All that which we call the attributes of God are only so many human ways of our conceiving that abyssal All which can neither be spoken nor conceived by us. And this way of thinking and speaking of God is suitable to our capacities, has its good use, and helps to express our adoration of him and his perfections…. Omnipotent love, inconceivable goodness, is that unity of God which we can neither conceive, as it is in itself, nor divide into this or that.
~William Law (1686-1761)
Hear my prayer, O Lord; let my cry come to you! Do not hide Your face from me in the day of my distress! Incline Your ear to me; answer me speedily in the day when I call! For my days pass away like smoke, and my bones burn like a furnace. My heart is struck down like grass and has withered; I forget to eat my bread. Because of my loud groaning my bones cling to my flesh. I am like a desert owl of the wilderness, like an owl of the waste places; I lie awake; I am like a lonely sparrow on the housetop. All the day my enemies taunt me; those who deride me use my name for a curse. For I eat ashes like bread and mingle tears with my drink, because of your indignation and anger; for you have taken me up and thrown me down. My days are like an evening shadow; I wither away like grass. But you, O Lord, are enthroned forever; You are remembered throughout all generations. You will arise and have pity on Zion; it is the time to favor her; the appointed time has come.
~ from Psalm 102
There is beloved, the firmest of anchors for our soul.
Him.
We serve One who simply is. And we are, because He is. So, measurement, words, thoughts, even the deep abyss of our spirit cannot even begin to touch the simple, free flow solidity of the One who is Love.
Circumstance and fear and time and chance and doubt and ignorance and wonder and need and change and decay and growth are but unneeded words in this space. For everything He was – He is – and shall ever be. For He has created infinite eternity as a habitation for Himself – and it seems this is but a context that we might have the slightest grasp on who He is; though even this grasp is as fleeting as strand of gossamer thread.
Everywhere we are going in time, He is already there and has been there always. And in this, we can see that the problems we face do not have a solution on the flip-side of some philosophical coin. For the G_d in whom we live and move and have our being has Designed all aspects into, through, and out of our problems as completely whole events which only end in Him getting glory and pushing even further into our existence. And as we are subsumed into Him, we gain the strength imparted by ever more nearness to Him.
He simply has no need for change, for He already was and is and will be everything He Himself was, is, and will be. And, He is everywhere. So, when we are looking to Him (as we should), we do not be needing to look in a certain direction, or to some place in the future or the past. No, we simply need to look away from everything else which would vector us into the useless terms like doubt and fear mentioned above.
And in taking our mind off the problem, it becomes exceedingly easy to see The Solution, for He is everywhere, and He is not going anywhere. He is completely real. He is completely unchanging. And it is upon the Foundation (read Him), that the legs of our shaky human lives can begin to stand with ever less wavering. For even if we fall, we fall into Him, and another dimension of His simple sameness upholds us for another go at whatever He is having us do.
And then it gets better. We begin to see that we are not only living and moving and having our being in Him. He – all of Him – is in us. For, the simple immutability of G_d is that everything He is, is everywhere. So, in a believer (read literally and fully), dwells the fullness of infinite Deity. We are, really and truly, empowered by the One who built the whole thing.
It follows then, that it is a vicious treason and sin for us to worry and fret and fear. It is an adulterous and wretched action for us to yield to the silly flesh we inhabit. It is the height of childish foolishness for us to take matters into our own hands. And this is not because we are going to get into trouble with some far-away god, on some far-away day. No, it is because we are cutting ourselves off from the already full and eternal relationship and fulfillment which we already have with and in Him, when we go looking for it again in our own strength.
Can we see it? Belief is the key to all of this. For belief is but a yielding to Truth and the reality of His great and unchanging Love for us. In believing, we finally stop running towards something that is not there – and in stopping – we realize we have already arrived; for He is already everywhere and has done everything to make the meeting possible.
What could happen to us if we simply yielded? Please allow this fool of a writer to preach for a moment…. It is a place of the most astounding beauty and power and Life and peace and joy. It is a place where circumstance (while real), becomes irrelevant. And instead of worry, there comes the great expectation that the One who is already there is making the way for us pilgrims through time. We who believe, are not guessing. We see Him everywhere, for everywhere He is. And everywhere He is, nothing can go wrong.
Rest tonight dear one. He is here. He has always been. He always will be.
