Ok, so there have been so many things I've wanted to post about since lent started but haven't had the time to sit down and write out a long post. Hopefully I'll post on them later, but I wanted to post this quick thought while it's fresh. I attend St. Athanasius Orthodox Church in Nicholasville, KY on Sundays and find the liturgy to be incredibly meaningful. During lent we are using the Liturgy of St. Basil and in one of the sections there is a place for a different song to be sung each Sunday. This isn't like special music, the whole service is singing except the sermon, this is more like instead of singing "O for a Thousand Tongues to Sing" at the start of every school year at Houghton they mixed it up once in a while with "And Can it Be." As I stood there yesterday listening to the choir (again not like typical protestant choirs) sing the song I heard these words. I'll try to quote them the best I can.
"The flaming sword of Eden has been extinguished by the wood of the cross...enter in to paradise!"
Isn't that beautiful! The imagery just fills my heart. Only with God could something so paradoxical become a reality. Wood extinguishing fire? Death bringing life in paradise? These are not intuitive things. Truly the cross is foolishness and a stumbling block and yet all the more we proclaim Christ and him crucified! Just as the first Adam's actions removed us from paradise, so the second Adam's actions allow us to reclaim it, or better yet, recieve a new one.
Amen. Come Lord Jesus.
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4 comments:
That is a sweet picture. I like.
I love it! It makes me picture a swordfight scene, but instead of the clash of metal on metal, I hear the dull thud of sword embedding itself in wood, as Satan wields a flaming sword and tries to hack away at the cross that Christ holds out in front of him. What a powerful image! Wood extinguishing fire, death winning life...I love that our God is not afraid of paradoxes!
Becca, i agree, and don't want to be a stickler for details, but it's not Satan that wields the sword, it's the cherubim. It represents the curse that God pronounced on humanity at the fall. I think that's part of the beauty that I see, God pronounces a curse, and only he can take it away and the way he chooses is a paradox. He extinquishes fire with wood, wrath with love. Praise the Lord.
But then again the song is just imagery so I like the sword fight too. Especially the dull thud.
Stickler, stickler, stickler! :)
You're right. I stand sheepishly corrected. (How I hate looking like a fool...but it's good for me.) I guess that I was just so excited about the thought of the cross being God's response to the sword, that I kind of forgot about the Eden part...that there was a literal sword of Eden, and it wasn't just a figurative representation of death...until I read your response, and I put 2 and 2 together... and then I felt very silly... hehehe... maybe I've been watching too many war movies recently, reading too much fantasy! :) Theological accuracy and consistency? Pshaw! It's completely overrated.
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