esson 10: The Round Table

  travel until sundown. Cresting a hill, I see below the greatest stone circle of them all. I skip down the hill to dance with joy in the full moon-lighted center. Round and round I spin and jump, waving my arms wildly in the air. I finally come to rest in the center and see that there are 36 stones and 36 doorways--one for each ten degrees of the circle, one for each year of my life. And I see that each year has its *own* cycle, which are just small parts of the bigger cycle which is my life, which is just a small part of the bigger cycle, &c., &c., &c.

   I walk around just inside the perimeter, observing these microcosmic cycles through the doorways. When I'm finished, I turn to the center and see a round table is standing there now. Thirteen are seated there, and I think of my family's tradition/superstition of not seating 13 at table. Those here are all men, and one really stands out, having a certain glow about him. He takes some bread and a cup, giving thanks over them, then, passing them around the table, he says:

"This means my body, which is to be given in your behalf. This cup means the new covenant by virtue of my blood, which is to be poured out in your behalf. Keep on sharing the bread and the wine, in remembrance of me."¹

   Since the beginning of time, mankind has been sold into the slavery of sin and death. But here is the one who can balance out the scales, the "Second Adam" who can give what the first Adam lost--one perfect life--for the whole world. The wages of sin is death, but if one *without sin* willing sacrifices his life, he's paid the price for us all, to ransom us from the grave.² Soon he will come, riding on a white horse, like a knight in shining armor, and right the world's biggest wrong, obliterating Evil and Death. I don't think he'll be so gentle and meek the next time he comes!

   I gaze at the cup being shared by the twelve, and consider the irony of his complaint in his last moments: "I thirst."³ The cup begins to rise into the air. Against the backdrop of the sky, it appears to be encircled by stars. Music, like choirs of angels:

"Come, all who are toiling, and I will refresh you.

Drink from this cup, and never thirst again.

The living waters I will give you will become in you a fountain,

A spring imparting everlasting Life."

   The cup ascends until it is out of sight. The moon rises over the hills, and I see silhouetted against its light a bird--a merlin--flying in my direction. He soars once around the stone circle, then flies to the center and drops a fish! It's a nice big trout, and I make a fire and cook it up, thinking all the while about water, and life, and the 'brain food' I need in this Sword Realm.

1) Today is Passover/Last Supper. {back}

2) The two greatest expressions of Love made manifest: to give one's only-begotten son as a sacrifice, and to surrender one's life for another. {back}

3) "Thirst! Not the thirst of the throat, though that be wildest and worst of pangs which smote alone into the heart of Christ, wringing that one cry from his throat: 'I thirst.'" {back}