Today I take the plunge. I have been writing a prototype blog via email to a handful of friends and now I'm going to leap off into the deep end and post what I've sent since August 25th, and, including this mornings meditations.


Meditations of a Christian Writer
August 25, 2003 Morning

It’s a gray Ottawa morning. I sit at my dining room table, in a condo where someone in a red garden tractor is mowing the lawn of the park-like common area outside my windows. I see spruce trees, green lawn sloping down to purple loosestrife and tall grass along the brook that travels along the base of the ravine. Weeping willows tower over the brook. The still, humid air smells of cut grass. The mower makes a racket that competes with my attempt to sing Morning Prayer from The Canadian Psalter: Plainsong Edition.
The Psalms for today begin with Part 5 of Psalm 19. This morning I will sing and meditate upon Parts 5-9.

Teach me, O Lord, the way of thy statutes: and I shall keep it unto the end.
The guy on the tractor is wearing a gray shirt and a tan baseball cap. He swerved around the spruce tree at enough of a clip to tilt him in his seat.

Give me understanding, and I shall keep thy law: yea, I shall keep it with my whole heart.

I’ve sung these verses, after running downstairs to the old electric piano to find my note and go over the tune. I want to sing them because singing helps me slow down and involve my whole body in worship. But I’m still new at plainsong, so I need to reread the words and make sure they sink in. Make sure I mean them.

Make me to go in the path of thy commandments: for therein is my desire.
Incline my heart unto thy testimonies: and not to covetousness.

I’m at a crossroads now in my writing. I’ve been working for years writing a novel and just heard from an agent I’d really like to represent me that my novel is “to much of a stretch for them.� I got the news after returning from a research trip on the sequel, which is probably going to be even more of a stretch.

So, what do I do? I’ve hit a lull also in the work I do for pay. Last night while I tried to go to sleep my body would not relax. It took hours to finally drift off to sleep. I bought a health membership yesterday at this new club in a spanking new minimalist hotel aimed to provide luxury accommodations to the high tech crowd in “Silicon Valley North� and some of the anxiety that perhaps invaded my sleep was wondering how I was going to pay for the membership. Was I being fair to my husband who is bringing in the lion’s share of the income right now?

What I am going to do is seek the Lord’s face and will for my life. And, I’m going to try an experiment. I’m going to write what I love to write, without fear of earning a living by it, and trust that God will reveal to me what things here and there I must do to make money. I will not succumb to the temptation to rush out and find work, any work to pay the bills, but will do things out of peace, only after a clear leading from the Holy Spirit. Hmm. That’s easier said than done. Back to my morning prayer.

And I will walk in liberty: for I seek thy precepts.

It’s beautiful how some of these verses are jumping out at me today.

Thy statutes have been my songs: in the house of my pilgrimage.

A gray squirrel eyes me from the windowsill, his paws nearly clasped over his white chest, his tiny ears attentive, his nostrils scenting the cool air. He just jumped on the balcony railing and I’m going to go chase him off, because the squirrels like to gnaw at the wood and already the brown paint is gouged in places by their rodenty incisors.
I went out onto the balcony and stamped my feet. After hesitating a moment, he jumped to the windowsill then climbed down the brick wall like Spiderman. I think again of my idea for a horror movie where all the little rodents in the wild decide to boldly attack mankind, the way the birds did in the famous Alfred Hitchcock movie The Birds. The squirrels, skunks, groundhogs and raccoons in this area already have little fear of people. A blue jay calls and a crow caws. The lawn mowing has stopped, and aside from the birds, I hear the hum of the furnace fan and the distant murmur of traffic.

It is good for me that I have been in trouble: that I might learn thy statutes.
The law of thy mouth is dearer unto me: than thousands of gold and silver.

A boy in a red shirt and a white baseball cap on backwards walks down the path towards the footbridge over the brook.

The first lesson this morning is 1 Kings 8:1-21. Solomon has the ark brought into the Temple he has built for the Lord.

And there was nothing in the ark save the two tables of stone which Moses put there at Horeb, when the Lord made a covenant with the children of Israel, when they came out of the land of Egypt.
And it came to pass, when the priests were to come out of the holy place, that the cloud filled the house of the Lord.
So that the priests could not stand to minister because of the cloud: for the glory of the Lord had filled the house of the Lord.
Then spake Solomon, The LORD said that he would dwell in the thick darkness. (I Kings 8:9-12
It’s amazing to me how connected these verses are to the Psalms I’ve sung this morning. That’s what I love about the old Book of Common Prayer, and how the way readings are juxtaposed, new meanings and relationships among Scripture passages are revealed.
I’m reminded of the Tommy Tenney book I read recently, The God Chasers, about how God wants people who seek His face, who want, like Moses, to see God’s glory. And I think about how sometimes, when we seek God, He is obscured by a cloud. Probably a different kind of cloud. This kind of cloud would make us tremble and feel a sense of weightiness, fear and awe. The cloud most of us experience in relation to God is like that referred to in the famous book The Cloud of Unknowing.
I think of prayer sometimes as similar to taking off during a storm. You’re on the tarmac. The clouds are heavy and dark. Rain is pelting down and wind buffets your little plane. You persist down the runway, rumbling heavily down the asphalt, and you’re airborne. Then your plane dips and bobs as the wind hurls it from side to side and up and down. The temptation is always to circle around and land. To get back on the ground and into the hangar. But, if you persist, you can break through the clouds to where the sun is shining, above the wind and the turbulence.
Now the sun has broken through. The green lilac leaves outside the patio door glisten with raindrops. A mourning dove flies nearby. I can hear the whistle of its wings. Not long ago, I heard a child’s voice. The mowers are off in the distance. The wind is picking up. I close the vertical blinds to block out the sun and preserve the morning cool.
Te Deum LaudamusWe praise thee, O God: we acknowledge thee to be the Lord

All the earth doth worhip thee: the Father everlasting.

And now, for the second lesson. Today it is 1 Corinthians 15:35-end.
These are the verses that jump out at me:

But some man will say, How are the dead raised up? And with what body to they come? (1 Corinthians 15:35)

There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars: for one star differeth from another star in glory.
So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption.
It is sown in dishonour, it is raised in glory: it is down in weakness it is raised in power: ( 1 Corinthians 15:41-43)

Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord. (1 Corinthians 15:58)

I wrestle with all the teachings these days about following one’s passion, about doing what one loves and that sense of calling. What I love to do is write emails to people I care about. So, I’m going to try that so that this grace and peace from this morning’s prayer can be shared and any insights God gives me as I start this day can be passed along.
Fiction is so much more difficult than this. Takes so much more discipline. Am I called to that? Today, I will discipline myself to plod ahead in that, in addition to taking care of some odds and ends for my money-earning business.

BENEDICTUS
Blessed be the Lord God of Israel: for he hath visited and redeemed his people;
And hath raised up a mighty salvation for us: in the house of his servant David.

August 26, 2003

I woke up this morning feeling achy, stiff, the beginnings of a dull headache. Unfortunately, I often feel this way in the morning, and it’s one of the things that gets in the way of doing a disciplined morning prayer first thing. I often take some time to ply myself with tea and a little breakfast and it’s tempting to read the newspaper while I eat. Yesterday and this morning, I had my tea and breakfast first but instead of the newspaper, I read from a little volume of selected writings of Henri Nouwen.

A spiritual life without discipline is impossible. Discipline is the other side of discipleship. The practice of discipline makes us more sensitive to the small, gentle voice of God. (Henri Nouwen: Writings Selected with an Introduction by Robert A. Jonas, Orbis Books, Modern Spiritual Masters Series)

But discipline is so hard to maintain. I can go for a season being disciplined but something always seems to come along to disrupt it, and often it’s physical sluggishness and discomfort that derails my prayer life. I also have to confess that sometimes it’s outright rebellion. Something will rise up in me that says, “I don’t want to.� And I don’t.

I’ve been trying to cope with the physical discomfort by watching what I eat, because my diet does affect the quality of my aches and pains. I can’t eat sugary, processed foods or refined flours without paying a price when I stop eating them. They act like addictive substances that make me feel reasonably okay while I’m eating them (though I feel tired, dopey, and want to eat all the time). It’s when I stop that withdrawal sets in.

The other way I cope is by exercising. And, this morning, I did some yoga stretches. I know that many Christians would be alarmed that I would even consider something like yoga, and I would not advise anyone to take a yoga class or to learn from a DVD (the way I did) without many caveats. The last thing I want to be guilty of is any kind of syncretism or falling under the influence of any vain philosophy or cleverly devised fable. It’s interesting to me, however, that Christians who would not touch yoga might do callisthenics or obey their doctor on issues like diet when these might be coming from an underlying philosophy of scientific materialism that is even further from the truth of the Gospel. Some apologetics sites warn that even the postures themselves open you up to occult influences. Perhaps some of the extreme postures do, but no way am I going to be standing on my head at all, never mind for hours at a time.

I try to stick with simple, sensible stretches and tune out the sound when the teacher on the DVD starts to talk about the philosophy or spiritual principles. I also continually check to make sure that I’m not getting into a place where I use yoga to “save myself� so that I can feel better in my sinfulness. No, I use yoga stretches to be a good steward of my body, especially given the cramped postures of a writer’s life, so that I can better obey the Lord, and better present my body as a living sacrifice.

My friend Cheryl and I discussed yoga last night while we went to our new health club and sat in the whirlpool tub. She said she wished there was a way to do yoga to the Lord’s Prayer. Spoil the Egyptians, take the gold, incorporate it into a Christian framework, but make sure that none of the pantheistic falsity comes along with it.

I now know several stretch routines and do them without the DVD, sometimes to Christian praise music. This morning I tried doing parts of the “Sun Salutation� as the “Son Salutation�, saying the Lord’s Prayer out loud. Then I did the breath prayer from the Orthodox tradition. “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.�

I love the way some churches have brought in liturgical dance. It grieves me, though, that so many Christians sit in churches as an audience, expecting to be entertained by a punchy sermon, drama skits, and a lively contemporary worship band. Without getting involved actively in the worship themselves, they have no idea what they’re missing. But, then, not so long ago I was one of those needing to be entertained. How I’ve envied people who know American sign language for the way they can worship with their gestures.

And so many Christians, myself included, are overweight. Gluttony is one of the seven deadly sins that doesn’t seem to get much negative attention. Potluck suppers and dessert parties with groaning tables of squares, pies, cookies, pastas, scalloped potatoes. I love the little sandwiches cut in quarters, especially egg salad with a little onion on soft, commercial whole wheat bread, but I digress.

Now, to my morning prayer. Outside, a couple of guys are pruning hedges with chain saws. There’s always something, no ?

The Psalms for this morning are parts 14 through 18 of Psalm 119.

Thy Word is a lantern unto my feet: and a light unto my path. Psalm 119:105

Thy testimonies are wonderful: therefore doth my soul keep them.
When thy word goeth forth: it giveth light and understanding unto the simple.
I opened my mouth and drew in my breath: for my delight was in they commandments.
O look thou upon me and be merciful unto me: as thou are wont to do unto those that love thy Name.

Order my steps in thy word: an so shall no wickedness have dominion over me. (Psalm 119:129-133 The Canadian Psalter, Plainsong Edition)

The readings today were 1 Kings 8:54-9:9 and I Cor. 16.

Watch ye, stand fast in the faith, quit you like men, be strong.
Let all your things be done with charity. (I Cor.16:13-4 KJV)

I found that by writing this yesterday that it helped me enter into a communal sense of prayer, because I knew that some of you reading this would be entering in with me into what God was revealing to me through His word. It also made me pay attention more to what I was doing, to take the time, to savor, to attune my ear and my eye more closely.
That’s one of the most beautiful parts of the writing life, that heightened sense of wonder and observation that you need to practice in order to write well, that ability to see, as Anne Lamott says in her book on writing Bird by Bird.

If we can truly taste and see that Lord is good, that is the reward of the Christian writing life. And it becomes a ministry when you can help others taste and see that the Lord is good.

I don’t know if anything will come of these writings, or whether they will remain in this form, but yesterday, these words seemed to be what God was calling me to do. And doing so released a logjam of unrealized creativity and motivation for the other things that have been languishing in uncertainty and procrastination. I could feel the flow of God’s grace in my life as my prayers drew to a close, where I communed in silence and the silence was rich and full and golden with Presence.

Now, I’m ready to start the day. I feel fine physically, praise God, stretched, prayed up, nourished physically and spiritually.

The collect for today is especially beautiful. It’s on page 233 of the Book of Common Prayer 1962 Canada edition.

Let thy merciful ears, O Lord, be open to the prayers of thy humble servants; and that they may obtain their petitions make them to ask such things as shall please thee; through Jesus Christ our Lord.


August 26, 2003 Evening

It’s evening. Cheryl’s too tired to go to the club. I’m at loose ends tonight, my spirits sagging a bit after an afternoon doing several hours on my second novel. I wonder whether this bit of depression or fatigue sets in from being alone so much. I also began to encounter a number of problems in the novel, a thicket of problems too big to hack through, so maybe I’m a little discouraged.

A thundershower just blew through. The sun is setting. The windows are open. I guess I’ll do evening prayer now and hope that I can find a sense of breakthrough. Moments ago, I tried to read Oswald Chamber’s devotional for today in My Utmost For His Highest and the words didn’t sink in at all. I don’t think I can even remember what I read. Yet other times, it’s amazing how directly and emphatically God speaks to me through those short little segments, one for every day of the year.

Hmmm. Rereading Oswald and came across this: If you are not right with God, you can never turn your mind anywhere but on yourself.

Then a little further down, it reads: Are you looking unto Jesus now, in the immediate matter that is pressing and receiving from Him peace? If so, He will be a gracious benediction in and through you. But if you try to worry it out, you obliterate Him and deserve all you get.

Whoa! Okay, so let’s see if I can get back in the place of looking to Jesus. Somewhere between this morning and the time working on my novel and preparing supper and changed plans for the evening, I lost my focus on Him.

As I was doing the Psalms tonight, Psalm 119:145 –176, it occurred to me that the reason why I had taken the computer out and was doing this was for self. Part of that focus on me and on wanting to feel better.

I paused for a few moments to ponder why I’m doing this and who I’m doing it for. I’d like to think that maybe somewhere out there someone else, one person, two, three, eventually more, might want to join me on this pilgrimage that includes writing and prayer. Neither of these disciplines are easy. In fact, so much of the time I find them hard and heavy slogging. I’d rather be out on a bar patio somewhere having intense conversations with a group of people about same sex marriage or some other hot potato topic than sitting solitary at my dining room table trying to make myself go through the Evening Prayer service.

But, like all disciplines, I know that the rewards come after submitting to them, not necessarily while I’m doing them.

I take it that when someone comes to mind while I’m in prayer that it might be a prompt from the Holy Spirit that I should lift that person to God and intercede. I used to spend far more time in intercession than I do now. When I was, I had a far deeper sense of the supernatural and a much more attuned ear to God’s still small voice.

I am thinking of my soon to be twenty-five year old younger son who came over the other day to pick up the ten gallon aquarium he’s had since he was a kid. He used to keep a green grass snake in it that he wrote a story about when he was in first grade and wrote phonetically. He called it his “snak�. He wanted it because he found a little mouse in his bathtub and he wants to keep it. His brown eyes were twinkling behind his glasses. I could see the little kid in him still, the one who had his “snak�, then, several years later, a green budgie he named Caesar Salad. Then I remember the kitten the boys named Garfield, but we ended up calling “the Goof� because he used to watch the bird hopping about in the birdcage suspended out of the cat’s reach. The “Goof�, who grew to be a lithe orange tabby, would crouch on a nearby rocking chair, his eyes locked on the bird until he’d fall asleep and crash to the floor.

I can get all prayed up, but what for? I’ve also often thought that when we don’t release the grace that’s been given us, if we don’t give it away and pass it along, it rots like the manna the Israelites tried to hoard, instead of waiting and trusting to be fed day by day.

The reading for the second lesson this evening is Luke 18:1-30.

It opens with: And he spake a parable unto them to this end, that men ought always to pray, and not to faint.

This chapter is so dense with parables and stories. Jesus first tells the parable of the unjust judge and the woman who troubles him to hear her case asking him to “avenge me of my adversary�. He talks about how the unjust judge listens to the woman because he wearies of her constant coming and says how much more God will avenge his own elect. It’s one of the parables that tells us to persist in prayer, to be “importunate�.

But then, this. Jesus asks, “Nevertheless, when the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth?�

Then there’s the parable about the Pharisee and the Publican, the disciples trying to turn away children and His telling them, “Suffer little children to come unto me, and forbid them not: for of such is the kingdom of God.�

Then the story of the Rich Young Ruler, who asks what must be done to inherit the Kingdom. Jesus tells him to give up his riches, and when he heard this he was very sorrowful, because he was very rich.

Who then can be saved, they ask, after Jesus tells them it’s easier for a camel to go through the eye of the needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.

“The things which are impossible with men are possible with God.�

Amazing. What this writing while I read is forcing me to do is to really read this passage and unpack it and meditate on what it means and what God is saying to me right now in it.

There’s a Christian discipline called Lectio Divina. Divine Reading in Latin. Perhaps this slowing down to write while I read is bringing me into an appreciation of Lectio Divina.

When the Son of man is looking to see if he shall find faith on this earth, I want to be able to say, yes, Lord, just as when I read passages elsewhere that ask, “Whom shall I send?� I answer, “Send me.�

But, I am both the Pharisee and the Publican. I sometimes take pride that I am more disciplined than many Christians when it comes to my prayer life, yet that very discipline often lays bare to me my spiritual poverty and how dependent on His mercy I am and makes me identify with the Publican. This is one of the things that so often gets glossed over in the Christian life. The suffering that goes with dying to self gets little mention in these days of the feel-good Gospel. The sinfulness and unworthiness of our selfish natures is considered too damaging to our precious “self-esteem.� Yet, our self-esteem should come from a realization that in Christ, we are made new, we have a new nature that is a gift. No, we don’t deserve it at all, but in faith, we can receive it.

It’s not easy to be the rich young ruler and have Jesus, whom you think you love, tell you there’s this thing you love more than Him. Then you have to decide, am I willing to give this up for God?

We’re told how wonderful it’s going to be to walk with God but they leave out the awful parts. So, people get started praying, the take up a discipline and what’s the first thing that happens? They feel worse, not better. Sometimes a whole lot worse. But, if they persist, if they’re willing to say, Okay, Lord, I still want to be faithful--take the riches, or whatever it is that I’m clutching onto--then they will discover a joy like no other. But, giving up those riches is wrenching. It helps to know that others know that sometimes it’s arid, and dry and difficult and unrewarding but that those are the times to stick with it, because you’ll never have your breakthrough if you don’t.

It just occurred to me that the Christian prayer life is like Buckley’s cough mixture. It tastes awful, but it works or whatever the slogan says. But it works, because it is God who works in us both to will and to do of His good pleasure. “For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure (Philippians 2:13)


August 27, 2003

Woke up again with a slight headache and sore muscles. Again that vague, gnawing sense of mournfulness, emptiness, spiritual darkness. Thankfully, I’m experienced enough in the rhythms of the prayerful life to know that this will pass, that sometimes this emptiness, sense of inadequacy, mournfulness, spiritual poverty are prerequisites to being filled. I think of the Beatitudes: Matthew 5:

2 And he opened his mouth, and taught them, saying,
3 Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
4 Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.
5 Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth.
6 Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.
7 Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy.
8 Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.
9 Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God.
10 Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
11 Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake. 12 Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you.

We think of blessed as happy, but doesn’t the root of the word blessed have something to do with wounding? In French the verb blesser means to wound.

It makes me recall the writings of some of the Christian mystics and the lover’s woundedness being separated from the Beloved. If we are faithful, we don’t try to fill ourselves with substitutes while we’re waiting. It’s also a proof that no matter how much we work at prayer, work our discipline, God is not at our beck and call, He is not, as Father Carl (the dean of the Cathedral I attend) likes to say, a great cosmic Bellhop. Nor is He some kind of Force we can turn on and off like a giant fire hydrant of blessing.

So, I console myself. Because He is faithful. But when He will come, that I do not know. Theologically I know that He is in me, and I am in Him, that in Him I live and move and have my being. But, there’s a disconnect today. My body feels firmly and recalcitrantly planted on earth, aching and sluggish like some overburdened, stubborn beast of burden.

As I went upstairs to brush my teeth, trying to find a better image for the beast of burden, I remembered the pony we used to have in Nova Scotia. He was a large painted pony, fourteen hands, the size of a small horse. His previous owner had used him to haul logs out of the woods, so he was strong and broad-chested, with splotches of brown and black on white. Beautiful to look at, like the kind of ponies the Indians rode in the movie Westerns. He came to us with the name “Speedy� that someone gave him with a great sense of irony. Speedy was only speedy when and if he chose to be and he was the most ornery, stubborn, calculating, lazy pony you would ever want to meet. Not mean, he didn’t bite or kick, but he definitely did things his way. The first time I got on him, he flicked me off , using the least amount of effort to dislodge me from his bare back. I never tried riding him after that. My first husband used to ride him, and Speedy would look for holes to step into to try to get him off. The only person with any success with Speedy was a persistent teenaged girl who wanted to ride him in the gymkhana games at the Digby County Exhibition one year. And she actually won a ribbon with him. She had flail her legs against him and yell “Hiyah’s� to get him to lumber down the track, round a barrel, then she had to dismount, get back on and flail Speedy back to the finish line. He won this barrel race because, while the other horses in their excitement danced and crab stepped and made it nearly impossible for their riders to get back on, as soon as Speedy’s rider stopped kicking his barrel-like sides, Speedy would lurch to a complete stop. She was able to get back on right away, and urge him to victory.

So, this morning, my will has to be like that teenaged girl, riding this “Speedy� body of mine, this fleshly self that wants to flick her off into the grass and stubbornly refuse to do anything but eat and relax and have fun.

Giddyap Speedy. It’s time for the VENITE (Psalm 95) That’s one of the wonderful things about Morning Prayer a la the Book of Common Prayer. You have a pattern of praise that you do whether you feel like it or not. Many evangelicals advise you to praise God when you don’t feel like it, and some might provide suggestions, but it’s a lot harder to wing praise when you don’t feel like it than to approach a pattern of praise and resolve to enter into it and mean it.

We start with:

O Lord, open thou our lips
And our mouth shall show forth they praise.
O God, make speed to save us.
O Lord, make haste to help us.

That is so theologically wonderful. God, please, open my lips so that I may praise you this morning. I need you to do this, because I can’t even genuinely praise You without Your help.

Then Psalm 95, the VENITE, EXULTEMUS DOMINO

It’s slightly different in the King James Version than it is in the Prayer Book. The prayer book version starts out:

O Come, let us sing unto the Lord: / let us heartily rejoice in the strength of our salvation.
Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving,/ and show ourselves glad in him with psalms.
For the Lord is a great God:/ and a great King above all gods.

Praise God, because He is giving me the grace to be thankful, the grace to worship and praise Him.

The Psalms for day 27 in the Psalter for today’s Morning Prayer are 120, 121, 122, 123, 124, 125.

I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills: O whence cometh my help?
My help cometh even from the Lord: who hath made heaven and earth.

The first lesson is 1 Kings 11:1-13, 26-end. Of course “Speedy� wants to read the part that’s been skipped, too, just to be ornery. Hmmm, it’s one of those unpolitically correct bits that might have been troublesome even in the early 1960’s when this edition of the Prayer Book came out.

The lesson concerns Solomon’s love of strange women and the way they turned his heart to their gods, angering God. It speaks to me about the judgement that might be upon Canada and on the West in general for its turning away to strange gods in such a wholesale fashion. Sobering stuff. But I don’t believe in the kind of easy quid pro quo judgements that some like Jerry Falwell are quoted as saying. Often the good suffer too. We suffer judgement corporately.

The second lesson is 1 Corinthians 1:1-22

Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort;
Who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God. (1 Cor. 1:3:4)

I remember how my dear friend Joanna comforted herself with these verses as she faced with such courage a rapidly growing brain tumor. And, though her tribulation was far worse than that of any of her friends, she was a wellspring of God’s comfort to the many people who would call or drop by to see her for a word, a smile, a touch. Thanks be to God, she survived two bouts of emergency brain surgery last fall and is steadily recovering her speech, her strength, her mobility, but it is a long haul.

But we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves but in God which raiseth the dead (1 Cor. 1:9)

For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, who was preached among you by us, even by me and Silvanus and Timotheus, was not yea and nay, but in him was yea.
For all the promises of God in him are yea, and in him Amen, unto the Glory of God by us. (1 Cor. 1:20-21)All God’s promises are Yes! And Amen! In Jesus. I will hold this verse with me today.

Now, I’m going to ride my bike to the club and go for a swim and sit in the hot tub to work out some of these aching muscles. I’ll also work out mentally some of the problems I’ve encountered in my novel. May I come back refreshed and full of ideas to make a dent in the huge amount of work ahead.

August 28, 2003 Morning

It’s 8:00 am, and I’m feeling a little rushed this morning. Some guys are coming to do the annual tune up of the furnace sometime between noon and three, and that means I must do some grocery shopping and drop off my receipts, the proverbial shoebox, to a gal I’ve asked to help me get my business finances in order.

I hope that sense of time limitation will not prevent me from entering into sacred time. In reading Henri Nouwen this morning while having my tea and rice cake with mayonnaise and fresh tomato from my friend June’s garden, I read in a segment entitled The Transforming Word, taken from pages 44-47 of Nouwen’s With Burning Hearts: A Meditation on the Eucharistic Life (Maryknoll, New York, Orbis Books, 1994).

Nouwen writes:

Words inform us. We need words in order to kinow what to do or how to do it. Where to go and how to get there.It is not surprising, then, that the words in the Eucharist are listened to mostly as words that inform us. They tell us a story, they instruct, they admonish. Since most of us have heard these words before, they seldom touch us deeply. Often we scarcely pay attention to them; they have become too familiar. We don’t expect to be surprised or touched…

The tragedy is that the words then looses its sacramental quality. The Word of God is sacramental. That means it is sacred, and as a sacred words it makes present what it indicates. When Jesus spoke to the two sad travelers on the road and explained to them the words of Scriptures that were about himself, their hearts began to burn, that is they experienced his presence. Speaking about himself he became present to them.

It’s wonderful when the Scriptures come alive and speak to us. When I slow down enough as I read the words of the lesson, hungry to hear and to see, then I have those moments where a word, a phrase becomes a “rhema� word, a living truth God is breathing into my heart.

Yesterday, I went to Evensong (though we said it, didn’t sing it) and Eucharist at my tiny little cathedral. I had trouble paying attention and entering into the sacred quality of the words. My mind wandered, I thought about the characters in my novel, and other distractions. I noticed the motor on the ceiling fan humming away and the creak of the wooden pews, the smell of the perfume one of the ladies wore.

Later that evening, I sat with my friend June who is my prayer and accountability partner. We prayed together, and God’s Presence was so palpable. Wherever two or three are gathered together in my Name, there am I in the midst of them, Jesus promised. He was present at the Eucharist yesterday but I was caught in my worldly fog and didn’t experience Him as fully as I wanted to.

Oswald Chambers this morning writes about prayer:

When a man is born from above, the life of the Son of God is born in him, and he can either starve that life or nourish it. Prayer is the way the life of God is nourished.

As I was trying to do the TE DEUM LAUDAMUS, and feeling that sense of being rushed because I had other things to do, the Holy Spirit spoke to me and, without words, gave me an impression that I had not asked God if what I had decided to do today was what He wanted me to do. I realized I am barging ahead with my plans and my timetable and expecting Him to fit into it, instead of asking Him what His timetable and His plans are for me today.

I sit here, finding it hard to proceed with the Morning Prayer pattern, reading it fast, feeling anxious in a Martha-like carefulness and anxiety about this world sort of way.

Is my prayer this morning only a means for me to obtain blessing from the Lord so I can go about my business? Or is it a way for me to go about His business? But the Martha in me argues that I have no food in the fridge, the workmen are coming, the receipts need to be dropped off. And the more I hem and haw about this, the longer it’s going to take before I can enter into the Lord’s peace.

The first lesson didn’t speak to me. It was 1 Kings 12:25-13:10.
Let’s see what the second lesson says. 2 Cor. 1:23-2:end.

As I pray in preparation for reading this, these scriptures are coming to me. Thou will keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on Thee. Perfect love casts out fear. Be anxious for nothing….

The second lesson didn’t speak specifically to me either.

So, I'll look up one of the verses that is coming to me while I listen in silence.

“Be careful of nothing; but in every thing by prayer and thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God.
And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.� Philippians 4: 6-7

I will not budge from this room until this anxiety passes. I will wrestle with God until He changes my name, even if it wounds me and the groceries to not get bought.

I’ve just spent more than twenty minutes in mostly silent prayer where I felt like I was going for a whir on the Potter’s wheel, where I was being prayed, like an instrument of the Holy Spirit, where mostly there were no words. Groanings, wrestling, staying my mind on Jesus, being present to the cool wind blowing in through the patio doors and the cooing of mourning doves and the soft metallic rattle our neurotic budgie creates as she climbs around her cage, which is always open, but she seldom leaves. Yes, I will give up my plans. What foolishness all this is to the world.

A train whistle calls out in the distance. Why He is calling me to wait here, I don’t know. Maybe He’s protecting me from being hit broadside as I drive through an intersection, rushing and distracted by all my wordly cares and errands. Maybe he wants me to spend more time with Isabel than to just hurry by with my shoebox.

I had planned to leave here a half an hour ago. Now it looks like shopping will be postponed until this afternoon, after the workmen have left. Maybe He has a divine appointment of some kind today and now I believe I am ready for it.

My desire is to do your will, O Lord. To always seek your face.

This from the second lesson this morning:

Now thanks be unto God, which always causeth us to triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest the savour of his knowledge by us in every place.
For we are unto God a sweet savour of Christ, in them that are saved, and in them that perish:
To the one we are the savour of death unto death; and to the other the savour of life unto life.

In Eugene Peterson’s The Message that same passage reads:

In the Messiah, in Christ, God leads us from place to place in one perpetual victory parade. Through us, he brings knowledge of Christ. Everywhere we go, people breathe in the exquisite fragrance. Because of Christ, we give off a sweet scent rising to God, which is recognized by those on the way of salvation—an aroma redolent with life. But those on the way to destruction treat us more like the stench of a rotting corpse. (The Message, Eugene Peterson, NavPress Publishing Group, 1993 p. 439)

Hmmm. I just tried to call Isabel and she isn’t home! Interesting. So, now I’ll send this off and write up a grocery list and menu for the next week, not because it’s in my nature to do that, but because the Flylady www.flylady.org advises it, and my husband appreciates it when I do it that way.

The joy of being in God’s will. The peace that passes understanding. I’m glad I hung around for it and insisted upon it. How everything we want to do our way conspires against our experiencing this joy and peace.

August 29, 2003

Every Friday morning, I go to the little cathedral where the dean, Father Carl, leads us in sung morning prayer. He puts little yellow stickies in the brown Canadian Psalters so we can easily find the VENITE, the TE LAUDAMUS, the Psalms for the Day. We usually have only a handful of people who attend during the week. Today we had a few extra because a Eucharist to commemorate the Beheading of St. John the Baptist followed the Mattins.

As we sang responsively, the sky grew darker and darker outside the little stucco cathedral so that the interior lights glowed warm and golden. Thunder rolled in the distance, soon followed by the gentle patter of rain on the roof.

It was one of those services where time slows down. The lesson was from Isaiah 40:1

Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God. 40:1

The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Isaiah 40:3

The Gospel lesson began at Luke 1:57

It’s about how Elizabeth said his name was John. What I recall vividly during the service is the image I had while Father Carl read bout John's father, Zacharias, who couldn’t speak, asking for a writing table, and writing, “His name is John.� As soon as he wrote it, “his tongue was loosened.�

The candles gleamed and flickered on the altar. Rain rattled down the drainspouts and poured in a stream past the window on the other side of the aisle. It pelted the cedar branches outside the window next to me . My bare knees felt the the nub of the rough, gray carpet remnants covering the wooden kneeler that swing under the pine pews when not in use.

When we said the Nicene Creed and the Lord’s Prayer together we said it in unison. This time, no straggling voices or rumble of myriad timings interfered with the music of speech crying out as one, as a congregation..

On Sundays, we sing the whole liturgy, including the Creed and the Lord’s Prayer. There’s enough incense to turn the air blue and the fragrance clings to your clothes when you leave. On weekdays we say the service, but the simplicity of a said Eucharist has its own grace and beauty.

I have often thought about how the Eucharist is the Last Supper taking place in sacred time. The bells ring, the priests walk in, and I am no longer just in Ottawa. I go to the altar rail and imagine that I’m there with Jesus and He is saying to me, “Take Eat, This is My body�…..

When the service was over, as is our custom, we gather for breakfast. Then it was my turn to clean the cathedral with my friend Mary’s husband, Alex. Mary’s already back teaching school, so he offered to give her a break.

He schlepped the big vacuum around to clean the red carpet in the church and washed the gray linoleum tiles of the parish all in the basement, while I dusted the pews, the picture frames, and other nooks and crannys and cleaned the bathrooms.

Now, I’m home, at my dining room table. I bought flowers at the supermarket yesterday when I finally did get out grocery shopping. Some lilies, some chrysanthemums, including a big white one that looks like a bursting star. It smells peppery and good.
The bouquet is pink and white except for one orange-yellow mini sunflower. I could sit here and contemplate their beauty, inhale their scents, touch the soft, cool petals.

Time to go and do some fiction writing.

August 30, 2003 Morning

The tree outside my bedroom window is already turning bronze. A chilly wind ruffles the leaves. Downstairs in my L-shaped living and dining area, the patio doors to the balcony are open, but I have a warm velour terry bathrobe that used to belong to my father, but was too hot for him. It’s got vertical stripes in green, blue and purple with black trim and it’s cozy and handsome-looking and the cool air doesn’t bother me. The sky is overcast, but bright, so mostly white, though not the white of languid summer heat.

The other day, the same squirrel that had peered into the diningroom window at me was sitting on the six foot high fence separating my patch of garden from next door. He scolded something, hunched over, his tail beating the air with each chuck chuck that he made. I was in the garden eating a green pepper and I tossed a little chunk at him. Instead of running away, he searched for a quick way to climb down the wooden fence and ran through its slats towards the piece of pepper, sniffed it, then moseyed up to me and stood on his hindquarters like a prairie dog, sniffing the breeze, little front paws in begging position. It alarmed me that this little thing would dare get so close. I could have kicked him.

I stamped my feet so he’d run away, but he didn’t. He scampered a couple of feet away, and wove among the flower pots, then edged closer to me again. I then realized that probably many of the birds and animals I see outside are not just generic squirrels or mourning doves or jays, but the same animals time after time. They live here too, in their little territory. They share this little plot of real estate. Maybe if I’m not careful, this little gray squirrel will not be a rat with a tail to me much longer but “Jack� or “Ted� with an anthropomorphic personality. I’m usually terrible at naming animals when I have them. Can think of great names when I don’t have a pet.

Last night, I didn’t do Evening Prayer, and, except for the cathedral cleaning I did not do any exercises or stretches and last night I paid for it in sore, tense muscles that created just enough discomfort to make sleep elusive. Instead of praying, last evening I drank a beer before a late dinner and watched a movie, Levity, with my husband. The movie was strange: a redemption story about an ex-con who wants to make up for the murder he committed as a teenager. He seeks out the older sister of the murdered boy who haunts him, though the haunting is kind, even angelic. Played by Billy Bob Thornton in one long, sorrowful note like notes that remain the same all the time on a bagpipe….can’t think of the term for that. Not dirge though he was dirge-like. Great performances by Kirsten Dunst , Holly Hunter and Morgan Freeoman. Slow, sometimes ponderous, some good, even surprising writing here and there and some original characterization for a couple of characters, the movie was otherwise too self-conscious. So, I give it mixed reviews. But it was at least trying to be something more than the usual Hollywood cliché so I’ve got to give it full marks for that.

This morning, as I dawdle and delay doing my morning prayer, I think about how difficult it is for me to maintain a routine of any sort, even when it’s proven that I get far more done, feel better after the fact, and many other benefits.

What I really want to do this morning is loll around and read the paper, but because you might possibly want to read my meditations and I choose to resist my carnal desires. And since that prayer session Thursday morning, I have felt like the Holy Spirit did an operation on my brainwaves. Any anxiety is gone, it’s been so much easier to enter into His courts. Time has slowed down. I can taste and see His goodness around me. So how can the dreary newspaper offer anything that in the least compares to being with Him? How can we think that the pleasures our old nature seeks can compete with worshipping our Lord? All I know is that often the old nature wins out. This morning, I choose to be with the Lord.

The sun streams into the room and I’ve closed the blinds on the diningroom window. It’s becoming warmer.

Oswald Chambers My Utmost For His Highest for August 30. If you want to read it, you can find it online through the www.ccel.org site. Click on the Classics by Author menu and find him among the C’s and today’s devotional will come up.

The scripture verse he uses is Luke 10:19:20

Here they are:

Behold, I give you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy: and nothing shall by any means hurt you.
Notwithstanding in this rejoice not, that the spirits are subject unto you; but rather rejoice because your names are written in heaven.

Oswald writes:

Keep your relationship right with Him, then whatever circumstances you are in, and whoever you meet day by day, He is pouring rivers of living water through you, and it is of His mercy that He does not let you know it.

The point he makes overall in the devotional is that we should not rejoice in how God uses us or in our service to Him. We should concentrate only on our right relationship to Him.

It is the work that God does through us that cdounts, not what we do for Him.

I sing the VENITE softly this morning because the windows are open and the neighbors are close by with open windows too.

The Psalms are 144, 145, 146.

The words in the Psalter are slightly different, but this is the way I best remember it:

The Lord is nigh unto all them that call upon him, to all that call upon him in truth. (Psalm 145:18)

I love that promise. God is faithful. But sometimes we have to persist and persist to experience His presence. Everything in the world, everything in our old natures will try to rob us of that.

The first reading is 2 Chronicles 13.

The message of this reading to me is that no matter how surrounded by enemies or dire circumstances, if you call upon the Lord with your whole heart, He will deliver you and you will overcome them. For me, the enemies most often are internal, my desires to do my own thing, my spiritual sloth, my worship of the idols of self-realization, trying to ambush the life of the Son of God in me.

The second lesson is 2 Corinthians 4

This is a beautiful chapter that goes so beautifully with the first lesson.

We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair;
Persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed;
Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body. (2 Cor. 4:8-10 KJV)

In our Christian churches today there is not enough talk about “Bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus�. It’s either about what a Friend God is, what a warm fuzzy in the sky, a Benevolent Uncle He is. Or, in some circles, it’s about health, wealth and supernatural blessings. I seek the God Paul worshipped and obeyed even after all those imprisonments and floggings and persecutions. A God who makes that suffering seem insignificant in comparison to His glory. A God worth dying for. A God I could praise even if my enemy sought my head on a platter. I seek His face, though I am easily daunted, discouraged by penny ante enemies like discomfort and….I hate to confess this….but comfort and ease as well.

I’m going to read last night’s Gospel reading from the Evening Prayer that I missed. It is Matthew 14: 1-12

It is about the beheading of John the Baptist because he told Herod it was unlawful for him to take Herodias, his brother Philip’s wife, as his wife.

In the BENEDICTUS, Zachariah says of his son John:

And thou, child, shall be called the Prophet of the Highest: for thou shalt go before the face of the Lord to prepare his ways; to give knowledge of salvation unto his people….

What a calling. When we say, take my life Lord, do we mean it? What if our enemies wanted our head on a platter? Would we say….okay, Lord, no thanks. Take that cup away. Instead, I want to serve you the easy way. This is how I choose to serve you.

Sometimes, we face terminal illness or some other tragedy we can’t avoid and all we have left is whether we choose to say, “Thy will be done� in the face of the inescapable. But those who do say that…..have perfect peace. I’ve witnessed it many times in the lives of dear friends who’ve faced death through cancer or who've suffered bereavement.

I want to be a Christian serving the easy way. But I know that God wants me to be the kind of Christian talked about in Revelation 12:10-12.

And I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, Now is come salvation, and strength and the kingdom of our God, and the power of his Christ: for the accuser of our brethren is cast down, which accused them before our God day and night.
And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; that they loved not their lives unto the death.

What’s beautiful about the way today’s lessons all tie together, even with dear Oswald Chambers is in this: I don’t have to worry about how I’m going to serve the Lord, or how He’s going to make use of me. The battle is His. The victory is His. All I have to do is faithfully make sure that I am abiding in Him, day by day, moment by moment, trusting that He will strengthen me and uphold me.

I wonder what John’s expression was on that platter. Was it like Stephen’s when he saw heaven open up before him?

My prayer for you today is that you will be strengthened in the inner man, that you will choose to abide in Christ and to do His will, and experience all the love, joy, peace and other fruits of the Spirit that are your birthright as a child of God.

September 1, 2003

It’s well after 10 am on Labor Day morning and it seems the whole neighborhood is still asleep or at the cottage. Hardly a car drives by. I hear a phone ringing in someone’s condo. I hear someone clearing her throat next door and I just caught a glimpse of a diapered toddler behind the patio doors of the unit next door.

I sit in my little backyard, the laptop positioned on a cracked, white plastic chair. I’m sitting opposite in another. The sky is blue, the sun has already burned off most of the dew on the cropped lawn, the air is sweet and fragrant with green and little gnats zig zag around my face, but they don’t land or bite so I can ignore them. A gentle breeze ruffles the crowns of the trees.

I hear sounds that the neighborhood is waking up. The scrape of a sliding screen door. Muffled conversation. The distant sound of a radio or television. A tall, thick blue spruce shades me from the sun. I sit under a smaller, more spindly spruce in my garden. The stalks that once held orange lilies are dry prongs and the green leaves are starting to die back. Some of the green and white ground cover are edged with brown. Decay setting in. A sign of autumn.

What is it Lord, that You wish to speak into my heart this morning? What is it that you would have me see and hear? A newborn baby mewls and fusses next door and I can hear our neurotic budgie chirping brightly from her open cage upstairs.

Now to morning prayer.

Oswald Chambers writes this morning about how God doesn’t call us to anything except holiness.

Never tolerate through sympathy with yourself or with others any practice that is not in keeping with a holy God. Holiness means unsullied walking with the feet, unsullied talking with the tongue, unsullied thinking with the mind—every detail of the life under the scrutiny of God.

I had underlined the above paragraph before, but another verse, higher up in the Sept. 1 devotional is leaping out at me. It says:

The preaching of the gospel awakens an intense resentment because it must reveal that I am unholy; but it also awakens an intense craving. God has one destined end for mankind: viz. holiness.

The Psalms for Day One are Psalms 1-5.

Stand in awe and sin not: commune with your heart, and in your chamber and be still.
Offer the sacrifice of righteousness; and put your trust in the Lord. (Psalm 4:4-5)

The sliding doors to the balcony on the other side of my house opened and a little blonde boy about eight stands on it snapping his fingers and slapping his thighs and marching to the beat he’s created. He doesn’t notice me sitting below him, the lilac branches hide me from view. His father said something to him in Polish before he came outside. He’s gone back inside.

If I construct my blog or website eventually, I would like to have links so that those who do not have a prayer book, but wish to follow along in the pattern with me can do so.

Yesterday, at the little cathedral, Jim, one of the ordinands, gave a powerful sermon about how the truth in the Bible, whether it’s the miracles concerning the Jews and their deliverance from Egypt, or the accounts in the gospels, is objective, historical fact. Eye-witness accounts of events that could be seen, heard, touched. Experience through all the five senses and these eyewitness accounts of the miracles were carefully passed down from one generation to the next. He stressed that we’re not reading about someone’s subjective mystical experience when we read scripture.

For we do not follow cleverly devised fables…..

In Morning and Evening Prayer, we are to say the Apostle’s Creed. During Eucharist we say the Nicene Creed. What I love about my little cathedral is that the priests mean what they’re reciting. And I too, choose to believe these creeds, even on the days where my understanding falters, or I fall into confusion or doubt. As an act of will, I choose to believe that Jesus Christ rose again from the dead and sits on the right hand of God. I chose to bring all thoughts in subjection to the truths in these creeds. Credo ut intelligam. As St. Anselm said, “I believe in order to understand.� Once upon a time, I sought understanding first in order to pick and choose what I believe.

I believe in one God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, And of all things visible and invisible; And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, Begotten of the Father before all worlds; God of God; Light, of Light; Very God, of very God; Begotten not made; Being of one substance with the Father; Through whom all things were made: Who for us men and for our salvation came down from heaven, And was incarnate by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary, And was made man, And was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate. He suffered and was buried, And the third day he rose again according to the Scriptures, And ascended into heaven, And sitteth on the right hand of the Father. And he shall come again with Glory to judge both the quick and the dead: Whose kingdom shall have no end.
And I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Lor5d, The Giver of Life, Who proceedth from the Father and the Son, Who with the Father and the Son together is worshipped and glorified, Who spake by the Prophets. And I believe one Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church. I acknowledge one Baptism for the remission of sins. And I look for the Resurrection of the dead, and the Life of the world to come. Amen. (the Nicene Creed from the The Book of Common Prayer 1962 Canada)

The first lesson this morning is 11 Chronicles 15.
The second lesson is 2 Corinthians 5.

The Lord is with you, while ye be with him; and if ye seek him, he will also be found of you; but if ye forsake him, he will forsake you. (II Chronicles 15:2 KJV)

Be ye strong therefore, and let not your hands be weak: for your work shall be rewarded
And when Asa heard these words….he took courage, and put away the abominable idols out of all the land….. (II Chronicles 15:7)

Interesting how the readings go with Oswald’s message about holiness today. How holiness has to do with seeking a holy God and putting away the idols. Casting down the high places in our hearts has been one of the themes that some of my friends and I are encountering in our walk these days.

What little ambitions, what little corners of our lives to we set apart for ourselves, what areas to we refuse to put under Christ’s control?

The second lesson begins with this:

For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.
For in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is from heaven:
If so be that being clothed we shall not be found naked.
For we that are in this tabernacle do groan, being burdened: not for that we would be unclothed, but clothed upon, that mortality might be swallowed up of life. (II Cor. 5:1-4)

What a wonderful resonance between the first lesson and the second lesson. I encourage you to read both of them slowly and to ruminate on them slowly.

In the first lesson again:

And they entered into a covenant to seek the Lord God of their fathers with all their heart and with all their soul; that whosoever would not seek the Lord God of Israel should be put to death, whether small or great, whether man or woman. (II Chronicles 15:12)


Would you be willing to enter into a covenant with me to seek the Lord God of our fathers with all your heart and soul? Would you be willing to put to death anything in yourself that rebels against this? Are you ready to voluntarily say, “I choose to be holy, set apart, to serve you, Lord God, to be what you call me to be.�

What’s so consoling and beautiful about the juxtaposition of these two lessons is that it’s so clear that holiness is not something we can give ourselves, or attain through our actions. It’s a gift to us that we choose to receive, to appropriate, to work out in our lives.

Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature; old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new,
And all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation.
Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us; we pray in Christ’s stead, be ye reconciled to God.� (11 Cor. 5:17-20)

What I’ve come to understand in my Christian journey is that it’s what we believe that counts far more than what we do. The reason is this: what we believe will have a profound effect on everything we do. Our Christian faith cannot be like a band-aid over worry, and a blanket assent to the beliefs and fables of the world that really govern how we live and act. If we really believe the Christian creeds and have a relationship with the Holy God they point to, then, yes, we will order, plan and govern our lives differently.

Yet, Oswald warns us of the resentment the gospels engender because they reveal that I am unholy. It awakes that resentment in others. How dare we assert that there is objective truth, a God who revealed Himself in time and in history, who is both absolute and transcendent and imminent and particular to have chosen one womb to enter into this world at a specific moment in time, in a singular place on this earth? The Word became flesh and dwelt among us. But Oswald also reminds us that with that resentment comes a craving. A craving to become what God created us to become: holy. Are we willing to be God’s love letters? Are we willing to let Christ make His appeal through us? Are we willing to believe and abide to closely that our holiness engenders not only that resentment but that craving. When our words match the fragrance of our lives, then others will want what we have. They may hate us for it at first. They may think that whatever it is that is special about us is part of our personality and try to get it to rub off on them, side-stepping their own relationship to Christ.

A yellow jacket landed on my shoulder and I brushed him off. I feel the hairs on my scalp raise. I beat him away. As the church lady on Saturday night would say, “Could it be……..satan?� Heh heh heh. A fly has landed on the back of the white plastic chair holding my books. He rubs his little front legs legs together like a greedy conspirator anticipating his plot coming to fruition.

The fly is striped black and white with a pink head and transparent wings. He now rests on the green edge of my King James Bible. A black squirrel darts under the big blue spruce and the mother of the little boy who was snapping and slapping a beat from his balcony, hangs laundry on a clothesline. Their big black German Shephard with a Polish name wanders about in her yard. The air smells like roses. A white butterfly flutters up towards the lilac leaves.

The neighborhood is awake. Children play on the other side of the ravine, their voices muted by the evergreens and the rustling of the willows.