Dear All
In my study is a box of cables that I do not want to deal with. Some of them are old and useless because technology and connectivity is constantly changing, while some are essential, but seldom used, or an unexpected situation arises where the cable all of a sudden becomes essential, so I have to root one out.
For example, a few weeks ago, somebody wanted to do a screen presentation for a sermon, and needed an HDMI cable. They were a little stressed because there did not seem to be one in church. I had to nip home and get one that was once connected to a computer monitor. It was so tangled in this box of cables that it was difficult to extract without cutting the end off a knotted kettle lead, before risking a speeding ticket so that the man in church could restore his relationship with the technology, and therefore his relationship with the congregation.
I discovered recently, while trying to play some music at a funeral, that untangling and connecting the threads of radio waves, which make up the Bluetooth signal in our church, is far more difficult even than that because signals fluctuate and diminish, making us powerless to rebuild new connections and to break others.
An old stone that had been used to prop open a door at my previous church in Colsterworth, had on it the carved shape of a Celtic cross, around it the shape of three chords woven together. It is instantly recognisable because it symbolises the binding of the three persons of the trinity; Creator, Redeemer, Sustainer. Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
Like my box of cables, impossible to separate. I find that the story of the Crucifixion seems to demonstrate the power and the cost of Christ’s passion; Jesus’ death has a far deeper cosmic implication that just a tortured soul dying on a piece of wood. Amongst his last words, Jesus (even in perfect faith!) cries out, abandoned by God, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46). Deeper, far deeper, at the point of death, Christ is abandoned even by his Spirit (John 19:30).
Here we see both entanglement and disentanglement, the woven threads of the unity of God torn like fabric. The same is true for human relationships; an unfathomable chaotic mess, too much for us to deal with. The depths of human weakness, sin, failure or just pure innocent misunderstanding is like an ancient woodland, with trees and growth, life and death, incomprehensibly tangled together with no hope of negotiation.
There is a Catholic devotional painting from around 1700 known as “Mary, The Undoer of Knots” (Johann Georg Melchior Schmittner). It shows Mary, assisted by angels, untangling a complex knotted ribbon, with the devil as a servant beneath her feet. It represents the tangled chaos of our lives, whether it be fear, division, debt, addiction, conflict or any of the problems human beings face, and calls us to give to Mary so that she influences her son, Jesus, to untangle and turn the water of our circumstances into the healing wine of grace.
Whether you subscribe to the Catholic devotion of Mary or not, there is so much truth to this beautiful image. I think of the conceptual unweaving of trinitarian relationships on the cross, and how the love of God in the crucified and risen Christ, seeks to unweave the childlike chaos of our world, to untangle the incomprehensible mess that many of us experience m our lives (filled with the consequential grief, rage, sorrow, confusion or conflict!), takes the threads of our hearts, our communities and our world, and weaves them with ribbons of the creator, redeemer and sustainer. What do we have at the end? A breathtaking tapestry of a new, healed and restored creation.
Over the coming month we face the symbolic journey of Lent, through the wilderness of our own hearts, as if, for many of us, there is not enough knotted and chaotic wilderness already. Whatever you face, here is your opportunity to bring it to the foot of the cross and witness Christ’s healing.
God bless.
Eric