This week's Sunday Sermon opens up with a prayer and ends with a poem. Between the two I explore the concept and symbolism of spirals and how they show up and impact our lives and our thoughts. When we increase our awareness of the spiral nature of life, it's much easier to have faith, build trust, and surrender in the day to day. We better understand that life, progress, and existence simply aren't linear. From there I explored the relationship between faith, trust, and surrender by revisiting, deconstructing and refining views I've previously held. Enjoy - and here's the poem:
WHAT HAPPENS TO THE GUEST
The hand sat in the classroom
Of the eye
And soon learned to love
Beauty.
The sky sat in the classroom
Of God
And now look what it gives us at night:
All that is learned.
There was a time when man
Was so burdened with survival
That he rarely bathed in dancing sounds.
But dear ones,
Now drop your pointed shields that wound.
What happens to the guest who visits the house
Of a great musician?
Of course his tastes become refined.
There are some who can visit
That Luminous Sphere that reveals
This life never
Was,
The truth of that experience
Is reserved for so
Very few;
God draws back like a kite
Some of those who get lost in the Sun
And after their recovery
From being sublimely independent,
Having known the Unspeakable Union--
They might try again with all their courage
To sing a simple tune like this:
"What happens to the guests who keep visiting
The verse of a Perfect One?
Their voices and cells become refined
And like the soft night candle (the moon)
They begin to give this world
All the light they have
Learned."
Your hand sits in the classroom
Of God,
An apprentice as Hafiz was,
Mastering the crave of
Divine beauty
As this earth spins on
The Potter's
Wheel.
