"transcendent joy"photo by bgrace
During an afternoon session of the retreat, we divided up into small groups. Christiane, George, Paulette and I stayed in the library sitting room where most of the sessions were held. I liked that room. There was a fireplace in it and over the fireplace was a painting of a plant, but I noticed that its leaves, green and red, reminded me of flames, and it became a kind of symbol to me of the burning bush. I was hopeful that God would show up and speak to us.
The group that I was in was an interesting mix. Christiane was French, and I loved to listen to her no matter what she said. Her accent was fabulous. George was a science teacher in the public school system, very well read, intellectual and yet also a bit touchy feely about stuff. A little eccentric but very likeable. Paulette--now she was very interesting. She had an Obama pin on her jacket and lots of slogan attire. She was a music teacher in a public school. She looked Irish, but was from the Midwest. And she was raised Catholic, though it was not a very good experience, and had become Quaker. She had been spending a lot of time putting Quaker quotes (think George Foxe) to music. She had this gorgeous deep, throaty, singing voice. A very powerful Celtic sounding voice that was surprisingly strong coming out of such a little body. She had been battling Lyme’s disease and depression for a while and seemed very much at the end of her rope. Like coming to the retreat was a desperate last resort for some hope.
Well, we were supposed to discuss some pre-directed questions, but it didn’t quite work out that way. (It wasn’t my fault this time, really.)
George had looked up the word beatitude and starting talking about some of the roots of the word. Happiness was one of the root words. He started talking about what happiness really means. His experience was that though his life was far from perfect he found himself happy. There was this idea of transcendent happiness in his experience. He told the story of his favorite Aunt who was dying. He went to see her on her deathbed and her parting words to him were this, “Whenever you think of me, think of me wishing you joy.”
As he spoke many things in my spirit started to merge together and I began to think of a book that I had just read in the children’s section of Barnes & Nobles called “Ode to Joy”. It was a simple story of a little girl who noticed a homeless man that no one else had time for. She had a special part in a play—just one line—and she invited the man to come to the church to hear it. The play began and it came time for the little girl to say her line, but she looked out into the audience and didn’t see the man. So she waited and waited. Everyone in the whole room waited. It seemed like forever. But she just knew he would come. Finally the door at the back of the sanctuary opened. Gingerly the homeless man walked in, and she knew then she could shout her words with all the gusto a little girl’s spirit could put forth. Her one line rang out, “Behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy!” (At that point I had tears running down my cheeks, which was a bit awkward in a bookstore.)
Many of the Quaker’s at the retreat, though they respect Christ, would be a bit hesitant to call themselves “Christians.” (And certainly very wary of the term evangelical.) Jean and I had realized this on Friday of the retreat and had spent time late that Friday night going over what was happening in our spirits. We shared communion together and prayed. I had this sense that Jesus was going to show up in someway if we would pay attention. So as George finished his story, I knew God was leading me to speak.
And so I shared with them this:
“The picture that speaks so clearly to me of transcendent happiness is the phrase, “I bring you good tidings of great joy.” But what is this news? The birth of Christ, yes. But it was not just the birth. For every player in the story there was both joy and pain. Mary would suffer greatly. “A sword would pierce her own soul.” Many suffered greatly after Herod’s decree that children were to be killed. All of Jesus’ disciples lives were marked with suffering and Jesus himself bore the greatest suffering in carrying the sin of all humanity. There were moments of GREAT PAIN, GREAT BEAUTY, and GREAT DARKNESS, and GREAT JOY. But the path of the cross was necessary, for it was the path to RESSURECTION, and REDEMPTION.”
If we miss the idea of transcendence we have no category to understand pain, disappointment, loss, and darkness in the overall picture of redemption, beauty, and joy. It’s in the arch of transcendence that we see it. It’s all in the beautiful rainbow of God’s promise. Light pierced. Light refracted.
I stopped talking because I realized I had said all that I had to say and the three of them just sat there looking at me like we had all had this really beautiful transcendent moment together. Paulette broke the silence and said in a tone that revealed a bit of disappointment, “I don’t have this Jesus experience that many of you speak about.” “I can’t relate to it or connect to it.” “Is this just a picture that we see throughout all of life or do we have to go through a personal experience of great pain in order to be able to have this joy?” And then she looked at me with her eyes sort of piercing my soul and said, “Are you speaking from your own experience?” It got very quiet in the room. And I said, “Some of us go through Job’s path. And yes, I have had my Job experience. The point where we have lost every human reason to hold on to God and all who would know our experience might say, “Curse God and die.” That is the blessed opportunity to choose to say as Job did, “Yet though He slay me, still I will trust Him.”
I started to say some things to Paulette that at this point I don’t remember. I believe that they were words from God to her because she began crying and nodding and writing them down. They spoke to her in ways I could not have known. My flesh was itching to share the Gospel with her, but I knew the Spirit was telling me to wait. He had not yet cut the path before my feet.
I have no recollection of what happened in the group after that, other than that we hugged each other at the end and I prayed for Paulette's healing from Lyme's Disease. But at lunch that afternoon, Paulette came and sat by me. She started to share some of her story with me. She was very much on the Obama campaign trail and seemed to be a very committed Democrat. (I’m not making any political statements for or against this, only trying to give you a picture of what was important to her.) She was involved in the public schools and very concerned about serving people and doing good things and VERY stressed because she can’t ever seem to do enough. And she brought up about the quotes that she was putting to music, and how she was comfortable with the Quakers, but was really struggling with the Jesus connection—that her experience as a young Catholic hadn’t given her any help. But she felt God was seriously calling her to do something with her music and yet she didn’t think the people around her were able to get it. And as she was talking I felt a strong sense that God was asking me to speak to her and I said, “Paulette, this really strong sense is coming over me. (I saw the acknowledgment in her eyes and so I continued.) "I believe you are feeling it to.” She nodded and started to cry. (And I teared up too at this point.) “I believe that it is the Spirit of God.” She nodded. And I said to her in a very soft and gentle voice, “You are terrified of Jesus…terrified of Jesus.” She nodded emphatically. Her eyes looked at me as if she was at such a loss with how to understand it all. Then I said, “You don’t need to be because He loves you very much.” Simple words, no earth shattering insights, but the arrow went directly to the core of her heart with the power of God.
Jean (who was sitting with us) looked at me, and I knew she had been silently praying throughout the conversation. It was a beautiful, humbling moment. A treasure, as I told Paulette later.
After dinner that evening, Paulette and I had a chance to talk, and she told me that she knew Jesus was trying to reach her. She had a vision a few years before where she was following a bunch of people in an assembly line. They all had stampers on their backs (like the kind you use to stamp “PAID” onto a paper) and she saw one being taken off the back of the person in front of her and it said, “CHRISTIAN.” She realized that she was afraid of ever being labeled a Christian. We spoke a bit about her perceptions of Christians and their reputations and how all of her friends and community she is a part of would never want to be associated with them because of how judgemental they are and closed minded, etc.
I encouraged her to read the Gospels. “Sometimes Jesus’ followers do great damage to representing the true Jesus,” I said. “Perhaps you can rediscover Jesus for yourself. And let HIM teach you.”
I knew that was all that I was to say. That was my part in her journey. The rest was in the hands of the One wooing her.
I knew that throughout the weekend, in the midst of all her confusion about what was truth, and who Jesus was, and what He was doing in her life--in the midst of all that--in a sort of transcendent way she had experienced a bit of true joy. I could see it in her face and in her eyes.
My joy was that I experienced in a very sweet and gentle way the truth of the words, “I am not ashamed of the gospel, for they are the power of God for those who believe.” (Rom. 1:16)
And I experienced the power of what it is like for the Spirit of God to go before us and bear witness so that our message comes not “with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power.” (I Cor. 2:4)
By the way, if you noticed in my post on Advent, there was a photo of a figurine of a pregnant woman kneeling by the Advent wreath. Christiane brought that to our last session together. She said she had been carrying it with her all weekend and wanted to share it with us. I thought it was quite perfect.
The group that I was in was an interesting mix. Christiane was French, and I loved to listen to her no matter what she said. Her accent was fabulous. George was a science teacher in the public school system, very well read, intellectual and yet also a bit touchy feely about stuff. A little eccentric but very likeable. Paulette--now she was very interesting. She had an Obama pin on her jacket and lots of slogan attire. She was a music teacher in a public school. She looked Irish, but was from the Midwest. And she was raised Catholic, though it was not a very good experience, and had become Quaker. She had been spending a lot of time putting Quaker quotes (think George Foxe) to music. She had this gorgeous deep, throaty, singing voice. A very powerful Celtic sounding voice that was surprisingly strong coming out of such a little body. She had been battling Lyme’s disease and depression for a while and seemed very much at the end of her rope. Like coming to the retreat was a desperate last resort for some hope.
Well, we were supposed to discuss some pre-directed questions, but it didn’t quite work out that way. (It wasn’t my fault this time, really.)
George had looked up the word beatitude and starting talking about some of the roots of the word. Happiness was one of the root words. He started talking about what happiness really means. His experience was that though his life was far from perfect he found himself happy. There was this idea of transcendent happiness in his experience. He told the story of his favorite Aunt who was dying. He went to see her on her deathbed and her parting words to him were this, “Whenever you think of me, think of me wishing you joy.”
As he spoke many things in my spirit started to merge together and I began to think of a book that I had just read in the children’s section of Barnes & Nobles called “Ode to Joy”. It was a simple story of a little girl who noticed a homeless man that no one else had time for. She had a special part in a play—just one line—and she invited the man to come to the church to hear it. The play began and it came time for the little girl to say her line, but she looked out into the audience and didn’t see the man. So she waited and waited. Everyone in the whole room waited. It seemed like forever. But she just knew he would come. Finally the door at the back of the sanctuary opened. Gingerly the homeless man walked in, and she knew then she could shout her words with all the gusto a little girl’s spirit could put forth. Her one line rang out, “Behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy!” (At that point I had tears running down my cheeks, which was a bit awkward in a bookstore.)
Many of the Quaker’s at the retreat, though they respect Christ, would be a bit hesitant to call themselves “Christians.” (And certainly very wary of the term evangelical.) Jean and I had realized this on Friday of the retreat and had spent time late that Friday night going over what was happening in our spirits. We shared communion together and prayed. I had this sense that Jesus was going to show up in someway if we would pay attention. So as George finished his story, I knew God was leading me to speak.
And so I shared with them this:
“The picture that speaks so clearly to me of transcendent happiness is the phrase, “I bring you good tidings of great joy.” But what is this news? The birth of Christ, yes. But it was not just the birth. For every player in the story there was both joy and pain. Mary would suffer greatly. “A sword would pierce her own soul.” Many suffered greatly after Herod’s decree that children were to be killed. All of Jesus’ disciples lives were marked with suffering and Jesus himself bore the greatest suffering in carrying the sin of all humanity. There were moments of GREAT PAIN, GREAT BEAUTY, and GREAT DARKNESS, and GREAT JOY. But the path of the cross was necessary, for it was the path to RESSURECTION, and REDEMPTION.”
If we miss the idea of transcendence we have no category to understand pain, disappointment, loss, and darkness in the overall picture of redemption, beauty, and joy. It’s in the arch of transcendence that we see it. It’s all in the beautiful rainbow of God’s promise. Light pierced. Light refracted.
I stopped talking because I realized I had said all that I had to say and the three of them just sat there looking at me like we had all had this really beautiful transcendent moment together. Paulette broke the silence and said in a tone that revealed a bit of disappointment, “I don’t have this Jesus experience that many of you speak about.” “I can’t relate to it or connect to it.” “Is this just a picture that we see throughout all of life or do we have to go through a personal experience of great pain in order to be able to have this joy?” And then she looked at me with her eyes sort of piercing my soul and said, “Are you speaking from your own experience?” It got very quiet in the room. And I said, “Some of us go through Job’s path. And yes, I have had my Job experience. The point where we have lost every human reason to hold on to God and all who would know our experience might say, “Curse God and die.” That is the blessed opportunity to choose to say as Job did, “Yet though He slay me, still I will trust Him.”
I started to say some things to Paulette that at this point I don’t remember. I believe that they were words from God to her because she began crying and nodding and writing them down. They spoke to her in ways I could not have known. My flesh was itching to share the Gospel with her, but I knew the Spirit was telling me to wait. He had not yet cut the path before my feet.
I have no recollection of what happened in the group after that, other than that we hugged each other at the end and I prayed for Paulette's healing from Lyme's Disease. But at lunch that afternoon, Paulette came and sat by me. She started to share some of her story with me. She was very much on the Obama campaign trail and seemed to be a very committed Democrat. (I’m not making any political statements for or against this, only trying to give you a picture of what was important to her.) She was involved in the public schools and very concerned about serving people and doing good things and VERY stressed because she can’t ever seem to do enough. And she brought up about the quotes that she was putting to music, and how she was comfortable with the Quakers, but was really struggling with the Jesus connection—that her experience as a young Catholic hadn’t given her any help. But she felt God was seriously calling her to do something with her music and yet she didn’t think the people around her were able to get it. And as she was talking I felt a strong sense that God was asking me to speak to her and I said, “Paulette, this really strong sense is coming over me. (I saw the acknowledgment in her eyes and so I continued.) "I believe you are feeling it to.” She nodded and started to cry. (And I teared up too at this point.) “I believe that it is the Spirit of God.” She nodded. And I said to her in a very soft and gentle voice, “You are terrified of Jesus…terrified of Jesus.” She nodded emphatically. Her eyes looked at me as if she was at such a loss with how to understand it all. Then I said, “You don’t need to be because He loves you very much.” Simple words, no earth shattering insights, but the arrow went directly to the core of her heart with the power of God.
Jean (who was sitting with us) looked at me, and I knew she had been silently praying throughout the conversation. It was a beautiful, humbling moment. A treasure, as I told Paulette later.
After dinner that evening, Paulette and I had a chance to talk, and she told me that she knew Jesus was trying to reach her. She had a vision a few years before where she was following a bunch of people in an assembly line. They all had stampers on their backs (like the kind you use to stamp “PAID” onto a paper) and she saw one being taken off the back of the person in front of her and it said, “CHRISTIAN.” She realized that she was afraid of ever being labeled a Christian. We spoke a bit about her perceptions of Christians and their reputations and how all of her friends and community she is a part of would never want to be associated with them because of how judgemental they are and closed minded, etc.
I encouraged her to read the Gospels. “Sometimes Jesus’ followers do great damage to representing the true Jesus,” I said. “Perhaps you can rediscover Jesus for yourself. And let HIM teach you.”
I knew that was all that I was to say. That was my part in her journey. The rest was in the hands of the One wooing her.
I knew that throughout the weekend, in the midst of all her confusion about what was truth, and who Jesus was, and what He was doing in her life--in the midst of all that--in a sort of transcendent way she had experienced a bit of true joy. I could see it in her face and in her eyes.
My joy was that I experienced in a very sweet and gentle way the truth of the words, “I am not ashamed of the gospel, for they are the power of God for those who believe.” (Rom. 1:16)
And I experienced the power of what it is like for the Spirit of God to go before us and bear witness so that our message comes not “with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power.” (I Cor. 2:4)
By the way, if you noticed in my post on Advent, there was a photo of a figurine of a pregnant woman kneeling by the Advent wreath. Christiane brought that to our last session together. She said she had been carrying it with her all weekend and wanted to share it with us. I thought it was quite perfect.
1 comment:
Becky - what an awesome story. And I am so thankful that you were a willing vessel and listened carefully to the way the Spirit led. I pray that Paulette will come to know and receive the gift.
Blessings.
Carol
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