May 5 Acts 16, Rev. 22,Jn. 14
We live in an area fed by and threatened by the Father of Waters, the Mississippi. Rivers are part of our imaginative landscape. Think of Huck Finn,or songs like Ole Man River or Springsteen or Talking Heads. We are deep in a mix of the quotidian and the symbolic this morning.Lydia was a dealer in purple. She is part of a gathering of women who meet on the Strymon riverside. Strymon was a river god, and this river was a marker for a number of battles and annoyed Hercules. In all likelihood she ran a small home production facility. I do not know if production meant that she made a lot producing material for the elite who could afford it.In other words, Lydia is a business woman.Maybe she belonged ot the local chamber of Commerce. Just like us, she is worshipping near a river. Importantly for our Reformed reading of Scripture her whole household is baptized. Her household becomes the base of operations for Paul for a while. Philippi was probably a bit smaller than Alton. It had a mixed community, including a number of retired Roman soldiers and officials, along with a variety of crafts and services, and of course, the poor. Lydia’s product was for the elite. Think of how only the emperor and the bishop could wear red shoes after the fall of Rome, or how bishops wear purple now.
We move toward the ending of Revelation, as it opens up a new passageway in time and space. It is an open invitation to bathe in and drink in the water of life. In March we read of Is. 55 to come to the waters without any tuition, any fees, and bills, and credit charges or overdraft fees. (see Reversed Thunder) waters of life could be baptism; they are certainly connected to Jesus, and the mythic waters of Ezekiel and its expansion in the new temple/dwelling place of God. How is it connected to the tree of life? Last week we encountered the river of the water of life.In Exekile, this Edneic river water trees for fruit and the leaves were for healing. Here the leaves of the trees are for the healing of nations. I suppose it means different peoples but perhaps their national life as well.Notice this book is closing in not on annihilation but healing. Certainly national wrongs need to be healed. Certainly the national memories that haunt us need to be healed. I am going to need healing of 9/11, Vietnam and other national problems.
A friend of mine led a confirmation retreat recently. He gave the students a choice of doing a statement of faith or a more artistic presentation. His son selected a tree as the core of his symbols for the faith. The Disney movie Pocahontas had a mystical, magical maternal tree that dispensed wisdom to the young girl.think of how the trees move as an avenging ecological army in Lord of the rings, or how Winnie the Pooh and countless fairy tales are set inhte wodds.
Heaven here is the presence of God. Here no light is needed, as God’s presence, God’s light pervades the place.In my imagination that makes it a place of perfect peace, inside and out.I had a film clip of the movie waht draams May come where the Robin Williams characterisable to paint his verison of heaven.
Jesus speaks of making a home, a place for us, crafting one, building it. The peace at the end of this chapter has Jesus leaving, bequeathing, handing down to us something precious. The verb usually means to let go, to relinquish, to forgive.Our passage starts with a response to a question by Judas.Jesus is promising healing from the anxiety and fears that beset us all.
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