Divine Loving Mystery – for Lovers of God

Looking for something in an old box stored away, I came across a few prayer journals. I started looking through them. One from November 1996, made me smile. I don’t usually do this, but I thought I’d share what I just read from it, a prayer/poem I wrote to the Lord fourteen years ago.

***

Thinking about how God called Himself “I AM.” God’s name for Himself seems to me like an unfinished statement. “I Am”… What? I desire to know Him truly and entirely for who He is. Jesus of the Gospels is in glory. I can’t see Him as He really is. Not yet. So, I must become intimately comfortable with Mystery. His intimate presence is real and I want to know Him for real — but can I? How? He remains so much of a mystery.

He is everywhere. He is within me. Yet He seems to be absent.

I think His language is less words and more action. When I settle comfortably into Mystery, am I really with Him? Am I “In heavenly places, seated with Christ Jesus?” What an amazing mystery is that?

He is Divine Loving Mystery. Yet, He has revealed Himself to me through Creation, the life of Jesus, the Bible, and His involvement in my life.
I long to know Him more.

Divine Loving Mystery,
Oh, how I long for You
Are your eyes sky blue?
Are they clear and deep loving pools?
Your face is mystery.

What about your voice — for true?
What gentle, soothing sound floats downstream of Your loving heart
Carried by tone and inflections?
I know in hearing them, I’d know You
Sometimes silent in strength You speak, yes, this too
I long for the human melody of Your mouth
Even if it’s scolding firmness to hold me close
And is there a voice not human in sound
That would roar or thunder more appropriate speech?
Your voice is mystery.

And, what of your gait when You walk?
Oh, what I’d give to watch you along Your way!
How does one follow in Your shadow today?
Passing among people, intent with purpose, You’d go
Sometimes are your shoulders bent?
Or, do You always carry the world with ease?
Straight and held back – confident and able?
Is Your stride determined?

Sometimes when You are passing, do You linger and watch?
Are our troubles too painful that You must stop to stare?
Do you reach out and touch and care?
Because of our choices do You steadily press on?
Have you ever even run?
How do You walk among us, Divine Loving Mystery?

And, what would I do, if suddenly here You stood?
Before me, everything I ever wanted or dreamed; yet beyond all, You’d be
Oh, Divine Loving Mystery, I know I’d be undone
So, really, I’m afraid for You to come
I’ll wait then, until it is time, both content and longing for You,
Divine Loving Mystery, I love You.
***

A while ago, I pondered how Moses asked God, at the site of the “burning bush” what His name was, so he could tell his people in Egypt who was sending him to deliver them from bondage. Well, God’s answer was “I AM” – meaning “I Exist”…

We all have names because somebody named us. Nobody named God because He always existed. I’ve wondered if it was that simple. With God, things are at once simple and complex. After all, how can we wrap our minds around the fact that He always existed? That’s mystery too.

The Mystery of the Cross – for Lovers of God

“This is a mystery, that Christ can be the obedient,

glorious love of God and the full measure of our disobedience,

both at once.” Walter Wangerin, Jr. 

I’ve been writing about the early church–the very first beginnings.  The first scene opens during the time Jesus is suffering on the cross. We’re not at that scene, however, we’re with his four brothers on their way home from Jerusalem because they can’t understand the things Jesus is doing during the Passover Feast.

I’ve been thinking about how wrong we can be sometimes. God’s ways often prove to be in contrast to what we think we know or expect.

Like the mystery of the Cross.  Paradox opens our eyes. Often in hindsight.

How can it be that God broke into our world through our violence towards him, so that he could lavish upon us his tremendous grace, love, and joy?

The Light was covered by utter darkness—for three hours. The Father rejects Sin through the suffering of his Son as Sin; and now the Father grants us acceptance through the Son. We rejoice as we embrace this wondrous mystery.

 

Lord of justice! Lord of mercy!

You hung suspended between the two.

 

What happened to Jesus at Golgotha was horrific, yet wonderful, ghastly yet glorious. But was it truly the Father’s will for Jesus to suffer so and die?

“Thou shalt not kill.”

The commandments of God were given to us so that we might know right from wrong. Can you imagine . . . We killed the Giver of the commandments—the Creator of life? Our sins nailed the image of God, God Incarnate, to a tree.

Why, oh why, did he go so willingly?

Jesus said that he came to lay down his life as a ransom for many. God himself became a perfect and holy living sacrifice. He paid the highest price that could ever be paid: God’s own life.

But Reason asks: How can someone else’s death be payment for what I have done?

He wasn’t just “someone” else – He was Life itself.

Besides, what Jesus has done for us goes way beyond reason. He himself calls it, through the infallible inspiration of Scripture, “the foolishness of the cross.” And it is the only way to forgiveness and eternal life.

Our way to eternal life was purchased at a very high price. God laid himself down, a perfect offering, for sin. He took upon his holy, glorious self the punishment and shame, filled with torment and pain, and became the one punished in our place. Surely, this sacrifice is the most extravagant, costly trade: God’s life for yours.

God became a man so he could pay the price and bring us back to him. The penalty for our sins has been paid by him.

“Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted.

“But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities;

“The punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.” Isaiah 53

How can it be that God broke into our world through our violence towards him, so that he could lavish upon us his tremendous grace, love, and joy?

This is the mystery of the Cross.