Athanasian Creed 1-4 (with Freewrite)

I am starting Lectio Divina on Scripture related to the Athansian Creed today. It is this and also a freewrite however God wants to lead me today. Here goes:

1-4 Whosoever will be saved, before all things it is necessary that he hold the catholic [universal] faith, which faith except every one do keep whole and undefiled, without doubt he shall perish everlastingly. And the catholic [universal] faith is this, that we worship one God in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity. Neither confounding the Persons, nor diving the substance. 

The Scriptures for meditation on this subject (and I may just meditate on one of them today) are:

Jesus is the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Him. (John 14:6)

The Lord Jesus prayed these words for the unity of all who would believe in Him, "I ask that all of them may be one, Father, just as You are in Me and I am in You, that they also may be in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me. And the glory that You gave Me I have given to them, that they may be one, just as We are one: I in them, and You in Me, that they may be perfected in one (NASB says "unity"), that the world may know that You have sent Me and have loved them, even as You have loved Me. (John 17:21-23). 

This is cool as I have been praying through a prayer guide for partners who have gathered together this last week in Thailand. One of the songs is "Make Us One" by Twila Paris. So I have been meditating on this quite a bit. It also goes along with the Lectio Divina journal I just finished and the 40 Day Journey with Bonhoeffer book I just meditated through. So, I am listening Lord. I love it when everything comes together.

I certainly have felt more oneness with others lately. Being housebound, it is so sweet that so many people have brought meals and have come to visit me. I feel very loved and not isolated. Unity in the body too. I love my church. I love my missional community. I have not loved having a broken leg, but I have certainly been nourished in heart, soul, and mind through this season with a nice balance of time alone and time with people visiting and having heart-to-heart fellowship (three hour lunch with the person who brought it to me on Monday) which is something that I am realizing more and more that I crave (and need and fills my soul with consolation).

For many years, I tried having that oneness with "cultural" believers who don't realize that there is SO MUCH MORE to life with Jesus! SO MUCH MORE. So, I am grateful that Jesus prayed this prayer in the Upper Room about oneness, and I see it is being played out in our living room so many times. They were not "my people." Something happened this last spring that totally cemented that for me. I could have felt rejection, but I just felt a final release from them after forty years. I love "my people" now. They are all flavors, walks of life, and ages; but they are people I have found so much oneness with.

The whole thought of being selective in fellowship comes to mind. Not striving to fit "IN" with the cool believers is the best thing for me. I look at the old crowd pictures, and I remember when I used to hang with them, there was such an emptiness. So much strife even though their pictures make it look like all smiles and fun. It may be for them (and bless them for it), it was never for me. My function in that group was one of counselor anyway. I just listened to their struggles in relationships (especially the marriages), but there was not really a caring for me. Part of that was because I used to set it up that way (Type Twos do that), because I was so not in touch with what I wanted or needed in relationship and in community. I did not think that was OK to have needs and wants in relationships. I would always hope that it would be more two way, and sometimes, it never happened. That is why the EnneaThought for today was so amazingly apropos for me:

As a Two, you identify powerfully with feelings for and about others and feelings about others' responses to you at the expense of recognizing your own feelings about yourself and your own needs. Notice this tendency in yourself today. (The Wisdom of the Enneagram, 44)

That is what I did with that group. I was so in tune to them not realizing that I had needs too. I still care about that group, but there is not a need I have for deep community being met there. It just will not happen. My heart passions and goals are so different from them too Maybe they have it with each other. So, blessings to them. I gave up putting any emotional energy into them. For so long, I wanted to belong, but I realized that belonging meant that I denied myself in the process. I feel like I have much better balance now than ever before. It is so beautiful! Community and oneness is happening for me, and I am so very grateful.
Well, I am going on to journaling, but this is my freewrite for this part of the Athanasian Creed.