Re-Gifting

Let me tell you a story. I won’t hold it against you if you don’t believe it. I don’t believe it, either. Last Monday night I met with a wonderful group of people to talk about the season of Advent. The specific topic was the word “Peace.” I led the group discussion which seemed to center around the question: “How do we find peace in this crazy world? What do we do to make it and keep it?” All nine of us wrestled with the question for a couple of hours, and concluded that “it’s not easy.” For reasons I cannot explain, I felt it important to say: We have within us the capacities to make peace right now. There is no need to ask God to bring peace, even to show us how to do it. The Spirit, the Christ, lives within us and we can choose to “be” peace in all our relationships and circumstances. We have what we need: Christ in us. Let’s let God off the hook.

When I got home Monday night after the meeting, that thought kept a place in my mind. A little later I picked a book off my shelf, one of those “I’ll read a minute to get sleepy” moments. I chose a book at random, one that seemed to be sticking out a little from the others, one that didn’t register in my memory. I didn’t even recognize the title or the author. When I opened the book, it was heavily underlined, indicating that I had, indeed, read it sometime. And the underlines led me right back into the conversation earlier in the evening. No, I didn’t just forget that I had read it recently. No, it had no role in my preparation for the discussion. It was a stunning confirmation of this basic idea: Life is a journey from separation to connection, from individuality to commonality, from “me” to “us”. The purpose of life is to “come home”…to come back to completeness. Jesus meant it when he said “I am in you and you are in me.” If I dare to believe that, and dare to act on that belief, guess what happens. Peace. Contentment. Joy. A new sense of Hope. These wonderful things are the result of one fundamental reality. I have what I ask for…and more…in me. What I must do is accept that reality and live it. If I want peace, I must be peace. And “being peace” is one more step in the fulfillment of my life…coming home, living each moment in the conscious presence of the spiritual reality I call God.

I’m still delightfully puzzled by this experience, and I regard it as a gift, which I now “re-gift” to you. You have what you need to be who you are. We are all trying to figure out how to reconnect with that deep, deep internal hint of The Holy, for the re-connection is the fullness of life. Maybe Nike was right: Just do it!