The Public Reading of Scripture

Sunday saw me up in the hills at the Moniack Mhor Writing Centre.  I had been lured there on the promise of writing poetry and exploring different poetry forms. The theme was “family” – not necessarily said with an Eastenders’ accent. I am a part of a family that expands often and shrinks occasionally. My own little branch is not really expanding apart from waist-wise.

The first prompt was to choose an object and use it as a prompt to describe a family member. Jewellery scored highly when describing mothers and grandmothers.  There were also pianos, fishing rods, teddy bears and false teeth.  For me there was a veritable mine of possibilities – but what to choose? I wish I had written about my brother’s urn resting on a shelf in a pub in Fuengirola in Spain. It might have made for a better poem than the one I did of my husband’s green dressing grown. I’m sure I have commented that I don’t do poems to order.  I’m never that creative on the day.

The second prompt caught my imagination.  This time it was about an activity we did as a child that we shared with an adult. Memories of playing endless games of rounders in the field at the back of the house came to mind. My mother was a child magnet. She was everyone favourite mother. The parents should have paid her for keeping their children occupied and entertained during long summer evenings. Two ever growing teams met to field or to bat. Children abandoned bikes, slides and climbing frames to join in.

I was never a sporty person. If awards could be given for trying hard I would have won a cupboard full of them. I just didn’t have the coordination.  The bat never met the ball.  There was no satisfying "thwack" as the ball sailed high and long.  No one had to chase after anything. I was rarely quick enough to drop the bat and make it to first base. As the looser I was told to join the fielders. I couldn’t catch balls either.  I wasn’t an asset to any side.

I wrote the poem, but was in the reading of it that it came to life. So much emotion was poured into such a few words! Did I really resent the other kids that joined the game?  Did I really feel that insecure that my mum might have preferred another, more athletic child, to me? I wasn’t the most secure child, nor indeed am I the most secure adult!

We commented about the reading of poetry. It was nice to hear different people reading poems. Among us there were different voices, different accents, different speeds of reading and a different imagining of what was happening in the poems and how they affected us. We bring our own baggage with us and can make connections, or not.

Reading out loud is a powerful thing when it’s done right.

“Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to preaching and to teaching.” 1 Timothy 4:13

I am reminded of Ezra’s public reading of God’s book of Law and the impact it had on people. It mattered who did the reading, I think.  It wasn’t like an actor delivering the well-rehearsed lines of a play. Ezra read words of life, words that he lived by, words that he knew were transformational, God’s own words spoken reverently. It mattered that every word was clearly spoken, nothing mumbled or fumbled.

Sometimes scripture doesn’t need to be picked apart. Sometimes in the picking apart we slip in our own truth, or we soften it, or dilute it, or tell it a hundred different ways in the hope that someone understands it. We talk to the brain and the reasoning in a person, when sometimes all we need to do is talk to the heart and the spirit.

“...the public reading of Scripture” – God’s word without the spin. And the Holy Spirit indwelling to explain it to our heart. I think we ought to have “a public reading of scripture” revival and see what happens to us all.

I’m up for it.  Are you with me?

Never Making it to First Base

This is our game of rounders

Our bat, our ball

That’s our house just the other side of

                the wire fence

and that’s our mum

My mum

waving you over to join in

You could say, “No thank you,”

but you don’t

Do you think that because she

                knows your name

it entitles you to a relationship?

She’s my mum – not yours

I cross my fingers  and hope you will

drop the ball

but you don’t

You cup it in your hands as it falls

I wish that, bat in hand, you will miss

Thwack

The ball sails high, thudding into

                the grass beside the slide

Maybe you will trip as you run

Perhaps you won’t reach first base

but you skip the circle -

first, second, third and home

That’s my mum

hugging you

and now I feel a prickle of anxiety

Inadequate

I can’t catch the ball

or hit it when it’s my turn

Only sometimes do I get to first base

I pray to God to

                let the sun set quickly

                so the game can end

and you can go home

and I can go home

with my mum

What is God?

This poem is based on "A Meditation on Question 4 of the Shorter Catechism" that my friend Jeanni led us through one Sunday morning at church - What is God? 

I have started reading through 1 Timothy and Paul cannot emphasise enough how important it is to have sound doctrine. Teaching false doctrine doesn't advance God's work.  It does nothing to transform the lives of believers.

What is God?

He is “I am”

Always

Unchanging in essence

Never ceasing to be

He is wisdom

Always

Marking every good path

Building houses on solid rock

He is power

Always

Laughing at impossibilities

Dismantling the storm

He is King

Always

Sceptre secure in hand

Increasing His government

He is love

Always

Laid down life

For His friends

He is truth

Always

Word in flesh dwelling

Sharp sword cleaving to core

He is “was, is and is to come”

Always

Without parallel in the universe

Everything bearing His fingerprint

Alpha and Omega and

Every letter in between

Now

Always

Yesterday, today, forever

Constant…

He is mine

Jonny Rook and His Offspring

Yesterday we went to the Moy Field Sports Fair.  The weather forecast promised a dry morning with rain later in the afternoon.

Dry? We should have checked the weather for the previous day.  Not so dry, methinks. It was saturated underfoot. The paths between rows of tents selling wares were churned up mud.  The small margins of grass just alongside the tents that weren’t mud were soggy. It was a welly wearing event and I don’t have any wellies. I’m not one that forges ahead confidently in mud or wet grass.  Every footstep is cautiously tested. I have fallen too often on dry ground for wet stuff not to be a hazard. Yes, I minced delicately along, my socks soon wet in my trainers. The clouds that had threatened for most of the morning broke in the early afternoon for some warm sunshine.  I fooled myself into thinking it was drying out just a little.

The show arena was the just behind the food tent.  Food had been macaroni cheese and chips – not really enough of either to justify the price they charged. The tea was hot, though, and with the tea bag left in, strong too.

Something to do with birds of prey was being exhibited in the arena. 

The first bird to take to the stage was a very young owl. Not yet at the flying stage, he was a brancher, out of the nest hopping along the branch but not yet up to flying. It was his debut appearance. I learned a lot about owls. Their eyes don’t move in their sockets. Their ears do all the hard work.  When they fly silently it has nothing to do with sneaking up on their prey unheard. It’s all about them not being able to hear the sound of their own wings beating and being a distraction to hearing their prey on the ground.  Put food by their feet and they are unable to see it and feel it out with their feet. Interesting!  He looked quite big and fluffy and ran around a lot with his wings outstretched.

The next bird was an adult owl. He was quite happy to fly from perch to hand and back to perch as long as he had the wind behind him. He didn’t like flying into the wind, but was prepared to make the sacrifice for a treat.

The third and final bird was quite a rarity – one of only a few hundred in the country. I can’t remember the name of the bird or the country of origin. Quick google – the caracara from the Falkland Islands that goes by the alias Jonny Rook. Where according to the commentary owls are not as wise as they are given credit for, this bird was the Einstein of the bird world. He was also the boss of the bird criminal underworld – a nasty piece of work.

Where owls and other bird species reared their young responsibly, making sure they had taught them the skills to be successful hunters, these caracaras were not so conscientious. It was all down to the food supply. In a place where the food supply is limited, these birds had a “me-first” mentality. They were not food sharers. When they had chicks they reared them. They didn’t always take dead stuff to the nest but watched to see how cleanly, or not, the live stuff could be dispatched and eaten by the chick. Once the chick did that it was kicked out of the nest, violently, to fend for itself. Juvenile birds would form a gang, maybe eight or nine birds, and egg each other on to meanness.

They were not trusting birds. They had found out the hard way that mum and dad couldn’t be trusted.  The gang they flew with couldn’t be trusted either. It was every caracara for themselves.

I got to thinking about good parenting and bad parenting. The owls were good parents, taking time to make sure their offspring had the right tools to succeed. The owls had time to grow and learn how to fly. Mum and dad didn’t trip up junior as he hopped along the branch. He flew when he was ready to fly and not before.

The caracaras were not good parents. It was a practical move to protect a limited food supply but junior didn’t get taught stuff, he had to learn it for himself in a very hostile world.

I have been thinking about human parents. There are plenty of parents that follow the owl way of doing things. The offspring they send off into the world are well equipped for whatever challenges they face, and they have all the tools necessary to be successful.

However, there are a lot of parents that are more like Jonny Rook. For the birds they are simply being practical in kicking their youngsters out of the nest to fend for themselves. Is there a kind way to do it if you are worried about your own food supply? They end up creating the next generation of caracaras that don’t know how to trust anyone or anything. These are birds that opt for the pre-emptive strike – hit before the other bird hits you. Strike first, ask questions later. Juvenile caracara birds learn how to fend for themselves at an impossibly early age, hang around in gangs that terrorise a neighbourhood and don’t trust authority figures because of their parents. Perhaps part of the problem lies in the food poverty that the caracaras live in. If there was an abundance of food, would they be better parents?

So much of what happens in nature has a people-application. How the next generation of people turns out depends very much on us and how we treat them. It’s not the government’s job, or the responsibility of teachers to take over the job of raising children. It’s not only the parent’s job either to equip their children with the right tools. It’s a communal thing – all of us together involved.

Name Him Great

These hours, these days so full of tears

These weeks, these months, these barren years

Nothing green and vibrant growing

No seeds in hand for harvest sowing

In the turmoil God meets our fears

Times when locusts fall like rain

Destroying wine and oil and grain

Scaling walls and breaking through

Snatching all we’re clinging to

God, in love, restores us again

These things that injure, God permits

The hostile place that snarls and spits

Such times convinced we’re cut adrift

He grasps our hand, to rescue, lift

Sovereign on His throne He sits

The Lord, extravagant in grace

Bids us turn to find His face

“Come rend your heart, return to me

Surrender now and bow the knee”

Of enemies no hint or trace

We raise our hands to celebrate

We lift our voices, name Him great

Restoring fruit, lush meadows green

God’s fingerprint so clearly seen

On Him, our faithful God, we wait

(Joel 2:1-24)

Poetry at the Museum of Childhood

“Poetry in Motion” was out at Strathpeffer this afternoon. We spent an hour or so in the Museum of Childhood at the old railway station. The first task was to write a word or phrase about the first ten objects that interested us, something that stirred a childhood memory or a feeling attached to the object.

I had two problems here. I can say with hand on heart that I remember very little about my childhood. Currently I am reading the first book of Maya Angelou’s biography, “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings”. She writes with so much detail and depth.  It’s unlikely that I will ever write my own biography.  Certainly not the early years. Not only can I not remember much, but I think it was not particularly that remarkable. I have a feeling that the things I think I remember were stories told to me over and over again that I have made my memories, if you know what I mean. I don’t know where the dividing line between story and reality lies.

Second problem – the museum wasn’t about my childhood.  The people I was with poked and prodded the dolls and the marbles and studied the pictures of cutting peat and collecting clams on a muddy beach. They remembered leather satchels and Peter Rabbit books. It was an interesting hour – but not evocative of my childhood. I had dolls. I might have had marbles too. I never cut peat or collected clams. I remember the occasional afternoon spent gleaning rosehips from hedges.  I don’t remember ever tasting the rose-hip syrup they became.

I made my list of ten. It wasn’t a satisfying list or one full of surprises.

The next task was to choose one or two of the objects and write about them – the colour, the shape, the function and anything else that comes to mind.  I took myself off to sit in the sunshine at a picnic table.

The Pram

Hers was not small and neat.  It never folded away to take up as little space as possible on the bus.

She never used the bus anyway. There was something of the claustrophobic about her. She imagined the bus crashing.  She knew she would be unable to climb out of a tiny window should the bus come to rest upside down. She was a woman of generous proportions.

Her pram was big and black, fashioned out of iron and springs. It was a station wagon rather than a nifty compact vehicle. A nest on wings, if you will, housing the next generation of Wilkinsons, silent and wide eyed, rarely mewling.  Three girls and a boy.

She fretted about the next arrival, due in March. The pram couldn’t take five children.  She scrutinised the current occupants and wondered which one to evict.

She kept close to the edge of the road. There were no pavements. A hedgerow of nettles and brambles, punctuated with dog-rose bushes and pale pink flowers, brushed against the side of the pram.

She thought about her children and worried that just as some had inherited her blue eyes and mouse brown hair, they might also inherit her fear of busses.

The pram, big and black, iron and springs, the nest on wheels, was her excuse not to face her fear.

Chosen

Before a word

Was spoken

Before the world

Became

Before the Spirit

Hovered over the void

And order was carved

From chaos

You chose me

Before a spark

Ignited in the hidden place

Before bones and flesh

Became

Before cells

Multiplied and divided

And ciphers concealed in DNA

Dictated character

You chose me

Before light

Greeted birth

Before breath

Became

Before eyes opened

And fingers twitched

And a mother’s breast

Nourished

You chose me

Before I learned

Right from wrong

Before aware I

Became

Before sin engraved its name

On cruel words

And careless actions

And selfish ambitions

You chose me

Before You called my name

And claimed me

Before Your child I

Became

There was no beauty in me

No worth

No advantage

No reason for choosing yet

You chose me

In a world of

Fatherless children

Seven thousand million lives

Disconnected and drifting

I am humbled

Pressed to my knees

Amazed beyond understanding!

You chose me

Holiday Snapshots

Last week was a visit down south to see family. Although I took the camera down with me I took very few pictures. I used to be a keen picture taker and worked my way up through different cameras and their levels of sophistication. I stopped printing off pictures with the arrival of digital cameras. Anyway, rather than drag you through pictures of people you don’t know, I will highlights some of the events of the week.

Most miserable day

I know.  Holidays are not supposed to have miserable days. And most people wouldn’t classify this as miserable. Tuesday was a very hot day. It was the kind of temperature that was good for the Costa del Sol but not for Warwickshire. Temperatures peaked at 33^oC which translates into the high 80s or 90s on the Fahrenheit scale. I have lived in Scotland too long and become acclimatised to cooler weather. By mid-afternoon, my body really didn’t know what to do with itself.  I am convinced I have more sweat glands than anyone else and every one of them was overworked. It was nice to sit in the shade, but even nicer to sit in a room with a few fans shifting air. It seemed as if every part of me was dysfunctional. I can’t believe that I lived in Cyprus for five years in similar and hotter temperatures! Is it an age thing? This intolerance of very hot temperatures?

Nicest niece or nephew

It constantly surprises me that I am related to so many beautiful young people. There was a newspaper article yesterday about the UK population being taller now than a generation ago.  I think that the niece and nephew generation on our family might not be taller but they are a good looking bunch! I was probably quite good looking too when I was their age but middle age spread happened and other aging events.

All of my next generation are nice, but I will highlight two of my nephews.

It’s not often when we go down to visit that we see my nephew Tom. It was really good to see him.  He has a wicked sense of humour. He seems to have reached a place of liking where he is at in life – not the physical place where he lives or the people that he encounters – but just being himself. I like him a lot!

The other nephew, Micah, I hadn’t seen since he was a boy. We lost touch when his parents were divorced and I miss not having a hundred photos of him and his sister, Melody, growing up. I apologise if I stared too much. I do that sometimes.  In my head I had all these deep conversations about his dad, Michael, and the last week of his life in Spain. I reality I talked about Brexit and Scottish independence. It was nice to be in his company and his wife Angela is awesome, confident and friendly.

Most interesting meal

Was the meal that great? The food? Maybe not to my taste. Richard and Linda, my brother and his wife, help out with a cookery club once a month. It’s a multi-cultural thing. Someone had funding from the council to buy half a dozen plug in induction hobs, half a dozen pans and chopping boards and kitchen utensils. The idea was to teach people to cook healthy food. A local church offered a room and the use of the kitchen. It is a great way to learn to cook meals from different cultures.

We cooked a stir fry. Everyone chopped and grated and sliced and quartered different vegetables, threw them into a hot pan with different sauces and sprinkles of spice. Joe is a purist when it comes to stir fries – the spices go in first.  They didn’t stir fry Joe-style. We got to taste one another’s meals. Linda’s chickens had an abundance of left over vegetables.

It was the desert which I really loved. Fruit salad with meringue and vanilla yoghurt. The meringue was vegan. I had no idea you could make a meringue without egg whites. I am wrong! Chickpea water! How would someone even go down that path of using chickpea water? Creativity at its best.

Best afternoon activity

I discovered a shopping gene one afternoon. Clothes shopping has often been a bit of a chore. What looks good on a coat hanger doesn’t look good on me. I also have a little voice in my head that reminds me that I possess knitting needles and a sewing machine and tells me “you could make that yourself!” Let’s not rake up the knitting and sewing days – yes, once upon a while I could have made things, and did.

Linda and I hit the sales one afternoon. She was looking for bedding for spare rooms in readiness for sons and families to stay.  She wasn’t hostile to dresses and other stuff. She collected dresses and skirts and tops much as a bee collects honey before heading off to the dressing room to try things on. She came away with a couple of dresses and ordered other things to collect later.

I caught the shopping bug. The hot weather helped in the sense that what we had packed wasn’t suitable. I bought a pretty top – sleeveless – I don’t really do sleeveless.

I suppose what made it so enjoyable was Linda. She took her time looking through the rails. There was no sense of urgency or hurry. Time was there to be spun out. I wasn’t hurried from one place to another. I wasn’t required to make snap decisions.

More vegan deserts

One of my nieces is vegan. She introduced us to vegan alternatives to some of the stuff we eat. I was just about to say I could become a vegetarian perhaps, but not a vegan, but I like meat too much. Bacon sandwiches – there are probably vegan alternatives.  A vegan lifestyle doesn’t sit well with my basically lazy nature.

As well as the vegan meringue, we also tasted vegan ice cream. It’s not made with the usual ingredients but tastes very much the same. I liked the vanilla ice cream, but didn’t like the chocolate one so much.  

The whole week was one of healthy eating and we have managed not to fall back into the fish and chip takeaway and cake and chocolate eating rut from before. So, although I am not about to embrace veganism or vegetarianism, or the two/five diet, trying to eat better is a good idea.

It was nice to see the family. I miss them. I admit to thinking often about returning to Warwickshire – but I love Scotland too much, and Nicola, and life in a slower lane.

Written on Your Palm

Lord, I ask

I beseech and plead

Show me Your palm

Outstretched and open

Let me see my name

Written for all eternity

Let me gently trace

Each letter

With my trembling fingers

My name

Carved with love

Cut into flesh

By the nails on the cross

And stained crimson

By the blood of Your Son

My own name

Written on your palm

For I have forgotten

And need reminding

That You love me

That the trials that I face

Are light and momentary

That the yoke on my shoulders

Is not so heavy

That the silence between us

Will soon be broken

By a gentle word

That soon

I will be lost

In Your strong embrace

Tears

Cloud my eyes

So that I cannot see

So I must feel

My name

Written on Your palm

Chosen

Cherished

Precious child

Which name is mine?

I hear Your whisper

“All are yours.”

© Melanie Kerr 2007

Cheese Dreams

I am a vivid dreamer. 

Some dreams seem to be very obvious God-dreams. They contain something very profound, life changing perhaps. They have got God stamped all over them.

Other dreams I call “cheese dreams”. Nothing profound happens and they seem to be linked to something that happened at work.  I assume that it’s just the way the brain sorts out stuff from the day. They can be interesting, or not. They can leave a bad cloud hanging over me in the morning, or not. Does the fact that I remember them mean they are not true cheese dreams at all? Sometimes I sit down and pick the dream apart looking for some kind of revelation. Sometimes there is vague insight to be gleaned. Most of the time I put it down to cheese.

This morning I fell among dream interpreters. The intention was a cup of tea with a friend and a handing over of the poetry manuscript for book 2. She had offered to take a look at it and cast a poet’s eye over it.  I’m not looking for any major overhauls of any of the poems, just a gut reaction about whether they made the grade. I have a few poems waiting in the wings for last minute evictions.

Another friend joined us. Apparently I was sort of gate crashing their weekly dream interpretation meeting. The group was usually bigger than just the two of them, but it is school holiday time and people fluctuations were to be expected. It’s possible that it was just tea or coffee on the menu with a break from the dream interpretation side of things – but I tossed a cheese dream onto the table. I was expecting confirmation that it was a cheese dream and no more.

It appears that cheese dreams don’t exist.

I’m not sure what I expected in terms of dream interpretations. I think I was looking for eyes closed and silent prayer and a particular connection to the heavenlies that I don’t possess. I was waiting for “I think God is saying this…” Instead, they took out notebooks and asked probing questions and drew spider diagrams. They went online to hunt down the meanings of the names of the people in my dream. There were corresponding numbers and related Bible verses to explore. They made interesting connections. It was very different from what I had expected. Very thorough. Significant looks passed between the two of them.

I thought it was all down to my insecurities at work. The dream featured people at work being given slices of my responsibilities leaving me lots of time and nothing to do.  I was being overlooked or passed by, or replaced by someone, who in all honesty I felt knew nothing at all about how to do my job better than I could. In the real world much of what I do has been cut down to a minimum and I often feel like a spare part. I know that “they” said I was indispensable and irreplaceable when “they” denied me voluntary redundancy, but that doesn’t mean that I feel particularly valued at times.

I soon discovered as I answered questions and listened to the conversation between the two ladies that unlocking dreams is not always as obvious as it looks. Even if it is just about my insecurities at work, that gives me something to bring before God to talk through and see His perspective. My ladies were not content with that.

My boss, who in real life is so supportive, in my dream showed little concern about my plight.  After some research on his name and linking in numbers and Bible verses they concluded that he could represent God. We all have expectations about God and how He should act – yes, God is supportive. I have been doing my own research into the faithfulness of God for a poem to be included in the book. God is faithful to His purposes in my life not to my purposes. Times when God wants to push me on to a deeper awareness or intimacy can be uncomfortable times. He has begun something in me and He is determined to see it to completion and doesn’t always get my full cooperation. God not acting the way I expect Him to act is something I know in my head, but don’t always embrace in my heart.

There was no dialogue in my dream just a one sided commentary on how badly I thought I was being treated.  I said things and no one answered. I expressed my sense of betrayal and no one said anything. I thought my sense of betrayal was significant. My dream interpreters thought otherwise. The fact that there had been no dialogue about it meant it might not be that important.

They didn’t come to a settled conclusion about the meaning. They missed the usual crowd and the varied tossing of thoughts into the pot. They agreed that despite the dream storyline there was a very positive message coming out. There are, or have been, new beginnings.  It could be work related, or church related or Mel related. It could be specifically poetry related. They didn’t say hard times are coming, strap yourself in. They did say God will show His grace and mercy. And, of course, I should never doubt that God loves me.

What I really valued about the whole experience was the permission granted to express my fears. Dream interpretation wasn’t something done to me. In the context of trying to figure out what my dream meant there were opportunities to look closely at some aspects of my life, to prod and poke around my psyche in a safe environment. All my “negatives” were balanced out with their “positives”.

So, yes, it may not be just about the dream interpretation but providing that opportunity to really talk and explore the hidden part of ourselves.

Those Curveball Moments

The Urban Dictionary defines a curveball as “a particularly difficult issue, obstacle, or problem. Named after the equally tricky baseball pitch.”  A friend of mine was talking about curveballs last night at our Women Aglow meeting.

I almost didn’t go. Imagine the scene - the Council of Nicaea in AD 325 and the three hundred men debating which inspired writings made it into the Bible and which didn’t. Think about that on a much smaller scale.  We are not talking about the Bible this time, but my second book of poetry. Working out which poems would make it on to the page and which wouldn’t has been a challenge. I’m still not quite there – the urge to tweak is strong. So, yes, saving the document, my precious manuscript, switching off the laptop and walking away – I almost didn’t make it! Even then, over my fish and chip supper I was still scrolling through the poem list in my head.

It surprised to me to discover that my friend and I share a very similar trait. It appears we are both nervous speakers – except that we are also very confident speakers too. In some situations we are shy people.  Out of our comfort zones we need to take the deep breath and launch out. Our comfort zones aren’t the same. I am comfortable speaking to large groups of people but not so easy with the one to one conversations.  My friend is the opposite – she does the one to one stuff brilliantly, but faced with the large group she is out of her comfort zone.

She talked about Joseph – the one with the technicolour dream coat. She chose not to read his story from start to finish, but picked out his curveball moments. Being thrown into a pit, and then sold into slavery by his brothers. Then to be accused of having an affair with the boss’ wife was not good either. Meeting his brothers later on when they came to Egypt for grain he chose not to take revenge testify to God’s plan for his life. God never approves of the evil that people do, but He works His own plans through it. Everything that Joseph went through was a part of God’s plan to make him into the man He could use, to put him in the place where he could best be used and in contact with the people he could have the most influence over.

I didn’t have a notebook so I couldn’t take notes – a shock to the system, a writer without a notebook! In one of the creative Bible communication course sessions the man leading the course scorned taking notes. He said that it was the responsibility of the speaker to make his word so memorable that taking notes should almost be an insult! I am not sure I agree with him on note taking. I take notes not because the speaker isn’t memorable but because weeks, months or perhaps years later I want to remind myself of the word. Whatever – I didn’t take notes.

One of the points made was about not allowing the curveball experiences to make us bitter or hard hearted. It is all too easy to build walls and tell yourself that you will not let them hurt you a second time – staying soft hearted is a challenge. We might never take revenge in any physical way, but thinking of the numerous ways we could cause harm to someone hardens our heart. We talk about learning through the experience but there is a right thing to learn and wrong thing. Letting God teach us the right thing is important.

She also talked about how easy it is to draw close to God in the difficult times. We have no solutions to the problem so we fall back on God. It is the times when all is going well when we are prone to let things slide. We think we don’t need God so much.

My friend talked about her more recent curveballs. Her son was diagnosed with Crohn's disease that causes inflammation and ulcers in the digestive system. He was admitted to hospital for treatment. She stayed with him for the two weeks sharing the same room. Theirs was not the ideal mother and son relationship, strained at times. The two weeks spent together brought about a new relationship.

She talked about the different people she met in the hospital – other mothers with sick sons, doctors who were praying for her and her family, those who had watched love ones die. God had put my friend in that place at that time to touch people with her words and her prayers. The curveball that the enemy would have liked to use for evil, God put it to good use.

When we are dealing with life’s curveballs there is always the opportunity for a wonderful witness to the power of God in our lives. So many conversations ready to happen, prayers ready to be launched, lives waiting for a touch or blessing. Too often we surrender the curveballs to the enemy and allow him use them to badmouth God or other people. Let’s wrest them from enemy hands and let God use them for His glory.

Me Because of You

I’m redeemed and stand before You

Dressed in a robe of righteousness

I’m amazed that I should be here

Treated as Your honoured guest

I am humbled that You chose me

Before the world began to turn

By Your grace I have been given

Blessings I could never earn

From on high You stooped down

To lift me up, to help me stand

You tell me I am precious

Write my name upon on Your hand

Undeserving yet You love me

Paid so much to bring me home

I am nothing, I am no one

Yet You’ve claimed me for Your own.

Evanton Woods

I’m hesitant to declare that fairies don’t exist. They probably don’t but I don’t want to be responsible for killing Tinkerbell.  I’d like to think that there is a little magic and mystery that we haven’t quite explained away with science.

The last few months I have been hanging around with the Poetry in Motion gang. It’s an offshoot of Creativity in Care. While other creative writing groups huddle indoors with pen, paper and prompts, Poetry in Motion heads out of doors, taking inspiration from nature.

Although I was invited, I felt somewhat a gate crasher as I arrived at Evanton woods late Saturday afternoon. It wasn’t really about poetry, although poems were shared.  Saturday was a celebration of winning an award. The woods belong to the Evanton Wood Community Company.  A long time ago I knew people in Evanton. It turned out that the people I knew then were part of the company. It was nice to catch up although I admit to fluffing names of kids now grown up that I’d once taught in Sunday School. The company had won a health and wellbeing award. There was a plaque and a cheque and a need to mark the occasion.

Being a few days after the summer solstice and mid-summer’s night, Shakespeare was on the menu. The plan was a short, steep and slow walk around a part of the forest not keeping to the main paths but forging through the foliage. We stopped every so often to read a poem or a quotation or act out a scene. We were accompanied along the way by two young musicians. A guitar and a fiddle provided lively tunes as we travelled along.

“Let’s take our hearts for a walk in the woods and listen to the magic whispers of old trees.” Author Unknown

Evanton woods was new territory to me. Although I spent time in Evanton years ago I never visited to woods. My younger friends had a passion for playing hide and seek, in the dark, in the woods, but I deemed myself too grown up for such frolics. I am not afraid of the dark, but neither am I at home in it. I am less grown up these days and much more inclined to frolic. It could be the onset of early eccentricity.

I doubt the trees in any woods have ever been so sweetly serenaded as they were on Saturday. Do trees smile? The Bible uses images of trees clapping their hands. Had I been a tree I would have clapped. They were not just somewhere in the background doing tree stuff while we walked and chatted and breathed in forest fragrances.  They were centre stage, being applauded.

“For in the true nature of things, if we rightly consider, every green tree is far more glorious than if it were made of gold and silver.” Martin Luther.

It wasn’t too fanciful to imagine that the trees were being entertained. They understood a message that some people, the ones in the community wood company and friends, recognised the need to connect to forests and nature. We are the takers in this world, very rarely the givers. The company gives its time to maintaining the woods, chopping bits back, replanting new stuff, finding ways to teach people bush craft and educating people about the diversity of plants, insects and animals.

I have done a lot of reading over the last few months about issues to do with creation and evolution. I am not a creationist but they talk about God's two great books that reveal His nature. One is the written word – the Bible. The second is God revealed in nature. The one doesn’t contradict the other. I may be able to read the Bible, but I fumble to read nature – It’s a language that I am not fluent in. Saturday’s people were fluent nature speakers. It was no wonder I said so little.

“The trees are God’s great alphabet:

With them He writes in shining green

Across the world His thoughts serene.”

~Leonora Speyer

Do you know, I think I said “Thank you” to at least one tree? There was a steep part of the path and I was making my way down hesitantly gripping one tree trunk after another. I traced pattern in the bark. Has I been on my own, chances are I wouldn’t have taken that path, but had I, I would have stopped and touched and dreamed a little. I would have strained to hear tree conversations. One tree trunk was so covered in rich green moss that my fingers wanted to linger.

It was not hard to think of fairies. The wood was so quiet. If, as some fairy-lovers suggest, we have pushed these mythical beings into hidden places, I would suggest that they hide in Evanton woods!

Us sing and dance, make faces and give flower bouquets, trying to be loved. You ever notice that trees do everything to git attention we do, except walk? ~Alice Walker, The Color Purple, 1982

There is something un-striving about nature. That’s not true. What appears to be peaceful isn’t really. All forms of life are in competition whether for food or water or adequate space. Another thing I learned on my creation/evolution travels is that the Victorians were shocked not about the apparent lack of a need for God when Darwin shared his observations. He talked about survival of the fittest and the dog eat dog way of life. Nature wasn’t about peace and harmony and lambs and rabbits frolicking (I like that word – frolic) but about predators and their prey. It didn’t tie in with the Victorian idealistic view of nature.

I hear the wind among the trees

Playing the celestial symphonies;

I see the branches downward bent,

Like keys of some great instrument.

~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

In all my encounters with woods and forests I feel better for having walked there. I breathe a different air. I think settled thoughts. My imagination is given permission to see fairies and talk to trees. I feel connected.

The Boy with the Flame Red Hair

She wakes to laughter, love and song

And peers through leaves – a happy throng

That stops, share poems, moves along

So confident that they belong

They glimpse her but see other things

Like butterflies, not fairy wings

She rises, dances, lightly springs

From twig to branch and softly sings

She sees him, fiddle in his hand

As men and women, children stand

Beneath an oak its branches spanned

And feel the magic of the land

She loves the boy with flame red hair

His grace and youth beyond compare

A life together could they share?

He doesn’t even know she’s there

She thinks to conjure up a spell

To draw him to her side to dwell

A love for her his heart compel

All thoughts of other worlds expel

But fairies almost never stay

It’s just part of the fairy way

To love a while and then to stray

She blows a kiss and turns away

Their journey through the woodland weaves

Stroking bark and catching leaves

A dry stick tossed a dog retrieves

And peace of heart each one receives

An Evening of Encouragement

I confess that I’m not a person who easily joins in things. I put it down to a childhood of never being picked for teams. I figured then that if they don’t want me, well, I don’t want them either.  I can manage all by myself.

Last night I went to “An Evening of Encouragement” at one of the local churches. It was a inter-church event tapping into the not-so-traditional gifts of the Spirit. I was in need of encouragement. It had been a rough previous week and there were one or two spiritual bruises I was nursing. One or two grudges too it turned out!

I was offered a list of options to make appointments for, steered towards selecting a couple to start with.  I could add to the list if I wanted to later.

I hadn’t had any interesting dreams so I didn’t feel the need to opt for dream interpretation. I have a young friend who has very vivid dreams that involve ghosts and zombies but didn’t really know enough detail to ask on his behalf.  Anything involving nails, nail art and hand massages were also out because at this time of the year, under stress, I don’t have nails, just chewed stubs of nails.  A week or two into the summer hols and I will I have a decent set of nails to decorate and massage.  I was left with a word of encouragement and responsive art.

I should just lay it down on the table from the outset – I’m a little bit cynical. I know it isn’t like horoscopes which can be vague enough to fit the circumstances of lots of people, or people can snip at their circumstances to make them fit the word given so I go into these things hesitantly.  There is an element of thinking that God could just tell me without resorting to a third party. Throughout scripture God uses third party messengers all the time. It was kind of arrogant of me to think that I has a special inside track and didn’t need anyone else to speak into my life.

The people giving the word of encouragement were people I knew.  I hate that initial silence at the beginning. Perhaps they had nothing to say.

The word given was Ephesians 5:1-2- “Follow God’s example, therefore, as dearly loved children and walk in the way of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.” There was an almost apologetic shrug and a run-with-it-if-you-want-to body language thing going on. I am a person that likes to be told. “God says” has me jumping to attention.  Take it or leave it doesn’t. God did say, despite the shrug. I struggle to be like Jesus.  Don’t we all? I’m surrounded so often by people who don’t walk in the way of love and I allow myself to be dragged along. I don’t always stand my ground. The “giving myself up” part is really hard as I can be very assertive at times.  God doesn’t ask us to do the impossible without first equipping us and pouring into our lives all the resources we need. Following God, walking in the way of love, giving myself up – all possible.

The second word was in picture form.  Avril saw a candle burning strongly in the dark. The strong wind blows and it feels as if the candle will be extinguished. There’s always oxygen, always the Holy Spirit enabling the candle to burn brightly. She talked about direction and light, and making a difference, and lighting up a room.

I knew all about strong winds and candles almost going out. Hadn’t I lived through the strong winds of someone’s hot anger the previous week? I would like to say that it was uncalled for – the intensity certainly was – but I hadn’t acted wisely. I hadn’t been given any benefit of the doubt. The anvil of anger fell and I was underneath and felt crushed.

I talked a little about the incident. God and I had raked over the embers for most of the weekend. He called me to forgive myself for being so unwise in the first place. I kind of felt I deserved the woman’s anger.  However, she knew a just single moment of my work life and had painted the rest of it in a matching colour. She didn’t know me at all. Forgiving her hadn’t really occurred to me. I was beating myself up with her words. It was nice to put down the stick.

I promised myself I wouldn’t cry but I did. That’s another reason I try to avoid these things. I am sometimes so tightly strung up that I can’t afford to fall apart – but I can’t really afford not to. I’m not designed to live as wound up as I get.

They prayed with me and I was collected and moved on to my next appointment – responsive art. I could have gone home at this point. I was feeling fragile. I didn’t need another spiritual poke in the ribs.

The lady on one side of me got a wonderful picture of a blazing fire in a forest. The lady on the other side of me got a glorious overflowing well. I liked those pictures. I wasn’t close enough to eavesdrop on the words that were spoken about the pictures. My artist drew a picture of an open door. An open door didn’t feel very creative or interesting. But not more than a month ago I had drawn the very same picture at a prayer meeting. I had a man dancing before my door, but it was the same kind of thing. An open door and a hesitation to step through. Another poke it the ribs? Another kick up the backside to shift me?

Not at all. Her door was one I wanted to step through. She talked about God taking me further in my creative journey with Him and a sense of fulfilment and joy. I love writing. Poetry is the one thing that really floats my boat. It’s my sweet spot. God, not just giving me permission to do it, or approval, but saying He is with me in my writing journey is very encouraging. To glorify Him through my poetry makes me want to write better poetry!

There are poetry adventures where I have not been able to whip out the swash and buckle and gut the enemy.  It was encouraging that God was not looking for another poet to do the work instead. He knows what is inside of me and is determined that I should know too. I like that.

The evening did what it said on the tin. I was encouraged.

Cornerstone

See now - God’s precious, treasured living stone

Tossed aside by men who too blind to see

Their feet are caught, they stumble, skin the bone

They glance but never see eternity

See now – the stones He chooses for His own

His living stones that move to do His will

Assembled as a house for Him alone

With praise His holy priests His temple fill

See now – the cornerstone He puts in place

For those who cast their lives, on Him depend

They look and know forgiveness, no disgrace

And own Him, Saviour, Shepherd, Friend

See now – the stone that holds in place the world

Tossed it is, into hungry hearts it's hurled

1 Peter 2:4-8

A Tale of Two Gardeners

Let’s suppose you need a gardener.

Actually, let’s not suppose at all. You do need a gardener. The shed is full of dead electric mowers. No one knows what killed them. They just stopped working. The last mower you purchased was not electric. It was a push-along-cylinder mower. Perhaps it brought back old memories of childhood and long summer days, short grass and a lilac bush in the corner of the garden – leaning at a slight angle where your older sister backed into it one driving lesson.

This mower, the push-along  one, is also dead now. You’ve tinkered with a spanner and fed it oil in its deep recesses – but it’s dead. No one knows exactly what killed it.  It just stopped working.

So, you decide not to buy another mower. It would be cruel to the mower to assign it an early death, just like the others and you are probably not as young as you were. Kneeling down is possible.  Getting back up again, less so.

The mower might be dead but the grass isn’t. It grows. A balance of spring to summer sun, lots of rain and no working mower conspire.  Ankle high.  Knee high.  Thigh high.  The grass grows.

The neighbours frown. You wish you had the courage to invite them to cut your grass for you, and weed the borders while they are at it, if they have such strong objections. You actually think your neighbour did have strong objections to living next door to your wilderness. You think they moved house in the middle of the night. You were greeted the other day by a stranger across the wall introducing herself.

Hiring a gardener is the answer.  There’s a list in the local paper. So you choose one. He doesn’t call back.  You choose another and he or she doesn’t call back. The man that lives around the corner is a gardener. He says he will call round about six. But he doesn’t.

The grass grows – waist high? Not quite.

You get lucky.  The next gardener you phone comes around and gives an estimate. It’s a bit steep – but the grass is high and you think you saw a lion, a tiger and a bear the other night. You agree to the price and tick off on your fingers exactly what is required. He’s not allowed to touch the bluebells and he’s not allowed to spray pesticides anywhere – think about the bees!

You look at the finished garden. Maybe you weren’t lucky at all.  Maybe the man could come to do it because he did such a bad job on other people’s gardens that he was never invited back. You have maybe had a bad hair- cut once upon a time and thought about wearing a paper bag over your head for a while. Paper bags don’t come lawn sized. It’s not good. There are no trim edges and the thistles at the back have been left to threaten the rhubarb. The conifers have been trimmed but my new neighbour mumbles as she sweeps up the mess he leaves on her side of the wall. No, it’s not good. You take a pair of scissors to his business card.

Meanwhile back around the corner, where the other gardener lives with his mother, he mows her lawn, trims the edges and weeds her borders.  She doesn’t have conifers to trim but you imagine he would to a good job and tidy up afterwards. He takes his time. He takes a few days. He pours love onto every blade of grass. He practically serenades the brown soil of the borders.  The garden sighs with happiness.

Now.  A quick change of direction. Suppose you want to be a gardener. Yes, there is a definite tinge of green on the fingers. So, you apprentice yourself out to one of our two gardeners.

Who do you choose?  Go on.  It’s not a trick question. If you are looking for a quick buck or a hundred and the fingers are not that green at all – maybe you will go with gardener number 1.  He is only going to teach you bad habits and he will never nurture your love of grass and ground and grubby worms.

No, you will go with the gardener around the corner. You have watched him work and you have seen the results. The garden loves him and gazes at him with adoration.

Another quick change of direction. Suppose you want to be a Christian. You don’t exactly apprentice yourself out.  Even you know it doesn’t work that way.  But you do have a good look at a couple of Christians.  Maybe there’s one that lives just around the corner. You want to know if being a Christian works! Do these people seem to have the inside track on troubles? Do they know something you don’t know? Are they happy? So you look at their lives.

Now, don’t get me wrong.  God doesn’t wrap his people in cotton wool or clean them up with antiseptic wipes. There is no vaccine against life. But how they deal with life – that tells you whether faith works or not.

Christians! No one is watching in anticipation and glee for you to fall. They are watching with baited breath for you to keep standing.  Only then will they begin to believe that faith in God works.

30 Days Wild

I signed up with the Wildlife Trust to do their “30 Days Wild” challenge. Each day I am being challenged to do a random act of wildness.  I am one week into the challenge and have discovered that wildness, random or otherwise, is hard work.  It doesn’t just happen but has to be planned into my day.

Day One – a thirty minute walk in a nearby forest. It was a quiet walk. I met a man and his dog.  The dog was willing to be friendly but the man wasn’t.

The thing about forest walks is I inevitably end up feeling guilty. I feel bad that I don’t know the names of the different trees.  I can’t identify the different birds by their songs. It’s like gate-crashing a party and not knowing any of the people there!  

Many years ago I taught for a while in a country primary school.  I arrived very early each day and spent the first half an hour in the company of the canteen staff. They spent their first hour drinking tea and gazing out of the kitchen window onto the school playing field. They pointed out various birds by name and talked about nesting pairs and all things wildlife. I knew what venn diagrams looked like and could draw the outline of the island of Australia. I wished I had their knowledge.

Day Two – closer to home this time. I filled up the bird feeders with new stuff. The peanuts had not gone down so well. The suet balls were gone. It has rained quite a bit previously and I could tell that I hadn’t changed the seeds in a while – the seeds had sprouted in the bottom of the feeder, sending up green shoots around the edge of the plastic.

Day Three – nothing to report.  It was a Friday.  I had planned to arrive early at my husband’s work to pick him up.  There was a meal to be eaten and then we were off to a race night raising school funds. I’m not a joiner-in and felt really out of place when all the ladies turned up dressed for Ascot in summer dresses and hats.

I discovered that when it comes to picking winners, I can’t do it without looking at the form – the horses' past race placements. Race nights don’t include that kind of information.  I thought that my husband, being a man who knows horses and horse racing, might actually be able to identify the races for real, but it wasn’t to be.  Everyone on our table won money except for us, although we did win two bottles of wine in the raffle.

As I say, I planned to turn up early to pick my husband and take a walk around the duck pond at his work.  I could have ticked my box but I was delayed.

Day Four – Another “I planned to do…” but it didn’t happen.  It was our monthly creative writing morning.  I planned to leave early and drive further down the road to a spot that looks out over the Beauly Firth. I have no idea why I was delayed – ah, yes, I wrote a poem instead. I’d looked over last month’s meeting notes.  What we wrote then was notes, lines, first drafts that I hadn’t done anything with. I needed to remedy that. What’s the point of creative writing workshops is you never polish up those first drafts.

I went along to the firth later on in the day. The day was glorious. The sky was very big and very blue. The tide was coming in. A few gulls were gliding on air currents. I tried to breathe the peace and tranquillity.

Someone was having a party and the throbbing beat of music and the drifting smoke from a barbeque didn’t do much to promote peace and harmony – though the neighbours seemed to have having a good time. More friendly dogs and unfriendly dog owners!

Day Five – I had witnessed forty four young people being confirmed at St Mary’s Roman Catholic Church. It wasn’t my usual place of worship, but I have a young friend who was one of the candidates and I wanted to be there to witness the event.

“Who’s St Harvey?” I whispered to my husband as my finger went down the list of candidates and their confirmation names. 

“He’s the patron saint of invisible rabbits,” was the reply.

This is not true, by the way. Harvey was a bishop in the very early church who was blind. He is a patron saint of bards and troubadours, and the man to pray to for eye infections.

Afterwards, I went to sit beside the River Ness. The last flakes of blossom were falling. I wasn’t watching the river or the trees but indulging in people watching. I loved seeing some couples walk in perfect synchronicity. I remembered my school days and how my best friend and I were matched for walking together.

Day Six – there are just some very busy days and fitting in something wild just isn’t possible. It was poetry at Eden Court. The topic was “Tea”. The poetry group can sometimes feel like that party crashing moment when you know they know lots of poets and poems and you don’t. One man, however, despairing of ever finding a “tea” poem resorted to writing his own. It was a wonderful comparison of men and women drinking tea. I suppose it was stereotyping – the ladies with the delicate tea cups and Earl Grey, and the men with the mugs and PG Tips doing DIY.

It was late. I dug out a nature magazine when I got home. I lusted after a decent camera so I could take good pictures of wildlife. I learned a lot about soil and how it takes 500 years to get good top soil and then a week of wet weather and it’s washed away, or a week of dry weather and it’s blown away. I discovered there are lots of species of bees beyond “bumble” and “honey”. I intend to be a more informed forest walker!

Day Seven – that’s today! My random wildness today was drinking a cup of herbal tea. I admit that it’s not so random. I have quite a collection of boxes with various “use by” and “best before” dates. Today’s selection was peppermint and nettle – Twinings, not homemade. 

The Dandelion Clock and the Hour for Letting Go

Finally.  Yes, finally I have got someone to come around and mow the lawn and clear the borders of weeds. They arrive tomorrow with rakes and spades, mowers and strimmers – but not weed killer. I gave the man strict instruction to spray nothing.  I may not have a liking for insects but birds do.  Enough that so many gardens are paved and pebbled over, not mine, I say, not mine!

I have been saying a last farewell to the long grass and the dandelion clocks. The grass has got to that interesting stage with vertical lines from the tall grass.  There is always movement and the grass seeds are ready to be tossed on the wind. A cloud of tiny winged things scatter everywhere I place my feet and the lawn is dotted with forget-me-nots and buttercups. What’s not to love? I’m not sure that I like the manicured look but my neighbours will stop frowning at me.

I know I should wage war on dandelions and dig down to the roots to get rid of them – but I like them. I am glad that God doesn’t rank flowers according to garden centre pedigree.  I like their persistence. I like their deep shade of yellow.  I like their clocks. I like their mechanism for reproducing. It’s a perfect strategy.  Over a hundred and fifty seeds, equipped with parachutes, just waiting to be loose enough to take to the air.

In our weekly prayer meeting I drew a picture of a dandelion clock with a few seeds sailing away. If the dandelion clock held on to its seeds and refused to surrender them to the breeze they would go nowhere. They would just shrivel on the end of the stalk. They would not be allowed to find a bit of soil and send down roots. I suspect that some gardeners, the lawn manicurists and the border patrol types would not object. There are plenty of out-of-the-garden places they could go – let them go there! But the breeze doesn’t discriminate.

I would like to have more of a dandelion mentality. The truth about Jesus I have learned over the years should be like the dandelion seeds loose and ready to take to the air.  The Holy Spirit blows where it wills, but I stubbornly hold on. My truth I would like to pass on to someone who is worthy of it, who won’t brush it aside, or smirk at it.  I want to know, before I pass it on, that it will germinate in a ready-to-listen heart and it will be bear fruit. It’s not as if it’s the only seed I possess. There is a lot of truth in me.  But it’s not for staying in me.  It’s for giving away.

A wise friend of mine suggested that the world, not always embracing the spiritual or the Christian, has of late become quite hostile. Humanists and atheists alike are not content to live and let live. It’s hunting season all year round and the prey is the man, woman or child of faith. Calling us idiots and fools they want to skin us of our faith and present us as naked, stripped-of-all-superstition life forms that finally face up to the real world.  They insist we will be happier knowing the truth. They are doing us a favour! Tough love!

We stay silent and hold onto our seeds of truth because we don’t want to be called idiots and fools. How the world labels us matter too much. We should not let the world dictate to us about truth and the real world. Their's is a looking at the world with only one eye barely open.

The breeze doesn’t discriminate – it blows on field and garden alike. The dandelion clock strikes the hour for letting go. The breeze comes and it holds nothing back.  The poet in me would like the hear the inner dandelion wishing every seed the longest of journeys, the brownness of soil, the warm touch of sunshine and the absence of trowels and green fingered gardeners.

The Christian in me knows about the path, and the rocky soil. Knows too about the choking weeds and thistles. But right at the forefront the Christian in me remembers the good soil and the harvest.

I pray for every seed of truth the best of journeys, readiness of spirit and soul to embrace God’s truth, the transforming touch of Holy Spirit and the resilience to flourish despite the enemy’s trowel.