The Threefold Way part 3: Via Unitiva

Pentecost 8 year B Sermon 09

Two weeks ago… we started a series…thinking of our church family as a school of practice…where we learn what it means to live and work…in the light of God’s love.

In his book…Finding our way again…Brian McLaren suggests if … we aren’t a school of practice…we’re in danger of becoming just another consumer group…or Sunday morning escape from reality.

Even when we see ourselves as a… passionate well educated congregation…if we’re not practicing the way Jesus taught…we can lose our way…and to find our way forward again…

we have to look back … to see where we got off the track in the first place …

so we recall the accumulated wisdom…

of centuries of Jesus’ disciples and rediscover…
the portrayal of Christian life as a journey…a path…a way…

with stages or seasons of spiritual growth…

It’s what the ancient church called‘the threefold way’ or three dimensions of Christian life…The first dimension…involves a season of self-examination…or self purging…called in Latin the Via Purgativa… or in Greek…Katharsis.

On this part of our journey we honestly examine… how the pursuit of money, pleasure and power… has a hold on our lives…
our marriages, our parenting… our work… our friendships....
We ask how we can hold each other accountable… as we seek to practice the opposite of greed and lust and pride…
as we seek to become a people of humility and compassion…
self control and simplicity. [pause]

Once we’ve cleaned the grime off the windows of our lives… we’re ready to let the light shine in…ready to explore the second dimension of the threefold way…a season of learning and growth… of study and listening and prayer and worship…where we practice seeing everything and everyone…in the light of God’s love.

Here in this second season…we let the wisdom of God illuminate… our lives and our relationships…this dimension of the Christian life ....is The Via Illuminativa…or Fotosis…

And all along…the first and second dimensions of the threefold way … have been preparing us for the third …the one we’re exploring today…the Via Unitiva…or Theosis… where all our practicing…finds fulfillment.

To understand this third dimension… McLaren suggests we sit comfortably by the fireplace… gazing into the flames. It’s so cosy on these cold days…[pause]

and its easy to become relaxed and even captivated by the… beauty and warmth of the fire…

Suddenly we realize we’ve left the tip of the iron poker…
lying in the hot red embers....and we notice something expected but still amazing has happened…

The tip of the poker has started to glow …and the section that’s deepest in the glowing embers… is now completely indistinguishable from them…it pulses with the same orange glow and the same mysterious radiance.

Further up the rod…we notice… it’s orange but not glowing…and still further from the tip… the poker’s white… then gray… and then the normal rough black… of unpolished iron.

And gradually a kind of revelation… starts to warm our hearts. we begin to understand …that the power of fire…is far greater… than the power of iron.

So instead of iron making the fire cold…the fire…
makes the iron hot. If the poker’s in the fire long enough…
the nature of fire overshadows the nature of iron… and the iron begins to catch the nature of the fire. The light and heat of fire… illuminate and warm the darkness and cold of the iron.
There’s a sense in which the iron is fire-ized.

This pre-scientific explanation might maintain that the iron partakes in the nature of fire…until it becomes light and heat itself.

Today we might say something about atoms and molecules and radiant energy or heat transfer…rapid oxidation and combustion. But its experience not science that’s taught us not to pick up the poker without a glove or an old rag even if the handle is black…and when we’ve taken it out the fire… we watch… as the tip reverts… from the nature of fire to the nature of iron.

Less dramatically…we could demonstrate the same thing…
by leaving the poker out in the sun…even simple sunlight can overpower the nature of iron.

Just imagine what would happen…if we could stick the poker right into the sun! Now we’re beginning to understand the third dimension on the threefold way… the via unitiva…the union of our nature… with the nature of God…

To get here…first… with the practice of self-examination…we clean the grime off our windows so the light can shine in…second… through the practice of study… prayer …listening and worship… we place ourselves in the light of God… and now third…we’re gradually overpowered…by the nature of God… and metaphorically you might say …we begin to glow with God’s radiance. We join God…in being fire. [pause]

Eight years before he died…a brilliant 17^th century scientist and mathematician…named Blaise Pascal… had a profound experience of the presence of God…an occurrence he described in a poem he stitched into the lining of his coat…as if he wanted to keep it close to his heart.

The poem begins: The year of grace 1654 Monday 23 November From about half past ten in the evening until about half past midnight…FIRE…

English can’t do justice to Pascal’s experience during those two hours…but some of the words he uses and repeats over and over again are these. Certitude. Certitude. Feeling. Joy. Peace Forgetfulness of the world and of everything except God. Greatness of the human soul, joy joy joy tears of joy…

Jesus Christ …Jesus Christ let me never be separated from him. Renunciation, total and sweet. Complete submission…[pause]

Don’t you think it’s fascinating…that Pascal was at the same time a great scientist… and Christian mystic? That his poem wasn’t discovered ‘til after his death…and don't you wonder why he began with the date and the time?

Well McLaren suggests Pascal knew his experience was extra-ordinary and would pass. Perhaps he knew…

if he didn’t write something down… it could easily be forgotten …lost among so many other memories.

And yes…to Pascal …the experience was real and mattered…

but… that wasn’t the point…the point was the agonising tension he expresses… between certainty and complete submission…
and the experience of separation… he writes…yet in my life I’ve departed from him…I left him… I fled him… renounced and crucified him.

Pascal’s extra-ordinary baptism of fire…helps him see and feel… as never before… the horror of turning away from the fire
and the light… of turning away God. And with full awareness of how many times he’s turned away… Pascal wonders how his sense of closeness to God can be sustained after the vision ends.
And so he writes these words

‘He’s to be found only in the ways taught in the Gospel…he is only kept securely… by the way taught in the Gospel’

Notice Pascal repeats the word ‘ways’.

Pascal knew that by definition… such a mystical experience…

is rare…and such moments can only be found and kept securely through ways… through practices….

So just as our hot poker caught fire…in the heat and glow of the embers...if we stay close enough to God’s light and heat… for long enough …through our practicing of self examination and prayerful study…then hopefully we’ll catch alight with God.

And when we do…then just maybe we’ll glow with what God has …maybe we will glow with love and peace and patience and justice and compassion and mercy and forgiveness…maybe these will be transferred to us…and maybe then…

we’ll be able to transfer that light and that heat to others. [pause]

In the beginning there was God…and God said let there be light… and time and space…and all created things were made…
and there was enough… and it was good and it was beautiful and we were given life as gift…and there in the garden of our freedom…we made ourselves the managers…and botched the job.

As Pascal lamented… we departed from him, we fled him…we renounced him…and even though he came to us in love…we crucified him.

The result of this on a global scale? War and waste…and wealth at the expense of others…ongoing poverty and ignorance in a world where God provided enough for everyone.

The result of this on a personal scale? Tears… curses… fear mocking laughter… vicious judgments…selfishness greed…broken families… and a tendency to grab onto anything that will temporarily stop the pain…

And when we discover we’re off the track…heading in the wrong direction… without the fire of God’s love and the light of the ways of the Gospel. We want to defect from the dark cold course we’re on… and so we begin again to practice the ancient ways…beginning afresh…with Katharsis proceeding through Fotosis seeking Theosis.

And we practice this threefold way… not just for ourselves…not just for our own salvation...but for the salvation of the world. We don’t seek union with God to the exclusion of others… but for their welbeing.

We seek theosis not to separate ourselves from those who are still cold and hard like iron…but so we can be glowing links in a chain that reaches through us to them…with light and warmth from God We grow hot so they can grow warm. And on and on it goes…until God is all in all…

As Jesus promised his followers…

‘Because I live, you also will live. On that day you’ll realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you.’

The whole purpose of Jesus coming… is that the whole world catch fire with the love of God. That all humanity are reconciled and united with God…till all glowing with Shalom…till all people radiate peace… with justice and compassion and mercy.

As Paul said the reading set down for today…in his letter to the church at Ephesus

So he came to proclaim peace… to you who were far off… aand peace to those who were near; for through him all humanity has access in one Spirit to the Father. So then… you’re no longer strangers and aliens to one another…but citizens with the saints… and members of the household of God.

With Christ Jesus himself as the cornerstone and in him the whole structure is joined together… and grows into a holy temple in the Lord…built together spiritually… into a dwelling place for God.

Let us open ourselves to this in silence as we listen to 'This is the air I breathe'.

The Threefold Way part 1: Via Purgativa

Pentecost 6 year B Sermon 09

What do you want to learn about?

Fishing, golf, skiing, knitting quilting, gaming…what about Italian cooking…for any of these things… there’s a worldwide community to learn from … you can meet them on the internet or in books…special classes or training camps.

I hope our faith community is like that too. In his book… Finding our way again…Brian McLaren suggests… that’s exactly what our churches are meant to be… schools of practice…and if we’re not a school of practice… we’re in danger of being just another consumer group…or Sunday morning escape from reality.

And when we think of our church family as a school of practice… why there’s every chance we’ll be a learning community… with a transformational impact on the community around us.

The New Testament is a witness to this.

The Gospels weren’t written until decades after the events they describe – and maybe that's because Jesus created so much work for his disciples … it took twenty or thirty years… for anyone to catch their breath long enough… to write down what had happened. And Paul’s letters were only written… when he was forced to slow down… when he’s shipwrecked or in jail.

How different it is to be part of a breathless dynamic learning congregation…what a contrast to a placid group of religious consumers or an argumentative bunch of religious experts… who’d rather defend their positions …than learn anything new.

Our faith needs practice doesn’t it…and sometimes when our faith’s gone a bit stale…or our congregation’s become complacent… we can lose our way…and we need to find our way again. And to find our way forward we have to look back to thousands of years of Christian practice…to see where we got off track in the first place…

When we look back like this…way back…before the missionaries came to New Zealand …even before the Protestants split off from the Catholics …… even before the Great Schism…which divided the ancient church… between east and west…when we look way way back…we find a common ancient treasure shared by the whole church – a portrayal of the Christian life as a journey in stages…as life on the way.

And there are useful ways to help us rediscover these stages or seasons…of spiritual development… that derive from what the ancient church called ‘the threefold way’.

It’s tempting to make this about higher and lower levels of spiritual achievement… as though we could complete one stage and leave it behind or admire people who are above us or put people down…who are beneath us But it’s more accurate to describe the threefold way as three dimensions or zones… of our spiritual pathway as practicing believers.

But down through the centuries…Christians have discovered… that we have to learn about these three dimensions … in a given order…even though we continue to practice all of them.

So over the next three weeks we’re going to explore a different dimension of the threefold way.

So what are these three dimensions called? Well each one inherited two names… a Latin name… from the Western Church… and a Greek name… from the Eastern church.

The first of the threefold way is the Via Purgativa… or Katharsis…this is the dimension of self examination…where we uncover the frequency and power of our tendency to turn away from God…our own sin if you like…

Next is the Via Illuminativa or Fotosis…the dimension of enlightenment…which comes as we receive into our lives… the light of God’s truth… God’s character…God’s energy and love.

You could say that if Katharsis is like the removing of clouds so the sun can shine through… then fotosis is like exposing our whole selves to God’s light… so we can grow and flourish…like a tree… humming with photosynthesis…in fotosis our hearts and energies…are illuminated and warmed with the Light of God.

The third dimension… is the Via Unitiva or Theosis…where our will becomes increasingly united with God’s will, our words and actions… increasingly aligned with God’s words and actions revealed in Jesus. In this dimension… there’s a sense in which we’re taken into God… and as well you could say …God fills us.

And when we practice the via unitiva… our individual uniqueness isn’t wiped out by our union with God…but enhanced and sanctified as we learn to operate more and more on God’s wavelength, tune in… more and more to God’s frequency…as our lives become harmonized…with everything else that lives… in harmony with God.

The church has long discovered that to keep to the path…or find its way back to the path… it helps to practice this threefold way…collectively and alone… and in the world.

So we begin today…with the via purgativa…the practice of Katharsis…let me explain by giving you one of Brian McLaren’s analogies…I want you to imagine you’re a house that’s fallen into disrepair… or maybe a house that’s been abandoned and boarded up before anyone could move in.

To make it livable… you have to start… by purging by getting rid of… the rubbish and the dirt and the pests...that have accumulated. So the via purgativa…the purgative way…first instructs you… to take the boards off the windows and throw out the filthy covers that hide the mess underneath.

.Then it instructs you to get a bucket of soap and water ….and scrub the windows… till they’re clean. .Everything your doing…depends on letting the light come in…because without light… you won’t be able to see what needs to be thrown out… and what just needs to be cleaned up and repaired.

And the wisdom of the via purgativa tells us… if it’s too dark to see the mess inside ourselves… if something is obstructing God’s light… its likely to be one of three things…

The first thing that blocks our God’s light… is a preoccupation with ourselves and our own influence and power…in biblical terms this translates as the sin of pride.

Second is a preoccupation with pleasure in general and sexual pleasure in particular… this translates as the sin of lust. And third …is a preoccupation with money and possessions – which of course is the sin of greed.

Pride, lust, and greed…money sex and power…

A preoccupation with any one of these can create a very thick and dirty film indeed…which blocks out the light …of God’s guidance and love…and the via purgative teaches us… to carefully examine the power of these things in our lives…unless we do we simply can’t make much progress… in finding our way again.

And this is why our reading set down for today from Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians…is so perfect…for talking about katharsis…You see Paul had cleaned house…Paul had examined his life.

So instead of bragging about his spiritual fitness …he points to his disabilities… what he calls… the thorn in his flesh. O certainly… Paul knows a guy… who’s experienced the pinnacle of spiritual ecstasy…a guy who says he’s been to paradise and back and Paul says yeah ‘I will boast about a man like that… but I won’t boast about myself, except about my weaknesses. I refrain, so no one will think more of me than is warranted by what I do or say.’

There is for Paul even as he builds a reputation as one of the greatest Christian leaders ever…an acknowledged weakness …a thorn in his flesh…that keeps him humble…as he walks the way of Christ.

Paul confesses his weakness and he’s entirely ready to have God remove it…He’s prayed humbly for God to take it away it…but all he gets from God is this…

"My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness."

Paul learns to identify and accept his weaknesses…and his powerlessness to overcome them by himself…and in that spiritual breakthrough…the light shines…andPaul discovers the meaning of grace. [pause] Even though he’s weak…God’s grace and mercy are still operating.

That’s why Paul says ‘Therefore I’ll boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so Christ's power may rest on me…For when I’m weak then I am strong.’

Maybe that’s why so many of us are prickly and cross and hard to get on with…maybe our insides are in disrepair … maybe one.. or all …of the three dark forces…are blocking out the light of God’s grace and love…maybe we need to practice the via purgativa

And when we do we’re likely to discover… that what needs cleaning up in our own lives… is also what infects our world… and with enough light… we can see the destructive forces of greed and lust and the worship of power… in the world in our community and even in the church.

Now wouldn’t we feel hopeless if we could never graduate from this stage of the threefold way …till we completely master… pride greed and lust in ourselves…but Paul tells us by God’s grace we can move on.

Only in honestly and humbly confronting our weaknesses can we enlist God’s help to withstand them. Only by facing our monsters and exposing them to the light of God… can we be cured of the dangerous naiveté… that we’ve made it all the way to highest spiritual rung of the ladder and will never fall off. [pause]

So what would the via purgativa look like… in our church…what about a small group of friends who gather weekly or monthly to review honestly how money, sex and power has a hold on their lives. How these three forces are affecting their marriages, their parenting… their work… how they’re blocking out the light of God’s love…

Imagine if these people were to journal every day… how greed or pride or a preoccupation with pleasure show up in their thoughts and words and behavior.

Or imagine these people were practice fasting… from those things that block out the light in their lives. Maybe they could give up pride one month and agree to go without defending themselves when they’re criticized…or maybe they could give up the influence and power they derive from gossiping…

Or maybe they could make a pact with each other…to find someone to help secretly… agreeing to give up the kudos they get. Or maybe they could practice fasting from the status they get from hanging out with the popular, the powerful and the prestigious and instead spend extra time with children, or the sick or the elderly or mentally handicapped… seeking to love and serve the powerless and lowly

Followers of Jesus understand that God forgives and saves by grace. So do you begin to see how purgation works?

It has nothing to do with paying for our sins. Purgation has everything to do with practice… not penance…with practicing humility and service… rather than pride and power…practicing generosity and simplicity… rather than greed…practicing self control and a willingness to suffer discomfort in a good cause… rather than a lust for pleasure and comfort.

If our church were a school of spiritual practice maybe we’d be helping each other say no to the three most powerful forces in our lives…and by the grace of God actively practicing their opposite… Next week we’ll explore the second dimension in this journey…