work & dreams

It’s transition time again! I’m starting a physio job (temporary!) soon so I’m finishing in the wee nursing home I’ve been working in. Besides wrecking my back, it’s been good & I have enjoyed being able to help take care of people well. Definitely have had a sense of satisfaction in it for which I’m thankful and I might be back depending on physio job outlook! For now, I'm excited to start my first physio job! :)

I’ve been reading a few different books recently... one of them, Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places, was recommended to me by a friend on a climb up Ben Nevis in the summer, but I’ve only just got around to reading it. It has great insights as to how what we believe can shape everyday life... the glorious outworking of faith in creation, history & community. A couple quotes...
“God’s great love and purposes for us are all worked out in messes in our kitchens and backyards, in storms and sins, blue skies, the daily work and dreams of our common lives. God works with us as we are and not as we should be or think we should be. God deals with us where we are and not where we would like to be...” p75

Peterson also talks about the idea of ordinary life lived in light of eternity but I found the way he explained this so helpful:
“...ordinary time... is a gift through which we participate in the present and daily work of God... end time influences present, ordinary time, not by diminishing it or denigrating it but by charging it, filling it with purpose and significance. The end time is not a future we wait for but the gift of the fullness of time that we receive in adoration and obedience as it flows into the present...”

Today, I’m thankful for purpose in the daily work and dreams of my common life...

no ebb, chill or change...

O love that wilt not let me go
I rest my weary soul in Thee
I give Thee back the life I owe
That in Thine ocean depth its flow
May richer, fuller be.
-George Matheson

"Beloved, nothing shall take the love of Christ from you, or separate you from it. It does not ebb with the ebbing of your feelings; it does not chill with the chill of your affections; it does not change with the changing scenes and circumstances of your life." -Octavius Winslow

I'm loving the changing colours of the trees these days... even if it is bringing with it the cold and the darker evenings. But in this time of transition for me, I am reminded of the never-changing love of God.

happenings and happiness

It’s been an amazing summer and I haven’t even left this wee island... I feel like it might be coming to an end soon but yet it’s just the beginning of all that’s next, which is also exciting. But the sun is still shining today which makes me think maybe summer is going to hang around for a while longer.

As I sit here typing, I'm realising I’ve kind of missed this wee venting space actually.

For those of you who want an update, I have graduated and for now I’m staying in Belfast. I’m on the hunt for a physio job but actually not too stressed about when that might appear. In the meantime, I’m starting work soon in a wee nursing home that I’ve worked in before. It’ll pay rent, keep me semi-connected to the caring/healthcare world, get me off the dole and keep me sane all of which can only be good things :)

I feel like I’ve seen more of Northern Ireland this summer than ever... random day trips (in between job hunting!) are so much more appealing with Sam and a convertible. Can you tell I’m in a good mood today? I am. For various reasons:
1. Just went for an hour long run (endorphins!) and didn’t die
2. I have a faithful God
3. I have another few weeks to chill, read, run, climb ben nevis & hang out with people until my job starts (blame the police checks...)
4. The sun is shining
5. I’m in love.

See, i’m not sure whether a return to blogging when I’m in this kind of mood will be good for the world. I suppose it’s to balance all those slightly depressed introspective blog/quotes I’ve posted over the last few years :)

Just to fulfil my quote quota for the day...
“There is a kind of happiness and wonder that makes you serious. It is too good to waste on jokes.” –CS Lewis, The Last Battle

one that sings

The Real Work by Wendell Berry

It may be that when we no longer know what to do
we have come to our real work,

and that when we no longer know which way to go
we have come to our real journey.

The mind that is not baffled is not employed.

The impeded stream is the one that sings.

_____________
this poem seemed kind of relevant to me today. on another note, i'm thinking about making a blogging comeback.... hmm....

hope's daughters

"Hope has two beautiful daughters; their names are anger and courage. Anger at the way things are, and courage to see that they do not remain as they are."
-St Augustine (HT: peter)

the promise

"The Christian faith, as I understand it, is not primarily a matter of signing on for the proposition that there exists a Supreme Being, but the kind of commitment made manifest by a human being at the end of his tether, foundering in darkness, pain and bewilderment, who nevertheless remains faithful to the promise of transformative love."
-Terry Eagleton, Reason, Faith & Revolution

update

I feel like I owe an explanation as to why I dropped off the blogging world for a few weeks... first, I'm no longer needing to blog for revision procrastination.... as no more revision :) and i met a boy... i think that sums it up. But I'll be back... unemployment = lots of thinking/reading time in between filling in delightful application forms...

realm beyond words

"Not everything has a name. Some things lead us into the realm beyond words... it is like that small mirror in the fairy tales – you glance in it and what you see is not yourself; for an instant you glimpse the Inaccessible, where no horse or magic carpet can take you. And the soul cries out for it." -Solzhenitsyn, Nobel lecture 1970

bright sunshiny day...

Waking up in Castlewellan Castle on Sunday morning (looking out the window at the breathtaking sunshine on the Mournes) was followed by great teaching on grace, good craic and a lovely drive back to Belfast. I crashed a sunny & chilled BBQ in the afternoon (complete with badminton and my fabulous wee nephew!).

Then I got a chance to hear the legendary journalist John Pilger being interviewed by William Crawley in downtown Belfast. Very interesting discussions - I seriously could have sat and listened to him all day.... just an incredible amount of experience and understanding of the historical/political dynamics in different parts of the world (obviously from his perspective, but is a very interesting one!) He’s deeply cynical about a lot of things, including the future of independent journalism, Obama, possibility of resolution of Israeli/Palestinian conflict, the UN in its current form etc. He was also very critical of British and US foreign policy, while being optimistic about developments in South America. He said he was most proud (in a humble way I think) of keeping going over his long career, and also having the chance to give a voice to people who needed one. Very inspiring guy. One quote of his (not from last night, although he did say this indirectly):
“It is not enough for journalists to see themselves as mere messengers without understanding the hidden agendas of the message and myths that surround it.”

Followed up by spontaneous chat over good coffee.... you could say it was the perfect day.... And the sun is STILL shining :)

fool's paradise?

I’ve been thinking about travel recently... probably due to future decisions but also from various things I’ve read in the last few weeks on blogs/in books:

Chesterton: “He who travels to be amused, or to get somewhat which he does not carry, travels away from himself, and grows old even in youth among old things... Travelling is a fool's paradise.”

Emerson: “Our first journeys discover to us the indifference of places. At home I dream that at Naples, at Rome, I can be intoxicated with beauty, and lose my sadness. I pack my trunk, embrace my friends, embark on the sea, and at last wake up in Naples, and there beside me is the stern fact, the sad self, unrelenting, identical, that I fled from... But the rage of travelling is a symptom of a deeper unsoundness affecting the whole intellectual action. The intellect is vagabond, and our system of education fosters restlessness. Our minds travel when our bodies are forced to stay at home.”

Andrew Sullivan (who quoted the guys above) puts it this way: “Seeking new superficialities at the expense of familiar depths is a neurosis, not an adventure.”

While I understand where these writers are coming from, reading these quotes just goes against everything I thought growing up. Travel is sort of in my blood and my philosophy is usually with Augustine who said: “The world is a book and those who do not travel read only a page.” I have treasured the opportunity to live overseas and travel some... but I think especially in the first few years I was back in Northern Ireland, I had a sense that people who had never been out of Northern Ireland could never begin to understand me or the world; looking back it probably was me that was being narrow-minded by putting people in boxes. I’ve come to realise it’s more about whether people think about the world/things outside themselves rather than whether or not they’ve travelled. And to be honest, short-term teams and sun holidays often do little to broaden horizons – (although seemingly living somewhere else can make an impact on creativity).

Then I read this yesterday:
“I’m sure that some people serve the Lord well as they buzz around the world for six months at a time. And I’m sure some young folks are making a difference for Christ as they float from job to job and place to place. But I’m equally certain that many of these same individuals are actually making self-centred decisions in the name of experience, cultural diversity, and sometimes, I hate to say it, under the guise of short-term missions.... My fear is that of all the choices people face today, the one they rarely consider is, “How can I serve most effectively and fruitfully in the local church?” I wonder if the abundance of opportunities to explore today is doing less to help make well-rounded disciples of Christ and more to help Christians avoid long-term responsibility and have less long-term impact.”
P36 Just do something, Kevin DeYoung

Anyway, food for thought. Don’t think the itchy feet will ever go away but just trying to make a case to myself for the other side of the argument...

laughter and forgetting

Just finished an interesting book that has so many quotes that I want to try and get my head around. Milan Kundera's The Book of Laughter and Forgetting sounds lovely and rosy... but most of it is anything but. I've been thinking about this quote...

“Graphomania (a mania for writing books) inevitably takes on epidemic proportions when a society develops to the point of creating three basic conditions:
(1) An elevated level of general well-being, which allows people to devote themselves to useless activities;
(2) A high degree of social atomization and, as a consequence, a general isolation of individuals;
(3) The absence of dramatic social changes in the nation’s internal life....
But by a backlash, the effect affects the cause. General isolation breeds graphomania, and generalized graphomania in turn intensifies and worsens isolation. The invention of printing formerly enabled people to understand one another. In the era of universal graphomania, the writing of books has an opposite meaning: everyone surrounded by his own words as by a wall of mirrors, which allows no voice to filter through from outside.” P127

Could you substitute the writing books with writing blogs?? Useless activities? Isolation? Wall of mirrors?

Although it is talking about life in communist Prague, reading the following cynical quotes I couldn’t help thinking about the conversations in Irish/UK politics at the minute about the abuse and expenses scandals...

“...like all political parties, like all peoples, like mankind...they shout that they want to shape a better future, but it’s not true. The future is only an indifferent void no one cares about, but the past is filled with life and its countenance is irritating, repellent, wounding, to the point that we want to destroy or repaint it. We want to be masters of the future only for the power to change the past.” P30
“The struggle of a man again power is the struggle of the memory against forgetting.” P4

Anyway, not sure if I’m recommending the book (as slightly disturbing) but definitely thought-provoking.

end of an era

So, it’s the end of an era. Thankfully. I endured, I mean enjoyed one last night of the Bot... the centre of the Belfast student world (and you thought it was a university?), along with the bizarre conversations you have when your friends are wasted. I felt like I wanted to go and just see my class people one last time before we all scatter/emigrate/etc. The night began at a mad house party in the notorious Holylands (where council people arrived mid-party to tell us to shut up – rightly so...). And then to Lavery’s (?!) to hear a culchie band from Co. Tyrone who are friends of friends... not my cup of tea but was amusing! Then to the Bot where it was lovely to see everyone, but you had to shout in each other’s ears or else be content with the smile and nod approach... although to be fair, we all were saying the same thing ie: good to be done, what are you doing next (no idea) etc, so you could get away with the nod/smile even if you couldn’t hear!!! I lost my voice in the process though. Give me a quiet pub any day. Maybe I’m just getting old. Then about 12ish, a friend and I decided to head to another classmate’s house for a couple hours to catch the end of a quiet barbeque, beer and chat with a random mix of interesting people – much more my cup of tea. It was a good, celebratory night in the end, even though I started out dreading the Bot part - it is still a whole different culture that I have never come to properly appreciate and don’t think I ever will but sometimes when in Rome and all that....

I have made a few good friends that I hope I can keep. Sometimes friendships are easy when you see people most days for four years.

And so to the start of summer, the month of research for one of my lecturers in June (not quite away from the university yet, but at least it’s paid!) graduation no2 and then to whatever’s next!

In the short term, 2 books just arrived in the post and Donegal is beckoning... not a bad start to the rest of my life.

prayer is...

the soul in paraphrase, heart in pilgrimage.
(George Herbert)

I've been mulling over this line for a couple weeks and I love the imagery both ideas portray... one of imperfect, spontaneous even rambling expression, trying to communicate something of our worship, desires and confusion to our Creator. The other of journeying with purpose (and often with others) - looking back along the road with tired feet and weary minds, yet with wonder and thankfulness; looking forward with humility and a sense of dependence for each step, seeking guidance and grace along the way....

ordinary sunday...

"Sometimes I have loved the peacefulness of an ordinary Sunday. It is like standing in a newly planted garden after a warm rain. You can feel the silent and invisible life. All it needs from you is that you take care not to trample on it." (Gilead)

emotions: positive v negative

I found this Atlantic article on happiness so interesting.... (thankfully the conclusions are mostly not easy pat answers... ie: we're complicated!!) but here's one part of it:

“...positive emotions make us more vulnerable than negative ones. One reason is that they’re future-oriented. Fear and sadness have immediate payoffs—protecting us from attack or attracting resources at times of distress. Gratitude and joy, over time, will yield better health and deeper connections—but in the short term actually put us at risk. That’s because, while negative emotions tend to be insulating, positive emotions expose us to the common elements of rejection and heartbreak.”

It makes me think of two other thoughts:

"Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket--safe, dark, motionless, airless--it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable." CS Lewis

And from Foy Vance’s Two Shades of Hope...
“Now hope deals the hardest blows
Yet I cannot help myself but hope”

For some reason I’m more hopeful these days... I think it’s because I’m just about to enter a new chapter of life, which fits with what the article says about positive emotions being more ‘future-oriented’... but it does sometimes seem wonderful and terrifying in equal proportions.

random reminiscing

I had a lovely dinner last night with 6 random people from my Queen’s days... random but in a good way! It’d been five years (almost to the day) since I’d talked at any length to most of them so we had a proper catch up and put the world to right.... everything from cheesy jokes and legendary quotes... to conversations about the beauty/struggle of ‘doing life’ with the people around us. In a letter my friend sent organising the dinner, she said it was to “mark these past five years... and freely look ahead with hope and faith for the next five years, longing for more of what God has for us all and this land...”

We’ve all gone in different directions, from designing sewage works, to teaching physics, to training to be a minister, to the Belfast music scene, to Newry solicitor, to getting married/engaged, to journalism, Kansas and back again, (to *ahem* still being a student)... but it was great to just touch base, even if it was a bit of an unlikely group of people round a dinner table!

Here’s to the next five :)

patches of sunlight

"We - or at least I - shall not be able to adore God on the highest occasions if we have learned no habit of doing so on the lowest. At best, our faith and reason will tell us that He is adorable, but we shall not have found Him so, not have 'tasted and seen'. Any patch of sunlight in a wood will show you something about the sun which you could never get from reading books on astronomy. These pure and spontaneous pleasures are 'patches of Godlight' in the woods of our experience."

CS Lewis, Prayer: Letters to Malcolm Ch17

(Ok, so I know just posting a quote is blatant lazy blogging... but I love them... and YAY for sunshine and experiences in life to taste and see that He is good...)

the birth and death of the day

So my ticket has just arrived in the post! Explosions in the sky, Sept 6. Don’t ask me why I bought a ticket for something in September when I have no idea where I’ll be by then. Part of me doesn’t like the idea of not knowing and so maybe having a date in the diary makes the next few months less daunting.

Anyway, I’m excited already.... Wahey! I blogged about them 2 years ago, but it’s taken them a while to make it to Belfast. Mousemutiny (who says they’re amazing live) says she might even come from texas for it... (prettyplease?)...

If you haven’t heard of them, go listen on spotify. What’s not to love?

2 song titles seem appropriate today....
The long spring and With tired eyes, tired minds, tired souls we slept.

But my two favourites at present:
The Birth and Death of the Day & Your Hand in Mine

rough edges

One of the things I don’t like about blogging is that I love handwritten things (except essays in exams and the scrawl in hospital notes...) but I love the idiosyncrasies and variety in handwriting. A few years ago I started ‘journalling’ of sorts on the computer... but I had to return to the proper journal and pen again... it just seemed too clinical or something.

For comparison’s sake, I’ve typed half the quote below, and written out the other half... does handwriting seem more real, more personal, less aloof, less predictable even if less convenient? Maybe like Christianity.*

"...the feebleness of all those watered versions of Christianity which leave out all the darker elements and try to establish a religion of pure consolation. No real belief in the watered versions can last. Bemused and besotted as we are, we still dimly know at heart that nothing which is at all times and in every way agreeable to us can have objective reality. CS Lewis, Prayer: Letters to Malcolm Ch14

*While this analogy makes sense in my head, it’s a bit random...and it’s been a long day, so if the paragraph above doesn’t make sense after you’ve read the quote, just ignore it and take what you want from the quote itself!

true

grace, community - these two words keep coming up in things I’m reading...

“There is in true grace an infinite circle: a man by thirsting receives, and receiving, thirsts for more.” Thomas Shepard

“In true community we are windows constantly offering each other new views on the mystery of God’s presence in our lives.” Henri Nouwen

unremembered skies

This got me thinking about memory/memories... In my psychology degree (which seems so long ago now), I had whole module on cognition that looked at all the processes of memory and recall, but looking back it all seemed a little reductionist.

Marilynne Robinson writes that ‘memory is the sense of loss, and loss pulls us after it’.
Sometimes that seems true for me about my memories of Nigeria. However good the memories are, they are sometimes tinged with a sense of loss and many painful goodbyes. Sometimes I think that many of my memories (especially as a child) are shaped by photos, but we usually don’t take photos of the depressing days, so does this give an inaccurate record of what we remember?

This is one of my favourite family photos from our early days in the south of Nigeria. It must have been a Sunday because in those days my sister and I only wore dresses (and shoes for that matter) on a Sunday. My dad’s so skinny too... when we returned from Nigeria after the first two years my aunt cried when she saw my dad because he was so thin! Guess I blinked. And yes, I looked like a boy... blame it on my mum’s haircutting... she says it was so short because of the heat, but seriously, I was called ‘fine boy’ in the market for about 3 years of my life... or else I needed my ears pierced like all other Nigerian baby girls...
--
Or is it the forgetting, but not wanting to that brings the sense of loss? Dylan Thomas writes...

"My tears are like the quiet drift

Of petals from some magic rose;

And all my grief flows from the rift

Of unremembered skies and snows."

And Robinson again on remembering people we love...
“There is so little to remember of anyone – an anecdote, a conversation at a table. But every memory is turned over and over again, every word, however chance, written in the heart in the hope that memory will fulfill itself, and become flesh, and that the wanderers will find a way home, and the perished, whose lack we always feel, will step through the door finally and stroke our hair with dreaming habitual fondness not having meant to keep us waiting long.”

Anyway, back to the short term memory cramming...

in dark and empty skies

The Van Morrison refrain at the end of Foy’s gig was “oh no, never let the spirit die” ... it made me think of a lyrics my pastor quoted in a sermon a couple of weeks ago... can’t even remember what point he was making, although I think it was in relation to the hope / resurrection, but all I wrote down were these words from this Dylan song...

“Oh, the tree of life is growing
Where the spirit never dies
And the bright light of salvation shines
In dark and empty skies”

so be there in the moment

Great gig last night. Good company (including chatting to nelly and a few others I haven't seen in ages... seriously though, I wonder if Foy knows he's got so many christian groupies?!) and of course, great music. Lowly Knights songs are growers... so definitely liked them even more last night. My favourite line for some reason is 'you can tell a man by the way he lifts his hands...'

Foy was fabulous as always... so good live; his cd doesn’t do justice to the one-man-wonder's sound (singing into his guitar for the reverberation being a highlight!). Introducing two shades of hope, he said that the greatest legacy his dad gave him was hope. And from two of his newer songs, these lines stood out for me...

“And when you run, far from my eyes, then I will come, in dead of night
But I wont speak, till morning light, I’ll be the song, just be the song”

and

“But I showed you that every mark you made, painted hearts and bleeding scars, is something that you needed to create, so be there in the moment...
Blood gets on the canvas, stains you cannot hide, are the truest indication of what’s going on inside, so be there in the moment”

And then ending with a bit of belfast slagging (as only someone who truly loves the place can) and the chorus of Van Morrison's Spirit... classic. All round great night.

One another note, I’m having slight withdrawal symptoms from not running a leg of the Belfast marathon today (first time in about 5 years I haven’t!). Although standing and then running in the cold / rain with 27,000 others maybe doesn’t sound that appealing... but then anything would be more appealing than revision...

true grace

"True grace is not an inactive thing; there is nothing in heaven or earth of a more active nature; for it is life itself, and the most active kind of life, even spiritual and divine life. It is no barren thing; there is nothing in the universe that in its nature has a greater tendency to fruit. Godliness in the heart has as direct a relation to practice as a fountain has to a stream, or as the luminous nature of the sun has to beams sent forth, or as life has to breathing or the beating of the pulse or any other vital act; or as a habit or principle of action has to action; for it is the very nature and notion of grace, that it is a principle of action or practice."

Jonathan Edwards
Religious Affections p320

providence

One of the slightly random things about my childhood (believe me, there are a few) was that I grew up learning the Heidelberg Catechism... For about three years (age 11-13ish), I had to meet on Tuesday afternoons and discuss reformed theology and church history with a few other students from the reformed tradition and recite off our catechism answers... it was mostly with dutch reformed missionary kids. I guess it was as close to presbyterian as my parents could find in nigeria! I have to say I’m not sure if I appreciated it at the time; looking back though, I wish I had maybe paid more attention. I’ve forgotten most of the answers now, except the classic Q/A 1 which I love.... But I like this one too...

Q & A 27
Q. What do you understand by the providence of God?
A. Providence is
the almighty and ever present power of God^1
by which he upholds, as with his hand,
heaven
and earth
and all creatures,^2
and so rules them that
leaf and blade,
rain and drought,
fruitful and lean years,
food and drink,
health and sickness,
prosperity and poverty—^3
all things, in fact, come to us
not by chance^4
but from his fatherly hand.^5

^1 Jer. 23:23-24; Acts 17:24-28 ^2 Heb. 1:3
^3 Jer. 5:24; Acts 14:15-17; John 9:3; Prov. 22:2 ^4 Prov. 16:33 ^5 Matt. 10:29

I wonder if the catechism tradition is gone from churches or is it just that the church I’m at now probably never had that tradition in the first place, and certainly not the heidelberg...

rainbow!

clearly need a proper photo merger or wider lens for panorama view but here's the (disjointed!) rainbow out my window today :)

where'd the sunshine go?

Just went for a walk... (yes, I know I wrote a serious post about procrastination, but still have to get out of the house sometimes or I’ll go crazy!) Seriously though, what happened to the sunshine and the possibility of summer? It’s cold! I’m not sure why I’m surprised anymore...

Found an old, battered and forgotten football on my travels on the beach (aka stones & seaweed) which made my day... To be fair it probably wasn’t forgotten, just its owner probably thought it had had its day... But it was one of those ones that are just flat enough to make you feel like a genius with keep-ups. Must have kept me entertained for a good half hour... Thankful for simple pleasures on a cold, gloomy day.

But still wanting the sunny days to come back!

games and glimpses

I like these quotes from Gavin Peacock this week...

“When you score a goal you never feel more alive,” he says. “But that’s just a momentary high, it’s not reality. It’s not the truth, it’s just a glimpse of something. In the big picture my reality is my walk with God and it’s eternal and everlasting.”

“Fans join together and experience it just for a moment with the player who’s scored or with the team’s victory. We want to partake in something of beauty, of glory, to take us out and up. Our souls were made for the majesty of Christ.”

ah, champions league time again... maybe its purpose is to give us glimpses of true glory :)

come on...

light of glory

"Men have a great deal of pleasure in human knowledge, in studies of natural things; but this is nothing to that joy which arises from this divine light shining into the soul. This light gives a view of those things that are immensely the most exquisitely beautiful, and capable of delighting the eye of the understanding. This spiritual light is the dawning of the light of glory in the heart. There is nothing so powerful as this to support persons in affliction, and to give the mind peace and brightness in this stormy and dark world." Jonathan Edwards

soli deo gloria

David Brainerd on his twenty-fifth.... April 1718
"Set apart this day for fasting and prayer, to bow my soul before God for the bestowment of divine grace; especially that all my sprirtual afflictions and inward distresses might be sanctified to my soul. And endeavoured also to remember the goodness of God to me the year past, this day being my birthday. Having obtained help of God, I have hitherto lived and am now arriving at the age of twenty-five years. My soul was pained to think of my barrenness and deadness; that I have lived so little to the glory of the eternal God. I spent the day in the woods alone, and there poured out my complaint to God. Oh, that God would enable me to live to His glory for the future!"

Ok, so I haven't spent the day fasting alone in the woods... but I want to echo that last sentence on my twenty-fifth :)

season of grace

I had a constructive day today :) - back into my last (ever!?) 2 weeks of classes and the start of exam revision season - just in time for the sunshine (four days in a row!). Had a fascinating lecture today on hand injuries... accompanied by lovely pictures. One before/after case study was of a guy who had his hand completely cut off just above the wrist with a chain saw... and then a video of him taken yesterday with the hand reattached - after months of therapy he had regained amazing movement! Great stuff. (I'll spare you the photos...)

I'm determined to finish strong. I have a tendency (!) to procrastinate so really trying not to as much this time.... makes me think of a few spurgeon quotes...

"It is by little procrastinations that (wo)men ruin their souls. They have no intention to delay for years - a few months will bring the more convenient season - tomorrow if you will, they will attend to serious things; but the present hour is so occupied and altogether so unsuitable, that they beg to be excused. Like sands from an hour-glass, time passes, life is wasted by driblets, and seasons of grace lost by little slumbers...."
"The way to do a great deal is to keep on doing a little. The way to do nothing at all is to be continually resolving that you will do everything."

Don't want to lose this season of grace.

1984

I was gardening in the lovely sunshine with my granny today... or I should say pretending to garden... she is starting to need a bit of help but to be honest, I don't really have a clue so I was just following orders! She grows amazing rhubarb which she makes into jam but I stole some of it this week :)Anyway, she found loads of her old diaries and specifically this entry (23rd) when she was sorting through some things this week, so she gave it to me today!

For some reason, the fact that I was born on an easter monday feels more significant for me this year, although it's probably just because I’ve just thought about it more. Maybe it’s because I see easter monday as the day that celebrating the significance of Jesus’ death and resurrection is lived out – where what I believe seeps into the ordinary - giving purpose and hope in the mundane of a monday...

Or maybe not. But even so, i thought the diary was kinda cool... (and my brother looks like he was totally trying to steal my thunder on the 24th...)

blood river

Just started another book last night... (why do I always read more when I’m putting off doing my actual work?!). But I got sucked in! It’s called Blood River – about a journalist who decided to follow the Congo River in the same way that explorer Stanley did decades before. It’s fascinating reading. Definitely brushing up my African history which should be better than it is...

He captures the sense of adventure, the risk, the hassles and the people he meets along the way while trying to understand the complexity of the region’s painful history and current conflicts. Anyway, I haven’t finished it yet. It’s kind of depressing in many ways, for obvious reasons. It’s places like DRC that I think the world forgets about, like we’ve heard it all before. 1200 people die every day?! The author does a good job of trying to explain the link between colonialism and the present day conflicts/economics which I’m finding helpful and his descriptions definitely draw you in.

I wonder, though, if people from DRC read the book would they agree with his thoughts on it? As someone who grew up in Africa (albeit a much calmer part) I still get annoyed when people make sweeping generalisations about how things are and why unless they’ve actually lived there for a while... Even though I know the situation in DRC is pretty grim, does this kind of book just perpetuate the myth of Africa as the heart of darkness?

make a plan

loving this song today... in the midst of future dreams and the ferris wheel that is my life, the reminder to be intentional with my love...

easter sunrise

that explosive morning

"What God did for Jesus that explosive morning is what He intends to do for the whole creation. We who live in the interval between Jesus's Resurrection and the final rescue and transformation of the whole world are called to be new-creation people here and now...."
Tom Wright today in The Times

"The purpose of God in sending his son to die and rise and live and be at the right hand of God the Father was that he might restore to us the missing jewel, the jewel of worship; that we might come back and learn to do again that which we were created to do in the first place - worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness, to spend our time in awesome wonder and adoration of God, feeling it and expressing it, and letting it get into our labours and doing nothing except as an act of worship to Almighty God through his son Jesus Christ." AW Tozer

When greeting someone on Easter Sunday in Nigeria we say "Christ is risen" and the other person replies "He is risen indeed!"

we call this friday good

view towards Cave Hill above and Belfast harbour below...

the blob of white on the left nearest the water is where i live :) these are taken today from Knockagh Monument... about 10 mins drive from my house

I'm thankful for the cross

and quiet places of beauty on this day of remembrance...

we call this friday good

risk

So, this was the biggest adrenaline rush of my year from last summer in South Africa - the highest in the world. It was so much fun... Definitely a few risks involved - For one, it was in Africa! Second, I really couldn't understand the guys who were putting the straps on etc so it was a major step in just trusting random people with your life... and I did it with 10 physio students, who let's face it probably would not be recommending such things to their patients... but hey, it's something i've always wanted to do... and it was amazing. It was interesting how they moved me so my toes were over the end and then let me stand there for a while and said 'we're just going to confirm if you're 100% safe" and I'm thinking... hmm... shouldn't you have done that before you move me to the edge?! I've been thinking about risk. Not bungee jump/stupid kind or this kind:

but risk for God...

"On the far side of every risk... the love of God triumphs. This is the faith that frees us to risk for the cause of God. It is not heroism, or lust for adventure, or courageous self-reliance, or efforts to earn God's favour. It is childlike faith in the triumph of God's love - that on the other side of all our risks for the sake of righteousness, God will still be holding us..." John Piper

"...the cross is not the terrible end to an otherwise God-fearing and happy life, but it meets us at the beginning of our communion with Christ. When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die." -Dietrich Bonhoeffer

mystery of grace

"grace...the force that infuses our lives and keeps letting us off the hook. It is unearned love - the love that goes before, that greets us on the way. It's the help you receive when you have no bright ideas left, when you are empty and desperate and have discovered that your best thinking and most charming charm have failed you. Grace is the light or electricity or juice or breeze that takes you from that isolated place and puts you with others who are as startled and embarrassed and eventually grateful as you are to be there." p139

"I do not at all understand the mystery of grace--only that it meets us where we are but does not leave us where it found us." p143

Anne Lamott, Traveling Mercies

climb with me

One of the main pastimes of my childhood was climbing trees. We knew the best ones to climb and the best technique; the best fruit at the best time of year - especially mangos and guavas... although we ate them even if they weren't ripe! I have so many memories of just hanging out in trees! Probably sounds random to most people, but for us it was just so normal. One of my fellow tree-climbing friends from those days has just written a poem that sums it up... all I can say reading this is a sense of lingering nostalgia; she captures it perfectly.

--
canopy

climb
with me to the top
of the mango tree where
the fruit is
ripe and the air
smells green we seem
to hover
over earth almost in the sky
no longer bound
by gravity or sanity just
playfilled delight and bubbling glee
pretend with me as
we scramble
from branch.

to branch.
bruising knees skinning
shins chins sweet
with juice proof we’ve found
eden’s fruit eternal youth within
our grasp sap covered
hands feet bathed
in dirt revert
to ageless days
unafraid

by Jesse Kaminski

gaze of love

2 songs stuck in my head at the start of this easter week...

Oh gaze of love so melt my pride
That I may in Your house but kneel
And in my brokenness to cry
Spring worship unto Thee
(from jars of clay's Hymn... especially that first line...)
--
What Thou, my Lord, hast suffered, was all for sinners’ gain;
Mine, mine was the transgression, but Thine the deadly pain.
Lo, here I fall, my Saviour! ’Tis I deserve Thy place;
Look on me with Thy favor, vouchsafe to me Thy grace.
(from O sacred head, now wounded)
--
Both of these songs hold memories for me. One is of a friend and I bashing out this song in high school on a rickety old piano... and being fascinated by the words 'bludgeoned' and 'pirouette'. And the second, I can still visualise my brother, sister and I trying to sing 3 part harmony to this hymn on a random lazy sunday afternoon at home when I was about 12 or 13 (again on a rickety piano... they seem to be a feature...)

nothing but blue skies

It's the end of a crazy week... full of randomness, stress, banter and spring!
Random? Bowling (check out my team below)
Stress? My dissertation presentation is done and dusted. Wahey!Banter? We had our physio formal last night! (i'm getting old... i'm paying for 2am today)

Spring? Loving the sunshine and daffodils this afternoon (about time!!).... i was a little optimistic with shorts and tshirt... but nearly! Even the thought of flipflops makes me happy. Let's hope it's not fluke weather...

Still can’t believe it’s April already!

justice & mercy

A few of us from my church met up with 3 inspiring ladies on thursday night who are reaching out into their local communities via a ministry (connected with their churches) called Besom in east belfast and ballynahinch. Very thought provoking... and challenging. We are just trying to think about ideas of ways we, as a church, could maybe help meet the needs of the community around us.... it's one thing to know we want to 'do justice and love mercy' but how exactly to put that into practice as a church is more difficult.

"If justice is the heart of God's vision for his redemptive work, we are bound to see the ecclesia as the alternative society in which those who are 'called out' of oppressive societies live that vision out." Scot McKnight, A Community Called Atonement p130

"Mercy is a command of God, yet it cannot simply be a response to a demand. It must arise out of hearts made generous and gracious by an understanding and experience of God's mercy. It is the hearts of the congregation that must be melted until they ask, 'where is my neighbour?'" Tim Keller, Ministries of Mercy p135

friends

Met a few friends last night for a late dinner in town and loved being able to catch up and just share life...

“Those who lack friends to open themselves unto are cannibals of their own hearts….This communicating of a man’s self to his friends works two contrary effects; for it redoubles joys and cuts griefs in half.” (Francis Bacon, “Of Friendship,” 1625)

Yay for friends :)

by love

"I believe that the world was created and approved by love, that it subsists, coheres, and endures by love, and that, insofar as it is redeemable, it can be redeemed only by love. I believe that divine love, incarnate and indwelling in the world, summons the world always toward wholeness, which ultimately is reconciliation and atonement with God."
....
"When I said early in this essay that we live in a world that was created and exists and is redeemable by love, I did not mean to sentimentalize it. For this is also a fallen world. It involves error and disease, ignorance and partiality, sin and death. If this world is a place where we may learn of our involvement in immortal love, as I believe it is, still such learning is only possible here because that love involves us so inescapably in the limits, sufferings, and sorrows of mortality."
-Wendell Berry

for the context of these two quotes check out this speech... Health is membership.

bittersweet dichotomy

A few years ago, I had a 5 day trip to the States for a friend's wedding / to see another friend (the joy of having friends all over the world, but rarely seeing them is the bittersweet dichotomy of an mk's world). One of the random memories I have when the 3 of us met up after over 4 years apart was that we were all wearing the same kind of shoes... i'm not sure if that was to be attributed to globilisation, good taste or just pure coincidence... but I bought a new pair of shoes this week to replace the ones i've been wearing for the last 3/4 years of my life that were about to die (about time!)... and the memory made me smile. i couldn't bear to break tradition...

anyway, here's to distant friends... I wonder if the 3 of us will be on the same continent again before this pair die?

spontaneity

I loved the spontaneity of yesterday. My sister and I caught the train into town, met some cousins and other friends to watch the st patrick's day parade (which was pretty lame) and got lunch. Then we decided to head north and loads of us ended up in ballintoy harbour and white park bay and watched the amazing sunset while walking the beach, before headed to my aunt's for irish stew and guinness & a bit of craic... a proper holiday feeling, hanging out with my family & co... hard to beat :)

it's days like yesterday that i'd miss if i decide to jump ship to NZ to find a job....

naija music

A friend sent me a link for this artist... this is the kind of music that makes me feel a little homesick... in a good way... I'm loving it :) Her latest song is Jailer... but this is Asa with So Beautiful (no video, just wanted the music!). Seemingly she wrote this song below for her mother:

coffee spoons and TS Eliot

On Monday, Foy Vance was singing a cover about measuring life with coffee spoons and TS Eliot... So coffee in hand, here's a quote from the man himself... (from Choruses from the Rock, 1934)

What life have you, if you have not life together?
There is not life that is not in community...
---
When the Stranger says: "What is the meaning of this city?
Do you huddle close together because you love each other?"
What will you answer? "We all dwell together
To make money from each other"? or "This is a community"?

Maybe how this community reacts in the coming days... facing difficult political and economic hurdles... might say something about the meaning of this place.

i'll remember

I was at an amazing gig last night in the ulster hall of 'ALL northern ireland's music greats' as one guy at the end kept saying... although I think there might be a few missing! Because I didn't grow up in Belfast, it was a valuable part of my education catch up!! Despite what the picture below suggests, I actually had a good time! It must have been taken in between the long breaks when they were get organised for the radio broadcast... and I blinked... not sleeping... promise :)
For me, Foy Vance's second song was the best of the night... he's just so good live and I love his facial expressions when he sings too :) Looking forward to his next album already!

I wonder if anyone else noticed the lack of female musicians represented last night, despite the token few in the lovely Lowly Knights...

Overall, a mixture of the random and the amazing, the old and the new, the bold and the beautiful... definitely a night to remember!

save the world?

My cousin's husband is a clinical psychologist and he was speaking in belfast today.... He shared this quote which I like:

"We don't set out to save the world; we set out to wonder how other people are doing and to reflect on how our actions affect other people's hearts." -Pema Chodron

for lent

"Repentance means turning from as much as you know of your sin to give as much as you know of yourself to as much as you know of your God, and as our knowledge grows at these three points, so our practice of repentance has to be enlarged." -J.I. Packer

And from another ''borrowed" book, this time from my dad...
"If we ought ever to exercise our affections at all, then they ought to be exercised about those objects which are most worthy of them. But is there anything which Christians can find in heaven or earth so worthy to be the objects of their admiration and love, their earnest and longing desires, their hope, and their rejoicing, and their fervent zeal, as these things that are held forth to us in the gospel of Jesus Christ?" - Jonathan Edwards, Religious Affections

wayfaring

"Here we see but through a glass darkly. It does not yet appear what we shall be. We are now but as wayfaring men, wandering in the lonely night, who see dimly upon the distant mountain peak the reflection of a sun that never rises here, but which shall never set in the 'new heavens' hereafter." Horatius Bonar, Home

I love this version of Wayfaring Stranger...

thankful

I was chatting to my granny tonight and decided to ask about our family history... she pulled out a family tree that she had started and I found out the names of some of my great-grandparents - names I've never heard before. James and Hannah, Charles and Elizabeth. And great great grandfathers Robert and John.

She also pulled out a booklet I'd never seen that was dictated by my grandfather (on the other side) near the end of his life. It recounts his childhood memories, his family history, the changes in his life as a dairy farmer. This is how the booklet ends...

"I give thanks and praise to Almighty God for his love and direction over every aspect of my life and work down through the years. Now in my blindness I recall many many years of happiness and I patiently wait until my Lord says "Come up Higher". Then I shall be in Heaven for all Eternity."

Mood: thankful

love

ok, so not the valentine's day type of love but... some quotes anyway for the craic :)

"Mine is an unchanging love
higher than the heights above
deeper than the depths beneath
free and faithful, strong as death"
-William Cowper
(from Hark my soul... crap tune, great words)

"If the love of a father will not make a child delight in him, what will?" -John Owen


Whoever, therefore, thinks he understands the divine Scriptures or any part of them so that it does not build the double love of God and of our neighbour does not understand it at all.
-Augustine

have you ever seen...

I love sunsets. For 10 years of my life, we could watch the sunset at the back of our garden through the silhouette of eucalyptus trees...I miss that view. I'm getting to see loads at the minute because the sun's always setting as I'm leaving work these days and I drive mostly in the direction it's setting. In my unrealistic world I think I'd like to live on the western side of a land mass (odd that I've thought about this I know...) because sunsets over ocean are just the best combination ... ie west donegal or the western cape of south africa being my 2 experiences of this ocean/sunset combo. Anyway, here's a poem...

The Sun by Mary Oliver

Have you ever seen
anything
in your life
more wonderful

than the way the sun,
every evening,
relaxed and easy,
floats toward the horizon

and into the clouds or the hills,
or the rumpled sea, and is gone--
and how it slides again

out of the blackness,
every morning,
on the other side of the world,
like a red flower

streaming upward on its heavenly oils,
say, on a morning in early summer,
at its perfect imperial distance--
and have you ever felt for anything such wild love--
do you think there is anywhere,
in any language,
a word billowing enough
for the pleasure

that fills you,
as the sun
reaches out,
as it warms you

as you stand there,
empty-handed--
or have you too
turned from this world--

or have you too
gone crazy
for power,
for things?

living today

Getting distracted by the uncertainty of my future a wee bit today but reminded of this quote I read a few weeks ago in one of my granda's old books again...

"Instead of allowing the future and thoughts of it to grip you, talk to yourself, remind yourself of who you are and what you are, and of what Spirit is within you; and having reminded yourself of the character of the Spirit, you will be able to go steadily forward, fearing nothing, living in the present, ready for the future, with one desire only, to glorify Him who gave His all for you..."
p105 Martyn Lloyd Jones in Spiritual Depression

Also really not wanting to wish away the next few months of my life...

"For a long time it seemed to me that life... was about to begin - real life. But there was always some obstacle to be gotten through first, some unfinished business, time to still be served, a debt to be paid. Then life ... would begin. At last it dawned on my that these obstacles were my life."
Alfred Souza (HT: peter)

“The great thing, if one can, is to stop regarding all the unpleasant things as interruptions of one’s ‘own,’ or ‘real’ life. The truth is of course that what one calls the interruptions are precisely one’s real life—the life God is sending one day by day; what one calls one’s ‘real life’ is a phantom of one’s own imagination. This at least is what I see at moments of insight: but it’s hard to remember it all the time." CS Lewis

grace to abide

Another random quote that just struck a cord with me...

"The idea [many Christians] have of grace is this: that their conversion and pardon are God's work, but that now, in gratitude to God, it is their work to live as Christians and follow Jesus... No wandering one, as it was Jesus who drew thee when He spake 'Come' so it is Jesus who keeps thee when he says 'Abide'. The grace to come and the grace to abide are alike from Him alone."
-Andrew Murray

Do I only see grace as this: 'O to grace, how great a debtor, daily I'm constrained to be...'

perspective

Today, one of my wee patients (not to sound too patronising... but she was wee) on a dander up the ward with me said, ‘I’m so lucky. I could be in Darfur or the Gaza strip...’ She was referring to access to healthcare. I guess perspective on healthcare can be a great thing. I’m not sure everyone would agree on her outlook on it... but I have to say that when people complain about the NHS, I do sometimes feel like saying – go to Africa and then complain... (even though occassionally I know it's probably been me that's been complaining about workforce planning, agenda for change confusion, bureaucracy etc.. i get sucked in being a CSP rep...).

In general though, I think the same thing about university. Ok, so I’ve been frustrated by lack of efficiency/some terrible lecturers at times, but talking to friends in Nigeria and considering the alternative of endless strikes, corruption and having to play the game to get through, I’d take it any day. It’s all relative.

But then I know that comparing things to the worst rather than the best doesn’t promote a desire for excellence and it's easy to settle for the status quo...

The psychologist wanabe (who appears randomly in my mind) would refer to this article – maybe our common emotional response to the NHS is all based on our expectations and maybe we have a silver medalist complex... because we're aiming for gold.

i can only imagine

The sunset was stunning today on my drive home . . . it made me think of heaven. And a few quotes...

"I feel sometimes as if I were a child who opens its eyes on the world once and sees amazing things it will never know any names for and then it has to close its eyes again. I know this is all mere apparition compared to what awaits, but it is only lovelier for that." (Gilead p65)

but it's hope / glimpses of so much more than a sunset...

"Jesus, unlike the founder of any other major faith, holds out hope for ordinary human life. Our future is not an etheral impersonal form of consciousness. We will not float through the air but rather will eat, embrace, sing, laugh and dance in the kingdom of God, in degrees of power, glory and joy that we can't at present imagine." (The Prodigal God p104)

just another patient?

I’ve just finished a book one of my lovely doctor friends gave me for Christmas. I’ve actually been meaning to read this book for ages – it was recommended by one of my lecturers 3 years ago during an in-depth discussion about caring for patients with communication difficulties and the perspective of the patient. It’s called The Diving Bell and the Butterfly written by a guy (the former editor-in-chief of Elle) who had a massive stroke and could only communicate by blinking one eye – that’s how he dictated the book. It’s a reflection on life (past and present), his relationships, emotions and thoughts in this ‘locked in’ world. Some of the most interesting parts for me were his impressions of the hospital staff...

“...gentle, rough, caring, indifferent, hardworking, lazy, the ones you can make contact with and the ones to whom you are just another patient. At first some of the staff had terrified me. I saw them as my jailers, as accomplices in some awful plot.
Later I hated some of them, those who wrenched my arm while putting me in my wheelchair, left me all night long with the TV on, let me lie in a painful position despite my protests. For a few minutes or a few hours I would cheerfully have killed them. And later still, as time cooled my fiercest rages, I got to know them better. They carried out as best they could their delicate mission: to ease our burden a little when our crosses bruised our shoulders too painfully...”

It reminded me of a quote I read in one of my ‘required reading’ articles a few months ago... “One of the essential qualities of the clinician is interest in humanity, for the secret of the care of the patient is in caring for the patient” Francis Peabody 1927

I'm back to the hospital world on monday :)

had a dream...

The world's eyes will be on Washington and Obama tomorrow. The BBC have uncovered footage of Martin Luther King in 1964 predicting an African-American president in less than 40 years... even in less than 25 years, which I just think is amazing... in 1964! I admire MLK's belief - maybe that's part of what made him so dynamic - he had a dream. Regardless of what you think about politics, and specifically american politics, it is a significant week. Know hope.

view out my window

the sunrise this morning...

exact places

Reading about church planting in belfast and portadown and trying to get in touch with another friend who has recently moved to start a galway church plant has made me think about a quote I read last summer...

Driscoll, referring to John 17:15–18 says: “Jesus prayed that we would not leave the sick and dying world and huddle into a safe subcultural ghetto of Christian nicety, but that we would stay in the world.” (from The Supremacy of Christ in a Postmodern World)

I’m still trying to figure out what that looks like for me. In the next year, I’ll have to figure out where I’m heading... what continent, never mind what city, town, or 'ghetto'... At this point in my life it will be largely influenced by where I can find a job. But I hope having a vision for the community where I choose to live will be part that decision...

‘...he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him...’ acts 17:26-27

In the meantime, I still don't really know my neighbours...

sense of sweetness

Tim Keller in his book The Prodigal God (great book!) quotes Jonathan Edwards saying:

“The difference between believing that God is gracious and tasting that God is gracious is a different as having a rational belief that honey is sweet and having the actual sense of its sweetness.”

John Owen talked about this head/heart perspective this way:

“When the heart is cast indeed into the mould of the doctrine that the mind embraceth—when the evidence and necessity of the truth abides in us—when not the sense of the words only is in our heads, but the sense of the thing abides in our hearts—when we have communion with God in the doctrine we contend for—then shall we be garrisoned by the grace of God against all the assaults of men. And without this all our contending is, as to ourselves, of no value. What am I the better if I can dispute that Christ is God, but have no sense of sweetness in my heart from hence that he is a God in covenant with my soul?”

Here’s to 2009 – a year I long to have more sense of that sweetness...

the bigger you dream...

I had a mid-revision ‘clearing the head’ walk yesterday and was listening to the lovely Gemma. But I’ve still got a line of a song stuck in my head.... Maybe it stuck because I’ve spent a lot of the last week dreaming or looking out the window at my street (instead of revising).

“You say the bigger you dream, the smaller your street looks in the rain...”

I’m trying to decide if I think that’s a depressing thought. I guess it depends on what you dream. Or if you dwell on the big dreams or on the small street. Or maybe streets only look smaller in the rain. Who knows, maybe this small street should be in my big dreams. Or are dreams always of some other place?

So much for clearing the head.

Good thing it’s from a song called Out of our hands.