Musings

Holy Wisdom!

Rev. Peter Faass | 5/20/2010

"Come and seek the ways of Wisdom,
she who danced when earth was new.
Follow closely what she teaches,
for her words are right and true.
Wisdom clears the path of justice,
showing us what love must do."

The lyrics above are from a lovely new hymn I learned at the recent clergy conference here in the Diocese of Ohio. In Christian theology Holy Wisdom is another expression for the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Trinity. Incidentally in Hebrew, "wisdom" is a feminine noun. Because of this Christianity is able to see in Holy Wisdom the feminine aspects of God. Don't be shocked when someone uses the feminine pronoun "she" to refer to Wisdom. It's not that they are being trendy or PC, they are engaging in good theology.

This coming Sunday is the feast of Pentecost, the day Christians commemorate God sending the Holy Spirit to the Church to be our comforter and guide in all of life. We will celebrate the festival with some glorious and unusual music, including an interesting setting of the hymn, "Come and seek the ways of Wisdom." By the way: please wear red, orange, pink or yellow to church this Sunday. In the Book of Acts when the Spirit came upon the disciples it was reported that it was as if tongues of fire landed on their heads. These colors will joyfully remind of those fiery tongues!

I love the phrase in the hymn lyrics that say, Wisdom shows us, "what love must do." Christ Church is a community that is learning from Wisdom what we must do in love. The love of God is grace itself; unmerited love, nothing we can ever do or say can earn it. Yet it is showered on us abundantly. Go figure.

The love of God's grace is the greatest gift we will ever receive, but it also puts upon us an enormous responsibility. If we receive love abundantly then we must in return love abundantly. We can just be takers of God's love, we must be givers of this love as well. That's no easy task. And when I say givers of love I don't mean superficially. I also don't mean some schlocky, saccharine emotion that all too often passes for love in Christianity.

The love I am speaking of is the love that Lynda Bernays spoke about in her "Letter from an IHN volunteer" this past week. This is a love that pushes us beyond being mere do-gooders when we volunteer and then get upset when the people we serve are, "not like us," and we shut down, gripe, or give up. The love Lynda wrote about speaks to a deeper interpersonal relationship with our IHN guests, a relationship which allows us to really know the pain and anxiety of being homeless, jobless, shuffled about all day like so much baggage and afraid of the uncertainty the future holds. It is a relationship that allows us to come to, "respect the dignity of every human being," in fact it reveals something of our own humanity to us. And in the breaking down of the barriers between "those folks" and "us" we profoundly experience the incarnational love of God. That is the real love of Holy Wisdom!

We are learning what love must do here at Christ Church. IHN hosting, the Community Meal, Shaker Gardens ministry, the new Community Garden project; through each of these outreach ministries and all the varied people we encounter, Holy Wisdom is at work, gently teaching us. I think it is a learning curve we engage in all of life if we are faithful people. Ultimately this is a marvelous journey to be on, even if at times is it at times frustrating, disappointing and down-right intimidating. We Christians need to bear in mind that Holy Wisdom nurtures us on this journey as our sacred comforter and companion. And in that relationship with Her we learn our own sacred worth. A pretty nice reward indeed!

Happy Pentecost!

Peter +

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