A BRUSH
MERCHANT
As I walked home, I was overtaken by a vertical collection
of brooms. As it passed, I realised it was a man on a bicycle with a neatly
bound selection of different sorts and colours of brushes. He skilfully wove
his way among the potholes like a dancer on a stage. His demeanour suggested a
happy man, confident he knew what he was doing.
We know little of the deeper stirrings in people’s hearts.
This week we have a saying in the scriptures; He is ‘the one who is going to
baptise with the Holy Spirit’. We can quickly pass by, saying, ‘Oh, I’ve heard
that before many times. I know what it means.’ Well, maybe. But what does it
really mean for us? Karl Rahner, the German Jesuit theologian who flourished in
the late twentieth century, wrote, ‘we may think we find around us too much of
the spirit of the world and too little of the Spirit of the Father. While these
impressions may frequently be valid, there is usually something false in them.
Something false, I say, because the human eye cannot detect the Spirit in us
and in the church.’
We are baptised. But we do not always attune ourselves to
the promptings of the Spirit who lives in us. I am always struck by the example
of Elizabeth Musodzi and Charles Mzingeli who, in the 1920s and 30s, worked
patiently and successfully for the improvement in the living and working conditions
of the people of Harare. They were brushed aside because they were not
producing quick results. Now, there are sharply different views about that
period of our history but the question can, at least, be asked; were we
attentive at the time to the deeper workings of the Spirit in our hearts? Ghandi
once said (I do not have his exact words), ‘I would be prepared to wait – if
necessary, for a long time – for freedom to come if, in doing so, we could
avoid violence.’ He was a man who reflected deeply and believed that violence
only breeds violence. Patience lays a better foundation.
We are baptised, yes. But has the Spirit found a place in
our bloodstream? Are our reactions and thoughts prompted by a habit of
attentiveness to the deeper movements of our heart or are we inclined to follow
the crowd? It is a question to ponder as we stand, in our imagination, by the
river Jordan this week and listen to the words of the Baptist.
Sometimes we can be helped by a person who passes by, like
the man selling brushes.
15 January 2023 Sunday
2 A Is 49:3-6 1 Cor 1:1-3 John 1:29-34
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