<html><body>Now to proceed at the editor's table. Blessings for your weekend.<div><br></div><div>Bob</div><div><br></div><div><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">THE EPISCOPAL CHURCH OF ST. ALBAN, ALBANY 7 EASTER c</span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">ACTS 16:16-34 8<sup>th</sup> MAY, 2016</span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">REVELATION 22:12-14, 16-17, 20-21 PSALM 97</span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">JOHN 17:20-26</span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; color: rgb(54, 54, 54);"> </span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"> We are One. Oh let us be One, as You, Jesus, are One with Your Father and ours. Let us be One!</span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"> A prayer, echoing Jesus’ prayer, a prayer in which Jesus doesn’t fill his hours with comments about Himself, except to say to God, “What we have, what we enjoy, what defines life – <b><span style="text-decoration: underline;">EVERY</span></b>one deserves that. Make sure that all will experience this!”</span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"> Trying to understand the relationship between the First and Second Person of the Trinity – between God the Creator and Jesus the Word – is a never-ending task. For some it is and will always remain a mystery. I remember a 1960s cartoon quote fixed below a picture of the laughing Archbishop of Canterbury, Michael Ramsey. The caption read, “The Holy Trinity? The Trinity is a joyful mystery!” And that about sums it up. There is so much that we’ll never understand, about God and about everything else. But if we can approach life in an attitude of joy, perhaps joyful amazement, then we can begin to find strength to deal with everything that’s nasty, that’s stupid, that’s abusive, that’s disastrous in the world.</span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"> Jesus and His closest friends had just celebrated the ritual meal which would be His last. They’d talked, they’d shared stories, they’d eaten and drunk, they’d continued to draw closer to one another, and they’d sung songs before Jesus went with Peter, James and John, into that cool, dark garden and Jesus separated Himself off from His friends so that He could pray. He knew that everything was closing in on Him. He sensed the powers of darkness would try to shut Him down, to obliterate everything that He’d tried to accomplish.</span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"> Jesus, physically all by Himself, spent His last hours emphasising and reaffirming how He and His Father were One. He drew strength, and comfort, and hope, no matter what else was going to happen, from the fact that He and His Father shared something so intense that they were inseparable. That sharing, the joy of knowing that He would always have God’s Presence – this was what enabled Jesus to kneel and to stand firm that night. This is what gave Jesus the joy of knowing that He would always have God’s Presence – this was what enabled Jesus to face up all the challenges about to try to bind Him and destroy Him. And this is why Jesus prayed as He did for Peter, and James, and John; and for His other disciples; and for us. Jesus was completely aware that what was about to break loose on Him would break loose on everyone else. Jesus knew that we, sitting here in 2016, would have to wrestle with all sorts of unknown difficulties and decision-making, and He knew that we needed that sense of unity in order to survive and flourish as God hopes that we will.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"> An article in<i> “Psychology Today”</i> several years ago reminded us that “It Takes Courage To Face Down Your Dark Side<b><i>. </i></b>Your willingness to wrestle with your demons will set you free.<i>” </i><sup>1</sup><b><i> </i></b>The author quoted playwright August Wilson who invited us to <span style="color: rgb(20, 24, 35); background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">“Confront the dark parts of yourself, and work to banish them with illumination and forgiveness. Your willingness to wrestle with your demons will cause your angels to sing.”</span></span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"> I don’t think Wilson was implying that it’s always easy to find our inner demons, let alone wrestle with them, but simply being aware that there is, within us, the possibility of forces trying to divert our attention from our goals, to distract us from sitting with Jesus, listening to Him as He prays for us – recognising that so much can draw us from the love of God; all of this gives us a reminder that we need to be on our guard, always, especially when we’re confronted with change, with making decisions that affect others as well as ourselves.</span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"> Think again about Jesus. He could have gone in so many directions than the one that he took, but that would have taken Him from the One-ness, the Unity which was essential to His life. It was this Unity which gave Him both the power and the drive to confront the inner demons which would have seduced Him to save Himself, to refuse the sacrificial ministry which He knew was His. And it’s this same sense of Unity with God and with one another that Jesus prays we’ll find.</span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"> If we forget the inter-relatedness which is part of God’s design for all of creation, then we lose our way, we become unbalanced in life. Everywhere we see and hear Jesus interacting with people, we discover how He always has time for each person as an individual. He helps them face up to, and name, and then expel whatever inner demon was destroying her or his life. Jesus had an incredible amount of compassion for those who were suffering in one way or another. They had lost that sense of unity which full relationship brings. When He healed them, however, He always sent them into a community, either the family or civic gathering from which they’d been set apart, or else He invited them to join a new community – the community of His immediate followers. Most times this worked. Frequently, the healed person and the community were reconciled, they became One again. But sometimes the community reacted against what Jesus had done. Sometimes they implied that Jesus wasn’t acting appropriately, therefore whatever He did was unacceptable. So, unfortunately, some groups wouldn’t let that person in within the gathering. No matter that Jesus had called the person, had offered healing and then had directed them back to their family or group of origin, this didn’t sit well with some.</span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><br></p></div></body></html>