Readings: Genesis 9:8-17; 1Peter 3: 18-22; Mark 9:1-15
When I use the word `journey` I automatically think of, and identify with, those great words of Morris West in his book entitled `A View From the Ridge`.

I feel like a climber who, after a long and arduous ascent, has reached the high ridge of the range and now pauses to draw breath and get his courage up for the last stage of the journey.

When I look back, I see a long, gradual slope, with all its features plain: the dark forests, the green pastures, the rocky outcrops, the flashing streams, the swamps, the dangerous defiles. The landscape is silent and empty, and I wonder what happened to other survivors. I wonder too why I have been spared to stand in this high place and contemplate my yesterdays.

I am surprised that the moment is so calm. Then I remember that what I see is all gained ground. It can never be disputed again, but nor can I ever again go back to it. I cannot even stay here in the momentary, windless calm of this high place. The pilgrimage is not over yet.

Before me the land falls steeply into a dark valley . . . I have always known that one day I would have to go down, alone into the dark valley, and make my own discovery of what lies on the other side.

Strange as it may seem, I am not afraid. I have accepted long since that a confession of faith is a confession of not knowing . . .

And then some great words that I identify with
. . . I do not seek to impose my opinions on you. God forbid! I seek only to share my thoughts as a Christian before I step down into the silence of the dark valley.

Life as a journey! Let me then make some comments about the journey to the ridge, and I do so in the belief that our society has lost its way and we desperately need a map to enable us to find the ascending reference points, to find our way through the deserts, the jungles and the mountain paths and streams.

The most detailed map I have ever struck is Ken Wilber`s `Integral Operating System` – Integral meaning whole or complete, and Operating System being that which allows software programs to operate. As Wilber says `If you are running any software in your life such as business, work, play or relationships you want the best operating system you can find. ` (1} For those of you who are computer savvy, think of it in terms of an operating system enabling you to use software to index your activities and allow each of the activities of business, art, politics, ecology etc to talk to each other. If you are computer illiterate, think of it in terms of a highly detailed map which you unfold. Either way we are going to need something to help us find our way to the heights. We are going to need an Integral Operating System or a detailed map. It matters not which you choose. Either way it is a means by which to undertake the journey. Life is a journey and we need a map to guide us.

Let me then share with you a map of the journey that I have found helpful– and then finish with the four word statement that sums up the metaphor of life as a journey and relates to our gathering here today and every Sunday. Don`t be over concerned if you find what I am about to say confusing. Most of it is confusing! At the end, however, there will be a four word statement that will make it all clear and which I guarantee you will not forget.

Let me start by asserting that life really is a journey. It is the nature of life, it is the nature of reality that everything grows and develops and changes. This is what evolution is about. We are evolving. Life consists of stages. And here is the staggering thing if we can grasp it: the nature of the entire cosmos is the nature of our own being and becoming. It is the nature of life. It is the nature of reality. We are a part of the cosmos.

What is the nature of the journey, of this growth and development? What are the milestones on the ascending path to the ridge? What are the different levels or stages of development?

It depends, of course whom you read. I rarely have an original thought and the components of the map I will outline are based on ideas of people much cleverer than I, people such as Gilligan, Graves, Loevinger, Piaget, Maslow, Kegan, Wilber etc . The names of some of their books give a good idea of what we are dealing with here, for example, Robert Kegan: `The Evolving Self. Problems and Process in Human Development`; Susan Cook-Greuter: `Greater Maps for Living`. I understand about five percent of what they are writing and find myself longing for simplicity, notwithstanding the old saying `Seek simplicity – and distrust It!`

Recognising this and keeping it always in mind, let me then try and show you a map which I have found helpful. The first thing to do is to fix the co-ordinates.


(To enlarge image, click on the page, hold down CTRL key and press +)

For the horizontal base line I have found Wilber`s `Life`s Questions` most helpful.

The base line co-ordinates are referred to as the `States of Consciousness`, but because the nature of consciousness is not readily understood at this time I have detailed them as `Aspects of Human Existence`- They are life as we experience it.

The vertical co-ordinates are referred to as `Stages of Consciousness`, (which in the interests of avoiding argument, I have detailed as `Levels of Human Experience`) The idea of stages can best be understood by looking at child development. An infant at birth is centred on survival. He or she has an identity but it is undeveloped. Their awareness is basically self absorbed. This is the `me` stage and is centred on survival. The child as it grows becomes aware of others and starts to relate to them, parents first, then extended family and then the tribe. This is the `me` to `us` stage. The next stage is when he or she becomes aware of others beyond the tribe and of a different culture. This is the `all of us` stage – the stage where he identifies with the commonwealth of all humanity.

The base line co-ordinates detail the great questions of life

Cognitive -What am I aware of?
Values - What is significant for me ?
Emotional - How do I feel about this?
Moral - What should I do?
Interpersonal - How should we interact?
Needs - What do I need?
Aesthetic - What is attractive to me?
Self - Who am I?
Spiritual - What is of ultimate concern?

How do we detail the Stages of Consciousness? There are a number of ways. One is egocentric, ethnocentric, worldcentric and Cosmocentric. Another is preconventional, conventional and postconventional. And yet another: Body, Mind and Spirit - not one of my favourites because it isolates the spiritual and introduces a sense of hubris regarding the religious.
In the end I adapted the Spiral Dynamics of Graves and Beck and Cowan. This not only gives more detail about the different stages but introduces a number of extra factors such as the fact that the progression to the different stages is not always clear and simple. Graves indicates this by introducing a spiral. I prefer a series of interconnected circles with the distinct possibility to go around and around in a circle defending it against all others. It is also possible to move to the next stage – and when you do you take with you all the elements of the stage from which you move. This is what is meant by Transcend and Include. The other thing that I find instructive about spiral dynamics is that it maintains you cannot jump stages. The best you can do is to move through the stage as quickly as possible - something we should recognise in trying to turn ethnic Muslim states into democratic societies.

Let me wrap up the map idea by saying that I never cease to wonder at the human story - our slow evolving from matter – and that you and I are not only part of the story but have the opportunity of contributing to it. How it all began and where we are now on the journey is of interest to me but the compelling interest is `to where are we going?` Creation is not in the past. It is in the future and we are called to love it into being. This to me is what life is about, what Jesus was about, what God is about. Do I believe in God? You may as well ask `Do I believe in life?` It isn`t about believing. It is about being! It is about being a significant part of the big picture. God isn`t a being outside the process of life. God is the energising spirit of life. God as Paul Tillich said fifty years ago, is the `ground of our being`. God is the energy sustaining everything in being. God is the empowering process of life. Meister Eckhart said it centuries ago. `Birthing is the generic activity of God.` – the process of birth, death and new life, the pattern of life, the evolution of life to which we contribute. We die so that others can live. We return to the elements and are no more or no less than we were before our earthly life. We are a part of the whole and always so. The nature of the cosmos is the nature of our own being!

Enough! Indeed, more than enough! At this point let us fold up the map. One could go on forever considering the maps – so much so that one never undertakes the journey. The map and the journey are not the same and we need to be wary of considering the map so much that we never undertake the journey. On the other hand we do not want to undertake the journey with an inaccurate map. Fortunately there is a way out of this quandary and here we come to what I promised - a four word statement that enables us to get moving on the journey of life. You may have got lost in the diagrams of growth and development. It is of no consequence. Providing you are awake and alert now you will hear the punch line, the summary, the peroration, the point to which everything I have said is proceeding.

`Jesus is our GPS`
Jesus points to and embodies the growth inherent in the human species. Jesus is the `Cosmos come to Consciousness`. Life is a journey and Jesus is our GPS. And that is why we meet here Sunday by Sunday: to acknowledge the centrality of Jesus of Nazareth and to remember his words: `My goal is that you might have life and have it in all its fullness.`

I find the GPS an extraordinary thing in that at any moment radio beams from four of 24 Satellites can be measured to determine precisely where we are on earth. The GPS is for me a matter of awe and wonder.
It is also very forgiving. When we first used one in Tasmania some two years ago we got confused and often took the wrong road whereupon the voice on the GPS would gently say `Recalculating`. It was so personal that it evoked from Marg the response of `Sorry Lucy`. I would suggest that these two characteristics of our GPS are symbolic of Jesus as our GPS – Jesus as an event of wonder and very forgiving.

I heard last week of an aboriginal guy in Roebourne who is giving Twiggy Forrest a run for his money. His name is Michael Woodley and his concern is that the aboriginal concept of `country` be not overlooked in the scramble for wealth. The concept of country is the recognition that we are a part of nature – as they put it: `the earth is our mother`. He is not against development and is in fact negotiating with Rio Tinto. In extolling the virtues of `country` he said, `We aborigines have it all – except the Jesus fella.` A profound statement if ever I have heard one!

Today is the first Sunday in Lent – the period of Jesus` journey that leads up to Easter, the time when the religious people of the day rid themselves of the dreamer. Rather than deal with the dreamer they got rid of him – at least they thought that they did! But the dream of life in all its fullness continues, and we remember this as we make our offering and listen to one of my favourite songs: `The Impossible Dream` - `Impossible` not in the sense of it being impossible but in the sense that life as we know it today is but a pale shadow of what it is intended to be, of what it could be.