Unfolding Light

          Go therefore and make disciples of all nations.
                       —Matthew 28.19

Jesus likely didn’t say this, at least not “all nations.”
(Multiple nations reflects Matthew’s reality.)
Jesus was having a hard enough time
making disciples of his disciples.
A nation can’t be a disciple. It isn’t a person.
But we can make disciples in all nations;
we can enable people to follow the law of love
no matter their country, or language, or religion.
And we can build nations that honor discipleship.
But there is no such thing as a Christian nation.
Such a thing would instantly dissolve,
because a disciple’s only allegiance is to God,
not one’s own self. Disciples give themselves away.
A nation shaped by the Spirit of Christ
would encourage people of all religions, as Christ did.
So how do we make disciples of all nations?
One person at a time, in deeds of love and justice,
trusting that love in one part of the body
affects the whole body.
We let go of trying to change the world,
and change ourselves,
and let the Spirit do its thing.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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          Go therefore and make disciples of all nations.
                       —Matthew 28.19

By your example,
you can make of anyone you meet
     a student of love,
     a practitioner of kindness,
     a follower in the way
     of deep trust in grace.
By your example
you may so touch people
     that something in them heals;
you can so intrigue people
     that they want to follow.

You will not convince anyone.
     But you may allure them.
They will not drop everything,
     but something in them may be changed.

It’s not you, of course,
     it’s the Spirit you bear.

Be a vessel.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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          In the one Spirit
          we were all baptized into one body.
                       —1 Corinthians 12.13

Of course we don’t believe that.
We think we’re separate.
We thank God
we don’t live in that war zone
as if we don’t,
as if those who live there are not us,
not our flesh and blood.
(And so their suffering is less real than ours.)
It comes naturally to assume
that the stranger is not part of us,
that the grief of a distant tribe is not ours,
that the lake on the tundra
has nothing to do with the flow of our blood.
It is our life’s work
to overcome the delusion,
to live in the Spirit in which we are one,
rather than by the flesh
by which we seem to be separate.
If claiming the suffering of the whole world
seems too wearisome,
too much grief for one person to take on,
that is because we still believe
we’re one person, one small individual.
But when we know we are one with all,
we trust that all the world’s evil and suffering
is easily borne and absorbed
by the infinite joy and beauty of the whole,
the very heart of God.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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That God lives in the airy space
between the leap and the landing place.

That tears may flow through you,
but then—something else.

That the Mystery holds more blessing than hurt,
that in the darkness is not monsters, but God.

That there is no falling
that God can’t make into a falling in love.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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In the other room
they discuss religion.
I will stay here
and do the dishes.
There is no talking,
only a single bird descending
outside the window.
But there is delight enough.
The sunlight on the suds
makes little rainbows
that are so clear.
The water is warm and attentive.
It meets perfectly
every moment of my hands,
moves perfectly with every move.
You can’t see it but
in the water you can feel
the weight of the water.
I want to tell
but the bird in the air
already knows.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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          Jesus said to them, “Peace be with you.
          As God has sent me, so I send you.”
          When he had said this, he breathed on them
          and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”
                       —John 20. 21-22


Sit still.
Breathe deeply.

In and out, breath flows.
Given, not bought.

Received … and released,
in … and out.

The breath is life,
with power to make life:

air becoming blood;
Word made flesh.

It is Love, which makes you alive.
Love is in you, to receive and give.

It is Spirit, the Breath of Christ,
breathing in you.

You are breathing Jesus.
Jesus is breathing you into the world.

Breathing in, Christ enters you.
Breathing out, love enters the world.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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           All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit
           and began to speak in other languages,
          as the Spirit gave them ability.
                                         —Acts 2.4

Probably not eloquently. More likely
in halting Phrygian, mangled Mesopotamian.
It probably took some back-and-forth, some double-checking,
requiring not just proclaiming but listening,
relating, getting feedback,
patience on the part of the hearers,
and courage and humility on the part of the speakers—
willingness to risk, to be beginners, to appear foolish,
to forgo the safety of being in the dominant group,
overcoming barriers.
None was a solo. They were all ensemble pieces.

Pray for such humility and courage,
to risk for the sake of love,
to be foolish for the sake of relating,
to let other people’s reality be real.
To harmonize.
This is how the Holy Spirit speaks, loud and clear.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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           Holy Abba, may they be one, as we are one.
                       —John 17.11

We do not all agree. We’re not “one” in that way.
We don’t see things, or do things, alike.

But we are one, as Abba and Son are one,
as the song and the music are one,

all part of the same Body, members of each other,
one Spirit, one divine movement.

Bow, then, give thanks, and listen: unknown to you,
vast choirs chant in foreign tongues

a liturgy that upholds you, and someone far off
and strange is praying your prayers.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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      I have calmed and quieted my soul,
           like a weaned child with its mother;
      my soul is like the weaned child that is with me.
                                      — Psalm 131.2

Holy One,
like a mother with her newborn infant,
you do not demand anything of me,
but purely love me, for my own sake.

I am born of you; I am like you,
made of your loving kindness.
Your unseen, immutable truth
is alive in me.

No matter what happens to me
I am in your arms.
No matter what I do
you are in me.

My soul is at peace.
I can become your love in the world.
I rest in your arms.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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          He was lifted up,
          and a cloud took him out of their sight.
                       —Acts 1.9

Now, standing on this godforsaken hillside
comes the real test:
to trust the God who absconds,
whose icon is empty air
with a light breeze.
The feeling that there once was more—
wasn’t there?—but not now;
once a simple certainty
that there was someone there,
but now that gray hollow in your guts,
the grief over your childhood faith,
the empty chair, the faint vale
in the other side of the bed.
And given that, to trust.

The Beloved has departed
the world of the senses
to be even more present,
a mystery for us, about us,
without us.
Not someone who is loving,
but love itself, loving.

Now we learn to be at home
in this peripheral God
who, like sleep, or the present moment,
in being perceived, disappears.

Now we learn a new faith,
to trust without feeling,
to breathe air we can’t see.

Above our wondering heads
birds migrate along their invisible paths.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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