In our gospel this week, Peter imagines after experiencing the transfiguration that Christ would want him to build a tent for him. But then the father speaks. “This is my son in whom I rejoice. Listen to him!” The words of the Father were not what Peter was expecting. He thought he should get to work and build. But what was needed was simply listening to and rejoicing in Christ. Within every one us is also a Peter. For so often our expectations of what we think is wanted, gets in the way of hearing what is actually needed. So often what we think someone wants, gets in the way of rejoicing and listening to who they really are. We build up expectations in our minds, imagining other peoples motivations, intentions, what they might be thinking. We create stories in our minds to justify ourselves, our judgements our stance.  And yet, if we take a moment, like Peter, to look deep into our hearts core, perhaps we too can hear the Father speaking to us:  Be silent, let go of your expectations, listen to the Son. For Christ is always with you. Rejoice in Him.  This contemplation by Rev. Evans was inspired by the Transfiguration.

A very wise man, Viktor Frankl once wrote…

“Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms — to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances….”

In the darkness of a concentration camp, Frankl awoke to this truth that our essential humanity lives in how we choose to meet what we are given – that every human soul is truly free.

And yet, at the same time, we are not free. We are not free to choose what comes to us in our lives. We are not free to select the sufferings and blessings that choose us and shape us with their weight and light. What we would choose to happen in our lives is often very different from what is needed. Nevertheless the deeply liberating reality is that no president, no company, no enemy, no illness can ever take from us the capacity of our spirit to choose how we meet what is.

Dear friends, let us remember that our battle is not with what is, our battle is whether or not we can bring dignity to what is. Our battle is whether or not we can connect with the presence of Christ in what is, weather or not we can bring love to what is; no matter how desperate or how dark what is may be.

Its flu season. And with it has come coughing, sneezing, aching, so many of us feeling lousy. But still, we bring ourselves, sicknesses and all, to the altar. We come to the altar for the Spirit, we come because we find The Healing Medicine.

And yet, even after communion our sickness remains. For we pray ‘Oh Christ, sick is the dwelling into which you are entering, but through your Word my soul becomes whole.’ This prayer does not say that my dwelling becomes whole, it says my soul becomes whole. The dwelling remains sick. For in communion we can all experience that we are not all at once made into a perfect being, free from all illness, magically and completely transformed. And even if we do experience healing by His power, there is always another aspect of our being that remains untransformed. For just as in our gospel today (wedding at Cana) the water was transformed but not its containers, communing with Christ in our time means to receive wholeness into the dwelling of our sickness. Communion with Christ is to be healed and at the same time be sick.

Dear friends, the Christian path means to carry His health in our sickness- His light in our darkness. And in these times when our karma has determined that division and hate will only increase, let us remember that it is not about escaping this sickness or finally solving it, following Christ means to carry His love in the midst of this dark. Therefore we can truly pray, “Oh Christ, sick is the dwelling into which you are entering, but through your word our soul becomes whole.”

Not only do we celebrate the Three Kings on Epiphany, we also celebrate the Epiphany in the river Jordan- The baptism of Jesus. Because just like the Star of Grace that blessed the kings with its light, the Holy Spirit blessed Jesus with Christ’s light in the river Jordan.

And yet, as important as the baptism of Jesus is, being blessed by the light would be nothing on its own. Without Jesus giving himself to the death on the cross for the life of the world, the light He received at the baptism would have no meaning. Without the three kings being able to give their gifts to the Holy Child, receiving the light of the Star would have been for naught. The point is, the gifts we receive only become meaningful in as much as we are able to give back.

For all Epiphanies lead to one thing: the joy of giving something, of offering something, however humble, that has meaning for someone. Let us remember, that our old age is fulfilled in the end, not by what we have achieved or received, our lives are fulfilled only by the spiritual joy of giving for the life of the world.

Dear friends, in these times of political turmoil, unsolvable fears and anxieties about the future, epidemics of terror and violent oppression across the globe, let us remember again that the real world is not what we see on the news. Let us remember that the true world is being brought to life in this painful darkness by the Christ-filled giving of the human heart.  
This contemplation by Rev. Evans was inspired by The Baptism.

Whenever beginnings come, whenever we celebrate beginnings, they always bring wishes and new resolutions. Beginnings remind us of what can be, of what is possible. Perhaps we know how important beginnings are because in the beginning was the word. Because God lives in Beginning-ness.

And yet, we all know how hard it is to follow through on a new beginning- how hard it is to accomplish a resolution. How often have we decided that we would like to change, only to find after much struggle and tears that our efforts alone are not enough?

In this new year, dear friends, let us indeed courageously resolve to transform! But let us remember that true change never comes through our efforts alone. Real transformation is always a gift- a gift that comes, so long as, the spiritual world deems us ready. Let us remember that change always requires a ‘Yes’ from us as well as a ‘Yes’ from the angels. And there is real peace if we can accept the wait.

Perhaps the only thing we can ever really do to help ourselves is not to refuse God’s grace, to say yes to the divine gift, when it comes.

After a long day out in the winter world, we make our way home. We brave the freezing air, endure the biting wind. But as soon as we come to our house, as soon as we turn our door-handle and step inside, the harsh cold will be left behind, the light will come on, we will feel the comfort of coming home; in this world, we are kept alive by the warmth and peace of home.

And yet, this world is not our home. For we are spiritual beings on a journey in and through the material world. The homes we have with four walls and a door are but faint reflections of another home – a true home – a spiritual home for every human soul. And the Christmas service is meant to bring our souls into relationship with this true home. We are called to courageously feel through the altar, through the words of the priest and the candles, our true home; the Spirits healing light of grace streaming into us.

Dear friends, at Christmas we celebrate our spiritual home that has come into our material world. Not only do we celebrate what happened 2000 years ago but we celebrate Emmanuel today – God with us now. The Christ has appeared in the realm of earth. Let us come close to Him. Let us lift our hearts to receive His comforting warmth- even when it is dark. For He is the Spirit-Sun at midnight. Christ is our true home.

The last couple of days here in Toronto the winds were blowing- the trees bending the leaves swirling. And since Wednesday soul winds are swirling across the globe. Storms of fear, anxiety and hate…gusts of anger, shock and uncertainty…. these soul winds are bending our human branches, challenging our roots…calling on our soul roots to dig deep.

This is because every human being, like the trees, has roots, inner roots. And these inner roots keep us steady when storms come. Like the trees, our inner roots are nourished, not by the winds and storms of fear and hate, we are nourished by the substance and being of The Ground of the World. Human souls are strengthened, not by swaying this way and that with the endless debate, human souls are strengthened by roots that push down into the Father Ground.

Dear friends, let us remember, in this time of soul storms and turmoil, that Christ did not come into the world to support a particular political party or a particular country. Let us remember that the real world is not what we see in politics or media. Let us remember that our battle is not with flesh and blood but with spiritual adversaries that seek to fill our hearts with fear and hate. Let us remember that our task is not to fix the world, but to bring love into a broken world. Let us remember that the divine call is still the same as it was before the election; not to eradicate and destroy evil, but in the destructive darkness to find light. Let us remember that Christ walks with all human souls no matter how corrupt, hoping to root us in the Father Ground of the World.

May our roots dig deep into what is real. May our roots dig deep into Christ, the substance of love. So that the storms which are raging not uproot our souls.

All around us we see churches shrinking. We see souls wanting nothing to do with religious institutions and for good reason. Even in The Christian Community we are seeing congregations struggle across the globe. Destruction is all around us.

And yet, the great german poet Christian Morgenstern wrote not long ago, “We stand not at the end of Christianity but at its very beginning.”

And Christian Morgenstern said this not because he saw outer Christianity on the rise, he said this not because he thought church buildings were going to start to replacing shopping malls. Christian Morgenstern said this because he knew true Christianity is not an institution. He knew that true Christianity is not actually perceptible to our normal senses. We need new senses.

Dear friends, Christianity is at its beginning because we are meant to shift our attention away from what the outer eyes see, to what the inner eye can see. For real Christianity is always hidden, esoteric, supersensible. It is actually not a set of beliefs, not even a teaching.

In reality, Christianity is a Spiritual being. And to practice sensing the living presence of The Etheric Christ Jesus, this is Christianity.

So, my brothers and sisters, when we see outer Christianity all around us begin to weaken and even turn into something unrecognizable… let this crumbling of the outer be a call to a Christianity that is inner. Let us remember that Christianity is nothing except a shared practice of opening our hearts-eye to the hidden, loved-filled presence of Jesus Christ.

This contemplation by Rev. Evans was inspired by Rev. 1.

Sometimes there is nothing better than a good road-trip. And even though we love the freedom and the care-free feeling that road trips bring, at the same time we must be disciplined and responsible for our fuel gage. We must stop when our tank is empty and fill up. If we don’t notice our gauge limits, we burn out. And even when we do notice that we are running low and stop, but mistakenly fill up with the wrong fuel, we also won’t get very far-  burn-out will come.

In our time, each and every human soul is challenged more and more with burn-out. And just like with a car, if we are to avoid soul burn-out, we must learn to read our personal fuel gage- we must practice knowing and accepting the limits of our own particular tank- respecting its boundaries, letting go of the vain desire to push on at all costs.

But at the same time, even if we do learn good boundaries and stop when we’re feeling low, mistakenly filling up on the wrong fuel will still lead us to burn-out. For when we go to our inner pump we are called today to learn to discern between the fuel that can truly sustain us for our journey and the fuel that leads to burn out. Burn-out fuel is feeling inspired and renewed because of how others see us…Burn-out fuel is feeling validated and energized by how much money our work is attracting…Burn-out fuel is our subtle expectation that the community and the our loved ones should fill us up with positive recognition. Outer recognition, however much, only feels good at first, but always leads to an empty gauge.

Real fuel that sustains our spirit only ever comes from angels. Real fuel never depends on what others see or don’t see. For only what comes from The Spirit will truly suffice if we are not to burn-out.

May the Christ’s loving Spirit that pours out from the place of our altar become our real fuel, sustaining our hearts, nourishing our souls.

There is a sacred secret in human evolution. It is a secret that is hidden and at the same time open to all human beings. This open secret is; that within each human soul there is a bride- an inner bride. And this bride of our hearts is being called to holy wedlock with a very special groom. The bride in every human heart is called to a holy union with Christ.

And yet, our Michaelmas gospel (Mt.22) tells us that if this hidden wedding is to take place for our heart, we must become worthy. ‘For all are called, but only individuals make themselves worthy.’

To be worthy for a wedding, the bride in our heart must first really believe , believe that the wedding is real! So when we come up to the altar, to be worthy for this holy (comm)union, we must practice trusting- trusting that He is actually here- waiting to unite with the bride in us- ready to touch us and make us whole…

To be found worthy for a wedding we are also called to receive, we are called to receive and put on the gift of the wedding garment. This means that we cannot remain the way we are. The bride must put on something different. To be worthy we must have the courage to be changed, made new.

And finally, to become worthy for the wedding, every human soul as bride must learn to speak. For above all we cannot be found to be speechless in the presence of God. We must learn to speak directly to the beloved- our words resounding from our hearts core saying “Take me, as You have given Yourself to me”