WITHOUT FORM AND VOID by Zach




WITHOUT FORM AND VOID-A SHAPE FOR LIFE IN THE MIDST OF FUTILITY

                When I was thinking about writing the article on Sacred Times and Sacred Space, I invited my son Zach to share his thoughts as well. Below is the resulting article by him and I like to share his writing whenever I can because his thoughts are profound and deep and good food for the spirit and soul.  My you be blessed. Rick

Without Form and Void- A Shape for Life in the Midst of Futility

Are we alive? The answer may seem obvious if you are reading this, but what if what seems obvious is a delusion? “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it, you shall surely die.” (Gen. 2:17) What does it mean to be alive? Life belongs only to God. Therefore, to live is to bear His image and to be a temple for His Holy Spirit. This is the purpose of our creation. And by being fruitful and multiplying, we were to differentiate and disperse the Kingdom of God throughout the cosmos. The Kingdom of God is the life of the Holy Trinity extending everywhere. But what happens if we remove ourselves from that life by breaking covenant with the Lord? Divorce and death. We lose the Holy Spirit and our spirit dies. We become like beasts, subject to futility and death and disease. We live by toil and the serpent of entropy is always gnawing away at the roots of our life.



The fallen man is a ghost. He exists in a half-life, a kind of dusk where the sun never fully rises or sets. Man now sees as if through a darkened glass. Our life is not God’s life, our unity is not God’s unity, our plans are not God’s plans, our marriage is not God’s marriage; and because of this our life, our attempts at unity (always manifesting as some kind of empire by which man tries to make a name for himself), our plans great and small are doomed to dust, our marriages are doomed to dissolution, and our seed are doomed to death. But do not despair. For Christ came into the world to bring the Life of the Holy Trinity back to mankind.  Now, “as many as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ.” Now we who walk according to the Spirit of God do not dwell in futility. Christ came as the true and uncreated light and began a new creation in us who respond to His calling. He is our Shepherd leading us through the valley of death and into the Holy Mountain of Life. There He will lead us to green pastures of peace and still waters of joy.



So what happened at Pentecost when the Spirit of God descended to brood over the chaos of a world without form and void once more? He who is filled with the Spirit of Christ speaks beyond the confusion of the tongues of Babel. This is about more than just speaking other languages, this is about the language of God that transcends language. This is the language of the prophets and apostles who see the hidden things of God and men’s hearts. This is the casting down of the principalities and the powers and the thrones and dominions, the rulers of the darkness of this age. For speech is the shape God gives to the soul. Speech is God’s, for He is the Word, the Logos. He is the Name. This is how form is given to chaos. The world without God’s Logos is a world without form, a world of futility and death. Pentecost announced a new creation. The Church, the communion of the Holy Trinity, came to dwell among men. Now, whenever two or three are gathered together in His Name, there the Lord is in their midst. Wherever the believer goes, there is the Kingdom of God. Only God knows his name.



Now, if we walk according to the Spirit and not according to the flesh, our deeds are transfigured and caught up in the life of God. Our faith becomes the substance of things unseen. Our life becomes God’s life, our unity becomes God’s unity, our marriage becomes God’s marriage, our plans great and small become the actions of a vassal of the Lord extending His reign. When we live according to the Spirit and not according to the flesh, even the chaos in which we live is given order in accordance with the will of God. Saint Seraphim of Sarov famously said, “Acquire the Spirit of Peace and thousands around you will be saved.” The servant of God who acquires the Holy Spirit becomes the friend of the Almighty and His kingdom is established wherever he invests.

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