Each day brings something new and sometimes shocking. For the United States of America and the world, that is a true statement for many this morning. Sometimes it is hard to hear what so many are saying, whether we personally agree with what is being said or not. It can be a difficult and sometimes seemingly dark reality, but at the same time, what is revealed always has the potential to heal and rebuild. There always seems to be the wound first, then the care and the healing. We have to see what it is that is sacred or holy in the moment of our lives in order to anoint and cradle the most precious pieces that can become the new foundation for something that seems tenuous and even sometimes unlikely. Staring at the wound will not heal it. Care must be taken by us together to clean the wound, and provide it with discerning care to help it to heal. A wound can continue to be disregarded until it spreads afar and deepens into despair and devastating destruction. Dare we not go that route.
The Gospel today (Jn 2:13-22) presents us with Jesus’ reaction to seeing the holy temple in Jerusalem as a marketplace of items that covers over the sacred character of a space before God:
“He made a whip out of cords and drove them all out of the temple area, with the sheep and oxen, and spilled the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables, and to those who sold doves he said, “Take these out of here, and stop making my Father’s house a marketplace.”
Clutter always seems to signify something that is being avoided – something that we may not want to deal with, that we would rather sweep in a corner or cover over with something else, so as to not have to really engage it. This is the marketplace in the “temple area” of our lives. The painful and hard-to-face things in our lives, in our world, that we would rather not look at, much less try to consider appropriate actions to address the issue(s). When Jesus is asked by the onlookers on what grounds he is trashing the temple area, he says:
““Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up.”
Christians are familiar with this statement as referring quite clearly to the passion, death and resurrection of Jesus the Christ, which is the very foundation of the Christian faith. It gets quite close to home though when we are faced with this very pattern of destruction/death and resurrection as inherent in each of our lives as well as our lives together as community.
Paul goes so far as to name us as the “temple of God,” where the Spirit of God dwells in his letter to the Corinthians (1 Cor 3:9c-11, 16-17 ). So, then are we to face the same fate of seeming destruction and death, in order for new life to come forth? It would appear so, and as most if not all of us can attest, if we look at our lives, we have indeed encountered this pattern more than once. How do we find the holy in places that seem to be so far from it? Paul continues to make it clear the responsibility we have to honor ourselves and each other as the “temple” of God:
“Brothers and sisters: You are God’s building. According to the grace of God given to me… But each one must be careful how he (or she) builds upon it, for no one can lay a foundation other than the one that is there, namely, Jesus Christ.”
We must build upon it, without losing sight or awareness of what the foundation is – Christ Jesus. The Holy One of God, Who expressed God’s Love in Creation and then humanly entered our world in history to show us how to find and respect the divine in each other. Yes, the spark of God that marks each of us as a temple, wherein the Holy Spirit dwells. So what do we have to do? How do we maintain our lives, our world, and our universe as clutter-free as possible without replacing things of significance with unnecessary and even harmful alternatives to authenticity? How do we heal the wounds of discontent, misunderstanding, and even injustice?
Our first reading today (Ez 47:1-2, 8-9, 12) I believe gives us a possible picture of what that may look like. The angel of the Lord is so to speak giving Ezekiel a tour of the Temple of God:
“This water flows…and empties into the sea, the salt waters, which it makes fresh. Wherever the river flows, every sort of living creature that can multiply shall live, and there shall be abundant fish, for wherever this water comes the sea shall be made fresh. Along both banks of the river, fruit trees of every kind shall grow; their leaves shall not fade, nor their fruit fail. Every month they shall bear fresh fruit, for they shall be watered by the flow from the sanctuary. Their fruit shall serve for food, and their leaves for medicine.”
The image in the Scriptures is of this wonderful river that flows out from threshold of the temple, spreading out in all directions, growing deeper and deeper. The water is FLOWING constantly. And as it flows, it sparks life ever anew, and makes all the water that it touches in its path now fresh. The flowing water also nourishes the banks of the river so that trees grow and bear fruit for food and leaves for healing.
Could this be an image of our lives, when we recognize first that I am a temple of God, and then almost simultaneously seeing that you, indeed, that all of us are “temples of God?” This acknowledgement of precious shared sparks of divinity within each of us grants a freedom that is like a flowing river. It can’t help but flow, when it is honored and cherished and allowed to flow. Abundance of nourishment and healing will always be present in the flow and along the banks of the flow. The wounds that we self-inflict and inflict upon each other can begin to heal in this river!
The question is will we allow the flow to happen? We can thwart it, or try to, and in these attempts, wreak havoc and confusion, violence and even death. But even when we build “dams” in this flowing river that must flow, there will be a breaking point. The life of God cannot be held back. The dam will collapse and the water will flow, and it can be appear destructive in its course, but can still result in creation, indeed, in new life, as it flows forth. The flow is for all of us and it seems that it is only when we see this that there can be a life-giving renewing freshness to our lives. Our temple is nourished to the extent that we share the flowing water, which is the Life of God within each of us. This is us allowing the Christ to clear out the clutter in our “temples” so that we can see the divine flowing within.
We are currently in somewhat “uncharted” waters in our nation and world today – perhaps a part of the river that we have not been before or seen. We must be diligent and dedicated in our attempts to “navigate” these waters, without ever losing sight of the holiness within the waters! We are swimming in the life of God within each other. The river is ever-widening and the waters are getting deeper. There is only one choice to make and that is to try our best not to drown one another, but carefully trust that we can together flow the love of God in and out to each other!
Peace
Thomas