Connecting with the Spirit (Rebirth 4)

May 1, 2016

Ancho + Corona

 Scripture: John 5:1-9a  and Acts 8: 4-25 

On the way back from our latest Presbytery meeting - this time in Las Cruces - Elana and I passed a billboard advertising a church in Alamogordo. Perhaps you've seen this sign, or one like it - it read, "Relationship - not religion." Relationship - not religion. Elana and I both pulled a face, and of course, kept driving. But you see, for so many people, even the word "religion" is a pejorative, a word used to describe and dismiss the spiritual practices of others. Now, I'm not dismissing that a relationship with God is important - far from it - but I think we need to talk about what religion is, and why it is NOT a bad word. Religion comes originally from Latin - Religare - which meant to bind together. Later, it became Religio - obligation, bond, or reverent observation, and then in Middle English, Religion, meaning "life under vows". One could have a faith of one's own - but in religion, you were bound to a code that you either chose for yourself, or that you felt God had led you to. There's a fine point here: you choose to be bound by the vows you make, and are not forced into the choice. Yes, it did occasionally happen that people were forced by their family or circumstance into the monastery or convent - but usually, it was something chosen for yourself. A spiritual practice of restriction - a lot like what people today may do during the season of Lent.

Maybe you've heard the phrase, "Spiritual, but not Religious". The sense in this is that one can be connected to the Spirit of God without being bound into one religious track. And true - the Spirit of God does work in and through people that we find surprising choices, but this phrase too dismisses religion as something that holds you back. Yet, if that's the case, why would anyone choose voluntarily to be religious? To join in the dance of the universe, you must give up everything that is not the right step at the right time. Or, as the Renaissance artist Michelangelo is reported to have said, you must remove everything from the block of marble that is not the beautiful sculpture inside.

John Philip Newell reminds us of the 20th Century monk, Thomas Merton, a man who gave up a loving relationship to take vows as a Trappist monk in Kentucky. He chose to take on additional religious activities in order to become closer with God. Merton believed that we live in a world that is absolutely transparent, and God shines through it all the time - in people and in things and in nature and in events. But we don't see it. We need to remember to see. We need to seek not to know ABOUT God - but to seek to KNOW God. That direct, personal experience.

For everyone, that direct personal experience of God is found through spiritual practice. Prayer is a spiritual practice. So is Yoga. So is walking through the woods, or along the fence line, and appreciating God's hand in the world. So is the acceptance of additional burdens - like the vows of monks and nuns - or the choice not to curse, or to remove your hat in church - or to put on a hat in worship! Spiritual practice is everywhere - and it is the root of religion. To claim that you can have a relationship without religion is nonsensical in the extreme. Think of relationships you have had - you have to have a relationship with a specific person, not with a person in the abstract. As such, it involves voluntary restrictions of one sort or another, hopefully to the benefit of you both. It is the same with the relationship with God - you take on voluntary obligations to strengthen your ties with the Divine - and it ought to spill over into strengthening your ties with your fellow human beings.

The scriptures are full of this sense of religion as voluntary restriction. From the Nazarite vows, like Samson took, to the Pharisees choosing movement restrictions, and even the disciples leaving everything behind to follow Jesus, it can seem like religion is all about giving up something. But - it’s a choice of giving something up that was distracting you from seeing the Divine in all things. In our passage from John, we learn of a man who, for thirty-eight years, sat by the pool at Bethesda (or Bethzetha) in Jerusalem, waiting for it to bubble and stir - and try to be the first in the water. Day after day, for 38 years, trying to make it in before anyone else, and yet being unable to make it, due to his paralyzed legs. Jesus comes up to him, and asks him simply, "Do you want to be healed?" Does he want to be healed? For 38 years, he's been trying! And he's nearly given up hope - he says, "I cannot walk, and if I am going to make it into the pool first, I need someone to carry me. Someone beats me there every time." For him, it has become a matter of life-long faith that one day, someone will carry him in to the water. His spiritual practice is to wait for that time to come - actively wait, asking passers by to help him in. And finally, he's asked the right person - not to help him into the water, but to heal him, his actual goal! Jesus doesn't lay hands on him, doesn't do anything other than tell him to stand up, pick up his mat, and walk. And just like that, 38 years of waiting by the pool's edge come to an end. He doesn't stop to ask who Jesus is, he just picks up his mat, and walks away - probably filled with joy!

In our Acts passage, similarly, we learn of a man named Simon who has converted to believing in Jesus. He was a magician, and people thought he was possibly the Messiah, given all the things he could make happen. Oddly, we know of Simon from three different texts of the first Century - he's an actual historical figure of note! But though he had begun to believe in Jesus after seeing Philip perform miracles, he didn't quite get it - he didn't quite give up those things that were separating him from seeing God at work in the world. So when John and Peter show up, and people start responding to the Holy Spirit at work in them, Simon thinks that this is a trick like those he used to do. So, he asks to buy the knowledge of passing on the Holy Spirit through laying-on-of-hands from Peter and John - and Peter tells him off. "May your money tarnish and rot away, you who think to buy God's power! Give up this way of thinking - repent of your wickedness - and pray for God's forgiveness, and that God transforms your heart." For this, we get the concept of Simony - trying to buy church office or spiritual power. Simon needed to give up his conception of how the world worked in order to become close enough with the Divine to see the Holy Spirit at work in the world. Simon had a relationship with Philip - and through Philip, Jesus - but hadn't quite gotten the religion part together. Simon wants to lead in the dance with God and the universe, but hadn't learned the steps. Hadn't listened to the rhythm. Yet, after this admonishment, he asks Peter to pray on his behalf, that he might change his ways - Simon wants to change! The text leaves him there, but I think the implication is that Simon worked to change his heart, and acted out of love - and joined the dance with God.

So, how do you connect with the Spirit of God? Most Presbyterians, when asked this question, will respond at least partially with "Prayer". Now, in our Directory for Worship - part of the constitution of the PC(USA), prayer is defined as "a conscious opening of the self to God, who initiates communion and communication with us. Prayer is receiving and responding, speaking and listening, waiting and acting in the presence of God. In prayer we respond to God in adoration, in thanksgiving, in confession, in supplication, in intercession, and in self-dedication." Or, as Brother Roland of the Community of the Transfiguration puts it: "There are two types of prayer: One is the dozing kitten prayer, purring by the warm fire of God's presence. The other is the yappy dog prayer, scratching at the door of heaven, imploring God's help in our lives." We focus a LOT of effort on the yappy-dog prayer - trying to choose the right words, thinking that if we just pull the right phrase from the air, God will do what we want. Yet, if we focus more on the dozing kitten prayer - "listening in silence, an expectancy" as Merton puts it - we might be able to hear where God is leading us to what we need.

"Spiritual practice," John Philip Newell says, "is not about self-important seriousness. Rather, it is about doing something that... is both less serious and more serious - a Cosmic Dance in which we discover that we do not have to take the lead. We cannot take the lead, for we do not know how to. But we can give ourselves to the Dance. We can let go with abandon to it, to be carried by its endless rhythm in a relationship that is deeper than our consciousness can comprehend. But what is most serious about the dance is that each one of us is needed. There is a place in the dance of the universe that no one else can take but each of us. "

Religion is about learning the steps to the Cosmic Dance - giving up of the things that distract us from the rhythm, that prevent us from seeing God's shining light in the world. To connect with the Spirit, we need to listen more - to seek the rhythm, and move with God and each other.

May God bless your dancing, that you may bless others. May Christ lead your steps, that you may not stumble. May your spirit be caught up in the Holy Spirit, until you see nothing but the light of God, hear nothing but the rhythm of Christ, and feel nothing but the love of the Holy Spirit. Amen.