Word Pictures

Recently, as the guest preacher at Virginia-Highland Church, I used a video in the sermon by a young African-American poet/preacher named Tiffanie Shanks.  I am a big fan of her work.  She has an incredible power to create word pictures.  In her poem “True Identity,” which you can watch on YouTube (www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJONBmVUKkg) she presents a picture that God has “hanndcrafted” us by “Love’s persistence.”

That unique identity and connection that we all have with God is true and freeing.  A classic understanding of the Triune God is as a dance where creator, son, and spirit are in constant relationship, emptying divine love from one to the other.  Father Richard Rohr has moved that understanding into our post-modern world, viewing the image of God as the elements of an atom, and that we and the entire universe are built upon that foundational image of three in one.   Beyond the science, though, I return to that powerful word picture that you and I and everyone else have been handcrafted us by Love’s persistence. May that word picture capture your imagination as it has mine.

by Gregg Carlson
Director of Online Learning Center and Coaching
The Center for Progressive Renewal