He who has a why to live can bear with almost any how.
Neitzche
What are we here for?
Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labour for that which does not satisfy?
Isaiah 55:1
The aims of life are the best defence against death
Primo Levi
Image: Michael Winters, Mount Tabor, 2017
Spend some time – looking at your life, with all its ups and downs – engaging with all the stories that make up your life – and explore the freedom that comes from not having to fight or prove yourself. Following Jesus is about receiving, clarifying, and embracing your “givenness” – and making choices out of this deep sense of self. Have they been achieved, modified, abandoned? How do you think about these goals now?
What happens when you think about the purpose of your life?
Can you recall “goals” you have had?
Have they been achieved, modified, abandoned?
How do you think about these goals now?
“God made me to know, love and serve him in this world, and to be happy with him for ever in the next”. St. Augustine says: “God has made us for God- and our hearts are restless till they find their rest in God”. These words are words about “ultimate concern”. Is life for you about being ultimately satisfied? Living congruently? Being and doing what matters? Finding freedom?
Rowan Williams says we have lost our souls because we have lost our sense of the “Other”. Only within the horizon which the “Other” brings can we discover our identity as something given. Only then – as we learn to live with our egos differently – can we let go of restlessly searching for satisfaction “out there”, and receive ourselves as gift.
From asking “Who is God?” and “What kind of God?”, ask yourself “Who is the God I address?” – and then ask: “What do I say to this God?” By listening to what you actually say, get in touch with your operative image of God.
You could also ask yourself: “Who am I?” But don’t stay there: Ask: “Whose am I?” Have you any sense that as a human being , made in the image of God, you have a God-given capacity for the infinite, for self-transcendence? That the ultimate “Other” ceaselessly calls to you through all the “others” in your life so that you wake up to and discover how related you are to everything that is.”
“I cannot be me without you
and we cannot be us without them”.
The images in this post are of photographs by Michael Winters, director of art and culture at Sojourn Church Midtown in Louisville Kentucky. His work explores the act of ‘seeing’, exploring the ways we can see the world and ourselves from different perspectives.
He says of his image Mount Tabor, “I stood viewing that scene in 2017. It looked so normal. I’m not sure why I felt compelled to punch holes in this photograph, but I think it’s because I wanted to be able to see through this ‘normal’ landscape to the glory of the transfigured Christ—which is to say, I wanted to see reality.”
Source: Michael Winters
O gather up the brokenness
And bring it to me now
The fragrance of those promises
You never dared to vow
The splinters that you carry
The cross you left behind
Come healing of the body
Come healing of the mind
And let the heavens hear it
The penitential hymn
Come healing of the spirit
Come healing of the limb
Behold the gates of mercy
In arbitrary space
And none of us deserving
The cruelty or the grace
O solitude of longing
Where love has been confined
Come healing of the body
Come healing of the mind
O see the darkness yielding
That tore the light apart
Come healing of the reason
Come healing of the heart
O troubledness concealing
An undivided love
The Heart* beneath is teaching
To the broken Heart above
O let the heavens falter
Let the earth proclaim:
Come healing of the Altar
Come healing of the Name
O longing of the branches
To lift the little bud
O longing of the arteries
To purify the blood
And let the heavens hear it
The penitential hymn
Come healing of the spirit
Come healing of the limb
O let the heavens hear it
The penitential hymn
Come healing of the spirit
Come healing of the limb
Leonard Cohen
For a printable PDF of the text of this meditation please click on the link below.
