Thursday, December 31, 2020

Beginning


In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters. Genesis 1:1-2

In our beginning, there was no time. Even Creation, there was no time. There was day, night, and seasons. For Earth and for us. There was only beauty and relationship. With Creator and then with each other. From then to now to forever: creation has no calendar. Day, night and seasons, but no clock. Time was a structural demarcation of nature that we constructed; and for that we are most thankful. Hours, days, months, years. Clocks and calendars meant to guide us…but never meant to control us. Interesting thing happened in the 2020th year since Christ was crucified and rose – by our calendar – since time split. Most of humanity over the entire Earth, had calendars cleared. We always say we want more time; but we mean on our own terms like a flurry of snowflakes in beauty and wonder. What we received, was an avalanche that rolled on with no end in sight. All together now. Go home and wait. And wait and wait. We are still waiting for “normal” to return – calendars to fill and demarcations to enclose. Just to feel normal. 9-5 work hours. Concert times. Dinner reservations. Yet some deadlines, on the other hand, did not cease: housing and electric bills, doctors’ appointments, and millions of other timelines. As varied as fingerprints, each had their own shockwave as never in our lifetime. Lose the clock, lose our minds. We don’t want a blank canvas to story; we want our lives back as before. Time on our terms. Clocks in our control. The clock ticks on and calendar turns a page tonight. Desperate for relief we always celebrate a “new beginning.” Maybe tonight more than ever. Deep down, we know there’s not carriage at midnight that magically changes circumstances. We are never called to complacency, but to wisdom  beyond ourselves that drives us to altar the lives that affect us and all around us. Choices to destiny.

A calendar is never our true comfort and joy. A grand celebration in tradition, to be sure! I celebrate with all the earth in the numbers turning tonight…but I look to celebrate more than the turn. I look not to return to before where time was Ruler of All, but to put time in its place: as a guide, not a dictator.  An earthen structure, I wish not to escape, but to embrace. I remember those who have no sense of turning time: humans enslaved and imprisoned. I am inspired by those who have no sense of turning time: nature as it’s been since the beginning. Less depression; more inspiration. More celebration in moments than numbers. Going back to the beginning to live in present. Not in ignorance or escape, quite the opposite. Live in full awareness that time in not limitations to entangle, but a harness to guide. Not a race against time, but a race with time. Beyond time. We will always have a beginning, an ending, and a life in between. But when I remember the true beginning – without time but with relationship – always intended to be without an end – true life is restored and lived. Celebration comes beyond tradition to expand into the horizons – celebration of life, provision, freedom, hope and love that nothing controls. Life is not controlled: Tragedy will come, as the dark with the light. But nothing separates from the love. As in the beginning to now to come there was only and will always be: rest in the Love.

So, tonight I celebrate a passing of time with great joy and contentment. Tonight the wind blows, so perfectly. Sensing the Spirit blowing away the days of past; not just in calendar, but in life. Let the seas swell and winds stir! All around are reminders of the Spirit as the true guide; great and small. Details, decisions, disasters and darkness. Most of all, grandeur, beauty, joy, and light. Dark days are ahead, but in the heart and mind of true awareness of the Unseen , most loved one: your carriage always awaits.