Pentecost
That's what it's called
A five dollar theological word
That means losing control
Of what you never had control of in the first place
Only the illusion of control
And that's what is lost
Thankfully
Since illusion is a waste of time
It sours the heart to truth
And siphons the hope for deliverance
Until great stone edifices sit as empty
As the hearts betrayed by fakery and foolishness

The veil is lifted
Eyes and heart are now open to the gift of every moment
The gift of every opportunity
The conviction to suck in and gulp down all of it
To take hold of it just as we are released from the clutches of fear
And welcomed to a whole different kind of awe
One we can't yet imagine or conceive
Newborns with appetites and instincts
Given a landscape undreamed
Wide open space with no fences
Only the arbitrary boundaries of ownership and by-laws
As if something that has been floating through space
For billions of years can be tethered, managed, owned
By something that rises and falls in half a Neptunian year
No chains
No claims
No names
The box of trinkets has been dumped out and scattered
Say your prayers and get ready to have the wind knocked out of you
By the Wind of all winds
Pentecost is not for sissies
It is the tsunami that wrecks our sandcastle sanctuaries
Leaving us stunned and drenched
Overwhelmed by the power of the love we thought we franchised
Pentecost is The Holy Other's dare to trust
Really let go and give up the reigns we held
      to the dead horse paradigms we've been beating
No more slogans
No more gimmicks
No more sale's pitches about heaven
No more pretend bargains
Stripped of the hocus pocus and the fault finding

Pay attention
There are Pentecost tracks in the rubble
Large paw prints of the prowling predator
Ravenously devouring falsehoods
And feeding the meek
Turning over the marketplace tables that mock the Prodigal Parent
And binding the wounds
Indifferent to the Caesars and Senators who wield woeful wands
Compassionate toward the wearied and burdened
Spewing forth the tepid temple plate-spinners
Gathering the languishing lambs and feeding them
And patiently starving those obese with lies

It isn't a day or an hour or a season or an event
It is a dawning that eclipses the shadowed life
Of everyone, even the baptized
Do not feign to tame that which cannot be chained
The Wind will conquer and claim
As the harvest is gathered
Through relentless love

© 2016 Stephen Carl