations visible beyond the first day of spring. It should have been removed by Valentines Day, I was told. Ash Wednesday would have been acceptable. But the vernal equinox is absolutely the latest permissible date for yuletide hangings.

People keep track of such things around here. They noted there are still eighteen offenders in our small community. I am one of them. My offence is particularly offensive because my home is in the center of the village for all to see. Furthermore as the local church pastor I am expected to set an example.

I pleaded for mercy. I told them that I had not been able to reach my front door since I purchased the house in January. There are still feet of snow and ice blocking my front door, prohibiting access.

I explained that it is not even my wreath. The previous owners left it on the door. I didn’t even want it! They should have taken it with them. If anybody should be blamed, it should be them. I told them that I had the former owners’ new address in Vermont if they needed it.

Nope. It is my responsibility now. Local social mores clearly state that the present owner is the responsible party for all decorative infractions.

Well it is April now, and we just got a few more inches of snow. I don’t think I will be digging out the front steps anytime soon. There is a good chance that the wreath may still be hanging there on Easter Sunday. I am wondering if the severity of the offense increases when the violation extends beyond the next Christian holy day.

But I have an idea. I am thinking of calling it an Easter Wreath. I’ll stick a few Easter lilies in it and start a new tradition. I am sure that Easter decorations are acceptable at least until Memorial Day. By then the snow ought to be melted enough to take it down. If not, I will just call it my Fourth of July Wreath. Anyone have any little American flags?

Fire Tending

I had never owned a woodstove before this year. But this winter – and this early spring - I find myself tending a fire regularly. We do not heat our home exclusively with wood, but most nights I build a fire in the box. I do it to save money on our propane bill and simply for the joy of it.

We have one of those woodstoves with a glass front through which you can view the fire burning. So we have the ambience of a fireplace while heating the house more efficiently than with an open fire.

I find it difficult to take my eyes off the fire. When I am reading or watching television, I find my eyes drawn irresistibly to the stove – to see if it needs more wood or just to watch the movement of the flames. It is so much more interesting then the flickering images on TV.

There is something mesmerizing about fire … and something very spiritual. Fire is a universal symbol for the divine. In the Hebrew Scriptures, sacrifices were offered through fire. In the Vedas, fire was the primary focus of Hindu worship.

The Holy Spirit descended on the apostles in tongues of fire at Pentecost. God appeared to Moses in a burning bush. There is something about fire that connects us to the spiritual realm.

Tending a fire feels like a spiritual practice. It is like tending to the spiritual life. A fire needs watching; so does the soul. Without attention, the flames die down and quickly go out. So does the fire of the soul.

There is nothing so dead as a cold woodstove. There is nothing colder than a dead soul. On the other hand there is nothing that warms the heart more than a blazing fire on a cold night.

I will leave it to the reader’s imagination to explore the details of this symbolism. How does one tend the fire of the soul? What is the fuel? What is the flame? Who is the one who tends the fire?

An ordinary wood fire easily becomes a complex allegory in the mind of a preacher sitting by his woodstove on a cold night. Undoubtedly my imagination is going too far. But how can I not speculate? The fire inspires.

Thaw of the Soul

It is March and the intermittent thaws send water flowing in the streets. Melting snow finds its path across roads, making its way into the lakes.

As I drive down Squam Lake Road, the water seems impatient with the customary routes of creeks and brooks. Water dashes in wide swaths across the road, seeking its rest in the mountain lake.

The sight stirs my soul. My inner being feels this way about God. My soul races toward God. I could not stop it any more than I could stop water from flowing downhill.

My soul seeks its home in God. My soul came from God and will return to God. In the meantime I sojourn here.

The soul is God’s. It is deeper and stronger than my mortal personality. It hungers for God. It flows from God. It empties into God.

I could not stop its flow if I wanted. But I do not want to stop it. Indeed, I wish to follow it to its Source. I ride the current of my soul like a twig carried by a river.

Revelation says there is a river that flows from the throne of God and flows through the streets of the New Jerusalem. I know what path it takes. It flows through my soul.

Fifty Thousand Thoughts

I was watching a new episode of the television show “House” recently and saw a segment called “House Call.” It is a fifteen second spot that presents interesting medical facts. This one was entitled “Thoughts.” (You can watch it here.) It stated that humans have about 50,000 thoughts a day. That is 2083 thoughts per hour or one thought every 1.2 seconds. That is almost as many junk emails as I get!

I have been thinking about those thoughts. It seems like an awful lot of thoughts. It does not leave much time for other things. But I know that it is true. My mind is a never-ending thought-producing machine.

Many of my thoughts are repetitive cycles of thoughts. I continuously rehearse the past or speculate about the future. Too many of the thoughts are negative. I read Norman Vincent Peale’s “The Power of Positive Thinking” years ago. It didn’t help. The more I try not to think negative thoughts, the more they appear.

It is like someone saying, “Don’t think of pink elephants.” Well, of course pink elephants pop into your mind. Then I start thinking of whether they are African or Asian elephants, and how a pink elephant could be born of a regular elephant, and where that recessive gene could have come from, and so on.

After thinking so many worthless thoughts, I have decided that thinking does not get me anywhere.  Even when I think godly thoughts, they don’t seem to bring me closer to God. Thinking thoughts about God keeps me bound to my restless mind instead of enjoying rest in the Spirit. Thinking about God becomes a substitute for experiencing God.

Thinking seems to erect a barrier to God. That is a rather disturbing thought for a pastor. I have been trained as a theologian. My job is to think about God and communicate those thoughts to my congregation in thoughtful sermons. It’s what I do; I’m a preacher.

But this preacher is thinking that thinking is an inadequate approach to God. It is all right as far as it goes; it just doesn’t go far enough. At some point in your thinking you come to the limit of thought. Then all you can do is point beyond thoughts in the direction of God.

You often have to use words to point, but they are words that point to the Reality beyond thoughts. They are triggers of faith. Faith is not believing thoughts for which there is insufficient evidence. Faith is stepping beyond thoughts into the realm of Spirit.

Faith is resting in the Ground beneath thoughts. It is living in the space between thoughts. If we have 50,000 different thoughts a day, then there are also 50,000 spaces between the thoughts, however brief they may be. That is where we meet God - fifty thousand times a day. What a glorious thought! Our minds are filled with God. We just have to know where to look!

The Unused Door

I recently bought a house with a front door that is not used. I am not the only one with such a door. It is quite common in this area to have unused front doors. People use their side doors, back doors and porch doors instead. There is an unspoken rule that front door entry is inappropriate.

I visited some friends’ home a few days ago, and they have a table barricading the front door to make sure no one will mistake it for a usable door. My front door has insulation stapled between the inner and outer doors to make sure that everyone (including the new owner) gets the point.

I think the door may also be nailed shut; I will find out in the spring when I can access the door from the outside. The snow bank that buttresses the front steps makes it impossible for anyone to approach that door now. At least I think there are front steps. I don’t really know. They were snowbound when we arrived in January, and I have never actually seen them.

The outside of our front door is unpainted as if to announce to the world that it is not to be used. It is neglected-looking gray wood, in contrast to the fresh paint that coats the rest of the house. It is a color code that shouts to UPS and FedEx drivers: “Use some other door!”

I am not sure why front doors are unused. Often the used door is harder to access than the front door. When we moved into our house in January, it would have been easier to carry our furniture through the unused front door. It is bigger and opens directly into a large room. In contrast, our side door opens into a narrow hallway with an immediate tight turn that makes it difficult to maneuver larger pieces of furniture.

Having a spiritual bent, I have been pondering the spiritual significance (if any) of unused front doors. For example, does God’s home have an unused front door? If Jerusalem is God’s hometown and the temple is “the house of God,” perhaps it does!

Jerusalem’s front door – the Golden Gate that faces east and was the main entrance to the Temple Mount in Jesus’ day – stands unused. It has been blocked for nearly five centuries. If you want to enter Jerusalem, you have to go in one of the side doors.

According to Jewish tradition, the Shekhinah (Divine Presence) used to appear through this front gate. Tradition says that this is the gate through which the Messiah will enter Jerusalem. For that reason the Ottoman Sultan Suleiman the Great sealed the Golden Gate in 1541 to prevent the Messiah's entry. Muslims built a cemetery in front of the gate to emphasize the point.

It makes me wonder if there is a spiritual significance to unused front doors. Is it symbolic? Is it psychological? Does it represent the door of our souls? Jesus’ words suddenly have greater significance.

“Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me.” If you hear knocking at your unused front door, now you know what to do.

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