Being face to face is the beginning of relationship with one another, with God. Moses had no personal relationship with God until the Holy One got his attention in the burning bush (Ex. 3:1-6). God is always the initiator in our interactions. Even when we think we are the ones searching for God, it is the Beloved who has inspired our desire to know God. To have relationships with others, we must spend time with them to get to know what is important to them, what makes them happy, what saddens them, what disturbs them. We know that is true in our relationships with our friends, as well as our family. It is also true in our relationship with the Divine. If we want our relationship with God to grow stronger, deeper, it behooves us to set aside time in our day when we will be undisturbed to focus our attention on the Beloved. We might merely sit in silence leaving what happens up to God; or we might read scripture--perhaps the daily lectionary in the Book of Common Prayer—or some other spiritual classic and see what resonates in our heart; or we might praise the Holy One with music or dance. What we do doesn’t matter so much as being with God face to face, letting the distractions of daily life go for a time.

Being face to face with another is also the beginning of reconciliation of any difficulty in a relationship. So long as we avoid, ignore, walk away from the other, the relationship will founder; the wounds will fester and grow. Since no relationship runs smoothly all the time, it is good to remember the importance of being face to face to work on the relationship, to restore frazzled feelings, to reconcile with the other. Once we can accept the others as they are, let go of our expectations for the others to be like us, forgive those who wound us as the Beloved forgives us for all the ways we separate ourselves from God, and meet one another face to face, we can trust reconciliation to come with Love.

Christ Jesus calls us to love God, one another, even our enemies. Face to face with the other is the pathway of Love.