| This is another example of why I read Theologians as I would a poet. Some of them, like Moltmann, are able to make the Reign of God so real - so present - so available. If the love for life awakens in us again, our senses also waken afresh. We may call this the sensuousness of the Holy Spirit. How should we think of it? In a great grief, after the loss of a beloved child or after a divorce, we feel that our senses have been extinguished like a candle. We don't see colours any more. We don't heart sounds any more. We don't taste anything , and our feelings seem to be dead. We become more or less indifferent, and although we are alive, we are as if turned to stone. If in the Spirit of life we again experience the unconditional love of God for life, the divine joy in living stirs in us anew. Then we suddenly see the brightness of the world. We hear melodies again, our sense of taste comes back, and we can feel once more. Our senses are quickened and we again participate in life. This is the sensuousness of the divine Spirit, who kindles all our senses. Do we trust that this Spirit of life is the power to open our lives to experience the unconditional love of God for life? When that is the case, the Spirit opens up our day to life that has been taken from us or life we have let go. Moltmann is writing here about a transformation that is as bold and bright and beautiful as the many stories we hear of the power of the resurrection to bring into being a whole new world never before experienced. In the cycle of death and sadness and destruction that is so real, there is also the word of profound love for us that kindles life even when we cannot see it or feel it or hear or touch it. But that Spirit is always pulling us into new life by making us aware of God's power of life within all that we can sense around us. In essence, we are given back our world - all of it. The world is not only given back to us, it is given back to us so that we can have our senses renewed - maybe even made sharper. Who knows? Why not! In the midst of everything there is a fullness that ready to fill our senses beyond belief. Connection: It is not easy to rise up after we have experienced great loss. And yet, this Spirit is all about lifting us up to life. |
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