That I'm focused more on Jesus leaving than on the arrival of the Holy Spirit, doubtless says something about me, and I don't like what it says. I read somewhere that genuine love is always given in the face of certain loss, rather than in the expectation of keeping our loved ones forever ... perhaps this was true of the disviples.
They were not broken up over Jesus' departure but were jazzed about their futures as witnesses of the good news. With barely a lingering look towards the heavesns, they allowed angels too easily to send them on their way. Jesus was gone and the Holy Spirit had not yet come, but they didn't spend their time mourning his loss or worrying about what was next, they prayed and waited, joyfully.
It's said that the ascended Jesus, at home now in the kingdom of God, turns the future and present into one, that he is with us now always and because of J's ascension, the battles we wage are at the same time already won.
But if I'd been a disciple, I'd have spent the rest of my days searching the sky.
4 comments:
But Crystal, you are a disciple; you have the same access to Jesus that they had-- in the Spirit. Jesus's lesson to them and to us is to awaken to a spiritual rather than purely materialistic outlook. We can do that.
Hi Larry :-). I can do that now, because I never knew Jesus in the flesh, but if I had, I think I would have found it hard to exchange him for a nebulous Holy Spirit. I guess I really don't fully understnad what it means or feels like to have that indwelling spirit.
You write, "It's said that the ascended Jesus, at home now in the kingdom of God, turns the future and present into one, that he is with us now always and because of J's ascension, the battles we wage are at the same time already won."
In a purely spiritual sense, all time is turned into one - the primordial eternal Now. In this, there is no coming and no going, there is no birth and no death.
I am reading the Bhagavad Gita wtih Jon Zuck's Wisdom Reading group, and there is a little synchronicity here with some of the verses from the Gita:
The presence that pervades the universe
is imperishable, unchanging,
beyond both is and is not:
how could it ever vanish?
These bodies come to an end;
but that vast embodied Self
is ageless, fathomless, eternal.
***
This is how I think about Jesus. This Christ light is no longer of his human form, but rather in the qualities of God - an ageless, fathomless, and eternal formlessness.
You write, "I really don't fully understand what it means or feels like to have that indwelling spirit." I think you hint at this feeling when you identified that genuine love is always given in the face of certain loss. This love is deep and poignant. Often it arises from sorrow. Sorrow arises from love. The two seem very connected. While there must have been sorrow connected to the loss of Jesus' human form, likely the disciples felt as though Jesus almost lived in them, and that his love for them was pure, and eternal. His presence pervaded them, even after his death.
Hi Merdith :-), I think the Gita and Hinduism are very interesting. I relate to it more than to Buddhism because God is personified in Hinduism and relational love is a part of worship (I think?). That's waht draws me to Jesus - his 'person-ness". if he was to me that eternal formless you mention, I don't think I would be able to relate to him as well.
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