“There is so much to say, but you just won’t understand it now.”* Like talking to a child about growing old, there are no tools with which to work. It cannot be taught. Only lived.
Jesus knows that his time is short. His bewildered friends listen as he promises not to leave them as orphans… that Someone will come to them. The words cannot yet take root.
What would you say to someone you love if you only had a handful of words? A radiant rush of heart and longing it would be, regardless of what spills out. Summoning the courage to say anything but goodbye to my dying mother, an economy of words washed over me as I wept, yet my heart couldn’t stop singing. That was word enough. And it was there in that stillness that I was visited.
“When the Friend comes, you will be led by the hand and guided to all truth,” says the teacher. She will bring you all you need. When you are visited by the Friend, you will be taken into the heart of all things.
The sweet maternal hand that led Jesus into his wilderness is the same hand that will lead us… and gift us the song of truth. Quietly, She sings us in our native tongue, and the veil lifts, revealing the truth of who we are: Songs of God.
We are not simply living our own lives. We are being lived. In the singing, we hear that we are the song being sung. This is how the Friend comes.
*John 16: 12-15 (The Message)
–Jim Marsh, Bread of Life Church
Questions to ponder:
- What is at the heart of your truth?
- What is the song you are singing?
- What might a “visit” look and feel like for you?
