When God gives of God’s self, one of two things happens: either flesh is inspirited or spirit is enfleshed.
—Richard Rohr
At last week’s 3to5 Club, a bi-monthly meeting of business owners, we reflected on the liminal dimension between the spirit and the flesh, in other words, a lifetime-goal-that-can-never-be-fulfilled—and the realities of living that out in our time-space continuum. Compare the ethereal “Being a loving father for life” with the gritty “Cleaning up after my sick grandson Pat at 1:39 a.m. last night.”
We pondered that paradox of bridging the unseen with the seen. One owner said, it’s what we can’t measure that we measure by. For example, suppose one’s lifetime goal is “experiencing joy,” which can’t be be measured. Suppose also that a waypoint on the lifetime voyage is to becoming a penta-millionaire by age 50. But if, upon reaching this waypoint, you didn’t experience joy, you would have failed your lifetime goal miserably according to the litmus test of being joyful.
Ultimately we were left with the question: How do we as business owners take “spirit” –our description of our life’s essence—and put it crudely into activity and relationships within the constraints of time, energy and dollars? In other words, how do we enflesh our spirit?
It’s no coincidence that I share these thoughts with you on Christmas Eve. Rohr’s statement describes this liminal event: that moment in time when followers of Jesus believe that spirit was enfleshed. Jesus’ birth is like that moment in 1606 at the Globe Theatre when Shakespeare’s King Lear, until then mere words on a page, was enfleshed, read out loud for the first time and so powerful that it transported the rough-hewn, bawdy crowd to the royal court for 2 hours. These words transformed the lives of both those on stage and those under its spell. Spirit enfleshed.
This day, regardless of how you might view Jesus’ birth, is a potential threshold to considering how your spirit might be enfleshed.
Toolkit:
Christmas Eve offers a great liminal dimension to consider a few unexamined questions:
- What does your Hope embody?
- How is that shaping your enfleshing now?
- What one thing can you do differently in 2013?
