We had our first WAC (Wednesdays at COOS) for the season a couple days ago. After a good dinner provided by the Hamburger Helpers (one of five cooking teams we have for this weekly event), John Wharton led the assembled group in several ice breaker games, which was a load of fun. As people laughed and joked, I could feel God's delight, like God was right there, playing with us.
That may sound far-fetched, but I mean it: I am very serious about God playing around! In our contemplative prayer group, we recently read this passage from Thomas Keating's book, Open Mind, Open Heart:
"God is not some remote, inaccessible, and implacable Being who demands instant perfection from His creatures and of whose love we must make ourselves worthy. He is not a tyrant to be obeyed out of terror, nor a policeman who is ever on the watch, nor a harsh judge ever ready to apply the verdict of guilty. We should relate to him less and less in terms of reward and punishment and more and more on the basis of the gratuity — or the play — of divine love."
Keating goes on to describe that divine love as "compassionate, tender, luminous, totally self-giving, seeking no reward, unifying everything."
We can be so serious and somber as we ponder God, but the Holy One who declared all creation good (Gen. 1), who made great sea creatures for the sport of it (Psalm 104:27), who delights in God's people (Isaiah 62:4), who rejoices in sexual love (the whole Song of Solomon!), and who pours out the Holy Spirit on all flesh (Joel 2:28; Acts 2:1-17) is a God who knows how to play! Laughter and joy are unmistakable signs of the Spirit. Life can be difficult, and at times excruciatingly painful, but true faith in the God Jesus reveals should always lighten the load and remind us that our story, part of The Story, has a happy ending. It's okay to laugh along the way.
The man who first taught me how to pray always told me to have a light touch. He would suggest a passage from Scripture for me to meditate on and say, "Just play with it." I was grimly serious, and so I struggled to do that: finding God must be agonizing, right? It must be a life and death struggle, with infinite stakes, correct? No! God's love is a free gift given to even the most sinful among us. The more we can accept that, the more playful we can become, the easier it is for God's love to transform our lives. It is actually quite funny that it took me so long to let that penetrate my defenses: once it did, it changed my life.
"Serious" religious people do so much damage in our world: they judge, they condemn, they hate, they persecute, and they kill. It does not have to be that way! Why not practice the spiritual disciplines of joy, delight, and self-giving love? Why not admit that none of us is perfect and never will be perfect in this life? Why not love freely and generously, trusting that it will all turn out well in the end? Why not actually live the faith we proclaim — you know, that part about Jesus rising from the dead and assuring us that God's love wins forever? Why not? It is true, and it feels so much better than the alternative!
Meister Eckhart, one of the great mystics of the church, once described the mystery of existence this way: “In the heart of the Trinity, the Father laughs and gives birth to the Son. The Son laughs back at the Father and gives birth to the Spirit. The whole Trinity laughs and gives birth to us.”
Yes! Play on!
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