The Secret Place

Posted on February 21, 2014 by Esther Hizsa

icecream storeI was in New Life’s Community Free Store the other day and found a book called The Ice Cream Store.  I scooped (!) it up. I loved reading Alligator Pie to my kids when they were young. Here was another book written by Canadian author Dennis Lee that I could enjoy reading to my grandchildren. One of my favourite poems in the book is “The Secret Place.” What a wonderful invitation to return to God in the secret place where we were made. Thanks, Dennis!

The Secret Place
by Dennis Lee 

There’s a place I go, inside myself,
  Where nobody else can be,
And none of my friends can tell it’s there–
  Nobody knows but me.

It’s hard to explain the way it feels,
  Or even where I go.
It isn’t a place in time or space,
  But once I’m there, I know.

It’s tiny, it’s shiny, it can’t be seen,
  But it’s big as the sky at night…
I try to explain and it hurts my brain
  But once I’m there, it’s right.

There’s a place I know inside myself,
  And it’s neither big nor small,
And whenever I go, it feels as though
  I never left at all. 

Even now that I am grown up, I can lose myself on the circumference of life. But when I return to that tiny, shiny, spacious place where God welcomes me, I am home.

“My frame was not hidden from you, I was made in the secret place,
when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.”
– Psalm 139:15

 SONY DSC

 

“God is the still-point of a turning world.”
-Thomas E. Clarke, SJ, Finding Grace at the Centre

Credits:
Knit Together by Kelly Dycavinu © 2011. Used by permission.
http://kellydycavinu.wordpress.com/
“The Secret Place” by Dennis Lee in The Ice Cream Store. Toronto:HarperCollins, 1991. Illustrations by David McPhail. Used by permission of HarperCollins Canada.
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© Esther Hizsa, An Everyday Pilgrim 2014
Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without permission from Esther Hizsa is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used provided there is a link to the original content and credit is given as follows: © Esther Hizsa, An Everyday Pilgrim 2013, 2014  http://www.estherhizsa.wordpress.com.
Posted in Childhood, Mystical, Poetry | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Cost of Love

Posted on February 14, 2014 by Esther Hizsa

heart in sand by jennaki_evie

All this talk about embracing our weaknesses is fine until someone gets hurt. I’m less inclined to romanticize the notion when I see how my failings have wounded others or how theirs have wounded me. When that happens, I’m tempted to hide behind a suit of armour.

Yet I can’t love others without being vulnerable. And that isn’t easy. I take a big risk when I allow people to see that I fear rejection, need approval, or desire control. Pharisees judge me; Moriartys exploit my weaknesses; and the offended pigeon-hole me (“Oh, there she goes, doing that annoying thing again”). Even if a person, as kindly as possible, tells me how my failings affect them, I still feel ashamed.

How do I embrace my weaknesses without getting hurt?

I can’t. It is the cost of love. It is the cost of taking up my cross and following Jesus.

A few weeks ago, while our contemplative group was in silent prayer, I remembered how our weaknesses endear us to Jesus. Then I sensed him inviting us to allow them to endear us to each other. That invitation shifted the focus from me to my neighbour.

Could I consider their shortcomings a precious part of them?

It wasn’t long before a good friend “went and did that annoying thing again” and ruffled my feathers. My first instinct–I can’t help it; it’s just the way I’m wired–was to figure out how he could have done it differently. But I also discovered two deeper instincts: the desire to find the empathy to love him even more, and the urge to sit back and watch what God would do. Often God does more in the process of smoothing feathers than he could have done if they had never been ruffled in the first place.

If I’m going to talk about love on Valentine’s Day, I want to move beyond romantic notions and talk about what real love is. I Corinthians 13: 4-7 says (amplification mine) “Love is not self-seeking. It always protects the vulnerable, always trusts that there is something bigger going on, always hopes that God will bring something good out of everything, always perseveres in the belief that this is the only way to live.”

 

Credits:
Love in Sand by Evie Prastacou  Used with permission.

© Esther Hizsa, An Everyday Pilgrim 2014
Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without permission from Esther Hizsa is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used provided there is a link to the original content and credit is given as follows: © Esther Hizsa, An Everyday Pilgrim 2013, 2014  http://www.estherhizsa.wordpress.com.
Posted in Poverty of Spirit | Tagged , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Lucky Bums

Posted on February 7, 2014 by Esther Hizsa

laughter-david-naman“Lucky bums!”  That’s how theologian Karl Barth described the poor in spirit who inherit God’s kingdom. Ever since someone mentioned that in our contemplative group, we have the urge to call each other “lucky bums.” It reminds us that we are blessed because of our weaknesses, not in spite of them.

It’s hard to resist our culture’s compulsion to distance ourselves from our shortcomings or treat them as temporary problems we must overcome or fix.* Most of us spend our lives trying to correct our inadequacies and assume this practice pleases God. We envision the model Christian as one who goes “from strength to strength.” Communion liturgies praise the Lamb who heals the weakness of our soul, and we presume our frailties are abhorrent to God. But they are not.

“Our weaknesses endear us to God,” says Rob Des Cotes of Imago Dei Communities. The Good Shepherd leaves the ninety-nine to find the one that has gone astray and joyfully, lovingly carries her back to the fold. The Father runs to embrace the smelly, shameful prodigal and welcomes him home.

One evening I led our contemplative group in a meditation on Jesus’s radical teaching. I wondered how to integrate what we had just learned about our blessed condition with the sacrament of communion. A thought came.

“We often come to the Lord’s table offering up our dark side to God. We are ashamed of it and want him to take it away along with our sins,” I said. “God will indeed dispose of our sins, but he doesn’t take away the parts of ourselves we don’t like. He wants us to love our whole selves as much as he does.”

That night we received the body of our Lord, broken for us. As we did we also received the One who loves and heals our brokenness.

And He received us!

Jesus loved to eat with tax collectors and “sinners.” Here he was doing it again. Aren’t we a bunch of lucky bums!

  

Credits and Acknowledgements:
“Laughter” by award-winning photographer David Naman. Used with permission. “Laughter” will be published this year in Treasure Art Magazine Yearbook 2014, Volume II’
The Laughing Statues are in Vancouver by English Bay at Morton Park.
Scripture references: Matthew 5:3; Psalm 84:7; Luke 15.
Celtic Communion Liturgy adapted by Imago Dei from Celtic Daily Prayer.
*Rob Des Cotes in “Meditation on Matthew 5:3” at Belonging to Life Retreat Nov 16, 2013.
Rob Des Cotes is director of Imago Dei Communities, an ecumenical network of Christian faith communities based in Vancouver, British Columbia.
© Esther Hizsa, An Everyday Pilgrim 2014
Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without permission from Esther Hizsa is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used provided there is a link to the original content and credit is given as follows: © Esther Hizsa, An Everyday Pilgrim 2013, 2014  http://www.estherhizsa.wordpress.com.

 

Posted in Poverty of Spirit, Rob Des Cotes | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 5 Comments

Trapped

Posted on January 31, 2014 by Esther Hizsa

Behind That Locked Door by innoxiuss

Frustrated, stuck, trapped. That’s how I felt. That’s what I recorded in my account of a spiritual direction session.

I had directed the session and was discussing it with five other spiritual directors who gather monthly for peer supervision. In supervision, we don’t focus on the client, called a directee, and what is going on with them. We focus on the director and what the Holy Spirit is doing in us. We pay special attention to the emotions we experienced as we listened to God and the directee in that sacred space.

My wise and compassionate friends poured over the dialogue* and the feelings I experienced during the exchange. They invited me to say more about them.

“I felt trapped because I didn’t know what to do,” I said. “When I calmly look back on the situation, I know now what I could have said or asked. But in my panic, I couldn’t see those options.”

I had experienced the same panicky feeling recently when I drove back and forth trying to find a house in the dark, when I overreacted to a comment, and when I tried to call Fred and his cell phone was off.

Tears came. “This happens a lot.”

“Do you think you’re triggered by something in your childhood?” someone asked. 

I thought for a moment, but nothing specific came to mind.

Two days later, in the middle of the night, I remembered a time when I was a young child and my siblings played a prank on me. We were in the curing room of my father’s cheese factory. They went out and shut the door, leaving me inside in the dark. They thought I knew how to get out, but I couldn’t figure out how to open the heavy industrial door. It seemed like forever until they came to let me out.

Now, with the help of my friends, I understood how the incident still affected me. I saw a pattern: something happens that I can’t control; I feel powerless; my upper body tightens. I have to get out.

A few years ago I talked about my childhood memory with a spiritual director. He invited me to picture Jesus in the curing room with me. I closed my eyes and saw myself as a little girl. Jesus pulled me onto his lap and enfolded me in his arms. He lit a light in the darkness and smiled.**

Jesus is with me when I am afraid. This truth may not keep me from feeling trapped by life’s events. But now, when I sense my upper body tighten, I can think of his arms around me again and be comforted. Eventually my eyes will adjust to the dark and will see the options before me.

And I will see the open door.

Open Doors by criggchef

even the darkness is not dark to you;
    the night is as bright as the day
 – Psalm 139:12 (NRSV)

Credits:
Behind That Locked Door by innoxiuss. Used with permission.
Open Doors by criggchef. Used with permission.
*The directee’s name and personal details were changed to protect their privacy.
** I wrote about this in “God in the Dark: Theory” by Esther Hizsa published here.

© Esther Hizsa, An Everyday Pilgrim 2014
Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without permission from Esther Hizsa is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used provided there is a link to the original content and credit is given as follows: © Esther Hizsa, An Everyday Pilgrim 2013, 2014  http://www.estherhizsa.wordpress.com.
Posted in Childhood, Popular Posts, Poverty of Spirit, Spiritual Direction, Stories, Stories of an Everyday Pilgrim | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

What’s a Bucket to Do?

Posted on January 24, 2014 by Esther Hizsa

jesusneedsnewpr.netI keep thinking of myself as that leaky bucket.  I marvel at the fact that I don’t need to put myself into God’s ocean of love; I’m already there.

The first illusion, which I talked about last week, is that I need to fix my holes to be useful to God. The second is that I could ever be empty of God.

When I open myself to God, I do not let in more of God. I am already full of God. Instead, I open myself to the reality that I am in God.

When Darrell Johnson taught at Regent College, he once said in a sermon on John 17, “We are in God and God is in us,” then added with a wondrous sigh, “and you can’t get much closer than in.” 

Jesus prayed that we would be one with the Father in the same way he is. God answered that prayer through Jesus’s death and resurrection. Yet we keep living as if nothing has changed. Father Thomas Keating, a Benedictine monk, said, “The chief thing that separates us from God is the thought that we are separated from Him. If we get rid of that thought, our troubles will be greatly reduced.”

Yes. That thought makes me thrash about, frantically trying to keep myself afloat. Jesus smiles. “Let yourself sink into my love. Abide in me and I will bear fruit in you.”

I imagine myself again as that leaky bucket sinking into an ocean of love, not fixing or accomplishing or becoming… anything. I feel peaceful.

But it doesn’t take long before my ego asks, “So, what are you doing here?”

The answer comes to me in the middle of the night: I am “doing” the will of God. As I rest in God’s love, I am fulfilling all God wants me to do with my life. 

Out of this resting, out of God’s fullness comes surrender to God’s will. I can surrender from a place of being immersed in love because I know that God is attending to my needs. My ego can relax: God is my creator, saviour, and sanctifier. 

Here in God’s ocean of love, with my ego asleep beside me, I am free to do whatever pleases God.

breath

Abide in me as I abide in you. John 15:4 (NRSV)

Credits:
I have been unable to find the original artists who created the pictures of  the girl with Jesus and “Breath” (the calm ocean image).  Please contact me if you are or know the artist.
Darrell Johnson is lead pastor at First Baptist Church in Vancouver.
Thomas Keating, Open Mind, Open Heart. (Warwick, NY: Amity House, 1986), 44.
© Esther Hizsa, An Everyday Pilgrim 2014
Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without permission from Esther Hizsa is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used provided there is a link to the original content and credit is given as follows: © Esther Hizsa, An Everyday Pilgrim 2013, 2014  http://www.estherhizsa.wordpress.com.
Posted in Helpful Images, Popular Posts, Poverty of Spirit | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Immersed in an Ocean of Love

Posted on January 17, 2014 by Esther Hizsa

I awake with an emotional heaviness at 4 a.m. and remember what caused this feeling. I got hoodwinked by fear in a legitimate disguise: I saw an injustice and pushed the panic button–again. I ended up making a fuss over nothing, and now I wonder if those involved are getting frustrated with me.

I hate these holes in my bucket.

“If you were a leaky bucket and wanted to be filled with God’s love,” I heard Rob Des Cotes say at a prayer retreat not long ago, “you could either spend your life patching the holes or simply immerse yourself in the ocean of God’s love.”

When I heard Rob’s words, I imagined myself as a bucket, filled and surrounded with love, and a deep ahhh relaxed my body.

God is loving me now at four in the morning. God doesn’t despise my weaknesses but sees these holes as openings through which I can be filled with love.

Waves Chris Niekel

I breathe in and out and picture myself lying in God’s ocean of love. I hear the pebbles move, feel them shift under me as the cold water flows out and rushes in again. Salty waves flood my weaknesses and recede, leaving every filament of their tattered edges as wet and vibrant as anemones.

In the morning, my fears will have drifted off to sea; I will laugh at myself and wonder why I was so worried. Even if my peers are wearied of me, I will not be undone. God is with me.

But here, now in the night, I don’t want a strategy for how to live with my weaknesses. Here and now, I just want to lie in the ocean of God’s love and feel God’s tireless, boundless love wash in and out of the holes in my soul.

sand beach When I awake, I am still with you. Psalm 139:18b

Credits:
“Waves” by Chris Niekel. Used with permission.
“Sandy Beach” by Donna Geissler. Used with permission.
Rob Des Cotes is director of Imago Dei Communities, an ecumenical network of Christian faith communities based in Vancouver, British Columbia.
© Esther Hizsa, An Everyday Pilgrim 2014
Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without permission from Esther Hizsa is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used provided there is a link to the original content and credit is given as follows: © Esther Hizsa, An Everyday Pilgrim 2013, 2014  http://www.estherhizsa.wordpress.com.
Posted in Helpful Images, Mystical, Popular Posts, Poverty of Spirit, Praying with the Imagination, Rob Des Cotes, Stories | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 10 Comments

Not Again?!

Posted on January 10, 2014 by Esther Hizsa

I went for a walk with a friend the other day. After we greeted each other with a hug, she did what she always does: clips a microphone on my collar. This silver bullet-shaped microphone transmits my voice to her hearing aids so she can hear me while we walk.

characters-professor-calculus-kneelingWe soon became engrossed in our conversation. When we neared the end of our walk I noticed the microphone was gone. We prayed and retraced our steps looking for it. We even asked sympathetic passers-by to keep an eye out for it. Finally we gave up and said goodbye.

Before getting into the car to go home, I unfastened the coat I had tied around my waist when I got overheated. That’s when I found the microphone still clipped to my coat collar. It had been there the whole time! 

At this point you might expect me to mention how God is always with us, even when we are unaware of him. Or talk about the importance of mindfulness. But really, considering my age, I’d rather just laugh about it. I’m getting as absent-minded as Professor Calculus. In situations like these, I find myself echoing my grandson. One of his favourite lines–said with a laughing groan–is “Not again?!”

We have to laugh at ourselves sometimes, and I rarely find myself short of material.zazzle mug

The other day I was racing out the door to Scrabble night with the girls when I remembered my cell phone needed charging. I grabbed the cord and intended to recharge my phone while we played.

I didn’t think of it again until I got home and couldn’t find the cord. I looked for it in my backpack and my coat pockets three times with no luck. I e-mailed my friends; they hadn’t seen it either. The next morning I checked the most likely places again and even looked in a coat pocket that I rarely use. As I did I felt something hard in the sleeve: the plug. Ha! The night before, I had the cord in my hand when I put on my jacket. The cord was still dangling in my sleeve!

When I told my friends what happened, they had a good laugh. And I hope you do too.

Please, tell me I’m not alone. Send me your absent-minded-not-again story by e-mail or in “comment” so we can all laugh together.

BTW when Fred sees this post he’s going to want to give me one of those mugs. Or maybe he already has…  Not again?!

Each time he said, “My grace is all you need. My power works best in weakness.”
– 2 Corinthians 12:9 (NLT)

Images used:
Image of Professor Calculus http://us.tintin.com/meet-the-characters/professor-calculus/
Image of Professor Calculus from Tin Tin on banner in single post: http://www.brusselspictures.com/wp-content/photos/tintin-stockel-metro-mural/Professor%20Calculus.jpg
© Esther Hizsa, An Everyday Pilgrim, 2014.
Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without permission from Esther Hizsa is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used provided there is a link to the original content and credit is given as follows: © Esther Hizsa, An Everyday Pilgrim 2013, 2014 http://www.estherhizsa.wordpress.com.
Posted in Humour, Stories | Tagged , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Free as a Bird

Posted on January 3, 2014 by Esther Hizsa

birds cropped AYFinally it’s January. The New Year brings me closer to spring and the possibility of more emotional energy. Dark December is always the hardest month for me. I keep praying that God will increase my desire for him, but other desires trap me and I feel somewhat numb and lost.

I gripe at God. “Just tell me what you want me to do to get out of this place.”

I think of people I know who struggle with long-term illnesses. They too long to be free as a bird–as free as the swallow that my son-in-law, Jeremy, saw while he was in hospital for the nth time because of Crohn’s disease.  His song Swallow is about that desire to be free. Click on the album cover for the link to listen to it. Here are the lyrics:

Swallow
by Jeremy Braacx

Geometric ShapesSwallow,
fly to your home
in the wall of the hospital.
I am stuck here inside,
and you may be,
but I’m not free at all.

My dance partner has been
this intravenous pole.
I am tired of the spin;
I am so tired of spinning her. 

Swallow,
fly to your home
in the wall of the hospital.
I am stuck here inside,
and you may be,
but I’m not free at all.

My mind’s been going whirr-tick-tick
to the sound of my IV pump.
I have been so tired and sick,
so sick and tired of thinking about–

Swallow,
fly to your home
in the wall of the hospital.
I am stuck here inside,
and you may be,
but I’m not free at all.         

     Swallow, fly into my chest.
     Make a nest; build a home.

     Swallow, fly into my chest.
     Make a nest; fill the hole
     in my soul. 

I heard of one who can raise the dead.
Transform the view from my hospital bed.

In the silence as I wait on God and think of Jeremy’s song, a deeper desire rises. The Cloud of Unknowing describes it as “a naked intent toward God in the depths of my being.” Its flame fills my chest with a sharp longing–not to flee this hole in my soul–but to fill it with God and his “unending miracle of love.”

Words come from a softer place in me now. “Lord, deepen my love for you.”

I find God’s reply in the wise words of the fourteenth century mystic who wrote The Cloud of Unknowing: “Though this loving desire is certainly God’s gift, it is up to you to nurture it… fix your love on him… Close the doors and windows of your spirit against the onslaught of pests and foes and prayerfully seek his strength; for if you do so, he will keep you safe from them. Press on then… Our Lord is always ready. He awaits only your co-operation.”

birds AY

 

O Holy Spirit,
fly into my chest,
build a nest,
make a home
in my soul.

Help me press on.
Close the door of my heart
to all competing desires
so I do not love anything
more than you.
Amen

 

*
Credits:
Photo by Anne Yungwirth. Used by permission.
Swallow: Music and Lyrics by Jeremy Braacx 2011. Used by permission.
Album Cover of Geometric Shapes: View from My Hospital Bed by Rick Vugteveen
Excerpts from The Cloud of Unknowing, 14th C. anonymous English author, © William Johnston, 1973.
© Esther Hizsa, An Everyday Pilgrim 2014
Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without permission from Esther Hizsa is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used provided there is a link to the original content and credit is given as follows: © Esther Hizsa, An Everyday Pilgrim 2013, 2014  http://www.estherhizsa.wordpress.com.
Posted in Poverty of Spirit, Prayer, Songs | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

What If Mary Had Said, “No”?

Posted on December 27, 2013 by Esther Hizsa

Annunciation Nicolas PoussinThe angel Gabriel appeared to Mary and told her she had found favour with God and was going to give birth to God’s son. Mary wondered how this could possibly be true since she was a virgin but responded with the words, “I am the Lord’s servant, may it be to me as you have said.”

Her immortal “Yes” has been painted, written about, and celebrated ever since. But what if Mary had said, “No.” What if, in that moment, she pulled the plug on the most beautiful aria in history. Imagine the pained look on Gabriel’s face if he had to tell the hosts of heaven to pack up shop. Would that have been the end of the story or would they have hastily gone looking for another young woman to take Mary’s place?

But Gabriel did not come to ask Mary if she wanted to bear the Son of God. He simply announced what would happen: the Holy Spirit would come upon her, the power of the Most High overshadow her, and the One born to her would be called Jesus.

It seems to me that if Mary didn’t want to hear Gabriel’s news and told him to go away, she still would have gotten pregnant and given birth to our Lord. But Jesus would have been born to a mother who didn’t want him, didn’t love him, and would not have encouraged him to be himself. He would have grown up to do all that God asked him to, while bearing the sorrow of being rejected by his own mother. Isaiah 49:15 would have become prophetic: “Can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion for the child she has borne? Though she may forget, I will not forget you.”

If Mary had interpreted Gabriel’s message as a burden foisted upon her, she would have gone down in history as the woman who missed the opportunity to enjoy mothering the Saviour of the world.

Mary’s story pierces our hearts because we too have been presented with a great opportunity. Whether we choose it or not, we have been overshadowed by the Holy Spirit who finds one way or another to be born in us. Everything in life has the potential of opening us to God. And God uses these things to enter the core of our being, so God can love us and be loved by us. The Holy One comes to us… whether or not we see it.

The question is not: will I allow God’s kingdom to come—for it most surely will—but, will I, like Mary, believe I have found favour in his sight? Will I praise God for his coming to me?

Caravaggio Adoration of the Shepherds


How silently, how silently,
the wondrous Gift is given!
So God imparts to human hearts
the blessings of His heaven.
No ear may hear His coming,
but in this world of sin,
where meek souls will receive Him still,
the dear Christ enters in.
– O Little Town of Bethlehem

 

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Images:
Annunciation by Nicolas Poussin, 1653
Adoration of the Shepherds by Caravaggio, 1609
© Esther Hizsa, An Everyday Pilgrim 2013
Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without permission from Esther Hizsa is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used provided there is a link to the original content and credit is given as follows: © Esther Hizsa, An Everyday Pilgrim 2013 http://www.estherhizsa.wordpress.com.
Posted in Christmas | Tagged , , , , , | 6 Comments

A Problem of Orientation and Proximity

Posted on December 24, 2013 by Esther Hizsa

Govert_Flinck_-_Angels_Announcing_the_Birth_of_Christ_to_the_Shepherds_-_WGA07928

And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.”
     Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying,
     “Glory to God in the highest heaven,
    and on earth peace to those on whom his favour rests.”
     When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let’s go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about.” – Luke 2:8-15

Today we celebrate good news of great joy that is for all people: God himself has come to earth to save us. But what has he come to save us from? The very thing that has robbed us of life: sin. The angels’ announcement was good news for all people because all of us have sinned and fallen short of what God intended for us.

During the Advent season, as the days got shorter and the nights longer,  I became acutely aware of the painful effects of sin–mine and everyone else’s. I suspected the Holy Spirit was getting me ready to receive the One who came to address it.

When I have been sinned against, I welcome such a saviour. I am glad Jesus has come to validate the injustice I have suffered. I want him to defend me and address those who have wronged me.

But what happens when I’m the sinner? The news that Jesus has come to address my sin does not sound good, nor does it fill me with great joy. No one likes to be found guilty. The angels knew that, yet they beckoned us all to rejoice. They wanted everyone to celebrate because Jesus did not come to condemn and reject us, but to inform and return us to God. For what is sin but a turning away from God and his love?

All of us have at one time or another turned away from God–the only one who can meet our deepest needs–and tried to get what we want from others. But they were not designed to meet all our needs. And so, on some level, they felt violated because, in fact, they have been. They have been sinned against.

The Old Testament prophets, seeing the harmful results of sin, told people to turn from their ways and stop sinning. They named the people’s wrongs and implored them to do what is right. When I read these passages I feel convicted. I know they are speaking to me about my sin too. But I often miss the word “turn” and skip right to “stop.” I feel ashamed of my sin so I try not to do it again. I may be successful for a time. But using determination alone to deal with sin is as about effective as taking an analgesic to heal a broken bone. It may kill the pain, but it won’t fix the problem.

I have come to realize that sin indicates a problem of orientation and proximity. When I turn away from God and move away from him to seek security, significance, and empowerment from others, I will inevitably leave a trail of suffering and anger.

God’s solution to all this violence was to send Jesus to redirect us to himself. When I turn toward Jesus, his light reveals the goodness of God. I am drawn closer and experience God’s loving attentiveness, faithfulness, power, and provision. God invites me to ask him for what I need and, as I wait on him to provide it, I become rightly related to others.

 “Come and follow me,” Jesus said to his disciples. When they weren’t sure they could trust him, he said, “Come and you will see.” When they got confused and lost their way, he found them–crying in the garden, disappointed on the road, guilty by the shore–and led them back to God.

On Christmas we celebrate the good news that God has come to save us. Jesus–laid in a manger, nailed to a cross, risen to life–did what it took to reorient us and bring us home.

And that is good news indeed.

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Image: Angels Announcing the Birth of Christ to the Shepherds by Govert Flinck. 1615-1660.
© Esther Hizsa, An Everyday Pilgrim 2013
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