What you least expect

 ‘…Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. ..’ (Luke 12:32)

Luke 12:32-48 (Year C: Trinity+11)

Something that makes life interesting and challenging is uncertainty.  Nobody can predict what tomorrow will bring.  Suppose someone had predicted, for example, thirty years ago on the 7^th of August 1986 that:

• The Berlin Wall would be gone within 5 years (and pretty much ‘without a shot’ being fired);
• The Republic of Ireland would be among the richest in the world within a generation (measurement problems aside);
• Some of the main protagonists in the ‘Troubles’ in Northern Ireland would be sharing Government in a place called Stormont (with the British Union Flag still flying there at least some days of the year);
• Within thirty years a referendum to approve equal marriage rights for gay and straight in the Republic of Ireland would be overwhelmingly passed across the Republic of Ireland (with all constituencies, bar one, approving the proposal);
• Within a generation we would be able to see, listen to, and talk with our friends and loved ones on the other side of the globe by means of a little gadget in our pocket called a ‘smartphone’….(and be able to predict the time of the next bus with an accuracy of a minute– one remembers those long waits in the rain for what seemed like hours in times past)…..

Such a person would be regarded as a complete fantasist.  Yet, the unimaginable happened while those things we most feared did not (at least from the vantage of summer of 1986) from the very real possibility of a nuclear holocaust before the end of the last century or the possibility at least some years prior to that in the 1970s of an escalation in the ‘Troubles’ in Northern Ireland to an all-out civil war across the whole island.

So it is in life. That which we fear and worry about the most very often does not happen or materialise. That which we never thought of or imagined happens. Life is full of surprises – joyful, pleasant, horrible and all else in between.  We cannot control the flow of world events. Neither can we control what is happening around us in our families, personal relationships and neighbourhoods. However, we can do something about our response to unexpected developments. We can also think and act and speak in such a manner that paves the way for different outcomes or possibilities, if not now, then in the future. We can also trust in a higher love and purpose.

The thrust of this week’s long passage from chapter 12 is the use of parables and conversations to emphasise three things:

• Peace of mind
• Trust
• Readiness

Take peace first. We worry about this and that from putting any food on the table (and lets face it many of us don’t have worries in that regard) to worry about the future of the world with all that is happening. The good news is that it was always like this and we need to get used to uncertainty.  The not so good news is that we can only be certain of three things in life (aside from taxation!):

• Getting older
• Getting sick
• Dying

Charming!  To the one who has no expectations beyond the seen world of this life it is a question of ‘living life to the full’ while one has it. Nothing wrong with that.  However, there is a more to life than the standard lifecycle of development and mile-stoning from cradle to grave. There is a silent current running through our lives making sense of it and gently nudging us forward and landing us in surprises and challenges we probably never thought of in the past. Look at it this way – whatever is worrying me will either happen or it will not happen. If there is something you can do to avert it then do it. If not why worry? It might not even happen. But if it does we have faith to cling on to that all is for the better in the long-run and God-who-is-love will see to it that ‘all shall be well and all manners of things shall be well’ (as the famous English mystic, Julian of Norwich, wrote in the 14th century (in Chapter XXVII of Revelations of Divine Love).

So, this gospel invites us to:

• Be patient
• To wait
• To trust
• To be ready
• To keep on going as we wait and seek

We only have so much time in this short life.  This truth becomes more and more apparent as the years and the decades roll by for us who are of an age. But, age is in some ways illusory and so is time. Culture and Commerce dictate that someone must work or must retire and such and such an age set by German actuarial analysis in the 19^th century. Time is relative and so is age. Much has been given to us (verse 48) and much is rightly expected of us.  May we be open books and the change we wish to see no matter what stage of our journey we are on. However, it is certain that you, reading this, and me writing this, have 365 days to enjoy/serve/love/create here in this world than was the case in August 2015. #JustSaying as it says on twitter!

Nowadays people do time management courses.  In other words they take up time to study how better to use it. The odd thing about the incarnation is that God chose his son to spend around 33 years of life in a backwater of the Roman Empire among a specially chosen people. However, of these 33 years some 30 years were spent in relative anonymity and obscurity while 3 years were spent preaching, healing, declaring and assembling.  And then the whole matter was resolved in three days after which the rest is living history. So there we have a lesson in time management!  If we stick with our core, essential and life-affirming goals every day and keep these rocks in the jar then the sands of other things may be poured in if there is space.

Another way of looking at this is to relate the act of being ready and vigilant to being totally given in the present moment. Think of a child playing on the beach this somewhere this August as she creatively makes castles and homes. She is completely absorbed in the pleasure of task. Past is not relevant. The future is not there. Just now.  That child is you, me, us at some point in our own journey perhaps many decades ago.  Now we see the child as an adult – racked by the past and the future and everything besides. Unable to focus properly, to listen, to receive, to give. Pinned on a cross with the past to the left side and the future to the right.

building castles of hope

But, in Luke 12 Jesus shows us the way to restore a presence in the now.  To live the present moment is to live in that moment in freedom and G.R.A.C.E. – Grounded, Relaxed, Attentive, Calm and Enthusiastic. Self-mastery is the fruit of living thus.  But, worry can never be exorcised – at least not entirely.  Only trust in a better future, in a noble purpose and in a higher being can carry us along. In this way, the past is healed, restored and transformed in the here and now.  The future is created only in the present moment. The present moment is the sacrament of God’s loving presence. No need to travel far, to undertake onerous spiritual exercises, to engage in many prayers, to strive and strive again. Rather, see, taste, breathe, hear, touch the present moment.  There God meets us – really. If you are fortunate by reason of means and health to enjoy a vacation at this time of year then enjoy it and build your sand castles of hope!