Vision and the Spirit

Vision.   

What’s the relationship between Vision and the Spirit?   These last few weeks we’ve been focusing here in our community on various aspects of Spirit – I’ve even invited people to engage with me in daily discernment-prayer at noon every day… a way of purposefully taking time in a busy day to remember, among other things, that our schedule isn’t God.  I suppose this could be a way of admitting our middle class American hubris gets in the way of faith.   It’s a way of admitting we don’t have all the answers, we can’t see around every bend, and we need God’s guidance!     And what more expensive a gift to give than our time!   Anyway, I’ve had thoughts and ideas about the Spirit bouncing around in my head off and on for a few weeks now.   

“Vision” is an aspect of the Spirit.   What’s vision? 

Could be it’s a determined, focused, movement towards a particular outcome.  I’ve known a few people that knew what they wanted to do with their lives since they were children.    They knew where they were going, and they knew how they were going to get there.    They were driven.  They were determined! 

I haven’t known many who were like this for their whole lives.   I’ve known quite a few who were like this for portions of their lives – I’m sure we’ve all been like this at some point;  we are focused on getting through college, or finishing a long-term task.   We know what we have to do, and we buckle down and do it.   

President Lyndon Johnson, in the mid ‘60’s pushed forward the Civil Rights Amendment!   He pushed… he politicked.  He played dirty if he had to, but the Civil Right Amendment WOULD pass!     He believed it needed to.   Considering he wanted to be on the right side of history on this one, the fact that he was President of the United States was not lost on him.     

He had a vision.

Vision could also be a projection into the future of the outcome of a particular event or situation.   Perhaps a wondering of what might be coming.   On one of the visits out to Rocky Boy reservation, on one evening we were all sitting around on the floor of the new church – that now is about 15 years old – talking about things.    There was a guy there with us from the reservation who helped us in various ways.   He helped us get to where we needed to go, he helped us prepare things at church if we needed to set things up, he helped us not only learn about Chippewa-Cree customs and culture, but he also helped us with the more practical things, like where the cleaning supplies were.   This particular evening, after a long day of activities and work, we all settled in to some relaxed time of talking and sharing in the new church.    Through the picture windows of the church, we could see the sun setting behind the mountains.   I’d say this was a dramatic and awe-inspiring view, but views like this were an everyday thing there.    What a place – full of Spirit!   And Derek invited people to ask him about his culture, his people, and customs.   

I don’t remember what the question was, but I remember his answer… he said he would send his spirit out to a particular point in the future, a situation or event maybe.    And he’d see how it would return.   

I knew another guy, back in the early 90’s in Ft. Bliss, TX who told me that as a kid, the night before his baseball games he would lay there in his bed at night, and visualize the whole game, from start to finish.  He would see himself in the game – he would visualize himself at bat, he would see himself playing his position – everything very clearly, from the feel of the bat in his hands to the sun on him, to the sound of the crowds, -everything- as clearly as he could.    He was a Captain then… he just got promoted to Brigadier General.   He’d started out as a Private!       

Both of these guys said the same thing but in different ways.   They both would project themselves into a future situation.   Have you ever spent some time the night before an interview where you sit and think how things might go?    Or you’re preparing for a presentation, and you visualize yourself in it the evening before?    Or maybe you’re preparing a sermon for Sunday?       Do you send your spirit out too?   Do you use your “vision” to see what might be coming?

 

Maybe in the classical sense, vision is an extra-earthly experience of the Spiritual world.   Actually, statistically more people than we think have had ethereal visions of a supernatural quality.    Sometimes these visions come unbidden – while we’re awake.  I’ve heard a few people share visions like this.  A pastor recently told me she had once had a vision in a small chapel in France where she was as a student, where during communion, she very explicitly saw people who were no longer alive in bodily form around the people gathered there as they were all going up for communion.   For her this event affirmed that “Communion” is not just a thing we do… or even just a theological concept – filled with heady, academic, doctrinal baggage.   For her, that moment of vision has informed her intellect and theology.   For her, “communion” is very strongly a communal gathering of the souls and spirits and bodies of the People of God – across time and space – together as one. 

Visions like this come in many forms.   They might happen while we’re fully awake and conscious, or while we’re meditation or sleeping.    Indigenous cultures call these “Big Dreams”.   Evidently having visions in these ways are a lot more common than we think.   A sizable minority of people have had visions.    But the irony is we in the western world, even those involved in religious traditions (dare I say especially religious leaders), avoid talking about them for fear of being labeled mentally unstable.   Only schizophrenics – and other’s suffering mental illness – see things that aren’t there… not us educated, professional, stable people!   We’re rational!   And not only that- we’re most definitely not affected by mental illness!    Mental illness involves seeing things that aren’t there, or hearing things that aren’t there… or both.   A trick of a sick mind?...   Or a glimpse into another space…    or a little of both?     In some indigenous cultures, people we call “crazy” are recognized as having gifts “normal’ people don’t have.   They are often considered as having one foot in one world and one foot in another world.   They’re often respected and treated well.   

Or, maybe vision is allowed in through the open door of our imagination.   At some point the vision develops a mind of its own, like it has its own consciousness… like it needs to come visit us.      

I’ve heard artists talk about vision in this way.    Some writers say sometimes the stories they write end up writing themselves.  As they write, they describe the characters in the story taking on a life of their own.  In fact, they say, the whole story takes on a life of its own.   The way they describe it, it’s almost like the story needed the writer to “get out” of the ethereal world and into the material world.   But they’re just describing the way it feels.   The stories don’t really exist as an “entity” other than in the mind of the writer, right?        

Do you have a guiding-vision?   Some understanding of the world, or of life, of God, of human beings, that informs your path… the choices you make… the people you hang around?   

Some have a vision of who they are, and why they are here – their purpose.    Mohandas K. Gandhi had a vision!     He started his professional life as a lawyer in 1891, but the vision guided him through his life.   He ended up ending colonial British rule through non-violent protest – often putting his own body at risk in resisting oppression and abuse of power.    Through this vision, he recognized his place in history – a powerful vision of being here in a particular time and place… for a particular purpose.       

   

Visions inform!   They have POWER!    They can change the world – they can try and heal it, with grace, with the powers of the divine.   They can take human weakness and convert it into something wonderful – a vision for hope!    He might have said his vision was of a free and religiously open India.  But maybe the vision existed in its own right – and sought him out.   Visions are powerful indeed!   

But visions aren’t always positive!   Hitler had a vision too.   One of subjugation and oppression based on hate, revenge, power over others.   His vision took the same human weaknesses and multiplied them for evil purposes.        

And yet, we still need vision!   We spend a life asking ourselves who we are, or what we are here for.    There has to be a reason we’re here, doesn’t there?   Otherwise what is the purpose of all this?   We look for people with vision. We seek them out.   Maybe they can help us make sense of some of these deep questions we might have – perhaps too deep to even know we have them.    Proverbs 29:18 – “Where there is no vision, the people perish.”

 

“But that’s all very silly!”  - We say!      Perhaps we ignore the these deeper questions, but they still remain.    Like a “bucket List” our soul has, at different times in our lives they assert themselves more strongly – “I am here!    Listen to me!    You need to look at me!    You need to understand what I am bringing to you!”     Sometimes they stay in their corner, waiting, resting, relaxing, not needed for the moment… or mostly ignored – like the hungry and homeless.  We can’t solve this tremendous problem…  it’s MUCH greater than any one of us can handle by ourselves... so we deal with it by ignoring it.   But they are always there.      And how far into this perishing are we?

The visions persist in their persistence though.

I’ve heard Native American healers speak of their chants and songs used for healing and ceremonies, that they have a life of their own – the belief is the songs have an existence on their own.   They describe the songs as having their own sentience; they assert themselves when they need to be present, they are invited to come, they are thanked even, as a person would be.  

The older one gets, the more regrets one has to deal with.    One of my regrets is not sending an inmate a book he wanted.   As I was leaving the St. Dysmas ministry I went around the different prisons saying good-bye.    One inmate – a man that had made a real impact on me considering how he’d lived his life, had been transferred to another prison, in Cumberland, MD.    I went to see him.  In our visit, he asked me to send him a book called “The Purpose-Driven Life” – about vision of faith lived-out consciously.   I told him I would find the book and send it to him.   

In all the commotion involved with leaving St. Dysmas, in all my own struggles with ministry at that time, I forgot about my promise to send him this book about vision.   Years went by, and when I remembered, I checked to see if he was still there, but he’d already been released.     I bought the book… because I have a vision of giving it to him someday, and of fulfilling my promise to him.

And the visions persist in their persistence.  

In our time, of long-term fears and apprehensions, we seek leaders with vision.    But we must be careful whom we seek and why.   Do we seek the leaders that pander to our deepest fears – of racial violence, of government oppression, of invasion by migrants looking to bring weapons and violence and disease to our cities?    Who lifts the vision of optimism in spite of challenge?  

Why is it that in the ‘60’s, in spite of the civil turmoil and unrest, the riots in some of our major cities, in spite of the assassinations, in spite of the violence and hate-mongering… in spite of all that, there was a sense of a new tomorrow coming even in the presence of real challenge?     There was a vision of a better day just around the corner.   We just had to hang in there and work for it. 

And yet today, the vision of yet another war exerts itself on our consciousness.  Distrust of government and our political leaders are at all-time highs.  What is this vision that exists?  What is this vision that is trying to find us, and take hold of us?   

        

Jesus had a vision – a vision of a new heaven and a new earth.   This wasn’t a Hollywood vision, that the good-guys would all win, and we’d all just get along after the good king took the throne.    This was a vision of life lived through the work needed to bring about this kingdom; forgiveness- not in the sappy, emotional sense, but in the hard work of letting the hurt go.   A vision through the work of justice – of recognizing our own struggles with culture and experience.  A vision of stewarding our resources and gifts in such a way that all are cared-for.    A vision of radical inclusivity that can stretch many of us to our breaking point.   

This vision was for the whole world!   For all the people.   And it’s still alive… sometimes just barely.     This is a vision that many of us listen to, but few of us want to hear.    It requires a lot of us.   I remember someone talking about dog training –they said you have to be thinking of dog training all the time; during walks, when you’re resting, when you’re playing… it’s all about training.  I said – wow, that’s a lot of work.    He said – isn’t that like raising kids though, you don’t stop being a parent just cuz you’re tired some days.    

Same thing with the vision of the Kingdom of God Jesus had – it never stops asserting itself in us.   There is never a non-training day when it comes to The Kingdom Jesus talked about!        

What can I say about this kingdom?   I’ve only seen glimpses… but I have a vision of what it could be.   For now, that’ll have to do, though.    It’ll have to for all of us.   Mostly, we’ll have to believe in the vision before it comes to pass.     Mostly, we’ll have to believe the vision before we see it fully present in reality.   Mostly we’ll just have to believe in the vision.

Mostly we’ll just have to believe in the vision –

That’s it IS alive in spite of the challenges.  

That this vision does exist in spite of us…

that this vision is real…

that this vision does live and has always had a life of its own. 

Mostly we’ll just have to believe the vision.