I'm leaving James Alison's book for awhile. This may be a jump off a cliff but I need clarification - maybe even a bit of a mess - to move myself more deeply into what it is to be a follower of Jesus - a resident in the Reign of God - a resurrected life. Therefore I am going to begin to simply write. What a better place to begin than with the beginning.
In the beginning was all that is God. All that is God is reflected in all that is from the beginning. In this telling of the beginning, you already hear an assumption. God was already there - in place - ready for life to spring into action. Does this mean that someone who does not believe in the existence of God must disagree with what is said here. I don't think so. All that is God is what is known as God's love. It is the spark that begins the next moment. It is the spark that brings into the next moment a shape to that moment. I am surely stealing an idea when I say that the shape of that moment is the power to bring all things together within a relationship in which no part is left out or considered leftover.
Rather, in the beginning all things reflect the power of life that ceaselessly brings all things together. This is even the power that brings together all things that have already started to become separated. That is important to say because no one can see a time when there was not separation. So before there was the power among us to lead us away from one another or put us at odds with one another or make us point fingers of disapproval or condemnation, there was the power that is able to unite all things - a creative power so our of our control, we say it is separate from us - it is other - it is - holy.
Note that in the beginning all things 'reflect.' It does not say 'reflected' as though there was one time in which this power of love was unleashed and available. We are constantly 'in the beginning' - that place and time when the power of love is working to make things new - creatively new - a new something that was not here just moments ago. The love of God is the beginning - always a beginning the world will find fresh and alive.
Connection: I need to know that before me there was a power that still is. I need to wake up in the morning and know that there is a potential for the world to be amazed by the power of uniting and reuniting love that I often call God. That's me. I already know my shortcomings and I'm sure you have a longer list at which you could ask me to look. So I need to be shaken up to see I do not need to create something new today - I need only step into something or step onto something that has a history that is from the beginning of all things and shaping the beginning of this moment.
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