On a dark night, Inflamed by love-longing – O exquisite risk! – Undetected I slipped away. My house, at last, grown still. Secure in the darkness, I climbed the secret ladder in disguise – O exquisite risk! – Concealed by the darkness. My house, at last, grown still.
That sweet night: a secret. Nobody saw me; I did not see a thing. No other light, no other guide Than the One burning in my heart.
This light led the way More clearly than the risen sun To where He was waiting for me – The One I knew so intimately – In a place where no one could find us.
O night, that guided me! O night, sweeter than sunrise! O night, that joined lover with Beloved! Lover transformed in Beloved! Upon my blossoming breast, Which I cultivated just for Him, He drifted into sleep, And while I caressed Him, A cedar breeze touched the air.
Wind blew down from the tower, Parting the locks of His hair. With His gentle hand He wounded my neck And all my senses were suspended.
I lost myself. Forgot myself. I lay my face against the Beloved’s face. Everything fell away and I left myself behind, Abandoning my cares Among the lilies, forgotten.
~ Saint John of the Cross, from Dark Night of the Soul
The voice of my beloved! Behold, He comes, leaping over the mountains, bounding over the hills. My Beloved is like a gazelle or a young stag. Behold, there He stands behind our wall, gazing through the windows, looking through the lattice.
My Beloved speaks and says to me: “Arise, My love, My fair one, and come away, for behold, the winter is past; the rain is over and gone. The flowers appear on the earth, the time of singing has come, and the voice of the turtledove is heard in our land. The fig tree ripens its figs, and the vines are in blossom; they give forth fragrance.
Arise, My love, My fair one, and come away. O My dove, in the clefts of the rock, in the crannies of the cliff, let Me see your face, let Me hear your voice, for your voice is sweet, and your face is lovely. Catch the foxes for us, the little foxes that spoil the vineyards, for our vineyards are in blossom.
My Beloved is mine, and I am His; He grazes among the lilies. Until the day breathes and the shadows flee, turn, my beloved, be like a gazelle or a young stag on cleft mountains.
~ Jesus and His Love for each of us, in Song of Songs 2
Ad Ora (Latin for: ‘to the mouth’ or ‘mouth-to-mouth’)
Oh beloved, it is true.
So many of us grew up in a religious tradition. And here, i use the term ‘religion’ in the positive sense. This, rather than the social machines and schemes we create to try and make ourselves feel better – or control others’ behaviors. This, rather than that sorry soporific that even Karl Marx said was but, ‘an opiate of the masses.’ No, true religion, this looking to G_d and loving Him with all our heart, soul, mind and strength. This taking care of the weak and alone in our midst, and reaching out to them in Love. This is the religion of which i speak.
Somewhere, as we are growing in the spiritual life, we begin to get a sense of what it means to truly Love others. We learn, little by little, to actively seek the good of others around us. We begin, as children might understand quantum physics, that in giving away, this is the only place where we ever truly receive.
Maybe we grow up a little more. We begin to Love the very One Who first Loved us. It is a mystery. It is something well beyond our ability to do, but we are just so thankful that we are compelled by gratitude. We begin to see His goodness, and we become fond of our King in true, but somewhat congenial, way.
And some of us, if we are fortunate, we are rocked by myriad troubles and crises. We come to see the power and protection that comes from abiding with Him. But, even in entering in under His wings, we actually still kind of look out from underneath His everlasting arms, and give our attention to the storms raging beyond. We do, though, begin to have a deep appreciation for the ways that G_d works on our behalf, and we begin to understand the Love that drives His work on our behalf.
We can miss it though, if we unwilling to see and listen.
Look at the two passages above. The first is by a Spanish mystic from the 16th century. And the passage from Scripture was written by King Solomon about 965 B.C. But, notice the similarities. They are far from coincidental, or two passages using the same genre. The two men experienced something so real, so intimate, so overwhelming that the language nearly makes us blush.
Can we see it?
All the way through our religious and spiritual walk we have been trying (rightly) to learn to Love G_d, and Love people. But, as any religious approach can do, we begin to see the situation as contingent, transactional, and based on reciprocity.
But wait.
Isn’t G_d perfect? Yes.
Isn’t He all powerful? Yes.
Isn’t He complete in Himself? Yes.
Isn’t He Love? Yes.
What does this mean, though?
Have we ever stopped for a moment to realize – and even embrace – the reality that if G_d is all of those things, and infinitely more, that there is something we are missing.
G_d Loves you. And His Love is the very substance of the TriUnity that created even existence.
The Love That Made The Worlds
The Consuming Fire
The Love that swallowed all our death and turned it to Life.
The One with no needs, Who desires to share Himself with each of us.
And as we turn to face Him, we open our mouths in awestruck wonder and praise.
Then…. it happens.
We feel the purity of it; the utter lack of need. We sense the Fire in it; the same Fire that lit the billion trillion stars in our universe. We are suddenly struck by the attention of One Who has no need to lust for anything. He is already everywhere and in everything. We experience the free giveness of it….
Love Themselves turn their Face towards us, and we see His Eyes; Jewels of eternal depth and color. We sense His breath; the pure and sweet wind that inspired life into our being. We feel the completely overwhelming sense of His strength, but somehow know that He does not use this strength to get His way. He uses His strength to embrace, protect, and to save.
Then… Oh! Nothing that we could have ever imagined……..
He pulls us into His arms. He draws us close. He looks right at us. OH! OH! OH! This, this moment, this being Loved for no reason but Love Himself, is what we have always been looking for. We have been looking to receive what is right in front of us. Our myriad desires, and tries at answers, fall into a pitious little heap of dust in the corner of forever….
We are known fully. We are accepted completely. We are desired in the purest of ways. And we finally get it. Jesus is religious too. His Life is perfect religion itself. He truly desires to give all of Who He Is to all of us lost and abandoned children. But, He doesn’t just want to help a little bit. He comes in with everything that He is, and all that He possesses and offers it to us with a Love so overwhelming that we just fall upon His breast, and hear the heartbeat of Life Himself. Its rhythm, in one beat, confirms that He is Who we have always wanted.
And now, we understand that we are all He ever wanted as well.
So, are you a believer? Do you participate in pure religion? Good. Excellent start. But, have you (or this fool of a writer) ever considered that fact that true religion is but another icon pointing us to the true reality. G_d Loves you with everything He is.
Tonight is your night. Turn your face to Him. Look into His eyes. Fall into His embrace. Kiss the Son and allow Him to ravish you with what you have ever desired – Himself.
How God thinks of us is not only more important, but infinitely more important. Indeed, how we think of Him is of no importance except insofar as it is related to how He thinks of us. It is written that we shall “stand before” Him, shall appear, shall be inspected. The promise of glory is the promise, almost incredible and only possible by the work of Christ, that some of us, that any of us who really chooses, shall actually survive that examination, shall find approval, shall please God. To please God… to be a real ingredient in the divine happiness… to be loved by God, not merely pitied, but delighted in as an artist delights in his work or a son— it seems impossible, a weight or burden of glory which our thoughts can hardly sustain. But so it is.
~C.S. Lewis, from The Weight of Glory
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