Are we there yet?

John 1:9-14

           I have learned not to say the word "never". Invariably when I do, it comes back to bite me in the ass. If anyone had told me in my teens and twenties that one day I would be a Deacon of the church, married, divorced and married again - to a man! - I would have said never, what are you smoking? 

Life is full of so many twists and turns. Things we could never imagine come true. Our lives take such unusual turns, it is almost beyond our comprehension. So much of life is mystery. Perhaps life is mystery.

           Many of the things which I probably would say is crazy talk I now am open to, or at least acknowledge the possibilities of. I don't dismiss things I don't understand or perhaps have never experienced.  When people talk about mystics, readers and visions, I am not quick to say they are wrong.

        Many of things that we believe in cannot be proven and cannot even be seen.  We must open our minds and adjust our thoughts to accept some of the truths that God has reveals directly or indirectly.

        I am sure the ancients had no concept of oxygen or that "air" actually was made of gases. We still cannot see those gases and yet we know without them, we would die.

        So how about some of the religious truths that we may not understand or cannot prove and yet we accept as truth. Perhaps we try to accept but we know better than to dismiss it. The fact that Jesus is the Word and was present at creation, that God became man for us, for our sins and lived among us. Do we believe this?  At the Friary the other day we discussed creeds, specifically the Apostles Creed and the Nicene Creed. How often do we say those words out loud, proud and very little of it can be proven as fact and yet we know it is true.  When we say that Mary became pregnant by the Holy Spirit, do we understand it? Do we accept it? Do we fathom the magnitude of this event , gesture of God and offer of salvation? It's part of the Nicene Creed.

       God's world has so many unseen and perhaps unprovable powers and yet we know they exist, we accept them. All of nature gives witness to the unseen,unprovable, unimaginable. This passage today is another sign of the invisible and unprovable that we accept and know as fact.

        Part our growth in Lent and in our lives is to try to deal with many of the unseen truths. They involve faith, they involve our very beings. One of the beauties of the Episcopal church is the idea that we can ask any question of God with fear of judgement. God who sees all and knows all, knows our hearts and knows our minds and sees our intention even if that is a struggle to understand or believe unseen truths. If we can remain as children as God wishes us to be, that means a constant array of questions, searching and trying to learn His ways - for our entire life.  Be free with questions and inquiries, seek the unknown, love the mystery.

           Don't get weighed down with "are we there yet". Enjoy the ride, seen and unseen.

The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world.

He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him. He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God.

And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth.