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| Photos by Ron Houser |
--this sudden dive by dream into reality--
to know the virgin conceives
and God is with us.
The dream powers its way
through winter weather
and gives me vision to see the Jesus gift."
- Eugene Peterson
Living the Christian life accepting a certain ambiguity. Even as both my wife and I understand why, she often observes with humor the inconsistency and the capacity for what John Keats labeled, in a different knowledge pursuit, the "negative capability" which is increasingly becoming accepted in the postmodern church.
I was reminded of this postmodern negative capability during the preaching and today's First Sunday in Advent service.
New approaches to the Gospel text are both intriguing and make ambiguity apparent. What does it mean when we wait for something in the future that has already happened and is happening right now? Should the church have an understandable, definitive answer about this or is that even possible?
The word Immanuel/Emmanuel means 'God with us.' Do we know exactly what this means - the implications, small print, effects on historical narratives, insights into the human experience, and varying repercussions for those who would use the word God and those who never would? Thinking we have "insider information" about 'God,' can strongly influence our chosen interpretation of the word 'us.' So what happens if we start by redefining 'us' instead? Pastor Ray preached that apocalypse (Ancient Greek: ἀποκάλυψις apokálypsis) comes from ἀπό and καλύπτω, which literally means "an uncovering". Apocalypse is a disclosure of knowledge or revelation so, perhaps, redefinition could help with in this uncovering process.
In verse 30 and 31 in Mark's gospel Jesus says, "Truly I tell you, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away."
Strange words when trying to understand these words as an end-of-the-world prophecy. If these words are a passion prophecy, they resonate more deeply. Jesus reveals his body as the temple expressing a true and living presence of God. Passion details come up in this gospel reading. At the Crucifixion the sun did darken, the moon did not give out it's light.
This Gospel also prefigures the passion with verses like "You must be on your guard. You will be handed over to the local councils and flogged in the synagogues. On account of me you will stand before governors and kings as witnesses to them. And the gospel must first be preached to all nations. Whenever you are arrested and brought to trial, do not worry beforehand about what to say. Just say whatever is given you at the time, for it is not you speaking, but the Holy Spirit."
The generation living at that time did not pass away before the passion. The previous nature of heaven and earth defined distinctly from one another did pass away and the words of Jesus have not passed away.
There is another verse that brings back another reference to slave that still has me meditating "It is like a man going on a journey, when he leaves home and puts his slaves in charge, each with his work, and commands the doorkeeper to be on the watch." I continue to ponder if people are God's slaves and / or if Jesus and Paul are God's slaves. See the November 19th blog post for more thoughts that came up at that time.
Anway back onto the main topic, Bob Dylan once wrote this verse in his song Gates of Eden:
At dawn my lover comes to me
And tells me of her dreams
With no attempts to shovel the glimpse
Into the ditch of what each one means
At times I think there are no words
But these to tell what's true
And there are no truths outside the Gates of Eden
For me these lyrics evoke the beauty and fire of truth. Simultaneously they begin to capture the always temporal and mercurial essence of many Gospel texts through using Keats' "negative capability" as a tool.
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