Wow, it's been a month! That's maybe a bit too wide open and spacious? I can see I may be coming to the end of this blog, or maybe I should just broaden it out a bit? At any rate, I am determined to see this read of The Message, Eugene Peterson's paraphrase of the Bible, through to the end, in roughly the order the original scriptures were written.
To Paul. I think to a lot of people, the Christian life looks small and restrictive. They see a lot of rules and think that it's all about self-denial, self-sacrifice, duty. In some ways, you could say they are right! What they don't see, though, is the tremendous sense of joy and freedom that arises when you decide to let go of trying to satisfy your own desires and needs and live the way Christ calls us to, reaching out to others in service and gratitude.
The thing is, spaciousness requires a certain structure; there's an architecture, if you will, to spaciousness. A pitcher, for example, is an object, but when it is empty, it is also an open space waiting to be filled. The pitcher which surrounds the space gives it structure and form, shows us how big the space is. They say that icebergs are often unimpressive in size because, though they are vast, there is rarely anything to compare them to, and that lack of comparison diminishes our perception of their size. In order to see or experience spaciousness, we need points of comparison, boundaries, some kind of scaffolding, so that we can actually perceive and experience the spaciousness that is there. The "rules" of Christianity, the call to live our lives in certain ways -- like not judging lest we be judged, and loving our enemies and feeding the hungry and clothing the poor, all the things Jesus talks about in the Gospels -- provide the structure within which we can experience the spaciousness and freedom of the Christian life. I think any spiritual path is similar in this regard. You have to do the practices, set up the structure, in order to find that experience of freedom.
What I am talking about here, of course, is spiritual freedom, not necessarily physical freedom. Freedom is not, as someone famously said, license. The person who has no structure in their lives, who sleeps and wakes whenever they will, who follows no routines, who lives, in short, a chaotic life, is not free. That person is like a leaf blowing in the wind, at the mercy of whatever whims or urgings prompt them on to the next step. Such a person is unlikely to accomplish much, or be of service to anyone, and is likely to experience life as unpredictable and unreliable, full of sadness and suffering. But once someone has a firm scaffolding in spiritual practice, an understanding of the kind of life to which Christ calls us, and is able to put in place these life-saving routines, there is a spacious freedom that arises, accompanied by such joy and gratitude in the simple act of living one's life, that is hard to describe to someone who doesn't feel it, too. These are the fruits of the spirit, and they arise spontaneously, organically, out of the disciplines of the Christian life. They are the result of grace: we can't manufacture it ourselves, but we can prepare and cultivate the soil of our souls, create the best possible conditions for its possibility, and then wait and see what happens.
Prayer: Dear God, You have shown us the path to true human freedom and fulfillment. Give me the wisdom, discipline and longing to follow the path you call us to, that I, too, may experience the joy and freedom you promise. Amen.
