I am filled with a kind of nervous energy today, as though charged with static electricity. I fear that to brush my hair will ignite a shower of sparks.
I think this is residual energy from working on my story yesterday. That story takes incredible amounts of energy, because I actually have no idea how to ask the question. In fact, frequently I feel certain that I have no idea what I am doing.
In order to write, I have to pull something out of what appears to be nothing at all. There's vast amounts of material- my entire childhood! And yet there is nothing but chaos, a jumble of memories and impressions.
In order to ask the question, I must sort through everything to find what was most important, and then ask why it was important- what it means, or vise versa. I'm not sure which comes first.
So it's like I have to screw my eyes shut and just write- just reach down blind into my subconscious and pull up from the depths some mysterious object, only now recognized, and then place it in the right order and in its proper setting.
Despite all this, I suspect that I have written the first chapter and am ready to rewrite the second.
In order to burn off excess energy, I have deep cleaned the bathroom, and plan to cook a Mexican casserole and to bake cookies and possibly muffins, and to finish the Christmas decorations.
That should do it, don't you think?
In the meantime, I read Psalm 116 again, and how beautiful is this psalm in the New Living Translation?
Here are the first nine verses of it:
I love the Lord because he hears my voice
and my prayer for mercy.
Because he bends down to listen,
I will pray as long as I have breath!
Death wrapped its ropes around me;
the terrors of the grave overtook me.
I saw only trouble and sorrow.
Then I called on the name of the Lord:
“Please, Lord, save me!”
How kind the Lord is! How good he is!
So merciful, this God of ours!
The Lord protects those of childlike faith;
I was facing death, and he saved me.
Let my soul be at rest again,
for the Lord has been good to me.
He has saved me from death,
my eyes from tears,
my feet from stumbling.
And so I walk in the Lord’s presence
as I live here on earth!
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
Monday, November 28, 2011
November 28th
I have a confession to make: I am listening to Kenny G right. now. Oh yes.
My only excuse is that I first listened to this music when I was young and impressionable, and didn't know any better and the music dug a groove into my brain that remained ever after. Since then I must, from time to time and furtively, satisfy my craving for cheese-filled emo sax.
It's raining and outside my windows everything is slowly being filled by a soft pearly light as the sun rises unseen. The headlights of neighbors pulling out for their morning commute slide across the road in a long slick of yellow light.
Oh beautiful solitude! Oh lovely quiet house, how I love thee!
I saw a quote on facebook, it said: "A solitude is the audience-chamber of God." Walter Savage Landor said that, and I agree.
Sometime before our trip to Indiana, I was praying about it and before I had finished my worried sentence, He said, "I've gone up ahead of you."
I was all flustered. That's the not the first time He's interrupted me while I was still talking to Him. The first time I got down right annoyed at Christ for doing that. Now I pause, marvel and regroup.
He was with me, up there. For some reason, I was worried that He wouldn't be- almost as though I expected the presence of God to be a purely localized phenomenon.
In my mother-in-law's house there were pictures of Jesus all over the place. I was familiar with those pictures from childhood- the picture of Jesus standing and knocking on the door, the picture of Jesus with serenely folded hands, praying in the garden of Gethsemane. There was one picture of just His hands, outstretched, as though He were saying, take My hand.
The pictures actually bothered me, but only because they were merely pictures. Behind them was nothing but the paper they were printed on, and behind that the sheetrock of the wall and empty space. Jesus is not in those pictures, though they seemed to contain Him.
Many times during the trip I was drawn to the doors or windows, all but putting my nose to the glass, and longed and longed to go out, out into the solitude- to shake off the noise and bustle around me and step into the silence that is full of Him, the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.
I could not- it would be too rude. I had to turn away and be once more in the midst. He was there too, near me in the warmth and voices and TV sounds, but I couldn't concentrate on Him the way I can in the silence.
(What do you want to bet, that if I had been born in the middle ages, I would have ended up happily secluded in a nunnery, eating gruel, copying Bibles and decorating the edges with gold gilt, all content with my vow of silence, the passing seasons and the sound of the wind whistling in the corners?)
At night, I threw myself into Him with desperation. The first night, I was filled with extraordinary relief- You were with me! You were with me the whole time! I declared to Him, with joy. But oh, tomorrow... what will I do tomorrow, when I am exhausted and have even less resource to make it through?
And I felt myself cradled in His arms, as though I were very small, so I knew He would be carrying me the next day.
The next day, a conversation occured between Keith and his mom that was very healing for both of them, and the room was full of the presence of God. It was so full of light that the sharp edges of the objects disappeared into the haze of it.
As it happened, I marveled. Then the light and the warmth faded away and we were just people in a small apartment, talking.
Yesterday, as I was busying myself with cleaning and decorating the house for Christmas, I felt this incredible longing for Him. It was as though I were carrying the longing around inside of me. I kept thinking, I'll get this one thing more done, and then I'll stop and deal with this longing.
But then I couldn't stand it anymore, so I stopped everything in sheer desperation and I read again Psalm 63, that begins:
"O God, You are my God, earnestly will I seek You; my inner self thirsts for You, my flesh longs and is faint for You, in a dry and weary land where no water is."
When I feel such a longing for God, I am very thankful for the Psalms, which contain such phrases as:
"As the hart pants and longs for the water brooks, so I pant and long for You, O God.
My inner self thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and behold the face of God?
"Deep calls to deep at the thunder of Your waterspouts; all Your breakers and Your rolling waves have gone over me."
Psalm 42:1-2, 7
"My soul yearns, yes, even pines and is homesick for the courts of the Lord; my heart and my flesh cry out and sing for joy to the living God."
Psalm 84:2
"Whom have I in heaven but You? And I have no delight or desire on earth besides You.
My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the Rock and firm Strength of my heart and my Portion forever."
Psalm 73:25-26
"I love the Lord, because He has heard my voice and my supplications. Because He has inclined His ear to me, therefore I will call upon Him as long as I live."
Psalm 116:1-2
My only excuse is that I first listened to this music when I was young and impressionable, and didn't know any better and the music dug a groove into my brain that remained ever after. Since then I must, from time to time and furtively, satisfy my craving for cheese-filled emo sax.
It's raining and outside my windows everything is slowly being filled by a soft pearly light as the sun rises unseen. The headlights of neighbors pulling out for their morning commute slide across the road in a long slick of yellow light.
Oh beautiful solitude! Oh lovely quiet house, how I love thee!
I saw a quote on facebook, it said: "A solitude is the audience-chamber of God." Walter Savage Landor said that, and I agree.
Sometime before our trip to Indiana, I was praying about it and before I had finished my worried sentence, He said, "I've gone up ahead of you."
I was all flustered. That's the not the first time He's interrupted me while I was still talking to Him. The first time I got down right annoyed at Christ for doing that. Now I pause, marvel and regroup.
He was with me, up there. For some reason, I was worried that He wouldn't be- almost as though I expected the presence of God to be a purely localized phenomenon.
In my mother-in-law's house there were pictures of Jesus all over the place. I was familiar with those pictures from childhood- the picture of Jesus standing and knocking on the door, the picture of Jesus with serenely folded hands, praying in the garden of Gethsemane. There was one picture of just His hands, outstretched, as though He were saying, take My hand.
The pictures actually bothered me, but only because they were merely pictures. Behind them was nothing but the paper they were printed on, and behind that the sheetrock of the wall and empty space. Jesus is not in those pictures, though they seemed to contain Him.
Many times during the trip I was drawn to the doors or windows, all but putting my nose to the glass, and longed and longed to go out, out into the solitude- to shake off the noise and bustle around me and step into the silence that is full of Him, the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.
I could not- it would be too rude. I had to turn away and be once more in the midst. He was there too, near me in the warmth and voices and TV sounds, but I couldn't concentrate on Him the way I can in the silence.
(What do you want to bet, that if I had been born in the middle ages, I would have ended up happily secluded in a nunnery, eating gruel, copying Bibles and decorating the edges with gold gilt, all content with my vow of silence, the passing seasons and the sound of the wind whistling in the corners?)
At night, I threw myself into Him with desperation. The first night, I was filled with extraordinary relief- You were with me! You were with me the whole time! I declared to Him, with joy. But oh, tomorrow... what will I do tomorrow, when I am exhausted and have even less resource to make it through?
And I felt myself cradled in His arms, as though I were very small, so I knew He would be carrying me the next day.
The next day, a conversation occured between Keith and his mom that was very healing for both of them, and the room was full of the presence of God. It was so full of light that the sharp edges of the objects disappeared into the haze of it.
As it happened, I marveled. Then the light and the warmth faded away and we were just people in a small apartment, talking.
Yesterday, as I was busying myself with cleaning and decorating the house for Christmas, I felt this incredible longing for Him. It was as though I were carrying the longing around inside of me. I kept thinking, I'll get this one thing more done, and then I'll stop and deal with this longing.
But then I couldn't stand it anymore, so I stopped everything in sheer desperation and I read again Psalm 63, that begins:
"O God, You are my God, earnestly will I seek You; my inner self thirsts for You, my flesh longs and is faint for You, in a dry and weary land where no water is."
When I feel such a longing for God, I am very thankful for the Psalms, which contain such phrases as:
"As the hart pants and longs for the water brooks, so I pant and long for You, O God.
My inner self thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and behold the face of God?
"Deep calls to deep at the thunder of Your waterspouts; all Your breakers and Your rolling waves have gone over me."
Psalm 42:1-2, 7
"My soul yearns, yes, even pines and is homesick for the courts of the Lord; my heart and my flesh cry out and sing for joy to the living God."
Psalm 84:2
"Whom have I in heaven but You? And I have no delight or desire on earth besides You.
My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the Rock and firm Strength of my heart and my Portion forever."
Psalm 73:25-26
"I love the Lord, because He has heard my voice and my supplications. Because He has inclined His ear to me, therefore I will call upon Him as long as I live."
Psalm 116:1-2
Sunday, November 27, 2011
November 27th
We are back. My body is still sore from two days of eight hour car travel and two nights on the air mattress. The morning sun is falling through the blinds and I am wearing the flannel PJs that my parents got me for my birthday.
I opened the present early, not wanting to pad around in someone else's house wearing Keith's ancient T shirt and mismatched, stained PJ pants that I normally wear to bed.
Yesterday morning, before we left Indiana, I didn't bother to brush my hair; I just left it in the braid that I'd slept in. I thought I looked pretty normal until we stopped somewhere in Tennessee and I saw myself in the streaky mirror.
The loose strands of my extremely long hair had been whipped up like an airy chiffon all around my face. What remained of the braid itself looked like road kill.
That's when I understood the strange looks I'd been getting at the gas station. I down right frightened some meek, middle aged woman with coiffed hair and soft leather handbag later on during the day, when my hair had had time to get worse.
Returning from the restroom, I made a bee line across the tarmac to the dusty Civic, weighed down with luggage and the speakers Keith had purchased from his brother.
Through the bug streaked windshield, I could see Keith and the dim outline of the dogs, their heads hanging over the front seats. I felt an upwelling of affection for the little group that awaited me, dog breath and all.
"Hello, family," I said cheerfully, opening my door.
"Hello, woman," Keith replied affectionately.
He picked up the stuff that I had been carrying on my lap, to make room for me to sit down in my spot.
Our car rejoined the stream of fellow Americans who were returning home from family get togethers and cramped sleeping arrangements one day early, hoping to avoid the traffic on Sunday. We flipped down the visors against the glare of the late November sun and settled in for the long haul.
Thanksgiving itself went well. We left the house at four thirty in the morning and did not see the sun until we'd reached the Chattanooga valley. By noon, we'd reached southern Indiana and our first turkey dinner of the day.
That dinner we ate on couches, casually, with the dogs underfoot amid decorative ivy plants, ruffled curtains and a welcoming apple motif in the kitchen.
I met the newest member of the family, a handsome little fellow with adorable red hair and the Indiana family chin. He got passed around a lot and was very tolerant of all the attention.
One of Keith's brothers couldn't eat anything but mashed potato because he'd smashed the left side of his face with a maul, trying to detach a tire from its rim by whaling on it.
The heavy hammer hit the rubber and sprung back into his cheek bones, fracturing two of them and causing his entire face to swell up to twice its size.
Eventually, we all alighted from there and regrouped at the second household for more turkey dinner, this time in a much more formal setting.
That house sits ensconced in a solid and quiet setting of rolling green fields, amid other prosperous Hoosiers who have build red brink houses with two or three car garages and multiple roof angles.
This house and its setting are as welcoming as a leather Lay-Z-Boy recliner. We left the dogs in the two and a half car garage and headed into a house scented by holiday cooking.
There was a walnut studded cheese ball on the bar in the game room, a display of ceramic pumpkins behind the glass cabinets in the kitchen and a football game on the huge TV above the fireplace.
Although I feel at home in this house, I retreated to my usual bolt hole- the love seat where the magazine basket is placed, heaped with holiday Crate and Barrel and Coldwater Creek catalogues. These, and a woman's devotional Bible, NIV and a book on heaven were my reading material.
I began in retail, made my way quickly through paradise and ended up in Exodus, fascinated as usual by the exchanges between the Lord God Almighty and Moses.
People swirled around me in little knots, gathering and regathering in the kitchen or the game room, or beside the bar, to make another whiskey cocktail.
We ate smoky and spicy chicken wings, a specialty of Keith's dad and then Thanksgiving dinner with all the trimmings, a specialty of Keith's step mother, both equally delicious. Then the family got down to the real business of the night- the Indiana family poker game.
It was a good Thanksgiving and now we are home and I am about to turn thirty four. At thirty four, the age of forty emerges from the shadows of the far distant future and becomes a distinct possibility. Maybe by then I'll have finished my darn story.
I opened the present early, not wanting to pad around in someone else's house wearing Keith's ancient T shirt and mismatched, stained PJ pants that I normally wear to bed.
Yesterday morning, before we left Indiana, I didn't bother to brush my hair; I just left it in the braid that I'd slept in. I thought I looked pretty normal until we stopped somewhere in Tennessee and I saw myself in the streaky mirror.
The loose strands of my extremely long hair had been whipped up like an airy chiffon all around my face. What remained of the braid itself looked like road kill.
That's when I understood the strange looks I'd been getting at the gas station. I down right frightened some meek, middle aged woman with coiffed hair and soft leather handbag later on during the day, when my hair had had time to get worse.
Returning from the restroom, I made a bee line across the tarmac to the dusty Civic, weighed down with luggage and the speakers Keith had purchased from his brother.
Through the bug streaked windshield, I could see Keith and the dim outline of the dogs, their heads hanging over the front seats. I felt an upwelling of affection for the little group that awaited me, dog breath and all.
"Hello, family," I said cheerfully, opening my door.
"Hello, woman," Keith replied affectionately.
He picked up the stuff that I had been carrying on my lap, to make room for me to sit down in my spot.
Our car rejoined the stream of fellow Americans who were returning home from family get togethers and cramped sleeping arrangements one day early, hoping to avoid the traffic on Sunday. We flipped down the visors against the glare of the late November sun and settled in for the long haul.
Thanksgiving itself went well. We left the house at four thirty in the morning and did not see the sun until we'd reached the Chattanooga valley. By noon, we'd reached southern Indiana and our first turkey dinner of the day.
That dinner we ate on couches, casually, with the dogs underfoot amid decorative ivy plants, ruffled curtains and a welcoming apple motif in the kitchen.
I met the newest member of the family, a handsome little fellow with adorable red hair and the Indiana family chin. He got passed around a lot and was very tolerant of all the attention.
One of Keith's brothers couldn't eat anything but mashed potato because he'd smashed the left side of his face with a maul, trying to detach a tire from its rim by whaling on it.
The heavy hammer hit the rubber and sprung back into his cheek bones, fracturing two of them and causing his entire face to swell up to twice its size.
Eventually, we all alighted from there and regrouped at the second household for more turkey dinner, this time in a much more formal setting.
That house sits ensconced in a solid and quiet setting of rolling green fields, amid other prosperous Hoosiers who have build red brink houses with two or three car garages and multiple roof angles.
This house and its setting are as welcoming as a leather Lay-Z-Boy recliner. We left the dogs in the two and a half car garage and headed into a house scented by holiday cooking.
There was a walnut studded cheese ball on the bar in the game room, a display of ceramic pumpkins behind the glass cabinets in the kitchen and a football game on the huge TV above the fireplace.
Although I feel at home in this house, I retreated to my usual bolt hole- the love seat where the magazine basket is placed, heaped with holiday Crate and Barrel and Coldwater Creek catalogues. These, and a woman's devotional Bible, NIV and a book on heaven were my reading material.
I began in retail, made my way quickly through paradise and ended up in Exodus, fascinated as usual by the exchanges between the Lord God Almighty and Moses.
People swirled around me in little knots, gathering and regathering in the kitchen or the game room, or beside the bar, to make another whiskey cocktail.
We ate smoky and spicy chicken wings, a specialty of Keith's dad and then Thanksgiving dinner with all the trimmings, a specialty of Keith's step mother, both equally delicious. Then the family got down to the real business of the night- the Indiana family poker game.
It was a good Thanksgiving and now we are home and I am about to turn thirty four. At thirty four, the age of forty emerges from the shadows of the far distant future and becomes a distinct possibility. Maybe by then I'll have finished my darn story.
Wednesday, November 23, 2011
November 23rd
I have packing that I must do, and laundry and various other things that I have already forgotten. The empty suitcase waits upon the bed.
A couple nights ago, I was reading in John -what a surprise- and it struck me, all of a sudden, that the first words John recorded Jesus as saying are: What do you seek?
He said that to two of John the Baptist's disciples who had started following Him.
Jesus turns and asks them that, in His voice, a voice full of compassion and quiet authority- what do you seek?
It turns out the disciples wanted to know where He was staying.
They could have asked Him about knowledge or confirmation -show us a sign, people are always asking Jesus, to His sorrow- but these guys did not ask anything like that. They just wanted to know where He lived.
That really struck me. If you know where God is, then you can stay with Him. You know where to go to find Him. If you want to know where He lives, it's probably because you want to be there as well.
Once you know where God lives, then you have the rest of your life to ask Him questions and to get to know Him.
Did Jesus give them detailed directions to where He was staying? No. He said: Come and see.
How like Jesus! How rarely He ever gives us a detailed map- we walk by faith. Instead, He said, follow Me. He says, come along with Me and I will show you.
It made me think of this:
"Tell me, O you whom I love,
Where you feed your flock,
Where you make it rest at noon.
For why should I be as one who veils herself
By the flocks of your companions?"
"If you do not know, O fairest among women,
Follow in the footsteps of the flock,
And feed your little goats
Beside the shepherds' tents."
Song of Solomon 1:7-8
Another words, come and see. Because, as it turns out, it's not about where He is staying. He stays with us, after all.
Instead, it's about where He is taking us. We get to know Him along the way.
A couple nights ago, I was reading in John -what a surprise- and it struck me, all of a sudden, that the first words John recorded Jesus as saying are: What do you seek?
He said that to two of John the Baptist's disciples who had started following Him.
Jesus turns and asks them that, in His voice, a voice full of compassion and quiet authority- what do you seek?
It turns out the disciples wanted to know where He was staying.
They could have asked Him about knowledge or confirmation -show us a sign, people are always asking Jesus, to His sorrow- but these guys did not ask anything like that. They just wanted to know where He lived.
That really struck me. If you know where God is, then you can stay with Him. You know where to go to find Him. If you want to know where He lives, it's probably because you want to be there as well.
Once you know where God lives, then you have the rest of your life to ask Him questions and to get to know Him.
Did Jesus give them detailed directions to where He was staying? No. He said: Come and see.
How like Jesus! How rarely He ever gives us a detailed map- we walk by faith. Instead, He said, follow Me. He says, come along with Me and I will show you.
It made me think of this:
"Tell me, O you whom I love,
Where you feed your flock,
Where you make it rest at noon.
For why should I be as one who veils herself
By the flocks of your companions?"
"If you do not know, O fairest among women,
Follow in the footsteps of the flock,
And feed your little goats
Beside the shepherds' tents."
Song of Solomon 1:7-8
Another words, come and see. Because, as it turns out, it's not about where He is staying. He stays with us, after all.
Instead, it's about where He is taking us. We get to know Him along the way.
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
November 22nd
I sent the first five pages of my newest story to my writer friend.
That story gets worked on slowly, by the way. Achingly slowly. In fact, I downright avoid the thing.
However, I had managed five pages or so, so I sent them. He called me back. He said, "Clearly you know how to write and need no instruction on the art of writing."
(This compliment I quite obviously memorized, from sheer delight.)
However, he gave me two tasks. One was to describe myself. He said I described so completely what I was seeing that he could not see myself in it at all.
I must be able to step in and out of my own skin, in a pleasing and well rounded way, so the reader sees first the child seeing, and then the sight itself, or visa versa, or simultaneously. Just so long as there are both things to see.
That was the easier task. The second task was to connect the dots. He said from reading my descriptions he knew that I was seeing what lay below the surface, but I wasn't allowing myself to actually talk about what was under the surface.
He said, ask the question.
That's the harder task.
He sent me the memoir, An American Childhood, by Annie Dillard. I keep turning down the corners of pages as I go along:
"I was too aware to do this, and had done it anyway. What could touch me now? For what were the people on Penn Avenue to me, or what was I to myself, really, but a witness to any boldness I could muster, or any cowardice if it came to that, any giving up on heaven for the sake of dignity on earth? I had not seen a great deal accomplished in the name of dignity, ever."
Last night we experienced the Night of the Living Cockroach, which is a thriller. In this thriller, one's unsuspecting husband, in his cotton shorts and clean socks, turns back the newly washed sheets. There he finds a cockroach all of two inches long, glistening in the light and making with all haste for the headboard.
The next scene, with compassionate editing for the sake of the husband, will be focused conveniently on the paper lamp shade. Note the soothing light, with its narrow creases of amber and white, and attendant oblong shadow cast against the wall. We will use but one adjective for this scene and that adjective is: vehement.
Next, all is chaos as the villain is insulted, searched for and threatened, but never found. Mattresses must be upended, dogs must be uprooted, and headboards pried from the wall. Pillows, made buoyant by passion, are tossed through the air.
Poison foam was sprayed upon every surface, and then sprayed again. Some people put lavender scent on their pillows; last night, we slept with insect killer haunting our troubled dreams. Even in our shallow sleep, the edges of the mattress loomed large.
In the morning, we found the dead body of our interloper. He lay upon his back by the French doors, as if, in his death throes, he had tried with fading instinct to make for the great outdoors and sweet, sweet freedom.
No such luck for him. If his relatives live nearby, let this be a lesson to them- no one here wants a sequel.
It is settled. We are heading up to Indiana for Thanksgiving.
This afternoon I rested my arms on the back of the couch and surveyed my reclining husband, who was peaceably watching Netflix. "What?" he asked.
"Are you ready?"
"For what?"
"For the holidays."
The light died in his eyes. "No," he said gravely, and then began to chuckle, shaking his head slowly. "No. Not at all. Are you?"
"No. No way."
Ready or not, here it comes.
That story gets worked on slowly, by the way. Achingly slowly. In fact, I downright avoid the thing.
However, I had managed five pages or so, so I sent them. He called me back. He said, "Clearly you know how to write and need no instruction on the art of writing."
(This compliment I quite obviously memorized, from sheer delight.)
However, he gave me two tasks. One was to describe myself. He said I described so completely what I was seeing that he could not see myself in it at all.
I must be able to step in and out of my own skin, in a pleasing and well rounded way, so the reader sees first the child seeing, and then the sight itself, or visa versa, or simultaneously. Just so long as there are both things to see.
That was the easier task. The second task was to connect the dots. He said from reading my descriptions he knew that I was seeing what lay below the surface, but I wasn't allowing myself to actually talk about what was under the surface.
He said, ask the question.
That's the harder task.
He sent me the memoir, An American Childhood, by Annie Dillard. I keep turning down the corners of pages as I go along:
"I was too aware to do this, and had done it anyway. What could touch me now? For what were the people on Penn Avenue to me, or what was I to myself, really, but a witness to any boldness I could muster, or any cowardice if it came to that, any giving up on heaven for the sake of dignity on earth? I had not seen a great deal accomplished in the name of dignity, ever."
Last night we experienced the Night of the Living Cockroach, which is a thriller. In this thriller, one's unsuspecting husband, in his cotton shorts and clean socks, turns back the newly washed sheets. There he finds a cockroach all of two inches long, glistening in the light and making with all haste for the headboard.
The next scene, with compassionate editing for the sake of the husband, will be focused conveniently on the paper lamp shade. Note the soothing light, with its narrow creases of amber and white, and attendant oblong shadow cast against the wall. We will use but one adjective for this scene and that adjective is: vehement.
Next, all is chaos as the villain is insulted, searched for and threatened, but never found. Mattresses must be upended, dogs must be uprooted, and headboards pried from the wall. Pillows, made buoyant by passion, are tossed through the air.
Poison foam was sprayed upon every surface, and then sprayed again. Some people put lavender scent on their pillows; last night, we slept with insect killer haunting our troubled dreams. Even in our shallow sleep, the edges of the mattress loomed large.
In the morning, we found the dead body of our interloper. He lay upon his back by the French doors, as if, in his death throes, he had tried with fading instinct to make for the great outdoors and sweet, sweet freedom.
No such luck for him. If his relatives live nearby, let this be a lesson to them- no one here wants a sequel.
It is settled. We are heading up to Indiana for Thanksgiving.
This afternoon I rested my arms on the back of the couch and surveyed my reclining husband, who was peaceably watching Netflix. "What?" he asked.
"Are you ready?"
"For what?"
"For the holidays."
The light died in his eyes. "No," he said gravely, and then began to chuckle, shaking his head slowly. "No. Not at all. Are you?"
"No. No way."
Ready or not, here it comes.
Monday, November 21, 2011
November 21st
A couple days ago, I read an awesome blog that had this quote in it:
"In my deepest wound I saw Your glory and it dazzled me." St. Augustine, Confessions
It starting me thinking about my wounds. Specifically, I've been thinking about my first marriage. It's not my deepest wound, but I have less understanding and acceptance of this wound than I have of my sexual abuse or infertility.
For years I have been conflicted about it- torn between a lingering resentment at God for not keeping me safe like I thought He promised He would do, and a hatred of myself- for my weakness, for my stupid choices, for my selfishness and for my naivete.
Yesterday, I was thinking about it again. I was wondering again why God, in His mercy, had not sent me a good man- like the one I have now. He could have just sent me a good man, and all pain would have been spared.
That's where I paused, as an unlikely thought hit me. What would it have been like, if I had married a merciful, Godly man at that point in my life? Wouldn't I have sublimated my desire and longing for God into my love of this man?
I certainly would have. I would have felt no need to search desperately for God in truth, in reality, in the ruins of everything that I had thought made me valuable to Him.
I bet I would have just leaned on my husband's religion, on his experience and definitions- because that is my default place, that is what I naturally tend to do.
Instead, in one swift blow, I lost all my cherished guide marks, all the religious routes I had leaned on and all the easy answers.
I had to come to Him with nothing to offer Him but my incomplete, unreliable self.
I had to come to Him in conflict, knowing there might never be any answers at all- not in this life.
I had to come to Him alone, and from sheer longing- not to impress anyone else or to get their approval, not to conform to someone else's idea and not to acquire blessings, but simply because I could not live without Him.
And I found Him.
So, last night, for the first time in my life, I thanked Christ, fervently and genuinely, for my abusive and failed marriage. I let go of my earthly expectations of what I felt He should have done. I let go of my judgment about how I felt I should have behaved.
I thanked Him instead for what was true- that through the experience, I was thrown on a path that would lead me straight into His arms and into a relationship with Him that was based on authenticity, pure need and without formula or ritual.
My marriage and divorce was, in fact, one of the best things that ever happened to me. That's an example of what happens when God's redemptive powers hit our failures. He doesn't just forgive us- He transforms the entire experience.
In fact, it's a little something like this (although, unlike Paul, I initially lost everything because of sin, not expressly for the sake of Christ):
"But whatever former things I had that might have been gains to me, I have come to consider as [one combined] loss for Christ's sake.
Yes, furthermore, I count everything as loss compared to the possession of the priceless privilege (the overwhelming preciousness, the surpassing worth, and supreme advantage) of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord and of progressively becoming more deeply and intimately acquainted with Him [of perceiving and recognizing and understanding Him more fully and clearly]. For His sake I have lost everything and consider it all to be mere rubbish (refuse, dregs), in order that I may win (gain) Christ (the Anointed One),
And that I may [actually] be found and known as in Him, not having any [self-achieved] righteousness that can be called my own, based on my obedience to the Law's demands (ritualistic uprightness and supposed right standing with God thus acquired), but possessing that [genuine righteousness] which comes through faith in Christ (the Anointed One), the [truly] right standing with God, which comes from God by [saving] faith."
Philippians 3:7-9, Amplified Bible
"In my deepest wound I saw Your glory and it dazzled me." St. Augustine, Confessions
It starting me thinking about my wounds. Specifically, I've been thinking about my first marriage. It's not my deepest wound, but I have less understanding and acceptance of this wound than I have of my sexual abuse or infertility.
For years I have been conflicted about it- torn between a lingering resentment at God for not keeping me safe like I thought He promised He would do, and a hatred of myself- for my weakness, for my stupid choices, for my selfishness and for my naivete.
Yesterday, I was thinking about it again. I was wondering again why God, in His mercy, had not sent me a good man- like the one I have now. He could have just sent me a good man, and all pain would have been spared.
That's where I paused, as an unlikely thought hit me. What would it have been like, if I had married a merciful, Godly man at that point in my life? Wouldn't I have sublimated my desire and longing for God into my love of this man?
I certainly would have. I would have felt no need to search desperately for God in truth, in reality, in the ruins of everything that I had thought made me valuable to Him.
I bet I would have just leaned on my husband's religion, on his experience and definitions- because that is my default place, that is what I naturally tend to do.
Instead, in one swift blow, I lost all my cherished guide marks, all the religious routes I had leaned on and all the easy answers.
I had to come to Him with nothing to offer Him but my incomplete, unreliable self.
I had to come to Him in conflict, knowing there might never be any answers at all- not in this life.
I had to come to Him alone, and from sheer longing- not to impress anyone else or to get their approval, not to conform to someone else's idea and not to acquire blessings, but simply because I could not live without Him.
And I found Him.
So, last night, for the first time in my life, I thanked Christ, fervently and genuinely, for my abusive and failed marriage. I let go of my earthly expectations of what I felt He should have done. I let go of my judgment about how I felt I should have behaved.
I thanked Him instead for what was true- that through the experience, I was thrown on a path that would lead me straight into His arms and into a relationship with Him that was based on authenticity, pure need and without formula or ritual.
My marriage and divorce was, in fact, one of the best things that ever happened to me. That's an example of what happens when God's redemptive powers hit our failures. He doesn't just forgive us- He transforms the entire experience.
In fact, it's a little something like this (although, unlike Paul, I initially lost everything because of sin, not expressly for the sake of Christ):
"But whatever former things I had that might have been gains to me, I have come to consider as [one combined] loss for Christ's sake.
Yes, furthermore, I count everything as loss compared to the possession of the priceless privilege (the overwhelming preciousness, the surpassing worth, and supreme advantage) of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord and of progressively becoming more deeply and intimately acquainted with Him [of perceiving and recognizing and understanding Him more fully and clearly]. For His sake I have lost everything and consider it all to be mere rubbish (refuse, dregs), in order that I may win (gain) Christ (the Anointed One),
And that I may [actually] be found and known as in Him, not having any [self-achieved] righteousness that can be called my own, based on my obedience to the Law's demands (ritualistic uprightness and supposed right standing with God thus acquired), but possessing that [genuine righteousness] which comes through faith in Christ (the Anointed One), the [truly] right standing with God, which comes from God by [saving] faith."
Philippians 3:7-9, Amplified Bible
Saturday, November 19, 2011
November 19th
I was rereading M. Scott Peck's A Bed By the Window, which by the way is an awesome book, and I read this part:
"Mrs. Simonton glanced at the office door through her tears to make sure it was shut. Not caring otherwise, knowing the staff might hear something strange, she looked over at the couch as if God Himself were sitting there smirking, and she hit her fist on the desk. "I don't trust You," she half screamed. "I've never trusted You. You've never deserved it, and I don't intend to begin trusting You now!"'
And on my goodness, I remembered so clearly reading that book and having that character's courageous and unsettling authenticity with God just really resonate with me. I loved reading it, the first time. It knocked something loose in me.
Last night, when I reread it, I had to put the book down and rest my head against the back of the couch, just thinking about it. I felt Him very close to me, as I was thinking about it.
"You loved me even then!" I said to Him, in wonder.
"Of course," He replied. "I love you as you are."
"But I was full of anger and mistrust."
"I want you as you really are, not as you wish to be," He said.
This is a really hard concept for me to grasp, but as I tested it fully, it must be true. Because He really did love me, all those years I kept Him at arm's length, out of mistrust and shame and fear. It didn't phase Him; He was relentless in His love.
I'm learning more and more not to hide things from Him. It's pointless anyway; He knows it all. To let it go, to acknowledge its reality, is such a freeing and therapeutic thing to do, I've found.
So, then I went back to reading my book and I got to this part:
"Well, I do believe in God."
"So?"
"So I talk to God and He talks to me. I talked to Him a great deal last night. I asked Him what could be done to help Heather. His answer to me was very clear."
I had to pause at that part too. I thought about the strangeness of talking to God and having Him reply. It's unconventional and comes out sounding grandiose no matter how I try and write it, although its perfectly obvious that He doesn't talk to me about anything really important- at least, anything that would be important to anyone else. He's not talking to me about the world or His plans or anything like that- He just talks to me about me.
Then I thought about it this way. For the most part, we relate to God through faith, while in this life. Now God can come down and shatter our phantom reality with His overwhelming reality, but He doesn't usually choose to. It seems to me that He lets us choose the size of the opening by which we experience Him- the window of our faith.
If we open the window wide, we present Him with a wide opportunity to interact with us. If we keep it narrow, for whatever reason, usually He respects our boundaries, unless for some reason of His own, He comes in full of grace and truth and expands us on His own. Which it seems to me He does sometimes, thank God! Otherwise, sometimes we'd be stuck.
Other times, maybe He gives us a deep longing and the longing is so great that we open all the windows, because we can't standing living in the smallness anymore. In that case, we find that we must have more of Him, and we will risk transparency to do so.
That's what it's been like for me. My thirst for God is so great that I must throw open all the windows and all the doors. Also, the deeper I go with Him, the more rooms inside myself I throw open for Him, because I know He's been inside them anyway. So I might as well be bold, you know?
I can't take the credit for this longing, because He placed it in me. He made me this way; I just yield to it. But I love it and I love Him and I love Him for making me this way.
There's a lot of risks inherent in talking to God, it seems to me, when I think about it. (One is that other people may think you are bag lady crazy.) But when I can surrender into Him and into the risk, and talk anyway, I have opened the window to actually hearing Him.
It's just simple trust, that is all. It's not some form of Super Spirituality or ultra perfection or anything else silly like that. All it is, is being quiet in Him with a kind of childlike trust.
I can't help but notice that the closer I draw to Him, the younger I feel myself to be. Part of myself doesn't like this- I want the dignity of being an adult. Another part of me finds this completely delightful and right, and a profound relief.
Of course I want to be perfect for Him. A part of me wishes to present my perfection to Him like a lovely gift that He's so grateful for. But that's not how it works- not for me, anyway. For me, it's the other way round. When I try and reverse it, and work on my own perfection for Him, all I do is turn my back on Him so I can get myself in good working order, as it were.
When I'm wrestling with this- with self judgment or some imperfection or fear or something else that hurts and bothers me, it's as though I were a child holding something sharp or jagged and stubbornly trying to make it better. And Christ touches my shoulder, to remind me and with relief, I turn to Him and I give it up to Him. He throws it as far away from us as the east is from the west and remembers it no more.
Then He picks me up in His arms and carries me and I am safe and home again. And I am so very grateful for it.
"Mrs. Simonton glanced at the office door through her tears to make sure it was shut. Not caring otherwise, knowing the staff might hear something strange, she looked over at the couch as if God Himself were sitting there smirking, and she hit her fist on the desk. "I don't trust You," she half screamed. "I've never trusted You. You've never deserved it, and I don't intend to begin trusting You now!"'
And on my goodness, I remembered so clearly reading that book and having that character's courageous and unsettling authenticity with God just really resonate with me. I loved reading it, the first time. It knocked something loose in me.
Last night, when I reread it, I had to put the book down and rest my head against the back of the couch, just thinking about it. I felt Him very close to me, as I was thinking about it.
"You loved me even then!" I said to Him, in wonder.
"Of course," He replied. "I love you as you are."
"But I was full of anger and mistrust."
"I want you as you really are, not as you wish to be," He said.
This is a really hard concept for me to grasp, but as I tested it fully, it must be true. Because He really did love me, all those years I kept Him at arm's length, out of mistrust and shame and fear. It didn't phase Him; He was relentless in His love.
I'm learning more and more not to hide things from Him. It's pointless anyway; He knows it all. To let it go, to acknowledge its reality, is such a freeing and therapeutic thing to do, I've found.
So, then I went back to reading my book and I got to this part:
"Well, I do believe in God."
"So?"
"So I talk to God and He talks to me. I talked to Him a great deal last night. I asked Him what could be done to help Heather. His answer to me was very clear."
I had to pause at that part too. I thought about the strangeness of talking to God and having Him reply. It's unconventional and comes out sounding grandiose no matter how I try and write it, although its perfectly obvious that He doesn't talk to me about anything really important- at least, anything that would be important to anyone else. He's not talking to me about the world or His plans or anything like that- He just talks to me about me.
Then I thought about it this way. For the most part, we relate to God through faith, while in this life. Now God can come down and shatter our phantom reality with His overwhelming reality, but He doesn't usually choose to. It seems to me that He lets us choose the size of the opening by which we experience Him- the window of our faith.
If we open the window wide, we present Him with a wide opportunity to interact with us. If we keep it narrow, for whatever reason, usually He respects our boundaries, unless for some reason of His own, He comes in full of grace and truth and expands us on His own. Which it seems to me He does sometimes, thank God! Otherwise, sometimes we'd be stuck.
Other times, maybe He gives us a deep longing and the longing is so great that we open all the windows, because we can't standing living in the smallness anymore. In that case, we find that we must have more of Him, and we will risk transparency to do so.
That's what it's been like for me. My thirst for God is so great that I must throw open all the windows and all the doors. Also, the deeper I go with Him, the more rooms inside myself I throw open for Him, because I know He's been inside them anyway. So I might as well be bold, you know?
I can't take the credit for this longing, because He placed it in me. He made me this way; I just yield to it. But I love it and I love Him and I love Him for making me this way.
There's a lot of risks inherent in talking to God, it seems to me, when I think about it. (One is that other people may think you are bag lady crazy.) But when I can surrender into Him and into the risk, and talk anyway, I have opened the window to actually hearing Him.
It's just simple trust, that is all. It's not some form of Super Spirituality or ultra perfection or anything else silly like that. All it is, is being quiet in Him with a kind of childlike trust.
I can't help but notice that the closer I draw to Him, the younger I feel myself to be. Part of myself doesn't like this- I want the dignity of being an adult. Another part of me finds this completely delightful and right, and a profound relief.
Of course I want to be perfect for Him. A part of me wishes to present my perfection to Him like a lovely gift that He's so grateful for. But that's not how it works- not for me, anyway. For me, it's the other way round. When I try and reverse it, and work on my own perfection for Him, all I do is turn my back on Him so I can get myself in good working order, as it were.
When I'm wrestling with this- with self judgment or some imperfection or fear or something else that hurts and bothers me, it's as though I were a child holding something sharp or jagged and stubbornly trying to make it better. And Christ touches my shoulder, to remind me and with relief, I turn to Him and I give it up to Him. He throws it as far away from us as the east is from the west and remembers it no more.
Then He picks me up in His arms and carries me and I am safe and home again. And I am so very grateful for it.
Thursday, November 17, 2011
November 17th
I write at least two blogs to every one that I publish, lately. I just don't have the courage to be that open. But here is one I wrote yesterday that I will post.
I think rainstorms in autumn are the best kind of rainstorms. Yesterday evening it rained; Keith and I stood at the back step to watch it. The rain and the wind were tearing off hundreds and hundreds of copper red leaves.
The ragged leaves were drifting down in great gusts through the rain. The sky and the air and the back yard were full of leaves. They brushed past my hands and fell right onto the door step.
I can pretty much read my entire way through the Bible now. I see things I never saw before. If one reads the Bible in fear or shame, it's very hard to catch even a little of its meaning. It's like reading it with a self imposed veil, or through a very warped lens.
Any time I felt bad about myself, any time I felt guilty or shameful, I embraced this as if it were from God. No wonder I have so many religious wounds. Good lord. So, reading the Bible was excruciating.
It amazes me, when I think back on it. I was a virgin, for goodness sake- well, I thought I was. I hadn't even held hands with a boy. Where on earth was my shame coming from when I read about maintaining sexual purity? My sexual abuse, of course.
It just amazes me now. There was no reason for me to feel shame- I was innocent! I wasn't sexually sinning! There was no reason for condemnation.
Yet I still felt condemnation and I embraced it whole heartedly. This is an awful bondage, a horrible, internal prison.
But now I can read through the Bible, thinking about each thing. And it is full of wondrous things.
There is a great deal that I don't understand but my teacher is Jesus Himself. So, when I see stuff I don't understand, I say, I'm not at that lesson yet, and I hand it to Him. If I feel scared, He takes me in His arms, and I remember that I'm all bound up in Him- my life, my right standing with God, my faith- everything flows from and is kept in Him. He is the very Wisdom of God.
I love to read in John when He says, you call Me Teacher and Lord, and it is right that you do, for so I am.(John 13:13)
So He is- He really is! He is my Teacher and my Lord. I like to call Him Lord, but I like best to call Him that at night, when He is close to me and I am resting in His tender and loving presence. Because then it is thrilling to know that my Lord and my God loves me and delights in me.
If I don't find Him close, I seek Him out. I cry out to Him, in my spirit, and He answers me. Sometimes I say His name just because I love to say His name, just because I must, because I can. Because He is there and listening and I can reach out to Him.
In the morning, when I wake, the first thing I do is to reach out to Him, to be sure He is there. I want Him always there. Hello, I tell Him. Hello, hello, hello!
It is like this:
O God, You are my God, earnestly will I seek You; my inner self thirsts for You, my flesh longs and is faint for You, in a dry and weary land where no water is.
So I have looked upon You in the sanctuary to see Your power and Your glory.
Because Your loving-kindness is better than life, my lips shall praise You.
So will I bless You while I live; I will lift up my hands in Your name.
My whole being shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness; and my mouth shall praise You with joyful lips
When I remember You upon my bed and meditate on You in the night watches.
For You have been my help, and in the shadow of Your wings will I rejoice.
My whole being follows hard after You and clings closely to You; Your right hand upholds me.
Psalm 63:1-8
I think rainstorms in autumn are the best kind of rainstorms. Yesterday evening it rained; Keith and I stood at the back step to watch it. The rain and the wind were tearing off hundreds and hundreds of copper red leaves.
The ragged leaves were drifting down in great gusts through the rain. The sky and the air and the back yard were full of leaves. They brushed past my hands and fell right onto the door step.
I can pretty much read my entire way through the Bible now. I see things I never saw before. If one reads the Bible in fear or shame, it's very hard to catch even a little of its meaning. It's like reading it with a self imposed veil, or through a very warped lens.
Any time I felt bad about myself, any time I felt guilty or shameful, I embraced this as if it were from God. No wonder I have so many religious wounds. Good lord. So, reading the Bible was excruciating.
It amazes me, when I think back on it. I was a virgin, for goodness sake- well, I thought I was. I hadn't even held hands with a boy. Where on earth was my shame coming from when I read about maintaining sexual purity? My sexual abuse, of course.
It just amazes me now. There was no reason for me to feel shame- I was innocent! I wasn't sexually sinning! There was no reason for condemnation.
Yet I still felt condemnation and I embraced it whole heartedly. This is an awful bondage, a horrible, internal prison.
But now I can read through the Bible, thinking about each thing. And it is full of wondrous things.
There is a great deal that I don't understand but my teacher is Jesus Himself. So, when I see stuff I don't understand, I say, I'm not at that lesson yet, and I hand it to Him. If I feel scared, He takes me in His arms, and I remember that I'm all bound up in Him- my life, my right standing with God, my faith- everything flows from and is kept in Him. He is the very Wisdom of God.
I love to read in John when He says, you call Me Teacher and Lord, and it is right that you do, for so I am.(John 13:13)
So He is- He really is! He is my Teacher and my Lord. I like to call Him Lord, but I like best to call Him that at night, when He is close to me and I am resting in His tender and loving presence. Because then it is thrilling to know that my Lord and my God loves me and delights in me.
If I don't find Him close, I seek Him out. I cry out to Him, in my spirit, and He answers me. Sometimes I say His name just because I love to say His name, just because I must, because I can. Because He is there and listening and I can reach out to Him.
In the morning, when I wake, the first thing I do is to reach out to Him, to be sure He is there. I want Him always there. Hello, I tell Him. Hello, hello, hello!
It is like this:
O God, You are my God, earnestly will I seek You; my inner self thirsts for You, my flesh longs and is faint for You, in a dry and weary land where no water is.
So I have looked upon You in the sanctuary to see Your power and Your glory.
Because Your loving-kindness is better than life, my lips shall praise You.
So will I bless You while I live; I will lift up my hands in Your name.
My whole being shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness; and my mouth shall praise You with joyful lips
When I remember You upon my bed and meditate on You in the night watches.
For You have been my help, and in the shadow of Your wings will I rejoice.
My whole being follows hard after You and clings closely to You; Your right hand upholds me.
Psalm 63:1-8
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
November 15th
A couple nights ago, I was thinking about the extraordinary relationship between Christ and His Father. I love to think about this; I find it beautiful and beyond understanding. I like to think about these things:
"The Lord possessed Me at the beginning of His work, the first of His acts of old. Ages ago, I was set up, at the first, before the beginning of the earth. When there were no depths, I was brought forth, when there were no springs abounding with water.
"...then I was beside Him, like a master workman, and I was daily His delight, rejoicing before Him always, rejoicing in His inhabited world, and delighting in the children of man."
Proverbs 8:22-24, 30-31
"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him and without Him was not anything made that was made."
John 1:1-3
"I will tell of the decree: The Lord said to me, "You are my Son; today I have begotten You. Ask of Me, and I will make the nations Your heritage, and the ends of the earth Your possession."
Psalm 2:7-8
""For to which of the angels did God ever say, "You are My Son, today I have begotten You"?
"Or again, "I will be to Him a father and He shall be to Me a son."
"And to which of the angels has He ever said, "Sit at My right hand until I make Your enemies a footstool for your feet."
Hebrews 1:5,13
"Then Jesus answered and said to them, "Most assuredly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He sees the Father do; for whatever He does, the Son also does in like manner. For the Father loves the Son, and shows Him all things that He Himself does; and He will show Him greater works than these, that you may marvel."
John 5:19-20
So, I was just resting in these things, thinking about them, and Jesus said to me, the Father loves you as much as He loves me.
And I was so appalled! I thought that could not possibly be true at all; nothing could possibly mean as much to God as His own uniquely begotten Son.
He said, reread My prayer before I was crucified.
So the next day, I did. I read this:
"I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.
“Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world."
John 17:22-24 TNIV
Then I realized that of course the Father must love us as much as He loves Christ, because He gave Christ up to death for our sakes. And Christ went willingly, freely giving up the glory and honor He had with His Father, in order to be born human and to die in our sins.
"But it was the will of the Lord to crush Him, causing Him to suffer. Because He gives His life as a gift on the altar for sin, He will see His children. Days will be added to His life, and the will of the Lord will do well in His hand. He will see what the suffering of His soul brings, and will be pleased. By what He knows, the One Who is right and good, My Servant, will carry the punishment of many and He will carry their sins. So I will give Him a share among the great. He will divide the riches with the strong, because He gave up His life. They thought of Him as One Who broke the Law. Yet He Himself carried the sin of many, and prayed for the sinners.
Isaiah 53:10-12, New Life Version
I spent the entire day pretty much just stunned, just in a haze of wonder. It's so much that I can't take it all in for very long. The plans of God are beyond all understanding and we are all caught up in them, at the very heart of them, and all those plans are overflowing and abounding with love.
So then, we have to exclaim, along with Paul:
"What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written:
“For your sake we face death all day long;
we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered."
No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord."
Romans 8:31-39, NIV
"The Lord possessed Me at the beginning of His work, the first of His acts of old. Ages ago, I was set up, at the first, before the beginning of the earth. When there were no depths, I was brought forth, when there were no springs abounding with water.
"...then I was beside Him, like a master workman, and I was daily His delight, rejoicing before Him always, rejoicing in His inhabited world, and delighting in the children of man."
Proverbs 8:22-24, 30-31
"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him and without Him was not anything made that was made."
John 1:1-3
"I will tell of the decree: The Lord said to me, "You are my Son; today I have begotten You. Ask of Me, and I will make the nations Your heritage, and the ends of the earth Your possession."
Psalm 2:7-8
""For to which of the angels did God ever say, "You are My Son, today I have begotten You"?
"Or again, "I will be to Him a father and He shall be to Me a son."
"And to which of the angels has He ever said, "Sit at My right hand until I make Your enemies a footstool for your feet."
Hebrews 1:5,13
"Then Jesus answered and said to them, "Most assuredly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He sees the Father do; for whatever He does, the Son also does in like manner. For the Father loves the Son, and shows Him all things that He Himself does; and He will show Him greater works than these, that you may marvel."
John 5:19-20
So, I was just resting in these things, thinking about them, and Jesus said to me, the Father loves you as much as He loves me.
And I was so appalled! I thought that could not possibly be true at all; nothing could possibly mean as much to God as His own uniquely begotten Son.
He said, reread My prayer before I was crucified.
So the next day, I did. I read this:
"I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.
“Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world."
John 17:22-24 TNIV
Then I realized that of course the Father must love us as much as He loves Christ, because He gave Christ up to death for our sakes. And Christ went willingly, freely giving up the glory and honor He had with His Father, in order to be born human and to die in our sins.
"But it was the will of the Lord to crush Him, causing Him to suffer. Because He gives His life as a gift on the altar for sin, He will see His children. Days will be added to His life, and the will of the Lord will do well in His hand. He will see what the suffering of His soul brings, and will be pleased. By what He knows, the One Who is right and good, My Servant, will carry the punishment of many and He will carry their sins. So I will give Him a share among the great. He will divide the riches with the strong, because He gave up His life. They thought of Him as One Who broke the Law. Yet He Himself carried the sin of many, and prayed for the sinners.
Isaiah 53:10-12, New Life Version
I spent the entire day pretty much just stunned, just in a haze of wonder. It's so much that I can't take it all in for very long. The plans of God are beyond all understanding and we are all caught up in them, at the very heart of them, and all those plans are overflowing and abounding with love.
So then, we have to exclaim, along with Paul:
"What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written:
“For your sake we face death all day long;
we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered."
No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord."
Romans 8:31-39, NIV
Sunday, November 13, 2011
November 13th
We did not go up to Indiana this weekend after all; it turns out we couldn't take Keith's mom down with us or visit her very often. But she is doing better and we plan to go up there for Thanksgiving.
Ok, so, yesterday I had the house to myself while Keith worked on Max. I was very much enjoying my nice long and quiet afternoon in the middle of a hectic four day weekend.
I was settled comfortably and deeply into the couch, my bare feet up on the dusty coffee table, watching Shadowlands. I'd seen it before, but I'd forgotten how good it was.
A pot of tea had been brewed and beside me was an opened bag of chips and in my lap was a small bowl of sour cream.
I was all set to completely blow my diet in a luxurious splurge of fatty foods while movie watching when my phone rang.
It was Keith calling, informing me that the work on Max was much more difficult than he'd anticipated, even with three guys helping, and he'd invited all of them, plus their families, over for dinner in a few hours.
He wanted me to pick up four ready made pizzas from Walmart and have them and the house ready for guests.
It was about three in the afternoon, the house was in a state of general and wide spread neglect and I was wearing a shirt with a hole in it. I hadn't brushed my hair or showered yet that day.
My head was like a broken Rolodex; constantly flipping and never stopping long enough to impart actual information. Sensing my impaired state of mind, Keith said that he would pick up the pizzas himself, then he had to ring off to get back to work.
"I love you," he said.
I did not say it back. I put the phone back in my pocket and kept taking a step in one direction and then stopping and taking a step in another, constantly beset by the multitude of things I had to get done. Grimly, I set my teeth.
"I'm going to be hospitable!" I goaded myself. "It's in the Bible. It must be done. It will be done. Go, do it! Clean the bathroom!"
"But my movie!' I wailed. "My chips! I have time... I can finish the movie, surely..."
"The bathrooms!" I told myself, implacably. "The floors. The counters. The bedroom. Turn the movie off. And be glad about it! Jesus is watching you right this minute! Stop having such a bad attitude about the whole thing. This is a chance to serve. Do it and be happy about it, damn it."
Heaving a sigh, I tried to wrestle myself into a happier state of mind while trying to find the remote. But fortunately for me, Jesus was watching and right there. You are angry, He reminded me. This reminder came with absolutely no sense of guilt, merely freedom.
So, feeling a little like Richard Gere in Pretty Woman, I said with careful deliberation: "I am very angry at Keith."
The girls perked their ears up and looked at me. I looked down at them.
"I am very angry at Daddy," I told them, with more force.
Then I roared at the ceiling in a huge outburst of massive anger and frustration and then I laughed, shook my shoulders free of it, turned off the TV and put my snacks away.
While listening to Dire Straits, Tom Petty, Pink Floyd and U2 streaming at very loud volume from Pandora, I vacuumed, dusted, Windexed, bleached, polished and rearranged almost everything in the house. I even picked up the pizzas myself.
By the time Keith got home with the guests, the house gleamed with polish and candles and smelled of pumpkin cookies. The pizzas were in the oven and I was wearing a presentable shirt and my hair was brushed.
When Keith got in the door, the pride on his face was almost palpable. He took a quick shower to wash off the grease and grime and then found me in the kitchen. He pulled me into his arms.
"You are beautiful and the house is beautiful and I love you," he whispered into my ear.
This time I said it back. And then I went and was hospitable.
Ok, so, yesterday I had the house to myself while Keith worked on Max. I was very much enjoying my nice long and quiet afternoon in the middle of a hectic four day weekend.
I was settled comfortably and deeply into the couch, my bare feet up on the dusty coffee table, watching Shadowlands. I'd seen it before, but I'd forgotten how good it was.
A pot of tea had been brewed and beside me was an opened bag of chips and in my lap was a small bowl of sour cream.
I was all set to completely blow my diet in a luxurious splurge of fatty foods while movie watching when my phone rang.
It was Keith calling, informing me that the work on Max was much more difficult than he'd anticipated, even with three guys helping, and he'd invited all of them, plus their families, over for dinner in a few hours.
He wanted me to pick up four ready made pizzas from Walmart and have them and the house ready for guests.
It was about three in the afternoon, the house was in a state of general and wide spread neglect and I was wearing a shirt with a hole in it. I hadn't brushed my hair or showered yet that day.
My head was like a broken Rolodex; constantly flipping and never stopping long enough to impart actual information. Sensing my impaired state of mind, Keith said that he would pick up the pizzas himself, then he had to ring off to get back to work.
"I love you," he said.
I did not say it back. I put the phone back in my pocket and kept taking a step in one direction and then stopping and taking a step in another, constantly beset by the multitude of things I had to get done. Grimly, I set my teeth.
"I'm going to be hospitable!" I goaded myself. "It's in the Bible. It must be done. It will be done. Go, do it! Clean the bathroom!"
"But my movie!' I wailed. "My chips! I have time... I can finish the movie, surely..."
"The bathrooms!" I told myself, implacably. "The floors. The counters. The bedroom. Turn the movie off. And be glad about it! Jesus is watching you right this minute! Stop having such a bad attitude about the whole thing. This is a chance to serve. Do it and be happy about it, damn it."
Heaving a sigh, I tried to wrestle myself into a happier state of mind while trying to find the remote. But fortunately for me, Jesus was watching and right there. You are angry, He reminded me. This reminder came with absolutely no sense of guilt, merely freedom.
So, feeling a little like Richard Gere in Pretty Woman, I said with careful deliberation: "I am very angry at Keith."
The girls perked their ears up and looked at me. I looked down at them.
"I am very angry at Daddy," I told them, with more force.
Then I roared at the ceiling in a huge outburst of massive anger and frustration and then I laughed, shook my shoulders free of it, turned off the TV and put my snacks away.
While listening to Dire Straits, Tom Petty, Pink Floyd and U2 streaming at very loud volume from Pandora, I vacuumed, dusted, Windexed, bleached, polished and rearranged almost everything in the house. I even picked up the pizzas myself.
By the time Keith got home with the guests, the house gleamed with polish and candles and smelled of pumpkin cookies. The pizzas were in the oven and I was wearing a presentable shirt and my hair was brushed.
When Keith got in the door, the pride on his face was almost palpable. He took a quick shower to wash off the grease and grime and then found me in the kitchen. He pulled me into his arms.
"You are beautiful and the house is beautiful and I love you," he whispered into my ear.
This time I said it back. And then I went and was hospitable.
Friday, November 11, 2011
November 11th
I'm glad my veteran is home with me this morning, researching ways to improve our computer and scribbling unintelligible things down on a note pad while listening to helpful instructional videos.
He's wearing a brand new, bright red tee shirt that reads "Callahan's Auto Parts." That shirt is one of ten that he ordered last week and had been waiting eagerly for all day yesterday. He has a Cool Aid smile tee shirt, the "Not Made in China" shirt and many, many others.
The clutch went out in his work truck, Max. Today we must pick up the new part and go grocery shopping together. This means that when it comes to checking out, I'll find a few unexpected items in the cart. Keith will be just as amazed as I.
"Where did this come from?" he will wonder, shaking his head. "Who would have put this in here?"
We'll purchase it anyway, of course, despite the mystery.
It dropped thirty degrees last night and when we woke up, the lawn was smothered in silver frost. It was cool enough in the house that I put my house robe on over my PJs. As I did, I noticed the dogs getting all excited and underfoot, with much tail wagging and eager expressions.
"Crazy little dogs!" I muttered. "What on earth do you think is going to happen?"
Then I remembered that in Kentucky, where we did not have a fenced in back yard, I had been forced to get up and walk them at all hours of the day and night. Very frequently, I was wearing my robe.
This experience must have taught them that the house robe equals going outside, smelling things, barking and remarking their territory, all very exciting and worthy activities.
In the interests of research, I spent all yesterday afternoon reading through a lot of my very, very old diaries. In particular, I read the one that spanned my graduation trip to England, when I was eighteen, all the way to my divorce from Bill. My last entry is dated October 1998, so that was... thirteen years ago?
All those thirteen years and I never once reread that thing. I couldn't, because the diary describes some of the worst years of my life. That diary was like a little time bomb, just quietly ticking away in my plastic storage bin.
But I guess by rereading it at last, I defused it. I'm still processing everything that came up for me as I read it. The thing that stood out to me the most were the entries I wrote about Jesus. In fact, my jaw dropped on more than one occasion as I read through the diary.
I had no idea. I had forgotten it all- I blacked it right out. I made myself forget, because the transition from who I had been to who I was when I married my ex husband was so steep and so horrific. I couldn't explain it. It took me years to heal from it.
I was eighteen years old when I wrote this:
"Dear Jesus," I wrote, back in mid September of 1996, "I read about You today and how the people followed You only because You gave them free meals. At least the crowd that followed You after You fed the 5,000. Then when You spoke of the important stuff- You being the Bread of Heaven, they grumbled and left You..."
Oh, that just makes me laugh out loud. Oh my goodness. What's hilarious is that, a month ago, when I was rereading the Gospels for the first time in a long time, I had the exact same reaction to that scene.
Here's another one:
"Dear Jesus,
I love You. You are close to me- You will never leave me. You will see to all my needs. You guide me along paths of righteousness for Your name's sake. You are faithful to keep me bound close to You. You have placed me like a seal over your heart, like a seal over Your arm. You are the author and finisher of my faith."
Whoa Nellie. That explains a lot, don't you think? That beautifully illuminates everything I've been experiencing lately.
When I finished that diary, I read a much older one. By the time I was sixteen, I was starting to develop an actual relationship with God.
How I did this is a complete mystery to me. Parts of the diary just show up, alive and beautiful, in the tangle of religious thought and self condemnation. Where on earth did they come from? How did I know that?
In April of 1994, when I was sixteen, I wrote this:
"So, at the same time as I discover this, I'm rejoicing in another kind of newness. It adds up to create a sense of wonder or a feeling like I'm a baby, just learning to walk, or like the disciple who walked on water. If he looked away from Jesus, he sank. I sink, but I look to Jesus every time the water reaches my ankles. Then I come to my senses and and I'm borne back up, forgiven, loved and helped to keep going. All I have to do is look to Jesus and He takes care of it.
"I am created just to please God. In one way it's humbling, in another it's more exciting than I have yet imagined.
"Well, this spiritual high will go, but God will still love and care for me as He does right now, and my roots in Christ will be deeper."
Reading this stuff just fills me with awe. Isn't life mysterious? Isn't it beautiful? Our entire life, He is drawing us to Him with cords of love, cords that can never be broken.
He's wearing a brand new, bright red tee shirt that reads "Callahan's Auto Parts." That shirt is one of ten that he ordered last week and had been waiting eagerly for all day yesterday. He has a Cool Aid smile tee shirt, the "Not Made in China" shirt and many, many others.
The clutch went out in his work truck, Max. Today we must pick up the new part and go grocery shopping together. This means that when it comes to checking out, I'll find a few unexpected items in the cart. Keith will be just as amazed as I.
"Where did this come from?" he will wonder, shaking his head. "Who would have put this in here?"
We'll purchase it anyway, of course, despite the mystery.
It dropped thirty degrees last night and when we woke up, the lawn was smothered in silver frost. It was cool enough in the house that I put my house robe on over my PJs. As I did, I noticed the dogs getting all excited and underfoot, with much tail wagging and eager expressions.
"Crazy little dogs!" I muttered. "What on earth do you think is going to happen?"
Then I remembered that in Kentucky, where we did not have a fenced in back yard, I had been forced to get up and walk them at all hours of the day and night. Very frequently, I was wearing my robe.
This experience must have taught them that the house robe equals going outside, smelling things, barking and remarking their territory, all very exciting and worthy activities.
In the interests of research, I spent all yesterday afternoon reading through a lot of my very, very old diaries. In particular, I read the one that spanned my graduation trip to England, when I was eighteen, all the way to my divorce from Bill. My last entry is dated October 1998, so that was... thirteen years ago?
All those thirteen years and I never once reread that thing. I couldn't, because the diary describes some of the worst years of my life. That diary was like a little time bomb, just quietly ticking away in my plastic storage bin.
But I guess by rereading it at last, I defused it. I'm still processing everything that came up for me as I read it. The thing that stood out to me the most were the entries I wrote about Jesus. In fact, my jaw dropped on more than one occasion as I read through the diary.
I had no idea. I had forgotten it all- I blacked it right out. I made myself forget, because the transition from who I had been to who I was when I married my ex husband was so steep and so horrific. I couldn't explain it. It took me years to heal from it.
I was eighteen years old when I wrote this:
"Dear Jesus," I wrote, back in mid September of 1996, "I read about You today and how the people followed You only because You gave them free meals. At least the crowd that followed You after You fed the 5,000. Then when You spoke of the important stuff- You being the Bread of Heaven, they grumbled and left You..."
Oh, that just makes me laugh out loud. Oh my goodness. What's hilarious is that, a month ago, when I was rereading the Gospels for the first time in a long time, I had the exact same reaction to that scene.
Here's another one:
"Dear Jesus,
I love You. You are close to me- You will never leave me. You will see to all my needs. You guide me along paths of righteousness for Your name's sake. You are faithful to keep me bound close to You. You have placed me like a seal over your heart, like a seal over Your arm. You are the author and finisher of my faith."
Whoa Nellie. That explains a lot, don't you think? That beautifully illuminates everything I've been experiencing lately.
When I finished that diary, I read a much older one. By the time I was sixteen, I was starting to develop an actual relationship with God.
How I did this is a complete mystery to me. Parts of the diary just show up, alive and beautiful, in the tangle of religious thought and self condemnation. Where on earth did they come from? How did I know that?
In April of 1994, when I was sixteen, I wrote this:
"So, at the same time as I discover this, I'm rejoicing in another kind of newness. It adds up to create a sense of wonder or a feeling like I'm a baby, just learning to walk, or like the disciple who walked on water. If he looked away from Jesus, he sank. I sink, but I look to Jesus every time the water reaches my ankles. Then I come to my senses and and I'm borne back up, forgiven, loved and helped to keep going. All I have to do is look to Jesus and He takes care of it.
"I am created just to please God. In one way it's humbling, in another it's more exciting than I have yet imagined.
"Well, this spiritual high will go, but God will still love and care for me as He does right now, and my roots in Christ will be deeper."
Reading this stuff just fills me with awe. Isn't life mysterious? Isn't it beautiful? Our entire life, He is drawing us to Him with cords of love, cords that can never be broken.
Thursday, November 10, 2011
November 10th
Well, I heard from my father's friend, the professional writer. He called me yesterday afternoon.
Basically, what it is, is that I have someone who will get my book published, provided I can write one. He presented me with this huge opportunity just as a gift. He said to me, you have the ability, the life experience and the point of view- write it, and I will help you publish it.
I gathered that I could write any type of novel I felt like, but it would need to be either fiction or memoir, not fantasy. His publisher friend is open to novels from an evangelical view point- apparently, she is working with a few such authors.
He said that the trick is to get the first book published, after that I could pretty much write anything I wanted. So, if I can get something really good out now, later I can hopefully get Torii published, once I've got it as it should be.
This time I managed not to say "oh my gosh" as often as the last time, but I sure felt like saying it. I can't say that I was cool and collected, but I was less of a spaz, so that's good.
Now I'm all paralyzed and my head is still spinning. I have this incredible opportunity. What should I do? What should I write? How should I format it? What should be my theme? What should be my plot line?
I can't write about my entire life, because it's just too much material for one novel. I have to narrow stuff down. Should I narrow down in advance, or should I just free write until a theme appears?
I talked with my dad and he had some good ideas. He thought I could try and find an overarching metaphor for the entire story, to help define it.
Also, we talked about making a list of all the important or defining emotional moments or junctions in my life and then writing out each of them like chapters and head them up with a quote that sums up that period or experience.
I'm going to start there and see what happens.
I don't think I can make it fiction. I can't find a fiction that would properly illustrate or capture the reality- apparently for me it's either complete fantasy or true to life, with no middle ground. Or maybe I can, after I've got some ideas in order.
Well, I guess I should stop worrying about it and just start working on it.
Basically, what it is, is that I have someone who will get my book published, provided I can write one. He presented me with this huge opportunity just as a gift. He said to me, you have the ability, the life experience and the point of view- write it, and I will help you publish it.
I gathered that I could write any type of novel I felt like, but it would need to be either fiction or memoir, not fantasy. His publisher friend is open to novels from an evangelical view point- apparently, she is working with a few such authors.
He said that the trick is to get the first book published, after that I could pretty much write anything I wanted. So, if I can get something really good out now, later I can hopefully get Torii published, once I've got it as it should be.
This time I managed not to say "oh my gosh" as often as the last time, but I sure felt like saying it. I can't say that I was cool and collected, but I was less of a spaz, so that's good.
Now I'm all paralyzed and my head is still spinning. I have this incredible opportunity. What should I do? What should I write? How should I format it? What should be my theme? What should be my plot line?
I can't write about my entire life, because it's just too much material for one novel. I have to narrow stuff down. Should I narrow down in advance, or should I just free write until a theme appears?
I talked with my dad and he had some good ideas. He thought I could try and find an overarching metaphor for the entire story, to help define it.
Also, we talked about making a list of all the important or defining emotional moments or junctions in my life and then writing out each of them like chapters and head them up with a quote that sums up that period or experience.
I'm going to start there and see what happens.
I don't think I can make it fiction. I can't find a fiction that would properly illustrate or capture the reality- apparently for me it's either complete fantasy or true to life, with no middle ground. Or maybe I can, after I've got some ideas in order.
Well, I guess I should stop worrying about it and just start working on it.
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
November 9th
There is this park that is very near our house. It's full of trimmed lawns and stately trees and little winding paths.
A stream runs through it and there is a vintage disc golf course laid out under the trees. No one ever plays, but the iron baskets, painted a pale green, are in good shape and stand invitingly along the gentle slopes.
There are lovely, long views of hillsides and autumn color, with glimpses of still water through the trees.
Here and there, built into the hillsides, are stone steps. Sometimes they lead to a shady spot with a picnic table and a stone grill.
Sometimes they don't go anywhere at all, they just are. They just rest there in the grassy slope, scattered over with leaves and moss grown, and above them is nothing but a copse of trees.
There's one place in particular, with a round, flat lawn, bordered by a very low stone wall. The curve of this wall divides the thick grass from the shallow waters of a marshy pond that lie on the other side of it. The lawn rises up into a wooden hill and against the hill is a stone grill, under the thick shade of an oak tree.
I go walking there every day I can now. I like to go in the morning, when the light is still horizontal, making bright bands of sunlight and shade across the grass. The grass here is still green, almost as green as summer.
I don't walk alone. It's as though, as soon as I shut the front door behind me, I feel Him come alongside and take my hand, and we walk along together.
Sometimes we say nothing. Sometimes I just lean my spirit right into Him, in love and worship. I guess that's like another way of saying, I lift my heart up to Him. Only it's not up, because He's right beside me. It's as though He has His arm around my shoulders and I am leaning against Him.
And I just soak Him in, His presence and His love, and I think about Him. I think with joy and wonder, He is the Holy One of God! The Anointed! The King of glory!
And my soul is just flooded with wonder that He is right beside me, and I belong to Him. I'm under His authority, and called by His name. He claims me completely. This is the most delightful sensation and I abandon myself to the joy of it.
I keep thinking of this- I think it's a verse- He satisfies the longing soul. I suppose I'm thinking of it because I'm finding it to be so very true.
Ah ha! It is a verse. It's from a psalm, to be exact:
Oh, give thanks to the LORD, for He is good!
For His mercy endures forever.
Let the redeemed of the LORD say so,
Whom He has redeemed from the hand of the enemy,
And gathered out of the lands,
From the east and from the west,
From the north and from the south.
They wandered in the wilderness in a desolate way;
They found no city to dwell in.
Hungry and thirsty,
Their soul fainted in them.
Then they cried out to the LORD in their trouble,
And He delivered them out of their distresses.
And He led them forth by the right way,
That they might go to a city for a dwelling place.
Oh, that men would give thanks to the LORD for His goodness,
And for His wonderful works to the children of men!
For He satisfies the longing soul,
And fills the hungry soul with goodness.
Psalm 107:1-9
A stream runs through it and there is a vintage disc golf course laid out under the trees. No one ever plays, but the iron baskets, painted a pale green, are in good shape and stand invitingly along the gentle slopes.
There are lovely, long views of hillsides and autumn color, with glimpses of still water through the trees.
Here and there, built into the hillsides, are stone steps. Sometimes they lead to a shady spot with a picnic table and a stone grill.
Sometimes they don't go anywhere at all, they just are. They just rest there in the grassy slope, scattered over with leaves and moss grown, and above them is nothing but a copse of trees.
There's one place in particular, with a round, flat lawn, bordered by a very low stone wall. The curve of this wall divides the thick grass from the shallow waters of a marshy pond that lie on the other side of it. The lawn rises up into a wooden hill and against the hill is a stone grill, under the thick shade of an oak tree.
I go walking there every day I can now. I like to go in the morning, when the light is still horizontal, making bright bands of sunlight and shade across the grass. The grass here is still green, almost as green as summer.
I don't walk alone. It's as though, as soon as I shut the front door behind me, I feel Him come alongside and take my hand, and we walk along together.
Sometimes we say nothing. Sometimes I just lean my spirit right into Him, in love and worship. I guess that's like another way of saying, I lift my heart up to Him. Only it's not up, because He's right beside me. It's as though He has His arm around my shoulders and I am leaning against Him.
And I just soak Him in, His presence and His love, and I think about Him. I think with joy and wonder, He is the Holy One of God! The Anointed! The King of glory!
And my soul is just flooded with wonder that He is right beside me, and I belong to Him. I'm under His authority, and called by His name. He claims me completely. This is the most delightful sensation and I abandon myself to the joy of it.
I keep thinking of this- I think it's a verse- He satisfies the longing soul. I suppose I'm thinking of it because I'm finding it to be so very true.
Ah ha! It is a verse. It's from a psalm, to be exact:
Oh, give thanks to the LORD, for He is good!
For His mercy endures forever.
Let the redeemed of the LORD say so,
Whom He has redeemed from the hand of the enemy,
And gathered out of the lands,
From the east and from the west,
From the north and from the south.
They wandered in the wilderness in a desolate way;
They found no city to dwell in.
Hungry and thirsty,
Their soul fainted in them.
Then they cried out to the LORD in their trouble,
And He delivered them out of their distresses.
And He led them forth by the right way,
That they might go to a city for a dwelling place.
Oh, that men would give thanks to the LORD for His goodness,
And for His wonderful works to the children of men!
For He satisfies the longing soul,
And fills the hungry soul with goodness.
Psalm 107:1-9
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
November 8th
I was having such a good morning. I got up at six thirty, feeling all smug and pleased with myself, despite the fact that it was the time change and not my industry that got me there, and stood outside on the front step and watched the sun rise.
It was lovely. There were tiny swallows flying and darting about in the ragged, golden trees to my left and the clouds above were pink and gold and white and grey. I wondered why some of the clouds never took on any color. Also, I stood there barefoot- that's how mild it is out here.
Then I went inside and the house smelled richly of coffee and was warm and quiet. I settled down at my desk and proceeded with the day. Everything was going swimmingly until I logged on to check my credit card balance.
Now, I knew that there had been some additional purchases in the last week or so- they weren't any surprise to me. However, it does seem clear that in this area, my deficiencies in math are to my distinct disadvantage, for I clearly do not add up the total correctly in advance.
I stared at the amount with disbelief and horror and growing anger. Feeling the anger taking hold, I instinctively began to pull it in, doing the spiritual equivalent of looking over my shoulder to see if Christ had noticed it at all- like, nothing to see over here! All's quiet on the western front, and all... Money! Pfft! I scoff at the stuff!
Then I remembered that I was invited to express my emotion, and not tamp it down so tightly. So I ended up shouting out loud and doing a little angry dance in my chair while shaking my clenched fists at the ceiling.
And then I paid the credit card. And because I had given myself permission to be really ridiculously, even childishly angry, I was able to then move past that and be honestly grateful that we have money to pay it off, and to pay our bills, and to buy stuff.
Also, this means that when Keith calls, innocently expecting to hear the dulcet tones of his loving wife wishing him good morning, he will not hear, instead, the screeching rasp of an angry fishwife who is going to hunt him down and hit him over the head with a greasy fry pan.
So that works out for Keith, too.
It was lovely. There were tiny swallows flying and darting about in the ragged, golden trees to my left and the clouds above were pink and gold and white and grey. I wondered why some of the clouds never took on any color. Also, I stood there barefoot- that's how mild it is out here.
Then I went inside and the house smelled richly of coffee and was warm and quiet. I settled down at my desk and proceeded with the day. Everything was going swimmingly until I logged on to check my credit card balance.
Now, I knew that there had been some additional purchases in the last week or so- they weren't any surprise to me. However, it does seem clear that in this area, my deficiencies in math are to my distinct disadvantage, for I clearly do not add up the total correctly in advance.
I stared at the amount with disbelief and horror and growing anger. Feeling the anger taking hold, I instinctively began to pull it in, doing the spiritual equivalent of looking over my shoulder to see if Christ had noticed it at all- like, nothing to see over here! All's quiet on the western front, and all... Money! Pfft! I scoff at the stuff!
Then I remembered that I was invited to express my emotion, and not tamp it down so tightly. So I ended up shouting out loud and doing a little angry dance in my chair while shaking my clenched fists at the ceiling.
And then I paid the credit card. And because I had given myself permission to be really ridiculously, even childishly angry, I was able to then move past that and be honestly grateful that we have money to pay it off, and to pay our bills, and to buy stuff.
Also, this means that when Keith calls, innocently expecting to hear the dulcet tones of his loving wife wishing him good morning, he will not hear, instead, the screeching rasp of an angry fishwife who is going to hunt him down and hit him over the head with a greasy fry pan.
So that works out for Keith, too.
Monday, November 7, 2011
November 7th
Today is a cloudy, quiet Monday. I have the bedding in the wash, as is usual, and must clean the floors.
Yesterday, we went to church.
I have a hard time describing church. Or maybe what is more true, is that I have a hard time thinking about or experiencing church.
Certain things about church I love very much, and enjoy. This church has a chant that goes like this:
Leader: Who do we believe is the Christ?
People: We believe Jesus is the Christ, the Anointed One of God, the firstborn of all creation, the firstborn from the dead, in whom all things hold together, in whom the fullness of God was pleased to dwell by the power of the Spirit. Christ is the head of the body, the church, and by the blood of the cross reconciles all things to God. Amen.
I also love dressing up and walking across the church through a beautiful fall day. I love the joyful solemnity of the church service. I love hearing the hymns- the hymns were mind blowing to me. It's so real, I guess is why.
We sang: I love You, Lord, and I lift my voice to worship You. O my soul, rejoice. Take joy, my King, in what You hear- may it be a sweet, sweet sound in Your ear.
And we sang: Jesus, draw me close, closer, Lord to You. Let the world around me fade away... for I desire to worship and obey.
They also sang Blessed Assurance and He Who began a good work in you will be faithful to complete it.
These songs knocked my socks off. Singing such things out loud filled me with wonder and shyness and joy. I felt dizzy. It awesome to have been doing that all week long and then get to sing about it out loud, with a whole group of people who know what the song is talking about, and also had experienced being close to and belonging to Him.
That's what I love about church. Other things confuse me and to be honest, I don't agree with some of what they say. But that's alright. I don't have to agree with them in order to worship God with them. We're all only human anyway, and I certainly don't think that I have it all put together. No way.
Keith's mother is having some serious health problems and we may be driving up to Indiana to pick her up and bring her down here, to stay for a couple weeks. This may not happen, but if it does, I will have to search for the guest bed under the mound of army gear that's currently and cleverly disguising it from the untrained eye.
My father's friend, the professional writer, is going to be calling me sometime this week about a book idea. I guess his friend, the publisher, is looking for a certain type of novel, and he thinks I could write just such a novel. I guess it would be based off my life, sort of autobiographical, but not completely.
I sort of started on such a thing, just to see what it would feel like. And the answer to that is- it feels painful and it's slow going.
I reread Torii and it captivated me. I didn't realize until then exactly how well I had done at capturing Christ's love in the person of Tenshio. That was my intent all along, but goodness. I remembered all those times I offered the story to Christ, over and over again, as I was writing it and as I was thinking about it.
But it needs such a dreadful amount of work.
Keith did so well running his training mission that his CO has made him mission commander of every single training mission from here on out, which is a very dubious honor. It will run the poor guy right into the gound, but he's already preparing for the next round of training missions.
Hopefully soon he will put in his packet for becoming a recruiter and we will be heading off in that direction. I guess everyone but Keith and fifteen other guys in his company have received orders, most of them to go to Korea for a year, so we are waiting to see if Keith won't come down on the same orders himself.
If he's accepted into the recruiter school, then he won't have to go to Korea- if indeed, the Army in all its wisdom is thinking of sending him there. If he did end up going there, I would move back to Colorado and we'd have to push back adoption plans for yet another year or more.
So, things are kind of up in the air. That's what's new over here at the Indiana household. Now the sun has come out again, and I'm going to go for a walk.
Yesterday, we went to church.
I have a hard time describing church. Or maybe what is more true, is that I have a hard time thinking about or experiencing church.
Certain things about church I love very much, and enjoy. This church has a chant that goes like this:
Leader: Who do we believe is the Christ?
People: We believe Jesus is the Christ, the Anointed One of God, the firstborn of all creation, the firstborn from the dead, in whom all things hold together, in whom the fullness of God was pleased to dwell by the power of the Spirit. Christ is the head of the body, the church, and by the blood of the cross reconciles all things to God. Amen.
I also love dressing up and walking across the church through a beautiful fall day. I love the joyful solemnity of the church service. I love hearing the hymns- the hymns were mind blowing to me. It's so real, I guess is why.
We sang: I love You, Lord, and I lift my voice to worship You. O my soul, rejoice. Take joy, my King, in what You hear- may it be a sweet, sweet sound in Your ear.
And we sang: Jesus, draw me close, closer, Lord to You. Let the world around me fade away... for I desire to worship and obey.
They also sang Blessed Assurance and He Who began a good work in you will be faithful to complete it.
These songs knocked my socks off. Singing such things out loud filled me with wonder and shyness and joy. I felt dizzy. It awesome to have been doing that all week long and then get to sing about it out loud, with a whole group of people who know what the song is talking about, and also had experienced being close to and belonging to Him.
That's what I love about church. Other things confuse me and to be honest, I don't agree with some of what they say. But that's alright. I don't have to agree with them in order to worship God with them. We're all only human anyway, and I certainly don't think that I have it all put together. No way.
Keith's mother is having some serious health problems and we may be driving up to Indiana to pick her up and bring her down here, to stay for a couple weeks. This may not happen, but if it does, I will have to search for the guest bed under the mound of army gear that's currently and cleverly disguising it from the untrained eye.
My father's friend, the professional writer, is going to be calling me sometime this week about a book idea. I guess his friend, the publisher, is looking for a certain type of novel, and he thinks I could write just such a novel. I guess it would be based off my life, sort of autobiographical, but not completely.
I sort of started on such a thing, just to see what it would feel like. And the answer to that is- it feels painful and it's slow going.
I reread Torii and it captivated me. I didn't realize until then exactly how well I had done at capturing Christ's love in the person of Tenshio. That was my intent all along, but goodness. I remembered all those times I offered the story to Christ, over and over again, as I was writing it and as I was thinking about it.
But it needs such a dreadful amount of work.
Keith did so well running his training mission that his CO has made him mission commander of every single training mission from here on out, which is a very dubious honor. It will run the poor guy right into the gound, but he's already preparing for the next round of training missions.
Hopefully soon he will put in his packet for becoming a recruiter and we will be heading off in that direction. I guess everyone but Keith and fifteen other guys in his company have received orders, most of them to go to Korea for a year, so we are waiting to see if Keith won't come down on the same orders himself.
If he's accepted into the recruiter school, then he won't have to go to Korea- if indeed, the Army in all its wisdom is thinking of sending him there. If he did end up going there, I would move back to Colorado and we'd have to push back adoption plans for yet another year or more.
So, things are kind of up in the air. That's what's new over here at the Indiana household. Now the sun has come out again, and I'm going to go for a walk.
Friday, November 4, 2011
November 4th
As usual, about twelve hours after posting my latest blog post, I got the anxiety and dread that comes later, even though I'd originally written that post three days ago and had been writing and thinking about it on and off all that time.
So, I was offering my anxiety to Christ yet again and He said gently, don't you trust Me?
And I said, I trust You, but the blog was faulty and could have been written much better. It's faulty material.
He said, do you think faulty material will prevent Me from bringing about My purpose in it?
And then I felt peaceful, because I knew faulty material could not stop the purpose of God. What He purposes, happens. And He is used to working with faulty material- in fact, He prefers broken, humble hearts and cracked pots. Thank goodness.
A few days ago, I was reading something and agonizing about it and how I could never do that, but feeling convinced that I should, and He said, clearly and firmly- I did not make you an apostle.
Oh the relief that swept through me! Am I the only person that does this? Surely not. I can't be the only person that just, without thinking about it, takes on everything. Not because we think we are capable, but because, for some reason, we begin to think we should.
Since then, He's been explaining, over and over, in many different ways, that no one person can be everything written about in the Bible- which is yet another of those bizarre and irrational thoughts that used to be wedged unconsciously in the back of my mind, causing disquiet and guilt.
We each have or do one or two things. We have one or maybe two gifts- we have one or maybe two roles. Maybe someone out there is called and equipped to be doing many, many things and God bless that person. I am not them.
Since then, I have been able to become more and more joyfully me, in His presence. I understand that Christ made me to be myself because it pleased Him to do so. And since it pleases Him, it must please me! How joyfully simple it can be, when I look at it that way.
So, I was offering my anxiety to Christ yet again and He said gently, don't you trust Me?
And I said, I trust You, but the blog was faulty and could have been written much better. It's faulty material.
He said, do you think faulty material will prevent Me from bringing about My purpose in it?
And then I felt peaceful, because I knew faulty material could not stop the purpose of God. What He purposes, happens. And He is used to working with faulty material- in fact, He prefers broken, humble hearts and cracked pots. Thank goodness.
A few days ago, I was reading something and agonizing about it and how I could never do that, but feeling convinced that I should, and He said, clearly and firmly- I did not make you an apostle.
Oh the relief that swept through me! Am I the only person that does this? Surely not. I can't be the only person that just, without thinking about it, takes on everything. Not because we think we are capable, but because, for some reason, we begin to think we should.
Since then, He's been explaining, over and over, in many different ways, that no one person can be everything written about in the Bible- which is yet another of those bizarre and irrational thoughts that used to be wedged unconsciously in the back of my mind, causing disquiet and guilt.
We each have or do one or two things. We have one or maybe two gifts- we have one or maybe two roles. Maybe someone out there is called and equipped to be doing many, many things and God bless that person. I am not them.
Since then, I have been able to become more and more joyfully me, in His presence. I understand that Christ made me to be myself because it pleased Him to do so. And since it pleases Him, it must please me! How joyfully simple it can be, when I look at it that way.
Thursday, November 3, 2011
November 3rd
I watched a homecoming video for a family who adopted a newborn through domestic adoption. I didn't feel too much angst until the video showed them coming home. They were the shiny, happy people. And I felt so, so weird.
"Why can't I be normal?" I whined to God. "How come I didn't get a normal life?" (It's easier to complain about that than to process my grief at continuing infertile.)
This wishing-I-were-normal is a refrain I keep coming back to, time after time. For long periods of time I'm happy in and sometimes even proud of my singular personality.
Then my uniqueness seems just... weird, especially lately, in the way I relate to God. I wrote a blog post two days ago, but I had to delete it because I had a sudden panic attack about how weird it was. I thought, "I can't share this; it's too unusual."
We went to church on Sunday; it was a United Methodist church. Growing up, I'd the vague idea that United Methodist churches were so liberal you might as well consider them the spawn of satan... Ok, I exaggerate a tad, but you get the idea.
They are not, actually. They're pretty straight laced and... well, methodical. I had the weirdest idea that while in church we would talk about Jesus. I was kind of looking forward to it. I was hoping to be in a group of people who all knew Him and had a relationship with Him.
But we didn't really talk about Him much. He didn't really come up as a subject. Don't get me wrong, they were all very nice people. They exuded niceness. I liked being there. I liked singing about how we'll gather at the river. They gave us a mug and some of them stopped by the house and gave us a loaf of bread. They looked like a new set of grandparents.
However, I think that experience actually heightened my sense of isolation. I have friends and family that I can write or talk to about Him, but I guess I was hoping for a sense of joyful community, you know?
It's that time of the month too, and my emotions are all over the chart, as usual. I've been finding it really challenging to experience sorrow, frustration, impatience and anger while in the presence of Christ. It just instinctively feels as though this must be insulting to Him.
Yesterday morning, I was wrestling with my negative emotions and I felt Him saying to me, read the Psalms. So I did, and I couldn't help but notice that David's emotions were all over the chart as well, sometimes even in just one psalm.
I said, ok, I see what You are saying.
Then He said, come outside, come walk with Me.
So I went. And we were walking along and He started explaining to me about rhythms, how everything He made has one, the seasons and my life as well. He explained to me that it's alright to slow down; He build periods and cycles of rest into everything He created.
He explained that this period of time when I've been doing so much reading and studying and which as been so wonderful, is going to naturally and rightly merge into a new season of life, probably back into finishing my story. My story keeps coming back into my heart lately.
I told Him that I was nervous if I stopped doing all this studying and Bible reading that I wouldn't find Him so close and real like I have. (It's amazing how quickly and persistently I want to put the living God into a nice, neat little box.)
He assured me that He would be guiding our relationship right along; it would continue to deepen and expand all through my life through every season and change. In everything and every place my life took me, He would teach me how to find Him present and available.
As we walked, I kept thinking of this phrase: practising the presence of God. I knew that phrase, or something like it, was the title of a book. When I got home, I googled it. It was a book written by a monk.
This monk also experienced the constant, loving and personal presence of God in much the same way I have. We related to Him in much the same way, only Brother Laurence had thirty years experience in walking that way and was therefore much, much better at it.
It relieved a lot of my sense of isolation and weirdness. Though, I guess relating to a seventeenth century monk is maybe not the most normal thing in the world... heh.
At a certain point, when I was getting all frustrated at myself that Brother Laurence's techniques weren't working for me, Christ gently reminded me that I'm not a monk... Good to remember.
It's getting a little easier just being in my negative emotion and in Christ at the same time. It feels a little like not fighting something any more... like, admitting to what it true and then resting in it.
He really and truly empathizes with me- He actually carried all my sorrows- but I can't experience it unless I admit to feeling the emotion myself, and then connect to Him in that place of emotional authenticity. If that makes any sense. Anyway, that's what I've been learning lately.
"Why can't I be normal?" I whined to God. "How come I didn't get a normal life?" (It's easier to complain about that than to process my grief at continuing infertile.)
This wishing-I-were-normal is a refrain I keep coming back to, time after time. For long periods of time I'm happy in and sometimes even proud of my singular personality.
Then my uniqueness seems just... weird, especially lately, in the way I relate to God. I wrote a blog post two days ago, but I had to delete it because I had a sudden panic attack about how weird it was. I thought, "I can't share this; it's too unusual."
We went to church on Sunday; it was a United Methodist church. Growing up, I'd the vague idea that United Methodist churches were so liberal you might as well consider them the spawn of satan... Ok, I exaggerate a tad, but you get the idea.
They are not, actually. They're pretty straight laced and... well, methodical. I had the weirdest idea that while in church we would talk about Jesus. I was kind of looking forward to it. I was hoping to be in a group of people who all knew Him and had a relationship with Him.
But we didn't really talk about Him much. He didn't really come up as a subject. Don't get me wrong, they were all very nice people. They exuded niceness. I liked being there. I liked singing about how we'll gather at the river. They gave us a mug and some of them stopped by the house and gave us a loaf of bread. They looked like a new set of grandparents.
However, I think that experience actually heightened my sense of isolation. I have friends and family that I can write or talk to about Him, but I guess I was hoping for a sense of joyful community, you know?
It's that time of the month too, and my emotions are all over the chart, as usual. I've been finding it really challenging to experience sorrow, frustration, impatience and anger while in the presence of Christ. It just instinctively feels as though this must be insulting to Him.
Yesterday morning, I was wrestling with my negative emotions and I felt Him saying to me, read the Psalms. So I did, and I couldn't help but notice that David's emotions were all over the chart as well, sometimes even in just one psalm.
I said, ok, I see what You are saying.
Then He said, come outside, come walk with Me.
So I went. And we were walking along and He started explaining to me about rhythms, how everything He made has one, the seasons and my life as well. He explained to me that it's alright to slow down; He build periods and cycles of rest into everything He created.
He explained that this period of time when I've been doing so much reading and studying and which as been so wonderful, is going to naturally and rightly merge into a new season of life, probably back into finishing my story. My story keeps coming back into my heart lately.
I told Him that I was nervous if I stopped doing all this studying and Bible reading that I wouldn't find Him so close and real like I have. (It's amazing how quickly and persistently I want to put the living God into a nice, neat little box.)
He assured me that He would be guiding our relationship right along; it would continue to deepen and expand all through my life through every season and change. In everything and every place my life took me, He would teach me how to find Him present and available.
As we walked, I kept thinking of this phrase: practising the presence of God. I knew that phrase, or something like it, was the title of a book. When I got home, I googled it. It was a book written by a monk.
This monk also experienced the constant, loving and personal presence of God in much the same way I have. We related to Him in much the same way, only Brother Laurence had thirty years experience in walking that way and was therefore much, much better at it.
It relieved a lot of my sense of isolation and weirdness. Though, I guess relating to a seventeenth century monk is maybe not the most normal thing in the world... heh.
At a certain point, when I was getting all frustrated at myself that Brother Laurence's techniques weren't working for me, Christ gently reminded me that I'm not a monk... Good to remember.
It's getting a little easier just being in my negative emotion and in Christ at the same time. It feels a little like not fighting something any more... like, admitting to what it true and then resting in it.
He really and truly empathizes with me- He actually carried all my sorrows- but I can't experience it unless I admit to feeling the emotion myself, and then connect to Him in that place of emotional authenticity. If that makes any sense. Anyway, that's what I've been learning lately.
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