I recently read one of the best definitions of contemplation I’ve ever come across. I’ve read it several times very slowly, and I encourage you to do the same.
“To ‘contemplate’ means to observe carefully, to pay attention. Throughout the day, things catch our eye and we momentarily contemplate them. In the quietness of the sustained attentive gaze, we recognize a preciousness—an immediate worth or value for which no words can do justice. And we sense this is so because the worth or value is God’s presence pouring itself out and giving itself away in and as the gift and miracle in whatever it is that may have captured our attention.” (James Finley)
Now read it like this…
Throughout the day, I catch God’s eye and He contemplates (gazes) on me. In the quietness of the sustained attentive gaze, He recognizes a preciousness – an immediate worth or value for which no words can do justice. This is so because the worth or value is God’s presence pouring itself out and giving itself away in and through the gift and miracle of me…
Wow. What if we took a few minutes of our precious Facebook-social media-news-frenzied time and just immersed in that reality…as the precious apple of God’s eye, soaking in His gaze with all the wonder and worth we are meant to live in? And what if we took a moment to gaze back? And then took that gaze, His gaze through us, to the rest of the world? No fear, no ego, no striving, no having to be right or fix this mess. Just soaking…so as to truly see His presence and worth and value in the midst of the clanging cymbals all around us. Discernment. Love.
Paul is speaking from this place, this cycle of love. He is immersing in God’s love, as God is completing the work He has begun in Paul. In this space, Paul is able to see the people around him, recognizing their precious worth and God’s miraculous presence and work in and through them. They are in this together. There is hope. He speaks from the outflow of a heart filled with joy as he sits in chains for God’s sake! He knows who he is, he is God’s and he is loved. He experiences it…tastes it…gives it…lives it.