Are you WOKE?

"The Holy Spirit will overshadow you."

The word לְהַאֲפִּיל sāḵaḵ (comes the word succoth) or overshadowing of the Spirit is used several times in the Old Testament especially in the Creation where the Spirit hovered over creation in Genesis 1:2. The same word is used in Exodus 40:34 and 1 Kings 8:11 where God is depicted as the cloud which filled or covered the temple or the tabernacle.

The word לְהַאֲפִּיל was used for the longest time to refer to sacred edifices and sacred objects. It was used to refer to a person in Mary because she was giving birth of its kind to a person. By her womb, a new Adam was born and a new creation along with him. Thus, she is the Mother of God, the New Temple, and the Mother of the New Creation which is the Church.

In the Old Testament, what were overshadowed by God were inanimate objects which were lifeless and thus unable for consent or participation. They were objects and edifices.

In the New Testament, the Word was applied to three persons. Mary. She was first because of Jesus. Second is Jesus himself and third is The Disciples at pentecost.

From this trajectory of the set of people overshadowed by the Spirit, we can see that what God has began in the Creation Story, he brings to completion in the Church.

What God has sanctified as his dwelling place, became a dwelling person.

What has come to be a landless God only had the womb of Mary for his dwelling. Yet this womb is the womb of a woman overshadowed by the Spirit. This womb, may not be a land for the God without land, but this womb is seedbed for the New Creation; the prototype of which is Christ. This womb is fullness of being a Temple. It is the fullness of being a Tabernacle because it was God’s dwelling. She was the God bearer.

The word Overshadow is interesting because it comes from two Greek words epi (shadow) and kaizo which means to block out something. It could mean:

1. An aphorism for procreation. Not sexual intercourse but simply to make pregnant.

2. To block, to cover, to conceal. It is suggestive of the act of preservation or protection from light. Shadow or (Epi) is the absence of light. Which light? Not all light came from God. The Angel of light is Lucifer of the prince of evil. The enemy of God and the People of God. The Book of Isaiah describes the devil as “morning star falling from heaven.” (Isaiah 14:12). The Image of falling star is also used in Luke 10:18 whereby Jesus describes “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven.”

May be this is what God had blocked Mary from, the light of sinfulness, the light of pride, the light of promiscuity, the light of power. In this sense, God preserved Mary from sin, overshadowed her from the light that was Satan.

However, the Morning Star which now is being attributed to Mary is one that never sets. Why? Because in the Book of Revelation (12:1, 2 & 5), a Woman of the Apocalypse is being described: And there appeared a great wonder in heaven; a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars.

Here is where the star symbol applies. The twelve stars above her head apply to both the twelve patriarchs of the tribes of Israel (original people of God), and the twelve apostles (renewed people of God) or the Church.

May be this is the context upon which Mary mentioned in Magnificat that God “has shown the strength of his arm and has scattered the proud in their conceit. He has cast down the mighty from their thrones and has lifted up the lowly.”(Luke 1:50-52) The pride and conceit of Luficer was compensated by the humility and obedience of Mary.

The light of pride falls while the light of humility and obedience rises and is crowned.

The message therefore, of the mystery of the Immaculate Conception is that not all light comes from God. The world may deceive us into believing that the spot light, the limelight, the light or the easy life, the instant life, the light of promise, the light of being enlightened are the only light worth seeking. (the enlightenment period).

But the question remains: Are we really enlightened? Is God causing our enlightenment? Or it is pride that is overriding (not overshadowing) the voice of God inside us?

How will we know if God was causing our lights? Our enlightenments? Our easy ways? Our smooth-sailing life? How do we know if these comes from God?

Let us take it from Mary in our Gospel today: Silence, Memory, Prayer and Discernment.

In a world that is noisy, in a world that is broken by sadness, in a world that everyone is willing to speak, in a world where everyone thinks he or she right, let us be silent like Mary. A Woman of calmness and peace. A woman of prayer. A woman of faith. A woman of discernment. A woman of question. A woman of memory. A woman of obedience.

Do not go back to the world or people which God saved you from. God has overshadowed you and has protected you from sin, from harm, and from all dangers. Never venture to go back to your old ways.

Once God enlightens us, be enlightenment for one another.