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Some readers will remember the November 1986 visit of Pope John Paul to Aotearoa.
He began his Christchurch Mass homily with a question: “How far is it from Christchurch to Rome?” After a brief dramatic pause he responded with his answer “today, no distance.”
The crowd laughed at the riddle and appreciated his point: the pope from Rome had made the journey to Aotearoa bridging any distance we might feel living (as we do) as far as you can travel from Rome.
Three weeks ago I began these Advent reflections focussing on the often-overlooked link between this name of the pre-Christmas season and the word ADVENTURE.
Advent = Adventure.
Faith is an adventure – not because we together work and pray to please and appease a God who is distant, but because faith is an adventure of love with a God who is present.
Too often we can think of faith as a project or a discipline. We might choose methods of prayer and adopt practices in the hope of bettering ourselves by adhering more closely to precepts of religion. Think of the good employee trying to please the boss, increase job security and perhaps even earn promotion.
But in such a project who is the protagonist? Me or God?
Consider instead the metaphor of a human relationship.
While some individuals might work hard to win the affections of a prospective partner, more often, more healthily and much more wonderfully there is an encounter when two people meet and discover an attraction which ignites and matures.
Then often disrupting my programmes and my plans, and beyond my hopes, a relationship of love develops.
In this relationship human behaviour – indeed all of human existence – is transformed for the two. Much of the time it does not feel like hard work but an irrepressible blossoming.
While almost four decades ago a pope visited Aotearoa, even more remarkably every moment of every day in Jesus Christ God is visiting me.
Perhaps I am too focussed on my well-intentioned God-centred projects and plans to realise that my place of encounter with Jesus (I could say my Christmas stable) is not so much my successes, achievements and well-disciplined religious programmes and projects but my vulnerability and struggle, my failures and sin.
Indeed in every moment God is nearer to me than I am to myself.
I’ve never thought about this before but perhaps this why in the prayer emoji two hands are held not apart as in measuring a distance, but together, inter-twined even.
In the future a pope might again visit Aotearoa. But I’m more delighted by the fact that today, here and now there is no distance between God and me.
And that’s a simple fact not a tricky riddle.
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Take an initiative and send me a date time and place for a FFF cafe-catchups john@fff.org.nz. I’ll advertise these on each morning’s post throughout Advent.
Monday 16th December 11.00am with Gillian
Cypress Café 10.00am St Heliers Bay Road
St Heliers, Auckland
Tuesday 17 December 10.30 with Catherine
Colombus at Mitre 10 MEGA
25 Bouverie St, Petone, Lower Hutt.
Thursday 19 December 10.00am with Joan
Stumble Inn, 200 Mangorei Road
Merrilands, New Plymouth
Such thoughts raise expectations and hope for a daily encounter with a God who loves us Thanks
Excellent reflection on our relationship with God. I’ve learnt over the years that faith and community, with God and with my Christian whanau is relationship, relationship, relationship! Hallelujah!!!
Thanks John. That’s a really uplifting thought and the analogy to a relationship is wonderful. I do think it’s a combination of all those energies. Even the healthiest relationship requires practice and discipline: reliance on an emotional relationship alone doesn’t suffice. It’s easy to fall into love and out of love but discipline and commitment help carry us all through the normal gulfs of life amidst all our feelings and faith seems no different to me
As I read thru this I was overwhelmed with God’s love pouring into my heart .
I dissolved into tears ,feeling God’s love like a constant stream washing over me ,into me .I dissolved into tears of utter acceptance.
There is no human love that is as powerful & reassuring as this. Praise God .
Thnx for your vulnerability John and the loving way you share so openly and lovingly. Advent is certainly an adventure.
God bless you and your whanau at this special time.
Anne