Make a move!

Making a move. Rutland Psalter. 1260

The Bible is a book of movement. It instructs, inspires and gives us cues from others -- it asks us to invite thousands of individuals into our lives. These individuals followed neither tradition nor social expectation but Life's calling or the search for God. People make a move, they walk and walk and walk, they move from one place to another, take extensive journeys, are motivated to meet new landscapes and new people, leave their home towns - some without possibility to return -, move up the mountains, into deserts, out of deserts, into cities, away from cities into the country side, they move as leaders, shepherds, followers. They can move because they know about a clear, unchanging, always new Truth that is God. This beautiful stability and reliable presence of the one God can be expected to greet us everywhere and is not impelling journeys with clear directions but also accompanying them at every step. 

Ever since I caught glimpses of this basic guiding theme - or leitmotif - of the Bible, I look out for it when I study daily the Christian Science Bible lesson and continue to explore the Biblical world. Without going into depths about directions of movement, movements in the Biblical physical world or within the layers of ancient society, movements between peoples and cultures, the diversity of the means of transportation, the meaning of going down or up, moving with boats from one side of a lake to the other, journeying on a donkey, or on foot, let me highlight three moments of Jesus' ministry and single out the imperatives or instructions coming from him. It is all about making a move - and Jesus' thought of God was never far away from the thought of wind... moving and a mighty force, thou invisible. It is the Spirit that impels moves like

"Rise up!" and "Stretch forth thy hand!" (Luke 6: 6-10). A man with a crippled hand rises up, stretches out his hand and it healed - making a move under the direction of the Christ.

"Come and see!" This is the first imperative recorded in the gospel of John, in the first chapter. Jesus Christ invites his first two disciples to come with him and see for themselves what his life is about.

"Keep it simple!" This is from the ninth chapter of Luke, in the rendering of The Message the full quote is (9:3): "Don't load yourselves up with equipment. Keep it simple; you are the equipment."

Rise up. Stretch forth thy hand (or whatever bothers you, stretch it away from you and put it into the remit of the Christ). Come and see (be adventurous and start to see good, everywhere). Keep it simple (stay with the basics and remember how wonderful your are).

Mary Baker Eddy writes: "The demands of God appeal to thought only." (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 182). Nothing can turn thought into something unmovable, static, or motionless. There is no possibility to resist God's demands. Thought can move and thought must move. Even if we sit on a chair thought doesn't need to sit on a chair. It can rise, it can stretch, it can explore and it can stay with the basics. Isn't this something to ponder - whether you are staying home or working, whether you are struggling or being at peace, whether you are wondering what comes next or think you know it already. You are an individual consciousness, you have a mind of your own, and that is God, divine Mind, the inventor of movement, the Cause of an ever changing and unfolding universe, including us.

---