attending with love to the everyday

Here's a Hauerwas quote that I've been thinking about today... on one of those ordinary days.

"...there is no substitute for learning to be a Christian by being in the presence of significant lives made significant by being Christian....
Significance suggests importance... lives that make a difference and that demand acknowledgement. But the lives of significance I began to notice were not significant in any of those ways. Rather, they were lives of quiet serenity, capable of attending with love to the everyday without the need to be recognised as 'making a difference'."

- Stanley Hauerwas
Hannah's Child: A Theologian's Memoir p95

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

sense of wonder

Driving across town this evening Radio 4's series of The Color Purple just happened to be on and this quote just jumped out at me:

"Well, us talk and talk bout God, but I’m still adrift. Trying to chase the old white man out of my head. I been so busy thinking bout him I never truly notice nothing God make. Not a blade of corn (how it do that?) Not the color purple (where it come from?). Not the little wildflowers. Nothing."

It's so easy to get caught up with my theoretical views of who God is and what it all means that sometimes I miss the obvious things around me declaring his glory. It made me think of the Brennan Manning quote in The Ragamuffin Gospel....
"By and large, our world has lost its sense of wonder. We have grown up. We no longer catch our breath at the sight of a rainbow or the scent of a rose, as we once did. We have grown bigger and everything else smaller, less impressive. We get blasé and worldly wise and sophisticated. We no longer run our fingers through water, no longer shout at the stars or make faces at the moon.... We get so preoccupied with ourselves, the words we speak, the plans and projects we conceive that we become immune to the glory of creation."

(just one of the many glorious south african sunsets - plettenberg bay)

love has come

This is a song by Sandra McCracken. I remember hearing her during my first year in belfast - she was singing at a wee halls gig with her husband, Derek Webb. But i haven't really listened to any of her music since. Came across this song today and i just like some of the words... especially verse 3...

how long you have travelled in darkness weeping
no rest in language, no words to speak
but there in the wreakage beneath bricks and bindings
love has come, love has come for you

against the night sky of your waiting
your face is like starlight when he walks in
everything worth keeping comes through dying
love has come, love has come for you

so lift up your heart now, to this unfolding
all that has been broken will be restored
here runs deep waters for all who are thirsty
love has come, love has come for you...

Here's a link to her myspace if you want to hear it - it's called ten thousand angels.

emotions

I had a great conversation over coffee with a friend today. We were talking about many things, but we started discussing emotions and faith. The psychology-freak in me probably makes me over-analyse on this one! This is what we discussed: I wonder if sometime we think that negative emotions are always seen to be a bad thing that we have to get sorted in order to be right with God/people? Do we say I’m down/angry/depressed at the minute, but I’m trying to get back to normal... (what is normal? coming from a psyc degree, we’re all on a spectrum anyway!) And sometimes, don’t you think that it is often our deepest, negative emotions that ultimately can draw us closer to God and point us to real hope. Maybe that sounds like a contradiction, but it’s just been something I’ve been thinking about over the summer too. It stems from two books I’ve just read: The Consolations of Theology which looks at various topics such as anxiety, depression, obsession, disappointment, pain etc from the perspectives of some great theologians, and The Cry of the Soul by two guys my dad studied with (here's one review). Some quotes to help explain what I mean:

“Anxiety is not something to flee from; but it is here, in the midst of the anxiety that is built into the fabric of our fallen world, that we can hear the promises of the gospel most sharply. It is here I am summoned to believe, to stake my all on the Son of God who loved me and gave himself up for me. -Kierkegaard

“In an important sense we must despair of all else in order to wholeheartedly rely on Christ and what he has done for us.” – Martin Luther

“Despair is an absence of hope – a loss of desire in the face of disappointment in relationship. Oddly, however, this difficult emotion can open the heart to grasp something about a hope that transcends mere human relationship. Despair can open the heart to taste hope in God.” Allender & Longman p145

“Don’t assume that resolving your turbulent emotions is the key to meeting God. It is actually within the inner mayhem of life that a stage is built for the intrusive story of His light and hope. The absence of tumult, more than its presence, is an enemy of the soul. God meets you in your weakness, not in your strength. He comforts those who mourn, not those who live above desperation.” Allender & Longman p27

I guess I’ve had one of those emotion-filled weeks... mostly negative. I’m not saying we should want to cling to those negative emotions, but I think I need to realise that in different seasons, it’s normal and maybe in the midst of when I’m struggling the most, ideas like grace and hope become so much more real. It’s completely different than some of the songs I remember singing as a child: like, climb up sunshine mountain/i’m in-right out-right upright downright happy all the time... What kind of crazy theology was that??

It’s back to a Spurgeon quote to round off this thought:
“What is my desolation? It is the black setting for the sapphire of His everlasting love.”

shared lives

“We loved you so much that we were delighted to share with you not only the gospel of God but our lives as well, because you had become so dear to us.” 1 Thess 2:8

I love this verse. Surely this is at the heart of everything: a life of love for each other that is reflected in mission and community. It's just figuring out what that looks like that's sometimes complicated...

waiting with murray

I hadn’t heard much about Andrew Murray until this summer. And I’m not talking about the tennis player. I drove past a statue of him in Wellington, South Africa this summer on a mini road trip. Then he was the answer to a random question in a South African Trivial Pursuit game played in a wee backpackers. (We played for hours huddled up outside with our blankets and hot water bottles in Oudtshoorn, SA - the ostrich capital of the world apparently... I also learned the important information that day that ostriches eat stones!) The third time Murray came up was on my dad’s bookshelf in Nigeria. I always raid my dad’s hundreds of books when I’m at home and this summer was no exception. I read a book called Waiting on God by Murray (which I discovered is only one of his 240+ books). Much of what he said resonated with me. It seems like he had such a heart for abiding in/waiting on God... Talking about waiting he said this:

“This is the one thing we need. If we but saw our God in his love, if we believed that he waits to be gracious, that he waits to be our life and to work all in us—how this waiting on God would become our highest joy, the natural and spontaneous response of our hearts to his great love and glory.”

life's checkerboard

Just back from Nigeria. Read this prayer this evening which I feel like echoing...

"Thank You that I can safely commit my location and situation to You. I can 'be willing for You to shift me anywhere on life’s checkerboard, or bury me anywhere in life’s garden, gladly yielding myself for You to please Yourself with, anywhere and anyway You choose' (source unknown). Thank You that I can trust You with my future places - ready to go, ready to stay.
So I rest in the fact that You have me in this place for this day, and I praise You that You will faithfully guide me throughout life to just where you want me to be, as I seek to do Your will.

And most important of all is my place in You. How delighted I am to have You as my dwelling place where I can settle down, feel secure and be content anywhere on earth…You are my blessed home, 'where I can enter and be at rest even when all around and above is a sea of trouble' (Andrew Murray). How my soul delights to hide in the secret of Your presence…to take refuge in the shadow of Your wings, to eat at Your table, to drink my fill of the river of Your delights. How blessed I am, my King and my God, for You have chosen me, and brought me near, to live in Your presence, to behold Your delightfulness, to seek Your counsel…And to think that I will dwell in Your house forever!” - Ruth Myers

imagination

I’ve decided that Spurgeon is the man... so have a few other people (check this out for Piper’s view ages ago and Driscoll’s blog recently). My wee nephew and my grandfather share/d the first part of his name which has probably has increased my interest in him, initially at least. I took his morning and evening devotional with me to South Africa and so many times I read things that just made sense for that day, even if it was written so long ago.

I have this thing about quotes (ask my family). I love them. I know it’s silly and probably it makes my own thoughts a bit unoriginal, but somehow the way someone puts a simple thought in words captures my imagination. Here’s a few from Spurgeon that I wrote down over the summer...
“Our griefs cannot mar the melody of our praise; we reckon them to be the bass part of our life’s song”
“The fig tree may not blossom and the flocks may cease from the field, it matters not to the man who can sing ‘My beloved is mine and I am His’.”
“If Christ be anything, He must be everything.”
“Ought we not to look upon our own history as being at least as full of God, as full of His goodness and of His truth, as much a proof of His faithfulness and veracity as the lives of any of the saints who have gone before?”
“Blessed are the waves that wash the mariner upon the rock of salvation.”
“Rejoice O my soul, that thou art spared to testify of the faithfulness of the Lord. The seasons change and thou changest; but thy Lord abides evermore the same and the streams of His love are as deep, as broad and as full as ever.”

AND, not just either / or

I’ve just finished a book called Why We’re Not Emergent (By Two Guys Who Should Be). Having read a few books recently by authors in the emergent movement, I felt like I wanted a different perspective on some of the things I was reading. (This book is more about emergent than emerging.) I think this book tried to give an honest critique of key issues - while commenting on many positives they are honest about some problems they see. Some things they discuss include: the idea of a journey without a destination, if doubt and uncertainty should really be seen as humility, the emergent view of modernism, the need for propositions, boundaries, and recognition of theological error, problems with “give me Jesus, not doctrine” perspective, an over-realised eschatology, the emergent view of scripture, the place of preaching, penal substitution, God’s wrath and much more. But I think they manage to join the ‘conversation’ in an often humorous, but humble way. You can check out part of the book on their website here. And here are a few reviews from various sides: Tim Challies, Dan Kimball and theooze.com.

In the last chapter (the best I think), one of the authors reflects on the churches in Revelation and highlights the need for emergent and non-emergent churches to be careful not to be lopsided churches; learning the beauty of AND, not just either / or:

“...my hope is that [the church] could be marked by grace and truth, logical precision and warmhearted passion, careful thinking and compassionate feeling, strong theology and tender love, Christian liberty and spiritual discipline, congregational care and committed outreach, diversity without doctrinal infidelity, ambition without arrogance, and contentment without complacency...I believe this is God’s vision for the church.” p257

tracing rainbows

A heart at peace brings life to the body... Prov. 14:30
I’m starting on the next chapter of my year and am so excited about what the next few months hold :) I feel like somehow a sense of peace is trickling back into my life after what has been a strange and at times, stressful few months. My piano has been a major stress reliever over the last month especially and I’ve somehow been drawn to playing old hymns I think maybe because the words seemed to resonate and captured what I was thinking... and pointed me to promises:
"O joy that seekest me thru pain,
I cannot close my heart to Thee;
I trace the rainbow thru the rain,
And feel the promise is not vain,
That morn shall tearless be."
-George Matheson, 1882

old women over their tea?

I think I might be sort of addicted to the news. Is that strange? Do you ever watch the news in the evening and no story is actually new because you’ve read about all the day’s events already? And you’ve read the analysis of the events, not just the unbiased (ha) BBC website reporting so you feel like you’re a step ahead? It’s probably just habit - a routine, and if my life changed (ie: i left the country for a few months as I will in June...) it might change again. I don’t know why, but I just have to get my daily fix of news at the minute. My main news stops at the minute are http://www.bbc.co.uk/ (especially the Africa section), http://www.timesonline.co.uk/, http://www.guardian.co.uk/, http://www.drudgereport.com/, http://www.politico.com/, (the last two taken with a pinch of salt - obviously showing my interest in the pointless media pontificating regarding the US elections as if there wasn't already enough in the first 3 sites!). Is it just knowledge for knowledge’s sake and largely a waste of time? Generally, I don’t think so. If it takes up too much time, then yes - but I think I have a better perspective on the world and my place in it because of the news. But I know that every newspaper/news website has a different perspective and interpretation of events, some with specific agendas (many of which may be wrong)... but that doesn’t mean I should stop reading them altogether.

Henry David Thoreau's view was that "news, as it is called, is gossip, and they who edit and read it are old women over their tea."
On the other hand, Dr Pete Lowman puts it this way which I’ve found helpful:

“The newspaper may be a selective mirror, and a distorting mirror, but for many issues and events it's the most in-depth mirror we have; it gives us perceptions that are admittedly as seen from particular angles, but are still often the most in-depth clues we have about the issues in terms of which we must live our lives....
...There are things we can do. One is to liberate ourselves by educating ourselves; learning to decode what we read. A trick loses its power once it's revealed for what it is. Once we've truly perceived the one-dimensional character of the picture our newspapers present, we're able to complement it with other kinds of awareness; if we see that we're being brainwashed into ignoring or marginalizing the most ultimate aspects of reality, that very awareness can turn our attention back towards those vital aspects.
It will not be easy; the picture coming at us from the papers can seem so vivid, so authoritative. So we will need to expose ourselves in depth to the alternative and 'entire' world-picture of the Bible, prayerfully and reflectively, if our thinking isn't going to be swamped, day by day. We will need to be reminded, in depth, 'what the world is really like', if we are to `decode’ rather than be deceived by the partial pictures from the news media.”
Check out the rest of his article here.

The question though, is how does what I read move from me being informed to it actually transforming how I take action, pray, or engage with the culture / world around me?

follow close behind

As I've been thinking about the mind over the last few days, it has led me to reflect on the mind of Christ. Helen Roseveare say this:

"Only as we are indwelt by the Holy Spirit, allowing Him to change us into the likeness of Christ, truly giving us the 'mind of Christ', that we might think as He thinks, love as He loves, weep as He weeps -- only then will we be motivated to move out, as Christ left heaven to become flesh and dwell among us. Only then will we be willing to be spent and not count the cost."

Thinking about Jesus coming among us and about the cost of following Him, I'm reminded, at the beginning of Lent, about Jesus' journey to the cross and His call for me to follow. I have part of a verse written on the front of my journal and it reminds me of that journey.
It says:
"my soul follows close behind you..." Ps 63:8 (The Living Bible)
I just love the image it creates of following... That's what I desire: to follow hard after God; to follow close to Him; to have more of the mind of Christ; to being willing to be spent and not count the cost in the coming days as I journey...

minding my head...

Just back from a crazy weekend wrestling with how my faith can engage with all areas of life because of the all-encompassing lordship of Christ. It was so good to be able to have space to just raise questions, have some questions answered and realise that i'm not alone in my fascination and desire to know more about the relevance of my faith in relation to a wide breadth to topics. To give you an example of the things that I discussed or thought about over the weekend (whether that was in a formal session or just over coffee/dinner etc) : philosophy, history of christian thought, what is a critical mind, reformation, calvinism & kuyper, moderism, post-moderity, biblical narrative, embryology research, abortion/pro-life, IVF, theistic evolution, the age of the earth, the faraday institute, dawkins/mcgrath debate, science & 'book' of nature, theology & the bible, psychology of pain, human rights, position/role of church in society, human worth, centrality of Jesus, women's rights, art&faith "caress and collide", music, expression, observation of society, colossians re:mixed, relationships, intelligence, missions, worship, resting in jesus, sovereignty of God... and I really could go on but you probably get the point. So much to think through- almost don't know where to start!

Then tonight, so blessed to meet up with a good friend and to talk honestly about life and the down-to-earth realities and decisions that we're both facing as well as airing some issues raised from the weekend. As much as I love stretching my brain, it's only in fellowship and friendship that all the head stuff is put in perspective and teased out into everyday life...

from this misty lowland

can't believe summer is nearly over but the chill in the air, my first cold of the season and (another!) university registration have convinced me it really is true. but i'm still reflecting/lingering over some stuff i read in nigeria before the excuses of busyness and more physio books take over my life again... Tozer is the kind of writer that takes a long time to digest!! Here's a quote and a prayer from The Pursuit of God that have continued to resonate...

"To have found God and yet to still pursue Him is the soul's greatest paradox of love."
-AW Tozer

"O God, I have tasted Thy goodness, and it has both satisfied me and made me thirsty for more. I am painfully conscious of my need of further grace. I am ashamed of my lack of desire. O God, the Triune God, I want to want Thee; I long to be filled with longing; I thirst to be made more thirsty still. Show me Thy glory, I pray Thee, that so I may know Thee indeed. Begin in mercy a new work of love within me. Say to my soul, 'Rise up my love, my fair one, and come away.' Then give me grace to rise and follow Thee up from this misty lowland where I have wandered so long. . ."
-AW Tozer

don't be good

I have Fionn Regan’s song Be Good or Be Gone stuck in my head. I actually really like his sound… and his video of this song (below) is amusing!! That is in spite of the fact that I’m a bit sceptical of musicians that seem to get some of there initial fame via Gray’s Anatomy…but I'll have to forgive him for that.
Although I like it, there’s just something about the words that grate. I’m not really even sure what he’s talking about in the song, but I think it’s the phrase “Be good” that has got me thinking.

It makes me think back to my days of listening week in, week out to Steve Stockman… especially when he used to talk about another musician - Rich Mullins, who’s trademark autograph was “Be God’s” (as opposed to be good…) trying to get away from the idea that we have be good to be loved and accepted by God… If you have no idea what I mean check out this article by Stocki.

(by the way... fionn regan's coming to the empire on nov 11...)

frightened panic or deluded lethargy

failure to worship consigns us to a life of spasms and jerks, at the mercy of every advertisement, every seduction, every siren. without worship we live manipulated and manipulating lives. we move in either frightened panic or deluded lethargy as we are, in turn, alarmed by spectres and soothed by placebos. -eugene peterson

i am resting...

Ever lift Thy face upon me
As I work and wait for Thee
Resting 'neath Thy smile Lord Jesus
Earth's dark shadows flee
Brightness of my Father's glory
Sunshine of my Father's face
Keep me ever trusting resting
Fill me with Thy grace

Jesus I am resting resting
In the joy of what Thou art
I am finding out the greatness
Of Thy loving heart

*this is part one of Hudson Taylor's favourite hymns... he was a pretty amazing guy. saw his life story acted out recently and it was so challenging... true image of what it is to give your life for the sake of christ. jesus i am resting...

your hands

my times are in your hands... psalm31:15a even though the day be laden

and my task dreary

and my strength small

a song keeps singing

in my heart

for i know that i am thine

i am part of thee

thou art kin to me

and all my times

are in thy hands

-alister mcclean

lent

After a crazy weekend away, in the midst of a crazy day... I've been thinking about lent today... saying it's starting tomorrow. I'll try to blog some of my thoughts over the next few weeks in relation to lent but in the meantime, here's a random collection of quotes and things i've been thinking about...

***

God of all seasons,
in your pattern of things
there is a time for keeping
and a time for losing,
a time for building up
and a time for pulling down.
In this holy season of Lent,
as we journey with our Lord to the cross
help us to discern in our lives
what we must lay down
and what we must take up,
what we must end
and what we must begin.
-Book of Common Order
***
May this lent be for you
a time of addition as well as subtraction,
a time of commission as well as omission.
***
My prayer for the Christian church is that God might awaken in us a hunger for himself—a new fasting. Not because we haven’t tasted the new wine of Christ’s presence, but because we have tasted it and long, with a deep and joyful aching of soul, to know more of his presence and power in our midst.
-John Piper – A Hunger for God
***
Lent can become a time when material things are put again in their proper secondary position; when we see in the spiritual the unconquerable forces of life. It can become a time of self-examination, when we reflect upon our present position in the pilgrimage and check our directions. It can become a time of personal readjustment, not through mental resolutions to do better but through yielding ourselves afresh to the God who demands to be obeyed. And it can become a time when, by following the battered path to Calvary, we identify ourselves once again with the Saviour who makes all things new.
***
“Lent is supposed to be a time when we review our spiritual life, think again about what it means to be a follower of Christ, reset the compass of our discipleship and prepare ourselves to celebrate the Easter festival. But often we just give up biscuits”
(Stephen Cottrell, I Thirst, p. 12)

***
Father in the life of Jesus you have shown us the way.
Give us his spirit of self-discipline;
Lead us more deeply into the way of the cross.
Before his hands were stretched out on the cross,
They were stretched out in love to children, women and men.
May your way of the cross be our way
That we, too, may stretch out our hands in love to all.

***

In repentance and rest is your salvation
In quietness and trust is your strength.
Isaiah 30:15