We live as if we have ultimate control over our lives. We don't, ultimately we don't decide when or how we die, we don't get to control other peoples lives although many have tried and are still trying. It makes us feel some sense of safety to think we are in control or that we have some measure of it over our lives.
I think this is part of the reason we admire martyrs so much. They don't surrender to someone else's demands for control over what they believe. They stand proclaiming their faith in God, Allah, the Creator as the person who holds the control thinks, if I can threaten a person with the loss of their life this person will change their belief or at least I can erase it.
This kind of control actually has no belief at all except in absolute power and hate of the other. We don't become a free people until we realize the depths of love in the God of many names. When we live in those depths we realize we surrender all to the love that understands everyone. Control when it is used for power does not care about anyone else except its own survival, its own protection in itself not dying. There is more freedom when we realize it doesn't matter, we are not in control.
It is a scary place to stand in this freedom because it opens a whole new world and the possibility that there is nothing we can do to ultimately be safe. We don't decide when or how we die, we don't decide who is other, we don't live in fear but for a short time may be consumed by it as we free fall into the truth of this: love is like Jesus says in John. I and the Father are one and we are to become one with them. We are not our own.
Jesus surrendered all control to die on the cross. This is an example to us because our trust is not in the control of this world, but in the life of the one to come. We are supposed to rest in the love of the oneness of God in order to be free in our lives. Can we dare to let go?
I think this is part of the reason we admire martyrs so much. They don't surrender to someone else's demands for control over what they believe. They stand proclaiming their faith in God, Allah, the Creator as the person who holds the control thinks, if I can threaten a person with the loss of their life this person will change their belief or at least I can erase it.
This kind of control actually has no belief at all except in absolute power and hate of the other. We don't become a free people until we realize the depths of love in the God of many names. When we live in those depths we realize we surrender all to the love that understands everyone. Control when it is used for power does not care about anyone else except its own survival, its own protection in itself not dying. There is more freedom when we realize it doesn't matter, we are not in control.
It is a scary place to stand in this freedom because it opens a whole new world and the possibility that there is nothing we can do to ultimately be safe. We don't decide when or how we die, we don't decide who is other, we don't live in fear but for a short time may be consumed by it as we free fall into the truth of this: love is like Jesus says in John. I and the Father are one and we are to become one with them. We are not our own.
Jesus surrendered all control to die on the cross. This is an example to us because our trust is not in the control of this world, but in the life of the one to come. We are supposed to rest in the love of the oneness of God in order to be free in our lives. Can we dare to let go?
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