Let all mortal flesh keep silence,
and with fear and trembling stand;
ponder nothing earthly minded,
for with blessing in his hand
Christ our God to earth descendeth,
our full homage to demand.
King of kings, yet born of Mary,
as of old on earth he stood,
Lord of lords in human vesture,
in the Body and the Blood
he will give to all the faithful
his own self for heavenly food.
Rank on rank the host of heaven
spreads its vanguard on the way,
as the Light of Light descendeth
from the realms of endless day,
that the powers of hell may vanish
as the darkness clears away.
At his feet the six-winged seraph;
cherubim with sleepless eye,
veil their faces to the Presence,
as with ceaseless voice they cry,
"Alleluia, alleluia!
Alleluia, Lord Most High!"
Just listened to Christian Forshaw's arrangement of "Let all mortal flesh keep silent", from his CD Sanctuary. Each time I read these words, listen to them sung, and especially the last Sunday in Advent, I'm left with a sense of wonder, awe and a feeling of convictional contentment. The Incarnation rightly understood, and properly expressed in beauty of image and precision of language, is a doctrine profound in its truth of the self-giving Triune God.
Convictional contentment is light years away from convictional certitude, or faith as ideological imperialism, or faith that as the complacency of the dominant has lost its sense of historic humility and rootedness in the nature of the God who comes. By using the phrase I mean an inner sense of fittingness, a way of thinking about God that is inexhaustible in truth and inexpressible in words, and thus yields a profound allegiance of heart to that glory which is full of grace and truth.
Content to live my own life on the conviction that the Word became flesh and dwelt amongst us
Content to be a practitioner of reconciliation on the conviction that God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself
Content to live in the joy, the peace and the hopefulness that is in Christ, on the conviction that joy, peace and hope are the will of God for the fractured reality that is our world.
Content then to embody the conviction of God incarnate in Jesus, in a life that likewise reaches out in love, resists injustice, models forgiveness, pursues peacemaking, encourages laughter, accompanies the lonely, welcomes the other, receives in grace the service of others, and is open to the will of God in trustful hope.
Content to live the conviction, to follow after Christ by the grace of God and in the power of the Spirit who pours the love of God into human hearts as unreliable as my own, and as unworthy.
The words above are from the Liturgy of St James, and carry within them theological immensity. The image is from the Hubble telescope and give a sense of vastness as beauty. The track from the CD combines organ, human voice and saxophone, three sounds in triune harmony. Coming at the end of the Daily Office of the Northumbrian Community they leave me with what I have tried to describe, the contentment of faith, rooted in the conviction that the God who comes is the one known in Jesus Christ, in whom all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell.
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