Greetings,
My friends.
This is Mark Gludman,
Also known as Brother Frederick James,
Your friendly neighbourhood monk in docks,
Welcoming you to our Lenten 2026 series,
In the Wilderness,
Still Held.
And today,
Day 21,
As we walk towards Easter in the Gospel of John.
As we begin,
I invite you to find a posture that allows you to be both relaxed and attentive.
If it's safe to do so,
You might like to close your eyes.
Let your shoulders soften.
Let your hands rest.
Take a slow breath in and an unhurried breath out.
And once more in and out.
And listen to this single sentence from the Gospel of John,
Chapter 6,
Verse 63.
Where John has Jesus saying,
It is the spirit that gives life.
The flesh is of no avail.
Let those words sink deeply today.
The spirit gives life.
There's no discussion here about God controlling or about God giving any certainty,
But life.
The spirit gives life.
Now,
In this passage,
Jesus is speaking to people who are struggling with what he's just said.
They're taking him literally.
They're trying to pin him down,
To reduce his words to something that's concrete so that they can manage it in their heads,
And he gently redirects them.
The spirit gives life.
And what he's doing here is he's inviting them beyond literalism into living meaning.
He's trying to bring them beyond rigid interpretation and into a living relationship.
He's trying to say to them,
Listen,
Don't limit yourself with tight definitions,
But allow this to expand into something that's breathing and alive.
Now,
It's true to say that for many of us,
We've inherited or grown into ourselves or up around forms of faith that feel incredibly tight.
Perhaps it's because faith was presented as a system that we needed to master.
Or maybe we were given a list of things and thought,
Well,
These are all the things we have to obey,
Or maybe a set of correct answers that we were given to defend.
And slowly,
And often without noticing,
Our souls became constricted.
Because when faith's presented in this way,
It becomes smaller,
Narrower,
Airless,
Dare we say,
Lifeless.
Just noticing yourself,
If anything in there resonates with you.
You might ask yourself,
Where has my spirituality become constricted?
I just invite you to sit with that just for a moment.
Jesus says the spirit gives life,
The spirit animates,
The spirit moves.
The spirit can't be contained inside our need for certainty.
Have you ever noticed that rigid certainty always looks,
Sounds and feels pretty much the same?
And I guess that's why some people hold to it,
Because it can be very comforting.
But it can also shrink the heart.
And yet by contrast,
The spirit creates spaciousness.
I invite you just now to take a slow breath in and imagine space opening up within you.
And as you breathe out,
Release the need to hold to things that just don't bring life anymore.
Now it's important to note that spiritual spaciousness isn't about being vague.
And neither is it about being indifferent.
What it is,
Is a quiet confidence that not everything we hold to be true can be reduced to a clarity or a formula or a precept or any sort of empirical truth even.
I mean,
There are truths you can explain,
But then there are some truths that you can only enter into.
So really what we're saying here is that mystery is never the enemy of faith.
But what mystery does,
Is it provides the atmosphere for faith to thrive and live.
Just let that idea rest in you for a moment.
Mystery is not the enemy of faith,
It is the atmosphere.
And this is really what the wilderness teaches us.
In the wilderness,
You can't control everything,
You can't predict every outcome,
You can't secure your future with neat little conclusions.
What the wilderness does,
Is it reintroduces us to wonder,
To awe.
It strips away the illusion that you can manage God,
Box God,
Control God,
Completely get your head around God.
It slowly and gently reopens the soul to awe.
And perhaps part of your journey right now feels like this wilderness.
It's unclear,
It's unsettling,
Or maybe even unresolved.
But I'd invite you to consider this.
Instead of rushing to fill that space with some sort of theological evidence or three-step sermon,
What would it mean if you allowed that space to just be for the moment?
What would it mean to allow that space to stay open and to trust the Spirit's quiet movement,
Steady and alive beneath the surface?
I invite you to take another slow,
Deep breath,
And as you inhale,
Silently say,
Spirit of Life,
And as you exhale,
Breathe in Me.
And again,
Spirit of Life,
Breathe in Me.
Spirit of Life,
Breathe in Me.
It's possible that right now there are areas in your life where your faith feels tight,
Where anxiety creeps in if everything isn't defined and clear,
With I's dotted and T's crossed,
With a scripture passage to reference every single thing.
I wonder,
Can you allow some room for mystery without anxiety?
Imagine your inner world expanding,
Walls gently moving outward,
Windows opening.
You don't need to resolve every question.
You don't need to defend every doctrine.
You don't need to reduce the infinite to something that's manageable.
The Spirit gives life,
And life is dynamic.
It's relational,
And it always shifts and moves.
Faith can breathe again.
In fact,
Let your breath become your teacher now.
Notice the natural rhythm of your breathing.
And while it's weird to say so,
You might notice that your breathing happens without you forcing it.
You could force it,
Of course,
If you want to.
But think about all those times you don't even think about breathing,
And yet your breathing goes on breathing without you forcing it.
This,
My friend,
Is how the Spirit works.
Always moving,
Already sustaining,
Already present,
Consistent.
You're not holding your faith together by effort.
You're just being held.
Let yourself rest in that.
As we bring our time today to a close,
Simply sit in spaciousness,
And imagine your heart wide,
Luminous,
Roomy,
Open,
And hold onto Jesus' words,
The Spirit gives life.
And as you go from this time today,
May your faith be wide enough for wonder.
May your questions become doorways and never be threats.
May your doubt sit and hold to the mystery.
And may the quiet movement of the Spirit create room inside you.
And may grace,
Peace,
And love be with you,
Remain with you,
And go with you today and every day.
Amen.
When you're ready,
You might open your eyes,
And as you return to your day,
Carry this spaciousness with you.
The Spirit gives life.
Let it breathe in you and through you today.
And until tomorrow,
Bye for now.
