Living the Message Jan. 9

Gift of Words

The gift of words for communion. We need to learn the nature of communion. this requires the risk of revelation--letting a piece of my self be exposed, this mystery of who I am. If I stand here mute, you have no idea what is going on with me. You can look at me, measure me, weigh me, test me, but until I start to talk you don not know what is going on inside, who I really am. I f you listen ans I am telling the truth, something marvelous starts to take place -- a new event. Something comes into being that was not there before. God does this for us. We learn to do it because God does it. New things happen then. Salvation comes into being; love comes into being. Communion, Words used this way do not define as much as deepen mystery -- entering into the ambiguities, pushing past the safely known into the risky unknown. The Christian Eucharist uses words, the simplest of words, "this is my body, this is my blood," that plunge us into an act of revelation which staggers the imagination, which we never figure out, but we enter into. These words do not describe, the point, they reach, they embrace. Every time I go to the ill, the dying, the lonely, it becomes obvious after a few moment that the only words that matter are words of communion. What is distressing is to find out how infrequently thy are used. Sometimes we find we are the only ones who bother using words this way on these occasions. Not the least of trials of the sick, the lonely and the dying is the endless stream of cliches and platitudes to which they have to listen. Doctors enter their rooms to communication the diagnosis, family members to communicate their anxieties, friends to communicate the gossip of the day. Not all of them do this, of course and not always, but she sad reality is that there is not a great deal of communion that goes on in these places with these ill and lonely and dying people, on street corners, in offices, in work places, in schools. That makes it urgent that the Christian becomes a specialist in words of communion.

The right word at the right time
is like a custom-made piece of jewelry,
And a wise friend's timely reprimand
is like a gold ring slipped on your finger.

Proverbs 25:11012