Advent Reflections in Shards of Broken Pottery – Paul E. Ralph
It’s Advent. And as I wait, I wonder about what manner of good news I can anticipate? What manner of good news my neighbours can expect this time of year? (What with Omicron, Putin and delayed Amazon shipments!)
Call me crazy, but perhaps we’ve truncated the gospel to be the vaccination for a virus that we’ve been unconsciously peddling for some time.
In other words, it might be that we’ve been answering questions that very few people are actually asking. Worse yet, could it be that we’ve been telling people what question(s) should matter to them?
And this might just be the granddaddy of them all. “Do you want to spend an eternity apart from God?” As I see it, this hardly matters if the unsettling reality that perplexes us is “Who am I?” (Followed closely by “Who are you?, Who are we?, and Why the hell does it matter anyway?”)
The forced question of eternity only matters to the person(s) in possession of the golden ticket to escape this life. Are we disciples of Willy Wonka? And is the most pressing ailment we suffer from an insatiable craving for chocolate?
To bastardize a Canadian poet, I hate to tell you that the candy man isn’t just gone,…he never was.
As best I can tell, humankind is alienated. Primarily from ourselves. Each of us possesses an unsettling awareness that we were meant for so much more. There is a deep longing at our soulish level to well and truly live in each moment as we encounter it. To surrender our past shortcomings and those of our loved ones, friends, and former friends. And its corollary, to quit living in the glory of our previous accomplishments.
To love, and be loved.
To know, and be known.
To forgive, and be forgiven.
(Sometimes I think I’d settle for a phone call, text or emoji from ‘that’ person.)
We live disconnected from ourselves, others, this planet, and the divine impulse which animates all of it.
Asking humankind to conjure up ‘an eternity’ in their minds while the very ground upon which we stand is as inhospitable as it’s ever been seems to me a fools’ errand.
This Advent, as I wait for belonging, I am choosing to heed the advice of the songwriter:
Kneel down
Pick up the broken shards of pottery that are strewn in the dirt around my own two feet
Dust them off.
Describe them to whoever will listen – myself included
In so doing, I might happen upon the beauty of dignity and grace in the delicious ambiguities of life. By chance, I might see a reflection of myself in the pottery. I just might even begin to see myself for who I am. Others for who they are. Creation for the inexplicable mystery that it is. (Wait. I am crazy. It’s true. I might even see the meaning, mercy and Messiah my heart craves.)
It’s advent, so I’m told.
While I don’t know much about spending eternity apart from God, I do know that it is decidedly good news that God decided not to spend an eternity apart from me. From you. From us.
Ps. I look forward to seeing you in the pottery.
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