Historical setting: 584 C.E. Ligugè
“We don’t have to hurry,” August explains, “the bread is rising, and the meal is eggs which will cook quickly as everyone is gathering at the boards.”
We break each egg and beat it into the froth as Brother August shares another bit of Brother Joel’s wisdom.
“He always said, ‘As it is in heaven, it is on earth.’”
“So you think Brother Joel is serving eggs in heaven?”
“No. He meant, things of earth are here for us to see as symbols of the unseen things of the Spirit. So he showed me the lesson of the omelet. Do you see how each egg is here in the basket before we break into these shells? Each is good in its own tangible way, some with speckles, some in pale shades of tans and whites. Good and fine they are separate, but eggs are neither food for people nor hatchlings for the flock until the shell is broken. When the eggs spread together on the griddle each only stays a separate egg for moment with its own yolk and white, then it spreads into another and another until the whole omelet is one great creation like a psalm sung in unison.
“Brother Joel gave me this lesson because I was one who believed the individuality of my shell-self was how I was beloved. My self was my protection against, against what? Was I waiting for my chicken-self to hatch and flap off into a flock? Was I shielding myself, saving this deepest being from bonding into the great spiritual omelet of God’s love? It’s a simple lesson. Jesus tried to say it in so many different ways – the vine and the vine tenders — the washing of the feet – in so many ways he was walloping the shells of us against the iron skillet and pouring our all into the omelet of one another. Brother Joel said our spirits within us join with Spirit until we are all the one great and holy omelet of God’s love.”
Jesus had a prayer for that. John 17:21-23 …”that they may all be one. As you, Father are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us, … I in them and you in me, that they may become completely one, so that the world may know that you have sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.”
(Continues tomorrow)
Lazarus Ink 