THE moment that is the GREATEST moment known to mankind is not when man walked on the moon, it is when GOD WALKED ON EARTH…
When my daughter was very young, she had some significant problems with her speech, particularly in the area of articulation. One of the things that she did was replace the “F” sound with the “S” sound when she spoke. That meant that if she were asking for “food”, she would say that she wanted some “sood” to eat.
You can image the problems this caused… There were other sounds that were problematic, that we worked on together with a speech therapist over many long months, but I remember the “F” sound most clearly.
When she was about three years old, my daughter was up in her cubby house offering her much older teenage cousins a meal. I was preparing Christmas lunch for a party that we were hosting and I was not paying too much attention to the play, as I knew she was supervised by her cousins and a very independent child, in any case. After a while, I could hear my daughter shouting – angrily and in frustration – at her older cousins. Running out to the cubby house, I asked what the problem was. My husband’s nephews turned to me and said, “We don’t understand her. She keeps asking if we want ‘sood’ and we don’t know what that is.” Laughingly, I translated, and the game was quickly resumed, with a very happy little three year old and two very amused teenage cousins!
I was reflecting on this memory the other day while I was praying to my Beloved. It seemed a fitting time to remember this very human failing to communicate because when I pray to God, I really just talk to Him. I speak – aloud, silently – and He listens. Sometimes, I speak so much, I forget to leave some silences in my prayer for Him to get a word in edgewise, but for the most part, there is silence and words in my conversations with my Beloved... Because for me, prayer is really just talking to the most dear love of my heart – the Infinite Gentleness of the Universe.
Sometimes when I talk to Him, my words make sense and I can articulate the thoughts, desires and needs of my soul quite coherently in the manner that I want. Other times, I babble like a baby, and only my Father – my Dad, my Daddy – could ever make sense out of what I am trying to say.
That babbling of mine reminds me of my daughter’s early speech.
When my daughter’s speech was all a jumble, long days of close and loving contact with her in anticipating her needs since her birth, meant that I – as her mother – was able to understand the babble that others were unable to understand. In fact, when she completed her speech assessment during her diagnostic appointment, the therapist asked whether I could understand her speech even when others could not. I could. After all, I spent all day and all night with her and learned to listen to her way of speaking. Her father – who loves her as dearly as I do – could not understand her though, because he was away from her during the working day…
Lucky for me that my Beloved is never away from me. He is always close. For He is beyond Time and Space and in His INFINITY, He will always understand me! Every. Single. Time.
And because He can understand me, it occurred to me that I should seek to renew my understanding of Him. And so, I turned to Sacred Scripture to seek out my Beloved in the words He inspired through the Blessed Person Holy Spirit…
For Christ is the GREAT I AM! And we know this because Christ said “I AM the True Vine…” (John 15:1). He said, “I AM the Bread of Life…” (John 6:15). Christ said, “I AM the Way, the Truth and the Life…” (John 14:6). He said, “I AM the Light of the world…” (John 8:12). Christ said, “I AM the Gate for the sheep…” (John 10:7). He said, “I AM the Good Shepherd…” (John 10:11). Christ said, “I AM the Resurrection and the Life…” (John 11:25).
For Christ is God and God is YAHWEH. YAHWEH is God (Exodus 3:14-15). YAHWEH means “I AM”. This means that God always is, was and will be – this means that God entered into Time and Space to be with us as God the Son – and to SAVE us… And that is surely the greatest miracle of all…
Jim Irwin, the NASA astronaut who walked on the Moon during the Apollo 15 Mission in the 1970s later said, “Jesus walking on the earth is more important than man walking on the moon…”
In fact, THE moment that is the GREATEST moment known to mankind is not when man walked on the moon, it is when GOD WALKED ON EARTH…
For with prayer, I stand on Holy Ground where everything is clear. Here. At the Foot of the Cross.
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