God INCLUDES us

Friday, March 03, 2017

I’ve been writing recently about the Trinity, and how it is essentially about relationship between the three persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. (For a fuller explanation of this, see Richard Rohr’s powerful book The Divine Dance: the Trinity and your transformation.)

Therefore our God is a God of relationship, a loving relationship between equals, each giving to and surrendering to the other in an eternal dance of beauty, truth and goodness. And what is even more beautiful about thinking of God in this way is the fact that we are intended to be part of that relationship, that there is a place for us within the “dance” that takes place among the persons.

I mention it again today because I was reading the 17^th Chapter of John’s Gospel, the “high priestly prayer” of Jesus before he was betrayed, arrested and taken away to be tortured to death. In this prayer, Jesus prays to the Father that we be included in their relationship. Nowhere is this expressed more clearly:

. . . that they may all be one; even as thou, Father, art in me and I in thee, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that thou hast sent me. The glory which thou hast given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and thou in me, that they may become perfectly one. . . . Father, I desire that they also, whom thou hast given me, may be with me where I am, to behold my glory which thou hast given me in thy love for me before the foundation of the world. . . . that the love with which thou hast loved me may be in them and I in them. (John 17:21-16; RSV translation)

This is what Jesus wants for you and me. This is our destiny, not off in some undatable future, but here and now, each and every day, even while we are lost in our struggles, trials, torments or failures.

It may also seem that the Holy Spirit, the third Person of the Trinity is not included in this prayer, but yet it is implicit. The Holy Spirit is “the love with which thou hast loved me.”

What difference might this make in your living, your thinking and your praying? Well, meditate on it; carry it around with you; refer to it frequently---and then find out for yourself what difference it will make.

God bless you! Have a good weekend. I’ll be back on Monday.