If Only

Je me souviens.  Toujours.

There's no escape, even now.  Stopped at Publix for a couple items.  Hadn't heard it in months.  Avoided it on YouTube.  But tormenting me from overhead, "You Make Me Smile."  Except not any more.

Just Like Heaven II

"Wow, thought Mooch.  What a great place."

I Take Comfort in Saul Become Paul

"That day a severe persecution began against the church in Jerusalem, and all except the apostles were scattered throughout the countryside of Judea and Samaria.  Devout men buried Stephen and made loud lamentation over him.  But Saul was ravaging the church by entering house after house; dragging off both men and women, he committed them to prison."

--Acts 8:1-3

"Money raised by evangelical Christians in the United States is fueling a violent antigay movement in Uganda, according to the “Gospel of Intolerance” by filmmaker Roger Ross Williams.

'American evangelicals are sending millions of dollars in donations to Africa to spread their message by funding Ugandan pastors and sponsoring missionaries, many of who do good work feeding the hungry and providing shelter to orphans,' Rev. Kapya Kaoma explained in the mini-documentary, which was published online Tuesday by the New York Times. “But some of that money just goes to feed a dangerous ideology that teaches that gays, lesbians, transgender, and bisexual people do not have a place in God’s kingdom and are a threat to society.”

Evangelicals from the United States have a strong influence in the deeply religious country, where antigay sentiments are mainstream. A number of Ugandans faced harassment and threats in 2010 after a newspaper published of list of alleged homosexuals. 

Kaoma said he was forced to flee the country after supporting LGBT rights.

Dolan, Eric W., "Film Exposes Link between U. S. evangelicals and violent anti-gay Ugandan movement."  2013. http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/01/23/film-exposes-link-between-u-s-evangelicals-and-antigay-ugandan-movement/

Luke 24:35

I Kings 19

Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done, and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword.  Then Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah, saying, “So may the gods do to me, and more also, if I do not make your life like the life of one of them by this time tomorrow.”  Then he was afraid; he got up and fled for his life[1][1], and came to Beer-sheba, which belongs to Judah; he left his servant there.

But he himself went a day’s journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a solitary broom tree.  He asked that he might die:[2][2] “It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life, for I am no better than my ancestors.”  Then he lay down under the broom tree and fell asleep.  Suddenly an angel touched him and said to him, “Get up and eat.”[3][3]  He looked, and there at his head was a cake baked on hot stones, and a jar of water.  He ate and drank, and lay down again.  The angel of the Lord came a second time, touched him, and said, “Get up and eat, otherwise the journey will be too much for you.”[4][4]  He got up, and ate and drank; then he went in the strength of that food forty days and forty nights to Horeb the mount of God.  At that place he came to a cave, and spent the night there. 

And here follows the well-known story of the earthquake, the fire, then the STILL SMALL VOICE.  How many times have I read that story since I have been reading the Bible through since high school?  How many times have I read it aloud or heard it read at Sunday Eucharist or retreats?  Dozens!  Yet, until now, I have missed that the STILL SMALL VOICE story is preceded by a nourishing meal provided by the angel of God.  I am posting this entry to memorialize that profound revelation.  It has been there all along, but this is one of those instances where I am tempted to say, “Was that in the Bible the last time I read it?”

---

---

[1][1] A very reasonable fear.

[2][2] How many times in the past year+ have I asked this?  The intensity of God’s work in my life felt unbearable and the feeling returns again and again.

[3][3] Get up and feed on the food provided by God’s angel and don’t try to tough it out on your own.

[4][4] A reminder to remain in good nutrition from that angel food.  One meal will not suffice.  Maintain, maintain, maintain.

Just Like Heaven

Waiting for the fog to lift...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IhR0Xk0b4xQ

Evelyn Underhill - Mysticism 29

Chapter Three – Purification

p. 137: “’God is the only reality,’ says Patmore, ‘and we are real only as far as we are in His order and He is in us.’”

Is this Keating’s “false self?”

p. 138: “To the true lover of the Absolute, Purgation no less than Illumination is a privilege, a dreadful joy.”

Hmm, I’m not feeling a sense of privilege or joy, although I get what is being said here.

16 Then someone came to him and said, ‘Teacher, what good deed must I do to have eternal life?’ ¹⁷And he said to him, ‘Why do you ask me about what is good? There is only one who is good. If you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments.’ ¹⁸He said to him, ‘Which ones?’ And Jesus said, ‘You shall not murder; You shall not commit adultery; You shall not steal; You shall not bear false witness; ¹⁹Honour your father and mother; also, You shall love your neighbour as yourself.’ ²⁰The young man said to him, ‘I have kept all these;^* what do I still lack?’ ²¹Jesus said to him, ‘If you wish to be perfect, go, sell your possessions, and give the money^* to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.’  ²²When the young man heard this word, he went away grieving, for he had many possessions.

Evelyn Underhill - Mysticism 28

"That in the winter, seeing a tree stripped of its leaves, and considering that within a little time the leaves would be renewed, and after that the flowers and fruit appear, he received a high view of the Providence and Power of God, which has never since been effaced from his soul.  That this view had set him perfectly loose from the world and kindled in him such a love for God that he could not tell whether it had increased in above forty years that he had lived since."  M. Beaufort, relating Brother Lawrence's mystical experience.

"...rapture or fluid splendor, and crystallize into a willed response to the Reality perceived..."  // "...from the emotional to the volitional stage."

Here is where I fall short.  I had such an experience, related in the walk around Lake Davis at the beginning of my Stephen Ministry training.  I have fallen short so many times in living the Reality I met there.  That is, perhaps, why Incarnation is such a key inspiration for me.  It is what I need to work on most.

28 ‘What do you think? A man had two sons; he went to the first and said, “Son, go and work in the vineyard today.” ²⁹He answered, “I will not”; but later he changed his mind and went. ³⁰The father^* went to the second and said the same; and he answered, “I go, sir”; but he did not go. ³¹Which of the two did the will of his father?’ They said, ‘The first.’