(This is the first of four reflections from a
group of us, based on our recent visit to the Abbey
of Gethsemani in Trappist, Kentucky over the
weekend. Over the course of the next few weeks,
others will share their insights and revelations,
poems and epiphanies emergent from this adventure.)
“Well, I should probably write something” was what I
said to myself this past weekend as I sat in the
library of the Abbey of Gethsemane, journal open in
front of me. “And it should probably be meaningful,
profound, or life-changing.” I was, after all, on
retreat: On retreat with five other people in a
monastic environment that championed silence, almost
demanding contemplation and spiritual formation. If
I couldn’t come up with something meaningful,
profound, or life-changing here, I probably didn’t
have much of a chance anywhere. I was waiting for a
moment —the moment when my search would end, purpose
became clear, and I “succeeded” at the exercise of
“retreating.” Literary minds call this an “epiphany
moment.” Come to think of it, spiritual minds do,
too.
Writers have to handle epiphany moments with the
greatest care. Characters need to go through
transformation, but that transformation has to be
believable, needing to be embedded throughout the
entire story. If a character hates his father for
the first 180 pages of a book and suddenly decides
he loves him on Page 181, not only is it not
believable or sincere, we think the entire action
specifically insincere.
I like to believe God knows this, too. And when we
suddenly have singular moments of extreme spiritual
shifts and revelation (which we often look for on
things like retreats), those moments beg the same
questions of longevity, believability and
insincerity that all of those Page 181 epiphany
moments do: “Where did this come from?” “How am I
supposed to believe that?”
|
This principle illustrated why our epiphany moments,
like those of our believable literary characters, are actually
epiphany journeys. Waiting on that singular moment to define your
experience will find you waiting forever, because it couldn’t
possibly do it. You need to go 10 mph before you can go 20 mph, but
neither is more important than the other; they’re just two different
steps on the same path. Any commitment you make now has to be
renewed constantly for it to endure. If that commitment only remains
in the present moment alone, it’s worthless — at least as far as
epiphanies go.
With that in mind, I got down to “retreating,” with
an increased interest in not waiting, or even searching, for that
affirming moment when all of my doubts and questions were erased, or
my “reason” for being on the retreat was revealed. Instead, my focus
became to experience that part of my journey, and recognize that
whatever I found there was just a paragraph of my lifelong story.
Our God is an adept author, and knows what needs to be embedded
along the way, so that when we get to Page 181, that epiphany moment
is as natural as the person experiencing it. And it needs to be,
because we don’t get a chance to rewrite the story if it’s not.
[Adam Quine, Pastor at First Presbyterian Church of Lincoln] |
