The rising of the sun has always meant something special to me. There's something entrancing about watching the light grow stronger on the horizon. It slowly, ever so slowly, creeps up and illuminates the landscape. That glow grows so softly, then those warm rays break suddenly.
This morning I'm sitting in the dining hall, and am watching the sky grow steadily brighter over the trees. As I do so, I am drawn to a memory.
Not long ago, while I was at OSH on a visit, I had tea with one of my sisters. The day before had been "Community Hour" in which we all, each sister and myself, sat around in the community room and visited with each other. During this particular Community Hour, we had started talking about the importance of names. One of the sisters, almost half to herself, stared off into some unknown distance and said, "And isn't it funny... names are so important, and yet we don't have a name for God..."
I'm not sure she meant for it to spark a theological spiral, but that statement haunted me. The conversation turned to other things soon after and the comment seemed to pass into oblivion. But I couldn't drop it so easily. The next day at lunch, I stopped her and asked to have tea that afternoon. "I can't stop thinking about what you said at Community Hour," I said. "I'd like to discuss it with you more." Always happy for a tea-date, she thankfully agreed. We sat down together a few hours later, and I launched in eagerly.
"Well. I think we do, in fact, have a name for God."
She quirked one eyebrow at me in an amused smirk, almost as if this kind of reaction was what she had been hoping for all along.
"Oh?"
"Yes. You see... I've been thinking. You're right in that most of the names we have for God are names we have given God. So, in essence, those words, those names, are defining markers of how we think of God, not how God thinks of Godself. But there is one point in Scripture where God gives a name to the Godhead. One point where God gives a defining name on God's own behalf."
She nodded along with me, one corner of her mouth upturned in the smallest of grins and her eyes sparking with interest. I continued on.
"It's when Moses encounters God at the burning bush. Moses asks what he is supposed to tell the Israelites when they ask what God sent him. And God responds with a name. 'I AM.' So when God gives a defining name, it is to talk about Being... about Presence!"
Her smirk grew as I spoke, and my own grin started to break out in full because I was starting to see, truly, what an amazing thing it was that we were talking about. I started to get misty-eyed toward the end of my little speech. How wonderful of a theological discovery! God defines Godself in terms of Presence! God's defining feature is Emmanuel, God with us...
Even now as I type that, I almost need a minute to collect myself. It is so amazing to me that God would choose to define Self by simply being. As she and I sat together, our tea started growing cold because then too we both needed a minute to collect ourselves. We both sat in amazed silence at the revelation.
Some quiet minutes passed, and finally, with a soft, wobbly voice, she turned my world upside down.
"Yes, I think you're right," she said. "And just think... if we are made in the image of God, then we are really just a lower-case 'i am.'"
It was like a firecracker was lit in my mind. I could almost hear the pops and cracks as old ways of defining myself burst into living flames of Love toward this God who is Being, and who made me to be.
It's been months since that conversation. But it hasn't been far from my mind at any moment in the time that has passed. And as I sit this morning, watching the sun rise over the trees, I can't help but think that this Great Presence that is God is still teaching me something from that conversation.
Like the growing light on the horizon, I am growing to realize that the thing I so long for, to be with God, is not something I have to work for and strive after and achieve. Rather, it is something simply to realize. God is already all about Presence... already all about being with me. And I am merely a lower-case version of that same presence. I am with God as intimately as God is with me. I don't have to try to break down barriers or climb great mountains. Rather, I must look within, open up my own heart, and in seeing myself for who I truly am, I will see the very Image of the Divine.
As the sun rises slowly, gradually illuminating the world around me, I am seeing that this is the work God has called me to... to discover, to allow my heart to be slowly illumined, until I see more and more clearly that God is here. God is with me. And I am with God. I don't have to clamor for God's affection and attention. Rather, I must take off my blinders and simply see the reality of God's Presence with me. And here lies my ministry as well. Not only my internal ministry toward my own soul, but the external ministry that is prayer for the world. Prayer that shines a light on the Presence that is already here.
By the time I've finished this post, the sun is just starting to peak over the tops of the trees. I can see its warming rays shimmering through the leaves. Perhaps, one day, I'll see my own soul and the souls of others with the warm, clear light of morning. Perhaps, dawn with continue to break in my Selfhood... and one day I'll look at the world around me and see only the God who made the world, keeps the world, and loves the world.