We are always just beginning (A minor theological work)

“As long as I am breathing, in my eyes, I am just beginning.”

― Criss Jami, Killosophy

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In the beginning

God,

Creation,

Newness,

and then life happened

and somehow

in some way

we lost touch with the Love

that created us ,sustains us, transforms us

and so revelation

God again

and again

and again

and again

progressively

revealing Sacred Presence

Sacred Nature

Sacred intent

for us, divine children

created in divine image

revealing, in many ways

in many places

through many people

Behold!

Behold!

“God’s new thing, can you not see it?”

well, no

not very well

those who would be “God’s people,”

seem so often to get it wrong

they exclude rather than include

hate rather than love

grasp rather than give

seek power over, rather than servanthood

they turn God’s guidance into a burden

all too often people have sought to control God

and use God

rather than love God

and so always

there have been the “righteous”

who instead of being open to God’s new thing

block the emergence of the Kingdom

In Jesus’ time there were Levitic priests

Pharisees and Saducees

well intentioned

thinking God needed their protection

(as if God cannot take care of herself)

but ultimately cementing faith

killing it

taking what should be alive and powerful

and making it stone like

and dead

and so God

the same God who is shown

moving history a new direction

in the Garden

with the call of Abraham

in the Exodus

through David, the King

through defeat and restoration

did it again

yet again

through a radical named Jesus

revealing in a new way

Sacred Nature

revealing in a new way

how the Sacred functions in human history,

in human lives

In Jesus Law became grace

The Beatitudes became the new code

for God’s children.

and the world was tilted

as hate was conquered

and death became life

the pattern is clear

God continually comes

and comes again, God

continually reveals

bringing forth the new

shattering the bonds we create

moving us forward toward the full revelation

toward what we call the Kingdom

a world in which God’s way rules

but now it is happening again

the church (especially the church in America)

has decided that there is no “new thing”

only the old thing

once again law reigns supreme

and we pretend that God is not free

to act

it is as if we believe it all stopped almost 2000 years ago

it is as if we believe all revelation ceased

and nothing new can emerge

no new understanding

nothing

new

and so the church teaches that the earth is young (its not)

and presents a God of hate (God is love)

and worships words written in stone (the Bible can become yet another idol)

so the church excludes (when it has been called to include)

and fails to feed the hungry, and help the oppressed (and sides with power and the status quo)

and so

once again

we need

we really, really, need

God’s new thing

Come Oh Sacred one

Shake us up

Wake us up

We are always just beginning