Sister Wisdom and the Sea of Glass.
Wisdom cries aloud in the street. In the markets she raises her voice; at the head of the noisy streets she cries out; at the entrance of the city gates she speaks: how long, O simple ones, will you love being simple?
(Proverbs 1:20)
And before the throne there was something like a sea of glass, like crystal; and in the centre and around to throne four living creatures full of eyes in front and behind. (REV 4:6)
I’m lying on my back, drifting in the delicious space between wake and sleep when I’m suddenly aware of the rhythmic sound of waves gently kissing the shore. I love the sound of the sea. This particular sea has a song in it, a high delicate tinkling sound that rises and falls as the waves move. I rest and open the eyes that can see. It seems that I am standing on the edge of a body of water. It moves all around me, tickling my feet and drawing me in. My eyes feast on the colours that sparkle as sunlight skims the surface of the water: blue, but so many blues; greens I’ve never seen before; a white that is iridescent as pearl.
My vision adjusts to the light and I can focus again. I notice that this is no normal sea. The water is made up of tiny beads of glass. The sound I heard was the melody of their moving against each other. It feels all at once familiar and totally absurd. A sea of glass. I blink for a moment wondering if I’m mistaken, and look up and around. In the distance, on the horizon, there is a luminous shape. The light is so bright I can’t make out any detail. Something in me awakens and I feel a whole body yearning to be closer to whatever the light contains. Gingerly I stretch out my foot wondering if the substance of this sea would mean I could walk on it’s surface. It takes my weight, but anyone watching would belly-laugh at the sight of me trying to stay upright on a moving floor. I make my way across the sea, ungainly as a baby deer. I’m mesmerised by the feast of coloured beads under my feet, the sound of their connecting, and the light that beckons. I’m more alive in every particle of my being than I’ve ever been before.
After some long walking I notice new colours emerging around the light-that-beckons. A little closer and detail emerges. The colours move like a rainbow asteroid band around a throne formed of living light. And there He is. The One who draws me closer, my being resonating with longing and echoing back the love radiating from Him.
He’s not alone. The closer I get the more there is to see, and I can’t take it all in. But inside I hear Him tell me I need to stay focused on Him. He has something on his heart to share with me. I stop moving. Listen. Somehow here, with sea between us, he speaks without words in clarity and stillness.
Look. My attention is drawn left to the most beautiful woman. She looks older than old, but dances like a child. She’s taller than most, with short white hair and a smile like sunshine. She leans into the sea and gathers up armfuls of the water-beads. I watch her kissing them and throwing them with joy through the air where it seems they add to the sound of her laughter before spilling into the sea again. Her eyes are locked into the eyes of the One sitting on the throne.
Meet Sister Wisdom, He says to me. Meet her children. He winks at my confusion and I’m OK. I don’t understand. It’s OK. I love Him.
He tosses me a ball and somehow I catch it in my two hands. It’s like a snow globe, but the image inside is of a man kneeling under the stars in prayer. I feel like I know it is Abraham, and as I shake the globe, sand falls like a curtain over the scene. Sand. Descendants as numerous as sand. I remember. It was the promise at the beginning. The dream to be fulfilled at the end. The ball in my hand grows hot, and flames flicker from the base of the globe and up the sides until I’m moving a ball of fire between my two hands. It doesn’t burn me. Without warning the ball shatters, and teeny beads of glass scatter. Light kisses their smooth surfaces, a firework display of glory and wonder.
For a minute all goes dark, and I find myself in the centre of the city I call home. My imagining is immediately accompanied by the smell of frying onions and the unsteady feel of uneven stones under my feet. I’m on a pedestrian crossroads, flanked by beautiful 19th century architecture. Once these buildings housed the big-named banks. Now they stand empty and waiting. A burger van holds centre stage, permeating the air with smells that tempt the nose and the gag-reflex simultaneously.
My mind is busy with memories and thoughts. It’s strange when you spend time in a city-centre-in-waiting. Little pockets of life and promise are flanked by empty windows and distant memories. Everything moves slowly. People stand still, alone, or in saggy groups eating cheap and warm.
Times gone by hold stories of life and hope and commerce on this very same crossroads. Trams and movement and all things we have come to associate with growth were once here and they may be here again someday. There are other tales, further back, of markets and corruption and the fight for fair trade and treatment of the ordinary worker. The stones hold the history, but most people don’t want to stand here for long enough to listen. Last time I was here I was queuing outside my bank with the masked and indignant. We waited, standing on the coloured circles helpfully painted to keep us 2m apart. I was a captive audience for a little lady with a white stick and dark glasses to tell me her story of pain and loss. She gave me a blue sandwich bag containing a satsuma and a chocolate bar for my trouble.
For some reason I’m often drawn here in my mind, and if I have time on my own I love to sit and people watch in this space. Hugging a coffee and a notepad I wait with the city for something. I think because I feel the waiting so strongly I often let it wrap itself around me. I let the city speak loudly it’s story and its pain. There was always another voice I could hear in that same place. Sweet and strong, sometimes it had my full attention and I tuned my heart to the frequency it carried. Other-times I leant towards the hum of sorrow and bitterness and fed my soul on decay.
Lost in these rambling thoughts of all that’s familiar I forget where I’ve just been. Then I see her. She’s barefoot on the dirty cobbles of my city. Her short white hair glistens and her sunshine smile is somehow more arresting with a backdrop of Yorkshire stone. Her voice is sweet and strong. She kisses every passerby with a promise and an invitation. Old, young, rich, poor, black, white, clean and dirty. Her kiss and her smile are constant. Most walk on by. Some lean in to the kiss for respite before they continue. Others stop and listen.
Meet Sister Wisdom, He says. Meet her children.
I catch her eye and she winks at me. My phone vibrates in my hand and I glance down to a message that reads:
And I heard every creature in heaven, on earth, and under the earth, in the sea – every creature everywhere – replying: “to the one who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb be blessing, honour, glory, and authority, for ever and ever.” (REV 5:13)
I look up as she whispers every creature before kissing a woman in a suit on her forehead. She walks on weary with cares, and Wisdom reaches out to smooth the furrows in her brow.
Numerous as sand on a seashore, the descendants of Abraham. The phrase rolls around my tongue as I watch Wisdom at work in the city. Suddenly she stretches out her arms and throws her head back in joy as a young man leans into her embrace. He stays there, warm and safe in the moment. Head tilted to catch the words she whispers in his ear. All is still, then the pause is broken as he steps back and nods his agreement, never breaking eyes with her. Intrigued I watch as she kneels and blesses his feet. Flames of fire begin to flicker from the soles of his trainers, spreading up his legs. He turns and limps away, rejoining friends who it seems are oblivious to the encounter and the fire.
I see. There is a most glorious alchemy at work here at the crossroads. In the centre of the city that stands as a monument to all we have built and trade into. The beauty and the mess we are and we make. In this place she stands. She blesses and kisses and gifts us with the very flame of love. The fire that judges, burns and restores. The process of fire transforming grains of sand into a sea of iridescent glass pearls. An offering of worship from Sister Wisdom to the King she loves.
Here, she sings. Here O King are your children.
And I saw what looked like a sea of glass glowing with fire and, standing beside the sea, those who had been victorious over the beast and its image and over the number of its name. They held harps given them by God. (Rev 15:2)
The beginning and the end are woven together for me in this moment. The dream of God and it’s fulfillment. I begin to understand. Then Sister Wisdom walks to me and she sits with me. I lock eyes with her and remember all the times I’ve heard her sweet song in this busy place but tuned into distraction. I recall the many times I’ve felt the flames at my feet and rushed to put them out fearing the discomfort they bring. It’s a kind fire, she says, and it is a kiss and a promise gifted to every person because sand is beautiful, but pearls of glass are glorious.
And I’m here in the city, she says as she stands. And I’m there in the fields, in the deserts, the forests and the homes. I’m the plus one in your car as you drive to work, and the guest in the classroom as children listen. Hands placed on the table she leans towards me. The world needs pearls of glass now, she says. Don’t wait till the fire kisses you in death. Welcome its work in you now. Let it burn you and love you and shape you into a light reflecting ball that forms the sea of glass before the throne and illuminates the streets on the earth with His glory at the very same time. All the time.
Imagine, she says, how your city would look. Her last words to me as she walks away are : if you want to work with me. Ask for me.
Proverbs 4:7
The beginning of Wisdom is this: Get wisdom. Though it cost all you have, get understanding.
Luke 11:9 – 13
So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.
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