Chapter Four!

This week I’ve been marvelling at those splendid photographs taken by the Canadian astronaut Commander Chris Hadfield from the International Space Station ttps://twitter.com/Cmdr_Hadfield).  They are simply stunning.  I love the one of the Isle of Wight – from space it actually looks the same shape as it does on the maps – how very reassuring!

In our evening sermon on Sunday David, our preacher, spoke of finding God in both the order and the chaos of life.  He spoke of God being bigger than, and not restricted to, the order we so dearly love as well as being found in the chaos of the universe that not even Commander Hadfield’s photos can fully explain. 

Isn’t it wonderfully ironic that we live in a big Cosmos that makes us feel small yet we trust in an infinite God who makes us feel valued?

All of this chimed in with the book I’m currently reading in preparation for next week’s Discussion Group at AFC – Richard Rohr’s ‘Falling Upwards’.  In chapter four he says:  ‘...life is characterized much more by exception and disorder than by total or perfect order’. 

The challenge for all of us, it seems to me, is to be open to God in those moments of dissonance when life is a struggle.  C.S.Lewis said: God whispers to us in our joys and shouts in our struggles.  I used to find that difficult to accept but I think I’m beginning to see its value.  That’s because, in reality, no one’s life, church, family or community is constantly lived on the sunny side of the street.  So what we all have to do is to actively be open to the loving, sustaining, disciplining and enlightening presence of God in those tough moments – just as much, if not more so, than when the sky is blue.

This is how Richard Rohr puts it in chapter four:  The Gospel was able to accept that life is tragic, but then graciously added that we can survive and will even grow from tragedy.  This is the great turnaround!  It all depends on whether we are willing to see down as up; or as Jung put it, that ‘when you stumble and fall, there you find pure gold’.

So my fellow readers in the Book Group – if you manage nothing else - read Chapter Four!

With best wishes,

Ian
ps – Let me do a bit of advertising.  Last year The Greens did a really enjoyable house swap with a manse family in Florida.  We made the connection through ChristianHomeExchange.com.  The idea of Christian Home Swap is being developed by the Lutheran pastor with whom we exchanged and I’m sure if this is something you want to explore a visit to their website would be worthwhile.  End of commercial!