Christmas Eve Meditation (24 Dec 2005)
Christmas Eve Meditation 05 Virgin Territory
At the end of the year, at my wife’s prompting we ask each other what new things did you experience past year?
We’ve talked about how as we get older we don’t want to become ultra conservative, refusing to try something new, because we don’t want to stop growing.
My wife and I are both originally from Japan, where zen masters talk about cultivating a “beginner’s mind.”
Jesus also spoke the importance of a beginner’s mind.
Jesus said in order to grow spiritually, we must have the mind of a child: open, not presuming that we “see.”
One of the new things my wife and I did together this past year was to take a 6 day sailing course in Gulf Islands.
I experienced a lot of new things on the boat, including manually lowering and then raising the anchor in Montague Harbor and then a 2nd time lowering the anchor more slowly and trying to get it right it to catch properly and… and then raising it again and a 3rd time and lowering the even more slowly anchor…. Reversing the boat trying making sure it takes hold….
but my wife Sakiko experienced even more things…
My wife grew up a larges cities Japan---the closest experience she’s ever had to camping was staying in hotel with some shrubbery in the front with some gold fish in a marble pond in the courtyard.
Spending 6 days on a boat with no shower and a marine head for a toilet really was a new experience for her!
At our small group Christmas party this past week, my wife asked our members what new things they had experienced this past year.
Someone said, “I’ve learning to parallel ski for the first time this year” another said, I’ve new ways to paint in art classes, but each member also talked about how they had a new experience of God.
One person said, this year, I’ve learn to pray regularly for this first time. Another said this year, I’ve learned to read the Bible and journal, and another said through our study of scripture, I’ve learned anew how to forgive. ..
Experiencing something new or anew is pathway to growth…
Mary the mother of Jesus is the ultimate example of allowing something radically new in her life by saying yes to God…
Like most famous people, there was a time, of course, when Mary the mother of Jesus, wasn’t famous, a time when she’s just a 14 years old virgin, an illiterate peasant from a small town…
God comes to her through the angel Gabriel and announces to her that she is the one whom God has chosen to conceive a child, miraculously, through the Holy Spirit coming over her and that she will bear in her body the life of the son of God, Jesus Christ.
And Mary says, “I am the Lord’s servant, may it be to me as you have said.”
In saying yes…
Mary risks ruining her reputation in a conservative, small town by becoming pregnant out of wedlock, losing her fiancé, and bearing in her body the savior of world…
And as my friend Elizabeth points out, raising a real “know it all”!
But in allowing God come into her, Mary is changed and becomes the person through which God has changed my life… perhaps yours, and countless people around the world…
Saying yes to God… involves risk… and it can be messy, giving birth in the best of circumstances is messy… but as we say yes to God we are animated by the life God and God’s life comes through us to the world…
Last year a friend of mine asked is their “virgin” territory in your life that you need to open to the life of God?
This Christmas Eve, may I ask you, “Is their virgin territory in your life?
Areas unknown, utouched, unexplored, that you would like God to enter into and bring life to?
Virgin areas… in your work, in a friendship, in area of passion for you?
Allowing God in your life to do new work in us involves risk: the risk of becoming a beginner, the risk of change, but it allows your life to be animated by the very life of God and, and like Mary, will enable you to blessing to the world…
Silent…Prayer… God Search me oh God and know my heart, test me and see if there is any part of me that has been untouched and guide me forward…
If you would a sacred birth to begin in your… join in praying…Jesus Christ, Oh Holy Child of Bethlehem… Descend on me I pray, cast out my sin and enter in be born in me today…
At the end of the year, at my wife’s prompting we ask each other what new things did you experience past year?
We’ve talked about how as we get older we don’t want to become ultra conservative, refusing to try something new, because we don’t want to stop growing.
My wife and I are both originally from Japan, where zen masters talk about cultivating a “beginner’s mind.”
Jesus also spoke the importance of a beginner’s mind.
Jesus said in order to grow spiritually, we must have the mind of a child: open, not presuming that we “see.”
One of the new things my wife and I did together this past year was to take a 6 day sailing course in Gulf Islands.
I experienced a lot of new things on the boat, including manually lowering and then raising the anchor in Montague Harbor and then a 2nd time lowering the anchor more slowly and trying to get it right it to catch properly and… and then raising it again and a 3rd time and lowering the even more slowly anchor…. Reversing the boat trying making sure it takes hold….
but my wife Sakiko experienced even more things…
My wife grew up a larges cities Japan---the closest experience she’s ever had to camping was staying in hotel with some shrubbery in the front with some gold fish in a marble pond in the courtyard.
Spending 6 days on a boat with no shower and a marine head for a toilet really was a new experience for her!
At our small group Christmas party this past week, my wife asked our members what new things they had experienced this past year.
Someone said, “I’ve learning to parallel ski for the first time this year” another said, I’ve new ways to paint in art classes, but each member also talked about how they had a new experience of God.
One person said, this year, I’ve learn to pray regularly for this first time. Another said this year, I’ve learned to read the Bible and journal, and another said through our study of scripture, I’ve learned anew how to forgive. ..
Experiencing something new or anew is pathway to growth…
Mary the mother of Jesus is the ultimate example of allowing something radically new in her life by saying yes to God…
Like most famous people, there was a time, of course, when Mary the mother of Jesus, wasn’t famous, a time when she’s just a 14 years old virgin, an illiterate peasant from a small town…
God comes to her through the angel Gabriel and announces to her that she is the one whom God has chosen to conceive a child, miraculously, through the Holy Spirit coming over her and that she will bear in her body the life of the son of God, Jesus Christ.
And Mary says, “I am the Lord’s servant, may it be to me as you have said.”
In saying yes…
Mary risks ruining her reputation in a conservative, small town by becoming pregnant out of wedlock, losing her fiancé, and bearing in her body the savior of world…
And as my friend Elizabeth points out, raising a real “know it all”!
But in allowing God come into her, Mary is changed and becomes the person through which God has changed my life… perhaps yours, and countless people around the world…
Saying yes to God… involves risk… and it can be messy, giving birth in the best of circumstances is messy… but as we say yes to God we are animated by the life God and God’s life comes through us to the world…
Last year a friend of mine asked is their “virgin” territory in your life that you need to open to the life of God?
This Christmas Eve, may I ask you, “Is their virgin territory in your life?
Areas unknown, utouched, unexplored, that you would like God to enter into and bring life to?
Virgin areas… in your work, in a friendship, in area of passion for you?
Allowing God in your life to do new work in us involves risk: the risk of becoming a beginner, the risk of change, but it allows your life to be animated by the very life of God and, and like Mary, will enable you to blessing to the world…
Silent…Prayer… God Search me oh God and know my heart, test me and see if there is any part of me that has been untouched and guide me forward…
If you would a sacred birth to begin in your… join in praying…Jesus Christ, Oh Holy Child of Bethlehem… Descend on me I pray, cast out my sin and enter in be born in me today…
posted by Shigematsu at 3:55 PM
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