Doxology of the Cosmic Christ
Christ sustains.
Christ maintains.
Christ holds all together.
Whatever we do for the least,
We do to Christ.
Whatever we refuse to the least,
We deny to Christ.
Christ is the head,
We are the body.
Christ is the vine,
We are the branches.
Christ is one with the Highest,
We are one with Christ.
Love and compassion are the signs of our faith.
Justice, mercy, healing, and joy are its fruit.
May all be blessed, healed, and strong and of good courage.
Grace of the Cosmic Christ
As we learn to live in the grace of the Cosmic Christ, seen in the beauty all around and within us, enraptured by awe, we also see the hate and abuse hurled at Christ daily.
I’m not talking about what the old church used to call sacrilegious: taking the name of the Lord in vain, making light of the sacrifice of Christ, or insulting the gospel. The Cosmic Christ is in all things. There is not even an atom in this cosmos where you cannot find that beautiful face. It is not hard to see that face in anguish. When we behold the faces of the living and dead in Ukraine and Gaza, we see the anguished face of Christ. When we see the gashes torn into the ground to extract minerals, we see the wounds of Christ. When we see ICE roaming the streets attacking, kidnapping, and locking people in concentration camps, we witness the soldiers coming for Christ.
That’s what it means to be a Christian after all, to see the face of Christ everywhere we look and to remember what we do to them we do to the Christ we claim to follow and worship.
Salvation in the Cosmic Christ
I’ve never understood why Christianity became so focused on personal salvation. The only thing that I can imagine is that it helps those in power for us to worry about whether or not we are going to hell or whether our neighbors are so we are not out doing the things we are called to do to bring the kin-dom of God here. Jesus didn’t teach a gospel of personal salvation, Paul did.
The apostle Paul was so worried about the end of the world coming in his own lifetime that he just wanted the church to get its affairs in order so we were ready for the great and terrible day of the Lord. While he understood that the son of man comes like a thief in the night, he didn’t understand that he came to give us life, and a life more abundantly.
A few people saw that in the gospel and perverted it into what we now call the prosperity gospel. Jesus didn’t come for us to be rich. He said it was easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than it was for a rich man to enter the kingdom. He told the rich young ruler to go and sell everything that he had and give it to the poor and then come and follow Jesus. Why? Because wealth is not something to be hoarded. Our work here, now, in this world is to take care of one another so that no one is alone.
The False Idol of the Christ
Yet here we are, in a so-called Christian country, with Christian fundamentalist scattered all throughout the government, and all they can think to do is help the rich get richer and to keep benefits from flowing to the poor. They slap the food and water out of Christ’s hand. They throw Christ from his home out onto the streets and call their Lord lazy, a moocher, a leech on society, and a criminal.
Christ said it is better for those who would bring or allow harm to a child to have a millstone wrapped around their neck and to be cast in the sea. Yet, they cover up the crimes of those who do this with no fear of accountability because they don’t actually believe in God.
Christ said you cannot serve God and mammon, and in this age, they have clearly chosen the latter. They have confused, avarice for love, greed for compassion, and retribution for justice.
In Service of the Living Christ
What are we who are called to serve the world through love to do when those who claim to serve the same God call compassion toxic?
It sounds treacly sweet, like a candy coated lie, but we are to work in love, let go of our anger, create something new and beautiful, and bring the justice that causes celebration throughout the land.
Love is not just hugs, sunshine, and rainbows. Love sustained the march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge. Love marched on Washington. Love stands in the breach when all feels lost and shouts, “you shall not pass.”
Anger and rage feel good, but we have to be careful. The reason our adversaries do so much of what they do is to stoke anger, rage, and fear. These emotions, all too easily, take control of our bodies and cause us to do the things they want and need us to do. They need us to be angry so they can paint us as unreasonable. They need rage to consume us so that we become violent and they can portray us as criminals. They need us to be afraid so they can keep us locked in our homes of our own accord, doing nothing.
True love casts out fear. So long as we keep our feet firmly planted on that rock when the winds blow and the rains come and the floods try to wash us away, we will not be moved. We are strongest together. So those who believe love and compassion are toxic will do anything they can to divide us. We cannot let them win.
If any of us who claim to have any devotion at all to Christ, truly wish to be of service, we have to get past our ego, remembering that the first shall be last and the last shall be first. Those who sit on their thrones will be cast down, and the rich will be sent away empty. That is the power of love.
There is no place for a throne in a house built on love. We do not greedily hoard wealth to ourselves when we are living in love. When we build a loving society, everyone will be fed, have shelter, clothes, healthcare, and all the other basic requirements that bring dignity to the heart and to life.
The Peacemakers of the Cosmic Christ
We are called to be peacemakers, and that is a high calling. There’s no greater and more difficult work in this life than to bring peace to the Earth. That is not just peace among people, but peace with the other than human world as well. There could be no peace without dignity. We have to restore dignity to all.
Remember my beloved siblings, we do not see the face of Christ only in the ones that we love and in the places we honor. We see the face of Christ in our enemies and love them. To look upon an enemy is to see Christ on a cross suffering. when our adversaries hurl hateful and angry language at us, we witness the scourging of Christ. When we see them march through our streets, we see Christ carrying the cross to Golgotha. In the lives of those who anger and enrage us, we are witnessing Christ’s passion and suffering right before our eyes.
In times like these, Christ’s suffering is all around us.
So we turned to the story to ask ourselves what is it that we can do?
We take care of the one we love. That is the real power of learning to see Christ’s face in every face and in everything that we behold. We listened to that word of love within us that shines from that eternal and everlasting light, and we take care of one another in the ways that are available to us.
Each and every one of us has a gift, a seed that can be sewn in good times and in bad. If you can make people laugh, make them laugh. If you can make people listen, make them listen. Vote, march, tend to the needs of those in your community who may be suffering. Find your talent and use it in love to bring healing and restoration to this world.
There’s no such thing as a small talent and a big talent, because we are all one body. We need all of our talents to accomplish the task. None of us are individually called to save the world. Together, we can and will save the world. From the person who makes sandwiches and brings bottled water to sustain those who march, to the ones who make the signs, to the ones who run for office, to the ones who have conversations with their friends over tea and coffee, we are all working to the same goal.
Faith, the size of a mustard seed can move a mountain because when the mountain hears that it is needed, it comes. That is not a parable about command, it is a story that reminds us that if we have trust in the loving and kind relationships of this world, when we call out, there will be an answer.
We are not alone. We are one body, one vine with many branches, not even the fires of hell can burn us away. Be strong and of good cheer. Together we can move mountains.
The house built on love, where no one sits on a throne and everyone is fed, sheltered, and held in dignity, has a name: the kin-dom. If you want to walk further into that vision, the Kin-dom Rising series explores what it looks like when the kin-dom of God takes root here and now, among ordinary people carrying ordinary gifts. Come read it at https://www.creationspaths.com/s/kin-dom-rising