The days of thinking of God as a white man with a white beard on a white cloud, staring down at us judgmentally, are gone, I hope. The gospel message that Jesus connected with God not just as a father, but as a loving “abba”, wanting a close and intimate relationship with all his children, is more widely appreciated.
There is perhaps a risk however that the comfort and familiarity that arises from this view of our relationship with our divine father makes it a little too “ordinary”, too similar to the relationships we have with the many other people in our lives.
Today’s readings remind us of another perspective of being in relationship with this divine father. This perspective is most visible through those who are sometimes called mystics, saints whose focus on that divine connection was so intense that it became the center of their whole experience of the world. Those people, like Saint Theresa of Avila, Saint John of the Cross, Dame Julian of Norwich, experienced God in a way that is radically different from most of us.
They show how God can take us over completely with an intensity of love that is both glorious and terrifying. The prophets such as Jeremiah tell of a similar experience, a God who is so present that it burns, that it allows no escape, no respite (Jeremiah 20:7-9). We might feel grateful not to experience the mystical pain of Jeremiah or St Teresa, but Jesus tells us that this experience is not for a special few but is something we are all called into (Matthew 16:21-27). We have to give up our lives, our sense of self, our illusion of control, and open ourselves totally and unreservedly to the overwhelming love of God. When we allow ourselves to be possessed by that love then we are truly alive, regardless of challenges we experience, the persecution suffered by Jeremiah, the agonies of St Theresa, whatever crosses we bear.
Paul, also one of those mystics, totally given over to the power of God working in him, pleads with us: “offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, … be transformed by the renewal of your mind”. Then you are able to be “good and pleasing and perfect”. (Romans 12:1-2)