Billy Graham and me

Last night, I intended to catch up with my Lent devotionals.  Just a couple of days behind, I thought I would blitz it, a biblical binge if you like.

The focus was on the cross – the actual process of crucifixion. Earlier in the week I had read a web page of fifty five facts about the death of Jesus.  For someone with an active imagination the words on screen transformed into a set of violent pictures in my head – things like the dislocation of shoulders, elbows and wrists, the difficulty in breathing, the build-up of fluid in the lungs. When you have watched the TV series “Jesus of Nazareth” with Robert Powell’s blue eyes and absolute serenity, it’s hard to think in terms of pain and distress.

I don’t know what string of thought led me to thinking about the Stations of the Cross, but I goggled it to find images.  Someone’s pinterest board had all I needed to know.  Some of the images were very peaceful and serene – Jesus looked like he was just strolling along the Via Delarosa. Other images, those painted by Peter Howson, a Scottish painter, were gruesome.  Every muscle was stretched and sweating.  Jesus’ eyes were full of pain.

It wasn’t long before tears were streaming from my eyes. Inside somewhere a voice saying, “No more! No more!” but I kept looking. That one human being, or a group of them, could do that to another human being is beyond belief.  It happened then and it happens now.

I sat stunned for a while. My world is not a violent one – not my small circle of experience. I haven’t been hit by anyone, unless you count a small street brawl when I was a child and Philip Hopper broke my front tooth. I suppose that the violence I endure tends to be verbal rather than physical and I know plenty of vocabulary and can modulate the tone of my voice to give as good as I  get – yes, I know there’s the whole turn the other cheek stuff that I struggle with.

“Was I worth it?” I asked to no one in particular. “Ah well, Jesus, at least you got Billy Graham.” He, Billy, has brought his millions to Jesus and I’m not sure I can credit just the one saved soul. Between the two of us, taking an average of souls saved, we’ve done fine.

“Billy Graham?” said God, “For all his millions of souls he didn’t walk Ian down to the Co-op to buy him two bags of groceries to make sure he had food in his house on Friday night.”

“Imagine if you will, Mel,” God continued, “Billy Graham leafing through a hundred images of the Stations of the Cross (a very Catholic thing that he might not have done, incidentally) and afterwards, stunned, asking that same question – “Was I worth it?”.  Imagine his next comment being “Ah well, Jesus, you got Mel”. Billy didn’t take Ian to the Co-op to get the two bags of shopping.  But what else didn’t he do? He didn’t sit with him over cups of coffee listening to Ian’s struggles. Had he known about Ian’s debt he might have paid it for him.  And he would never have had the conversation about the 500 hats on Ian’s wall at home, some of which could have been sold to pay his debts.  He wouldn’t have known about the Indian wigwam still in its box or the Elvis Presley signed record covers.  He wouldn’t have known about Ian’s encounter with someone that invaded his personal space and spewed the gospel at him.  He wouldn’t have encouraged Ian to stick with the church and not push his friends and supporters away.

“It’s not that Billy wouldn’t have done it if he could, but there would be cameras soaking up the moments, perhaps, following Billy around, famous as he is.  Every line of conversation would be noted down, typed out, printed off and splayed over a newspaper, perhaps.  Ian wouldn’t have said anything anyway, because he doesn’t know Billy like he knows you.

“Billy does best what Billy does best – he doesn’t do Mel.  You do Mel.”

“The answer to your question – were you worth it? Hand on beating heart? Yes – always, yes.”

Poetry Writing at Moniack Mhor

It had been a while since I last drove out to the writing centre at Moniack Mhor.  The last time, it had been a cold day.  Ice on a single track road, with twists and turns, and always the possibility of something coming in the opposite direction had not put me in the right frame of mind for writing anything – a will perhaps to cover the worst scenario on the way back.  Yesterday was a warm day, no ice and I was earlier than I needed to be.

The fourteen who signed up plus the tutor introduced themselves.  I am always suspicious then someone says they have never written poems before.  They always go on to write something well-crafted and inspiring.

Task 1 - to put pen to paper, to just make a mark, our first task involved choosing two words – an animal/insect and a favourite word and creating a three line poem using them both.  Something bad had to happen.

caterpillar munches leaves on a shuggley branch

blackbird eats caterpillar

life and death, two seconds apart

Not a great start to the day, but no one expected Shakespeare.  We talked about haikus - 5 syllable, 7 syllable – 5 syllable offerings of something a Buddhist would be proud to live by.  Our offerings if they hit the criteria were christened “bastard haikus”. 

Task 2 – the inspiration for this one was a Norman MacCaig poem “Notations of Ten Summer MInuites”.  We had more than ten minutes to come up with our own observations of the scenery inside or out.  I wrote notes, bent the rules, veered off topic somewhat and wrote something that contrasted the peace of Moniack with my normal classroom environment.  Some strong images were applauded. My opening and closing stanza were dismissed as having too much tell and not enough show.

Task 3 – I came into my own on this one.  A list poem is all about lists.  I do lists – the to-do kind which doesn’t always get done. “Questions I wanted to ask you in the swimming pool” by Emily Berry was the prompt.  She is a modern poet who has chosen not to post this poem anywhere on the internet – so no link. Her poem features a list of questions. This is where prose and poetry seem to nudge each other.  It looks like prose, reads like prose but it’s a poem.  Maybe it is the poet that decides it’s a poem and not the reader. We didn’t really sort that one out.

Cake

why must you place yourself in my line of vision, warm soft

brown with an illicit smear of icing? Why must your smell be

intoxicating, making me giddy with your spices? Why must you

corner me, call me, coax me into consummation as you stir my taste buds?

why must you hoard together a thousand calories or more and laugh at

my bathrooms scales? Why must you exploit my weakness? Why

must you be someone else’s forgotten slice- not mine? Don’t you know

I would never discard you?

Task 4 was optional, another list poem prompted by “Props” by Emily Berry.  The story is told through a list of props someone might compile as if they were planning a play.  In the case of “Props” it is a jaunt through the Bible story and God’s plan of salvation. 

Lunch was announced and I admit to abandoning my work easily to head to the kitchen.  Chicken soup was on offer and stuff to make sandwiches. Gluten free options were also covered. 

I didn’t need an hour.  It’s not as if I could pop into town and do some shopping. A turn about the various buildings didn’t take that long. I took a few photos with my phone but they weren’t up to much.  It was cold and breezy outside.  I coveted their clothes line and thought about washing that was stagnating in the machine at home.

Task 5 began with a look at the language we use.  Specialised vocabulary can be great for poets – apparently.  We were called to come up with a list of words - 3 scientific/medical words, 3 religious words, 3 words from the world of finance, 3 slang or street words, and 3 words from any other interest.

He shifts his atoms to meditate beneath a tree

And sows the seeds of his inner debt recovery

“Dude” he thinks, “Let’s baptise the bank balance

And resurrect the lymphatic system

Mitosis demands he doesn’t dis the baseline

Of his economic slump

Everything is level at deuce

It turns out he’s not the EMO he thought he was

Task 6 – yes, she was throwing everything at us in the hope that something would stick. The poem “The Race” by Sharon Olds was interesting in that the way the lines were structured with unnatural line breaks created speed.  It fitted the story of rushing to catch a plane.  Joe tells a story that because I was too busy nosing around the duty free store we almost missed a flight from Dublin.  I don’t remember it that way at all.

This was one poem too far. We were supposed to compose a journey poem, the journey being for an urgent purpose.  I took a slow walk to the toilet and a slow walk back – timewasting. I wrote and abandoned one thing to begin and abandon another.  I was poetried out.

We shared the different poems we had written and, I was right, these people who claimed not to have written poems before – I declared them to have stretched the truth a little.

We talked about free poems and structure.  There don’t appear to be any rules about line endings.  There is a song, or music, that is heard when a poem is read – a poet knows whether the music is good or not.  Someone suggested that as long as you could justify your line breaks they should stand – if you couldn’t then you must rethink.

We discussed the use of capital letters at the start of lines. The letter is perhaps too big and commands too much attention compared to the message of the poem.

We talked about reading and experiencing life and making that the basis of our intuition that something works or not.  You write what you write from what you read and experience.

The final piece of advice was to keep a messy notebook!

She issued two homework tasks without any obligation to do them and post the results on to her.  The second task which appeals was based on “My Mother’s Lips” by C K Williams.  He makes use of extremely long lines with multiple clauses – for what reason I have no idea.  It is the kind of poem I would never read to the end.  I might have a go at the homework though – my own ten lines of poetry made up of one sentence only.  Lots of clauses and commas are permitted. 

 

I left for home, the twisting single track downwards, armed with new ideas to try. The world, it seemed was watching either a rugby game on one channel or a football match on the other.  I was abandoning my usual rhyming couplets to write lists in my head instead.

Virgil to my Dante

I continue to read through Malcolm Guite’s book of Lent Poetry “The Word in the Wilderness”. Wednesday we were coming to the end of Dante’s “Inferno”.

Then, at a place in the shadow with the dew...

my master placed the palms of both his hands,

spread wide, likely and gently on the tender grass.

And I aware of what his purpose was,

offered my tear-stained cheeks to meet his touch.

At which, he made once more entirely clean

the colour that the dark of hell had hidden.

As Malcolm writes in his commentary, it is a very touching scene. Dante emerges into the sunlight with a face smeared with the grime of hell and stained with tears. Virgil, his companion on the journey, gathers up the morning dew in his palms, stoops down and washes Dante’s face.

I was reading it at lunchtime, over my cheese and piccalilli sandwich. I thought of the “morning dew” of all the truth I glean in my quiet times.  What did I do with it? Did I wash anyone’s tear-stained face? Did I wipe away the grime of hell? Did I refresh anyone with my words? I have to own up – no.  Quite the contrary, I think.

I’d been thinking earlier on in the week when, in an earlier part of the poem, Dante and Virgil began their journey together, that I don’t share my journey often enough. I am rather too self-sufficient.  I wondered if I knew anyone well enough for them to see my grime of hell and my tear-stained face to know that I was need of a palm of morning dew to wipe it clean.  Yes, Jesus stoops down to wash my face – but what about people? 

Then Sunday happened.

I don’t do Mothers’ Day well. It is a celebration of all that I am not. I know there are plenty of messages out there that tell everyone to remember the women without children.  We all mother someone, blood related or not.  For the most part I get through the day.

Yesterday was not a day I got through. It has been a while since I have done Mothers’ Day so badly. I did it badly yesterday. The rewind button on the memory was stuck on failed fertility treatments and miscarriages and the misery that was then. I felt distinctly “less than”. I normally head myself off at the pass long before I reach the cliff edge – but yesterday I sailed over it. Partly it was mothers being rewarded with little chocolate hearts. Partly is was people offering sympathy – giving me the excuse to bawl my eyes out.

But then the Vergil/Dante/palm of morning dew moment happened.

I seriously wanted to lock myself in the ladies room.  On my own I planned to pull myself together and plant a brave smile on my face.  Two friends followed me and wrapped themselves around me long before I made it to the ladies. I wasn’t permitted to pull myself together, but to fall apart secure in the knowledge that they held me and supported me. They prayed. They shared their own stories of sad losses.  I would never have known that they really did know how I felt because they had been there.  They talked of their lost children waiting in heaven.

It was as if they were Virgil to my Dante – hands full of morning dew, my face offered to meet their touch and being made entirely clean.

It seemed important to not be so swift afterwards to hide. I wasn’t OK and I said I wasn’t OK and I let people hug me – which is not really like me at all, mostly. If I want people to journey with me I need to let them see that the journey is worthwhile, that they can add to my life, that I haven’t got it all sorted, that I am still in that process of becoming – and that happened yesterday.

Demonstrating brokenness and vulnerability is never easy, but allowing people to hold you and to offer them the chance to share their own stories is a precious thing.

This is church.

A Poetry Callenge

The book is “Ordinary Genius: A Guide of the Poet Within” by Kim Addonizio.

The page number is page 45.

The exercise is as follows:-

·         Choose a contemporary poem, or two, that you really like.

·         Make a list of all the nouns in the poem(s).

·         Make a list of all the verbs.

·         Make a list of all the adjectives.

·         Choose six nouns, five verbs and three adjectives.

·         Use five of the nouns, all five verbs and the three adjectives to create a poem of your own adding your own words as necessary.

·         The sixth noun is the title of your poem.

·         Try to copy the rhythm of one of the poems you used.

The poem I chose was “How I talk to God” by Kelly Belmonte.

The poem I created – I won’t bother listing the nouns, verbs and adjectives I selected.  See if you can spot them!  My heading isn’t one of the nouns and I didn’t stick to her rhythm either, but I like the end result.

Calvary

Always I was free

To step away from the cross

I could have listened

To the chatter of the world

Left Calvary alone

Listed all the reasons why

You were hard to love

But I saw your open wound

Heard your cry for peace

Touched the brokenness and knew

Your ache to connect

I walked on a troubled sea

To rescue you once

Another storm draws near but

I will keep you safe

I give you My word

This is Prayer

A throne to seek

A drawing near

A word to speak

A holy fear

A truth to learn

An ask to see

A key to turn

A change in me

A vow to make

A yoke to bear

A road to take

A joy to share

A foe to rout

A sword to swing

A vict’ry shout

A psalm to sing

A silent space

A wordless sigh

A lifted face

A question why

Emptying the Wardrobe

Thursday’s prayer meeting was another adventure into hearing, listening and talking to God.  What we prayed about came out of a time of hearing and listening and writing down words or phrases or drawing, perhaps, pictures of what we saw.

My word was “empty”. I had the picture of a wardrobe.

My husband watches the TV programme “Come Dine With Me”. While the host is doing something interesting with an avocado and rocket leaves, the guests are free to explore the house, open cupboards and stick their noses into various corners.  Wardrobes feature heavily. They make all sorts of about the kind of person the host is from the things that hang in the wardrobe. The sparkly top says that they like clubbing, the walking boots with their crust of dried mud says that they like the outdoor life and so on.  Much of what is said is not always complimentary.  A lot of sneering goes on.

And that is precisely why I will never volunteer for that programme.  My wardrobe is MY wardrobe and no one has access to it. There are one or two sparkly tops that have nothing to do with clubbing – just an acknowledgment that there are occasions that demand a little sprucing up.  There are also walking boots without the mud crust – another acknowledgement that the outdoors are waiting for me.

Many items in my wardrobe are not for wearing but for remembering.  I will most likely never be that slim again, or the fashion may never come around again but I won’t part from them.

The wardrobe I pictured and the word “empty” was all about the stuff we carry inside of us – the thoughts, the prejudices, the lies and the half-truths, warped truths, paraphrases of long forgotten arguments and polished grievances. All of thise things need to come out, so that God can put His things in.

I once did this personality test thing trying to find out how mature and balanced I was.  Right? You do these things too! I wasn’t totally unbalanced. One of the areas of my life that was sadly lacking was labelled “Adventure” – apparently I was not adventurous and disinclined to take risks. I was supposed to sit down with God and thrash out ten things I could do to be more adventurous.  The list didn’t include bungy-jumping or white-water rafting or high risk sports – the best that I could come up with was to buy a colourful scarf! That was my level of risk!

God asked me the other night, “What’s the colour of the robe of righteousness?” Did it have a colour? Red perhaps – the colour of the blood of Jesus?

“It isn’t grey,” said God.

I thought about all the birds, the really colourful ones, the ones that flap their wings, stalk about with beaks held high in a mating dance.  They are out to catch a mate ad they preen and they prance.

Too many churches are grey – not the buildings or the decoration, nor the clothes of the congregation. Their form of Christianity is grey.  Sometimes it’s not particularly vibrant or lively. I am not asking people to flap their arms, or preen and prance in the aisle. There has to be a quality of life that attracts people.  Grey is not a quality of life.

So, I kind of got the message to stop being a grey Christian and add a little bit of colour to my life. The wardrobe with its God filled contents was almost throbbing with life.  The clothes inside were almost begging me to worn.  If I allow myself to keep the old stuff, those old thought patterns and choices, chances are that I will eventually slip back into them.  They are familiar and I know how to wear them. Better for me to throw them out.

Spring is the season of cleaning out the old ready for the new to be given the space to take rot and flourish.  Where better to begin than with my heart-mind-soul-and-spirit wardrobe.

This Journey

I’m not at home with mystery

With twists and turns that baffle me

The path ahead I long to see

And in control I want to be

One step is all that I can make

A step of faith I choose to take

And even as the mountains shake

This journey’s one I can’t forsake

My days are filled with mercies new

And sometimes clouds that block my view

Your hand in mine will lead me through

As every day I walk with You

Be My Valentine

That’s two weeks in a row my husband has made me breakfast.  I’m up far too early for it to be a breakfast-in-bed event. Last week was Valentine’s Day.  This week was not.

A man from the carpet shop was coming around to measure the stairs, landing and one of the spare bedrooms for new carpets. It was good we were up and about as he arrived early, poked his measuring tape into various corners, did the arithmetic in his head and said he would be back with a price once he got back to the shop.

Last week I had got the date wrong. Valentine’s Day snuck up on me and I wasn’t prepared.  No card, no chocolates – nothing. I think my husband likes to have one up on me and he dines on it for years later.  One year, I forget where we were, but we bought exactly the same cards for each other. This year there was just the one card – big and glittery and pack full of sentiment.

I held a card in my hand as I was in the local shop buying the papers and a bottle of milk. It wasn’t for a husband, but for a boyfriend, but I’m well capable of scribbling out unwanted titles on cards and replacing them with my own.  In this particular incident that would have had a look of desperation about it.

Then I had an idea.  I have often written love poems to Joe – in cards, books, bits of paper hidden in the lunch box – and thought about bringing some of them together in some way. I’ve done similar things before – a sheet of A4 paper folded up into a little book.  Unfolded, the paper reveals lots of little poems.  I have done a few different ones and I love them and actually think I could market them.

So I set to work, digging out old anniversary or Valentine’s cards, birthday cards and searching through recipe books and so on. The search was a wonderful experience of rediscovering tenderness and passion anew.  I’m not saying that romance has turned cold, because it hasn’t, but it’s always good to be stirred. 

It was a joy to make.  My husband has it tucked in his wallet and shows to people he meets. This week had been a hard one and he tells me that every so often he has read through the poetry and it has brought a smile to his face. He knows himself to be loved and valued.

I have also had my challenges this week and to know that I have done one thing, at least, that has blessed someone brings a smile to my face.

Triumphal Entry

Approaching the King and drowning in need

Waving our palm leaves for victory we plead

Weary of bondage and longing for peace

From Roman oppression we ache for release

He comes on a donkey, no symbol of force

Spurning our wishes, He follows His course

Peace is His highway, salvation His aim

By putting to death our sin and our shame

  

To dance on His highway, palms in our hand

Free and forgiven, this He has planned

Angels and Peace

The heading of Saturday’s Bible notes was “Angels and Peace” – it was technically Friday’s heading as I was a day behind, but it was the right time to be reading it. If you know what I mean. 

Friday night was not a good night – not me at my best. I am a morning person.  There are things that I am capable of doing on a morning that completely defeat me on an evening, particularly a Friday evening – like reversing the car. I had gone to pick up my husband from the city centre. Current building work has meant that my usual pick up point is not available. We agreed on a carpark just opposite the Chinese takeaway.

Workmen had filled the end of the carpark with a large container. There was probably enough room to do a three point turn.  Perhaps more of a multi-point turn, but it was a Friday, and an evening, and not a time when I can do these things. The container made the space that much smaller and I got stuck. There were one or two car park spaces but the cars on either side of them were more abandoned than parked and it would have been a tight fit.  I would have tackled it on a morning.

I tried to reverse out of the carpark, but it wasn’t working. I went backwards, then forwards, then backwards again, and forwards. My mind just couldn’t figure out how to get out of the carpark.  The large container was in the way.

With each forward and back manoeuvre I was getting more agitated. I muttered.  I didn’t swear. I broke down in tears and I loudly berated my husband for his poor choice of a pick-up point. “Loudly berated” doesn’t really convey the way I spoke. I don’t think I have ever visited that side of hysteria before.

“That was bad,” said God, as I crawled into the throne room, “but it really didn’t measure up to Venice.”

Venice? We are not going to resurrect Venice, sufficient to say it was bad. When my husband talks of Venice, it is with affection. I think we must have been on separate holidays.  Affection isn’t the word that comes to mind.

Apologies didn’t seem to be enough once we got home. It was bad. What horrified me was that all those horrible words were just inside, hiding somewhere, waiting to spill out. I was devastated that I could cause so much harm to someone that I loved.

The next day was a Breathe Writer’s morning. And this is where my angels show up. The cloud I had whipped up the previous evening was still raining down on me. I didn’t really think about not showing up. Writing is my release.  I printed off a couple of poems to share if there was the opportunity, squared my shoulders and headed off.

I’m not talking about the heavenly angels but God’s earthly messengers.  We talked about all sorts of stuff. My friend, Marion, was there. My heart lifted and the cloud shifted just a little. Marion had signed up for an on-line prophetic writing course and led us through one of the exercises. List twenty words about spring and then write a poem or a short story without using any of them.

We picked through our pieces of writing.  I had forgotten to put my hearing aids in ad probably missed a lot of what people were saying.  Each poem, prose passage or narrative seemed to be a launching point for sharing God’s truth. I was being ministered to and being put back together. It was a blessing. My peace was restored.

Later on in the day, the evening, the car parked in a sensible place, the Poetry Club continued the good work from the morning. Being surrounded by godly people and sharing stories and poems was so good.

Angels and Peace – God’s gifts to someone that really needed them.

Thank you, Father.

The Holy One

I have really got to stop buying books.  There’s nowhere to put them.  Open a random cupboard door and books fall out.  

This particular book is “Calling God Names: Seven Names of God That Reveal His Character” by Norman Hubbard.

Just about every prayer of mine begins “Oh God,” or “Oh Father” or “Oh Lord”.  They don’t quite have the disaster quality one might associate with the two-word starters.  I am conscious there is a beauty in addressing God that I am missing out on. I don’t want to use flowery titles to make my prayers sound great, but I want to use His titles to direct and empower the words I pray.

The first chapter addresses God as The Holy One. The study begins with Exodus 19 when the Israelite nation arrive at Mount Sinai ready to receive the law.  God is not portrayed as their buddy or their pal.  The mountain is off limits. God obscures himself in fire and cloud.  The nation trembles at the idea of God drawing near.  Nothing about God was to be taken carelessly or casually. They were not able to bear the completeness of God ad so He reveals himself bit by bit, adding to what they know, building a reservoir of knowledge and experience.  His intention is that their relationship with Him is always growing. 

I shared a poem I had written with the Breathe Writers this morning.

Mount Sinai

I am not sure

I want to be

This close to Him

Who choses me

He wraps himself

In fire and flame

This Holy One

I cannot tame

In silent awe

In stillness stand

He shares with me

His purpose planned

“This Holy One/I cannot tame” speaks to me of engaging with God on His terms, not mine.  He is not a presence in my life to do my bidding, which is not to say He ignores my requests.  I cannot bring God down to my level, although He chooses to stoop down.  God then, as God now, lays down the terms of His relationship with me.

“He shares with me/His purpose planned” speaks to me of the conversation God wants to enter into with me. He is not looking for a “yes” man who is just wanting to be told what to do. He invites me to ask questions, to make suggestions and to voice my protests if necessary. Neither of us, Him or me, are required to be the silent partner in the firm. There’s probably so much more He wants to tell me about, but He doesn’t always have my attention.

Something I wrote in my journal – Exodus 19:4 “I carried you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself.” God doesn’t push me away, or pull Himself away from me when I fail to live the way He has set out for me. Rather, He enters into my life more fully to teach me His ways.

The Dusty Finger Tour

He Loves Me

From when I take my first time breath

Till time I shall embrace my death

He loves me

In moments stirred as angels sing

In tearful times as demons sting

He loves me

In times today I walk alone

Tomorrow’s journey yet unknown

He loves me

He loves me as the enemy

Aims his fiery darts at me

He loves me when I feel so high

Tracing rainbows in the sky

He loves me through the darkest night

Stumbling, lost, without a light

With every sunrise, every dawn

In every day that’s newly born

He loves me

At every end of every day

As stars across the heavens play

He loves me

(Romans 8:38-39)

Declaring What Is

I bought a second hand how-to-write-poetry book the other day through Amazon.  I wonder whether some of the great poets would scorn the use of such a book.  Is poetry something that you can learn to do, or is it part of the essence in a real poet that doesn’t need instructions? I have played around with different poetry forms and I can hunt down the one word that works in a line – but is there more?

The chapter I’m reading is about the sound of poetry, vowel sounds in words set next to other words stretch or shorten them as the poet need it.

I skipped the paragraphs on Hindu mantras focussing on sounds of Hindu words, saying them out loud, twenty times, and reflecting on how it makes me feel.  I would prefer not to be calling on Durga, the goddess of protection. She might ride on a lion and have a hundred arms and wield a hundred different weapons – but it/she isn’t my God. The idea of simply the sounds of words rather than the meaning of them is something I haven’t thought about.

The next challenge was to write a poem to the gods (or in my case God) – to write it in a language that’s made up, an unknown language, sounds without meaning to get a feel for the mood that sounds create.

Can any language ever be truly made up? I recognise in my poem some attempt at Lord-of-the-Rings elvish and a hint of something Gaelic sounding.  I liked the sound of it.

Eir ruhm engethir sig nurn

Eir rhut enshrith as nhur

Shrievne both giran, oth Gher

Lathne both giran, Sun Seir

Methlin eir rhum til blethnir rhun

Enshrir both giran, oth Gher

Lethir shu gheldir, en Othri Aan

Bear in mind, here, that I had been reading Jonathan Edward’s list of 70 Resolutions he made daily. It’s an impressive catalogue of intentions. There is a lovely one somewhere at the start that acknowledges there will be days when the last thing he wants to do is resolve to do something – off days, days when getting out of bed is an achievement. Those days, he resolves, are days simply to wait it out until he find himself again– then he will repent and get back to his resolutions.

One of the results of his living in such a way was seen in the revivals that he ignited.  He didn’t ask for revival, or plead for it.  He didn’t particularly preach with passion and zeal as if to find words to stir people. He preached the truth that God revealed to him as he studied and as he set to live his life according to his resolutions.

I would love to see the revivals, but deep down I would want to be the person with the words and the passion that would stir hearts. If it was all dependent on living my life to the standard of his resolutions – it might not happen.

So, in my heart I was aware that my faith walk was a little bit too mediocre and not quite sharp enough.

The next part of the writing challenge was to translate the poem. This was what my heart seemed to be saying.

I don’t know how to walk without stumbling

I long to walk a straight path

Reveal your way, dearest Guide

Call me onto Your path, Heaven’s Traveller

May I fully trust Your road beneath my feet

Lead me along Your highway, dearest Guide

To the place You inhabit, oh Eternal One

It’s one thing to ask God to call me on to His path, but another to answer that call. In the gospel story where Peter walks on water, his stepping out of the boat begins with his challenge to Jesus -

Lord, if it’s really you, tell me to come to you, walking on the water.” And Jesus answered, “Com”. Peter left to boat to walk on the water towards Jesus.

I walk with confidence, not stumbling

I stride the straight path, feet secure and arms swinging

For He has revealed His way to me, my dear Guide

He has called me onto His path, inviting me to travel with Him

And as I commit to His road beneath my feet

He leads me along His highway, and guides my steps and

Every day I find the place He inhabits.

Maybe what’s needed is a bit of a re-wrtie – something less hesitant, less tip-toeing. Something that declares what is rather than what I would like. I don’t have, or want, 70 resolutions. God doesn’t want another Jonathan Edwards. He is not looking for a matching pair for His mantelpiece. He just wants me.  It is enough.

The Storerooms of Heaven

I was praying and I looked and I saw a door standing open in heaven. And it opened up to a vast storeroom.  A voice said, “Come inside, and I will show you everything.” In an instant I stood next to Jesus. I looked and saw there were deep shelves on the walls of the storeroom, all of them empty, and a sweet fragrance filled the air.

He touched the first shelf. “Here is my joy. It’s broad and rich. It turns away sharp hurts and hot anger and makes the heart light and the enemy easier to love.” The shelf was empty but I heard the echo of laughter.

He touched the second shelf. “Here is my healing. By this comes wholeness of spirit, soul and body. Combined with mustard seed, mountain moving faith bones are knit together, skin is washed clean of disease and blemish, a spine straightens, a limb grows and the broken highways of the synapses in the mind are restored.” The shelf was empty but I saw the shadow of a man dancing.

He touched a third shelf. “Here is my resilience to build strong family ties. No short cuts or easy answers to create a robust family, but patience and understanding are here in abundance. The love and tenderness of the heavenly Father lights the path ahead.” The shelf was empty but I felt the last lingering softness of an embrace.

He touched a fourth shelf. “Here are my victories. For those watching times when the Lord fights the battle, there is stillness for the soul.  For those sword-wielding, shield-lifting times, there is vigour to see the battle through. The word stirs the spirit, and when spoken with boldness - the enemy runs.” The shelf was empty but I smelt Satan’s fear.

He touched a fifth shelf. “Here is my intimacy. The bright thread of obedience is woven into the search for truth and wisdom. The surrendered heart listens for the still small voice.” The shelf was empty but the taste of sweet honey was on my lips.

“Lord,” I said, “Why are the shelves empty?”

“Because when My church earnestly prays they plunder the storerooms of heaven.”

New Adventures

I have been thinking about the challenges ahead in this New Year. I would very much like to play the ostrich with them and stick my head firmly in the sand and hope they just go away. That’s not likely to happen though.

I occasionally do some of the Facebook quizzes but rarely post the result unless it really impresses me. A recent one was about abstract paintings and you were to indicate the colours which most attracted your attention, an emotion you sensed or some such thing. It was supposed to explore your subconscious mind.  Apparently my character trait turned out to be “courage”.  Quite how they come to these conclusions I don’t know and for the most part I take them with a pinch of salt. I could run a hundred scenarios through my mind that would demonstrate the lack of courage – but deep down there was a resounding “Yes, I am courageous!”

I thought back to my move up to Inverness.  It was more than 25 years ago. I had taught abroad for a number of years, returned home to discover the education system had gone through too many changes for me to feel I could catch up. I wasn’t a happy beanie.  I was in a church where the women were all mothers and met in the afternoons for Bible studies and prayer meetings.  Their lives revolved around homes and husbands and babies and – nothing whatsoever I could relate to. I though the solution was to find a husband and have lots of babies and become a proper woman! Sadly that is how some churches deal with women.  Find them husbands. That wasn’t God’s plan.  A year spent on a gospel outreach team was His plan – not mine at all.  Door knocking, street drama, days of intense prayer, fasting – not my cup of tea I thought but it turned out to be totally me for that one year. The rest of the team might have been full of angst and soul searching and deep repentance or whatever, but I was having a ball.

The outreach year began at the end of September with a team-bonding week in a stately home mid-way between Newcastle and Jedborough. Our team was one of a half dozen or so. After that we all piled into minibuses and headed off to various towns and cities around the UK. My pastor at the time, Steve Petra, had recommended I be placed in Inverness – the furthest north he could place me. He wanted me to be as far away from Rugby as I could go, so I wouldn’t keep coming home when things got tough. He severed the spiritual apron strings and kicked me north.

I thought I was making a big mistake. I wasn’t a sociable being – still aren’t. I wasn’t particularly vocal about my faith. I had heaps of baggage from the Plymouth Brethren Church I had been attending for years and had issues about the role of women. It just seemed such a bad idea but I’d handed in my notice at work, raised the relevant funds to get on the team and I was carrying the best wishes of a church I had been a part of for barely two years.

We stopped somewhere along the A9 – possibly to let me out of the van to be sick.  I have never been a great traveller by bus. It was night time and the middle of nowhere.  It’s quite possible we did the holy thing – praying before arriving in Inverness and giving the year over to God – like you do on gospel outreach teams.

There was no light pollution.  The sky was cram-packed with stars. I remember looking up at them and being able to identify the few constellations I knew. They were like familiar friends.

“Just as the stars in the sky never change, I never change either,” said God. “I am the same God, yesterday, today and tomorrow.”

My life was changing.  My place of residence was changing. The things I would be doing each day were going to be different from anything I had ever done before but God was still the same. I felt courage seep into every bit of me. I squared my shoulders and stood up tall – as tall as someone who was four foot eleven inches could be – and I climbed back into the minibus with something approaching joy.

Years later I wrote a poem. I find the words are speaking to me again, reminding me that whatever the challenges ahead I am fixed to the truth of an unchanging God.

New Adventures 

Broad sky above her

Peppered with stars.

A road winding northwards

Empty of cars.

Uprooted and moving

To pastures unknown.

Friends left behind her

Feeling alone.

She traces the patterns

Of stars in the sky,

Fixed in their places

Shining so high.

Some things are certain

They always will be;

Like sunrise and sunset

And tides of the sea.

God never changes,

This much she knows.

Fixed to this truth

Onward she goes.

This New Life

it ends now -

this foolishness and disobedience

this slavery to lust and pleasure

this life of evil and envy and hatred

for God has shown me His love

without limits or conditions

conquered me with His kindness

that melts this intolerant heart

granted me His mercy

tossing sin too far away to touch and

generously poured out His grace

I inhabit this

new life of the Spirit given me

through Christ

my Saviour

Possido

The usual monthly search for a poem began in earnest this morning.  The theme for “Poetry for Everyone” at Eden Court on Monday is all about time – and in my case time is running out.  I have decided on a Mel poem that matches the theme, “Numbered Days”, swithering about whether to exclude two of the verses which are “in-your-face-Christian-doctrine”.  The poem works well without them, and no one comes to a poetry night to be preached at – but I wouldn’t ever consider censoring someone else’s poem in such away, so the verses stay!

Looking for a second poem to read I came across “08/22/08” - by David Lehman.

I have never been a person who is able to recall where I was when great events in history happened. I don’t know where I was when Martin Luther King was assassinated – playing, most likely. I don’t know where I was when John Lennon was shot – playing, most likely.  Or when men took their first steps on the moon. Or when the two towers were destroyed on 9/11. I can’t remember anything about what I was doing, nothing caught my eye outside or inside, no particular sense of history in the making, nothing. I have to admit that it bothers me.  Am I so much the centre of my own universe that other things, other people, unless it impinges directly on me, just don’t count?

There’s another search that has been going on for a much longer time. It’s this whole My One Word thing. Last year the word was Contineo, the Latin word for “connect”.  The English word would have done sufficiently well, but the writer in me demanded something poetic.  Did I connect? Actually, yes. The desire to connect led to some very unexpected but inevitable changes.  I have made mew friends and embraced new “families”.  I have also connected at a deeper level with friends I have known for a while and the various groups I am involved in. It’s not all been successful but then, not everything we get involved in will be.  There are re-connections still to be made.

This year’s word, another Latin one, is Possido – the Latin word for “occupy”.  Possido can be translated as hold, inherit, occupy, possess or seize.  Occupy is defined as:- “to take possession of by settlement or seizure, to hold possession of by tenure, to dwell in, to take up or fill up (space, time, etc.) or to employ, busy, or engage (oneself, one's attention, mind, etc.)

You see, maybe I don’t remember all these moments in history because I don’t fully occupy my life. I don’t stretch out and fill every moment and every corner with thoughts, feelings and experiences. In John 10:10 Jesus says, “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.” The NLT puts it this way – “a rich and satisfying life.”  I’m not sure that I would describe my life that way. My life is only lightly occupied.

Throughout advent and the Christmas period I have been challenging myself to write a poem a day. I have a week or so worth of poems to catch up on but a short one, a haiku perhaps is this one:-

Heaven’s King

 

Heaven’s king comes down

Jesus at ease in His skin

touches a leper

Jesus fully occupied every moment of his days on earth.  He was at ease in His skin, not fretting about stuff.  Nowhere is scripture do you read of Jesus chewing his fingernails or fretting about who was or wasn’t listening to his teaching.  He just took responsibility for what He was given to do and did it wholeheartedly.  He wasn’t half involved but fully.

That is my challenge to myself this year – to be at ease in my skin and to fully occupy every moment of the days I have been given this year.

Advent Poems

At the end of my summer holidays I spent a week with a friend in Armadale on Skye.  It was just the two of us with a plan to write. We both had books half written and thought to make some progress. Mine was a second poetry book.  I thought the first poetry book published a couple of years ago was so good that perhaps I didn’t have a second book in me so I had been putting it off and putting it off. In the process of helping my friend organise her material – absorbing stuff about Scottish clans – I took a fresh look at the second book and began to see what poetry I already had and what poems I needed to write new.  The first book had an Easter section and the plan was for this new book to have a Christmas section. Trouble was I didn’t have that many Christmas poems and the ones I had were all very alike – nativity scenes really – different words, different rhyming schemes, different rhythms but same poem.  Maybe I should just abandon Christmas – don’t we all feel like that sometimes?

Advent arrived. I had signed up for email devotionals, bought a study book and found a sheet of Christmas themed Bible verses to write out each day – the usual overdosing.

It came to me that I might want to use the advent devotionals and/or the study book and/or the Bible verses I was writing out daily to use as poetry prompts.  I figured that by Christmas and up to the end of December I would have a whole pile of poems to add to the Christmas section of the new book.

Seriously? Have I had fun? Absolutely!

Some poems are book-definites, others need a bit of polishing up to hit the mark, some will never make it and one or two are rather quirky but I love them.  I am four prompts behind schedule.  My brain tells me it’s OK to write a bad poem to fill the space or just two lines that rhyme.  Not every poem has to be brilliant. The writer in me objects strongly and insists on a good poem!

It’s the reading up that I’ve enjoyed the most.  Reading up about Herod, or the star, or the magi has given me a different perspective of Christmas.  I have always known stuff but it feels like I am on my own little journey, seeing aspects of the Christmas story from all the different characters involved.  In trying to find their heart I have found interesting bits of my own.

Yesterday’s poem was all about Joseph.  I was reading articles about the role of men at the birth and whether they had any real role to play at all.  Gone are the days of walking up and down the corridor outside the maternity suite in the hospital.  They are there holding their wife’s hand – but do they need to be?  Apparently, yes. Bonding matters to fathers just as much as it does to mothers.

I read the things that men had written about holding the baby minutes after the birth, even before the baby is cleaned and wrapped in a blanket. They are in awe of this little life they hold who wield such power over them.

I admit to a real surge of jealousy, almost anger that I had been denied that experience.  There are times when childlessness bites deep and the wound never really goes away.  I felt angry that my husband never had that experience either. He would have been a great dad.  Some little child would have had absolute power over him.  I would have been relegated to the role of bad cop.

I thought of Joseph holding Jesus and searching his tiny face for signs of himself even though he knew he wouldn’t find any – the set of the chin or the shape of the ear.  Of course, Joseph was the biological father.  God chose so wisely when he chose not just Mary, but Joseph too.  In his later life when Jesus talked of God as Father – it was Joseph that had taught him all he knew about fathers and Joseph had done a good job.

There may not have been any DNA of Joseph’s floating about in Jesus – but Joseph had built himself into Jesus through the words he spoke, the compassion he showed, his gentle patience as a carpenter and his love of God and His word.  God himself couldn’t father Jesus in his humanity but He found someone who could. 

Joseph’s Son

I marvel at Your tiny form

Cradled here, so soft and warm

I breathe Your fragrance, hold You near

And tremble with an awesome fear

I cannot help but look to see

If in You there’s a trace of me

Of form and frame there’s nought we share

Yet God has placed You in my care

My boy to nurture and to grow

But You…God’s Son…I just don’t know

A task so big, I dread to fail

But God so close, I will prevail

I see the grain in lengths of wood

In You I’ll shape what’s kind and good

And then one day, I’ll glance and see

In You there’ll be that trace of me

Magi

East dwellers; immortalised by storytellers

Avid learners; lighting candles both end burners

Star gazers; read what’s written there amazers

Truth seekers; into heaven’s purpose peekers

Risk takers; crossing deserts, journey makers

Stable finders; smell of scented hay don’t minders

Crown wearers, gold, frankincense and myrrh bearers

Knee benders; up into heaven praise senders

Christ revere-ers; simply blessed to be right here-ers

Home headers; as they travel joy spreaders

There's Something About Mary

I think I have been taught to mistrust Mary over the years.

I cut my spiritual teeth, as it were, in the Roman Catholic Church. We had been wrenched away from Sunday School at the local Congregational Chapel just streets away to walk two miles every week to the Roman Catholic Chapel in a neighbouring village.  I wasn’t pleased to go as I was planning on winning the annual memory verse challenge that year.  I had come third the previous year and felt I had something to prove. The Roman Catholic Chapel didn’t have memory verse challenges.  It didn’t really have anything designed for children at all.  We just sat in the pews with the adults and followed the liturgy in the books we were given. I never really dived in deep into the theology of saints and statues.  I watched “The Song of Bernadette” many times and considered a life as a nun until Donny Osmond rescued me.

The other churches that have dotted my faith landscape have not been kind to Mary.  One almost gets the impression from them that Mary must have posed for the marble statues, that she was a willing partner. She’s just one of us, they insisted, nothing special.

I have been thinking about that and I’m not so sure she was nothing special. What young girl in any culture doesn’t dream of a wedding day? I’m sure Mary did – but God launched her into a very different future from the one she planned. God had been silent for hundreds of years so miracles were not part of everyday life.  What other alternatives were there to explain a young girl’s pregnancy? And the law was harsh on women even without the charge of adultery being thrown into the mix. Mary embraced it all.

She wasn’t just a womb, you know. Chromosomes only go so far in producing a person.

Without Mary, the Jesus we have would not be the man He turned out to be. Before He began His ministry, Jesus had thirty years of Mary. It was her arms that comforted Him and her fingers that wove the fabric that His clothes were made from. It was her voice that sang the lullabies that sent Him to sleep ad her gentle shakes that woke Him in the morning. She bathed the grazed knees of childhood tumbles and pulled out the splinters when he began his work as a carpenter. Her silly songs made Him smile and her pain made Him cry. And what He learned about the Father He learned from her. What he learned about servanthood he learned by following her example.  What He learned about prayer came from listening to her prayers. He became the man He was because she was the woman she was.

Mary’s Song

My heart cannot contain such praise

My soul bursts with delight

For God stoops down to rescue me

Displays his power and might

Those kings who claim to be secure

Their thrones He sweeps away

The rich with greedy grasping hands -

Such men have had their day

He turns to lift the mild and meek

The famished heart to feed

The things He promised come to pass

There’s boundless joy indeed

Luke 1:46-55

Have Mercy On Me

“He called out, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” Luke 18:38

When the blind man begging beside the roadside in Jericho heard a commotion he wanted to know what was happening.  He was told that Jesus of Nazareth was passing by.

When he called out to Jesus, the blind man swapped titles. He called out to Jesus, Son of David, not Jesus of Nazareth. And that caught Jesus’ attention.  Jesus of Nazareth is just a geographical title, pointing to a place on a map and carrying with it assumptions people thought they knew about people that came from there's.

The title “Jesus, Son of David” points to a place in time, and a promise made by God. It was a Messianic title reserved for the long-awaited Deliverer and the fulfilment of many Old Testament prophecies. By choosing that name, the blind beggar was expressing a longing for God’s kingdom to be established – a longing for God’s rule through His King and a kingdom that wouldn’t end. He was looking for a Kingdom where there was wholeness and completeness, a kingdom without tears and without pain.  This was the cry of his heart.

When the crowd tried to silence him, he shouted all the louder.

It makes me wonder if my own heart has a cry that will not be silenced by the crowd.

Jesus had the blind man brought over to him.  The title “Jesus, Son of David” had caught His attention and mercy had been asked for.

I have been thinking a lot about that phrase “have mercy on me.” A plea to God for mercy is asking Him to withhold the judgment we deserve and instead grant to us the forgiveness we in no way have earned. It came to my mind after I had been catching up with Facebook posts.  The bombing of Paris had been followed by posts announcing how gun-ready and armed people were getting in some parts of America.  There seemed to be no safe places and terrorists lurked behind every Burka clad Muslim woman. Japan, it was posted, had it right by banning Muslims from a whole host of human rights. There were a few lone voices appealing for calm. 

I sensed an anger in me that Christians who speak about the love of God could be so lacking in compassion for the Muslim majority who have nothing to do with ISIS or terrorism. 

In the middle of a divine encounter, when God is talking about the destruction of Sodom, Abraham stepped into the conversation:-

“Then Abraham approached him and said: “Will you sweep away the righteous with the wicked? What if there are fifty righteous people in the city? Will you really sweep it away and not spare the place for the sake of the fifty righteous people in it? Far be it from you to do such a thing—to kill the righteous with the wicked, treating the righteous and the wicked alike. Far be it from you! Will not the Judge of all the earth do right?” (Genesis 18:23-25)

It seems that we are not willing to be like the Judge of all the earth and do right. To ensure the end of the minority, we are willing to sacrifice the majority, treating the righteous and the wicked alike. If we are so swift to defend ourselves and so savagely, when do we allow God to fight on our behalf? When do we step aside and let God fight for us? Is this too big and issue, too important a battle to leave it up to God? Perhaps we are just not interested in God showing any mercy.

The cry of my heart?  I think I have discovered it.  If Jesus asked me what I want Him to me to do for me it would have nothing to do with ISIS at all.  I want to be always tender-hearted, giving and embracing. I want to be always able to show love.  His mercy towards me would be in His intervening in my life to stop me following a path of hard-heartedness.

Jesus gave the blind man what he asked for. He restored his sight.  Loud again, he praised God.  This time there was no crowd telling him to quieten down.  They joined in.  The blind man was a catalyst, a pivotal point in the community.  The crowd who had had no personal interest in Jesus turned from being interested observers to active worshippers.

Amazing things happen when we cry out to Jesus, Son of David, and ask for mercy,  Not for someone else, but for oursleves.  Not pointing out what is wrong with the other person, but what is worng with us.

"Have mercy on me," is becoming the cry of my heart.

The Warm-Up Act

He stands centre stage

dressed in an echo of another man

He knows his lines and

delivers them with authority

to a packed crowd

“Snakes!”

He names those in the gallery

who peer down from lofty heights

fools that think they are near to God

They bear no fruit of repentance

To those in the stalls

he sets the challenge to sacrifice 

spare shirts and

scrap all their schemes to swindle

Savour contentment instead

He tosses water

into the audience

cold and clear, bestowing on them a

clean slate start

Of course, he’s only the warm-up act to

the man with top billing who waits in the wings

He knows he’s being

written out of the drama

Will he surrender the stage,

gracefully step aside and

take his final bow

before the curtain falls?

No lengthy encores?

Jesus of Nazareth arrives

quietly

He sees him and declares,

“The Lamb of God

who takes away the sin of the world.”

An aside to the audience

Last lines spoken humbly,

“He must increase, but I must decrease.”

The spotlight shifts as

a dove flutters down