A New Day Dawns

A new day dawns. The kingdom of God rushes in; sumbeams penetrating the darkness, dispelling the frigid night air. A frozen planet begings to thaw.

A new day dawns. Light cascades through atmospheric dust to reach a silent, suffering planet. Liquid gold laps upon her shores with redemptive fingers - wooing her, calling her out of dark dwelling places.

A new day dawns. Artemis bows her head to say good-bye. Her silvery locks kiss the golden hem of the dayspring of whom she has been a reflection of glory. The coronation trumpets sound. A new day dawns.

A new day dawns -to a people dwelling in darkness where optical possibilities lie only in black and white. The dawn brings with it a burst of vivid, brilliant color and eyes which have never seen must learn to see again, this time within the frequencies of the broad color spectrum.

A new day dawns. Light has come, and it dances into every dark corner, sending out the invitation to come and join the dance.

November 7th

In Diary of an Old Soul, George MacDonald writes:

Wilt Thou not one day, Lord? In all my wrong,
self-love and weakness, laziness and fear,
This one thing I can say; I am content
To be and have what in Thy heart I am meant
To be and have. In my best times I long
After Thy will, and think it glorious-dear;
Even in my worst, perforce my will to Thine is bent.

Cool

Do I really care about my homeless friends, really love them, or is it just cool in Christianity today to be into social action?

Am I really bothered by poverty and injustice in the world, or it just cool in Christianity today to be concerned with these things?

Do I really love my neighbors or is it just cool in Christianity today to say I've done some good things for them?

Do I really want to follow Jesus or is it just cool in Christianity today (and in the political realm for that matter) to use His name to endorse my agendas?

Do I really love my enemies or is it just cool in Christianity today to tolerate them?

Am I striving after cool and trendy things in Christianity today or am I submitting my life to Jesus as my Lord?

Realizations

I've realized that very often-

I don't pray...
-instead, I plan
(and give God viable options to choose from!)

Since when did the Almighty need anything viable to create??

I am a worm

Sometimes my faith seems to have all but evaporated. Left to the harsh reality of the scorching sun, it is drawn molecule by molecule into the arid atmosphere.

I am sure this anti-gravitational phenomenon takes huge effort on someone's part, but I find myself rather sitting there-playing victim to a process I do not recognize unitl it is almost too late.

I am the earthworm coaxed from her subterranean abode by the cool dewy morning, only to find herself stuck to the concrete. My faith drying up moment by moment until all that is left is a crusty shadow of its existence.

Oh bring on the rain, to bring hydration to my body so I may crawl just inches to the salvation of the moist, dark soil!

What am I?

Supposedly here is my theological position (after 50 fill in the blank questions)!

You scored as Emergent/Postmodern.

You are Emergent/Postmodern in your theology. You feel alienated from older forms of church, you don't think they connect to modern culture very well. No one knows the whole truth about God, and we have much to learn from each other, and so learning takes place in dialogue. Evangelism should take place in relationships rather than through crusades and altar-calls. People are interested in spirituality and want to ask questions, so the church should help them to do this.

Emergent/Postmodern

89%
Evangelical Holiness/Wesleyan
82%
Charismatic/Pentecostal
68%
Neo orthodox
61%
Classical Liberal
43%
Roman Catholic
36%
Modern Liberal
36%
Fundamentalist
32%
Reformed Evangelical
21%

Old habits never die

I once read an article about the fact that when God takes you through hard, dark times, they can be messy and unnerving. The author likened it to always having your cupboard doors open and being unable to close them. All the "stuff" in the cabinets is exposed for anyone to see and the inability to close the doors (ie figure the situation out, come up with a plan of action, find a formula to fit)is simply exasperating.

As I go to bed tonight (just a few hours after my previous post) I realize that living this life of "melted glass" allows me even to leave my house a mess. There is a pot of spaghetti sauce on the counter that should have been cleaned hours ago. My George Forman grill is on the other counter in the kitchen - with caked on chicken pieces - and who knows when it will be cleaned. There are sheets on the couch, wet clothes in the dryer, cups on the ottoman and an empty otter pop wrapper in the living room. Plus my ironing board is in the hallway (as I made half of an attempt to iron today, but only did one shirt!)

All these are huge breakthroughs (or should I say "melt aways") for me - as I've like to have control over my environments (or at least my house) for the past couple of years. But the one residual neurosis? Even though my whole living room is a mess, tonight as I turned off the lights...
... I made sure I closed the cupboard doors on the armoire!!

Glass melts

Recently read out of Leaving the Saints by Martha Beck:

"I never had any trouble understanding why Virginia Woolf killed herself. I'd read biographies describing how the writer was molested by a cousin during childhood and developed a classic case of posttraumatic stress disorder, which seems to have left her half sentient, never fully engaged with the events around her. She could see beauty but not feel connected to it, yearn for love but not participate in it. She experienced things flattened, diminished, once removed. She was anesthetized to physical suffering (she seems to have drowned herself without flinching) but also to happiness. Psychologists call it psychic numbing or in Virginia Wolfe's words "living behind a pane of glass"."

This passage strikes me not because I have ever been a victim of molestation (or rape or any other haneous crime) but because through circumstances - some controlable and others not - I, too, feel like I've lived behind a pane of glass.

I'm sure it started with thyroid disorders, and then was catapulted by my dad's death. Add a dose of post partum depression, a church falling apart, feeling lied to, and feeling like a single mom through it all and my reaction was to move behind the pane of glass where I wouldn't have to fully engage with the events that surrounded me. (I don't think I consiously chose this, but felt so hurt, so empty and dark that it seemed safer then life out in the open.) (And it was...for a while.)

What amazes me is that, even there, behind the "safety" of this barricade, God found a way to get in! I don't know how and I don't know when, for the darkness and numbness seemed to last for so long. At times I felt as though I was going crazy or losing my faith - a swirling madness of a carnival ride where lights flash on periodically only to reveal the next gut wrenching turn or dip.

But, then, one morning I awoke and was able to breathe. (I mean really breathe - for the first time in a long time.) It was as though my lungs got their first gulp of fresh coastal air after years of breathing the suffocating air of smokey, dark rooms. I see colors so much more intensely, intricacies of patterns in nature so delicate and beautiful. The idea that as humans we get to touch one another and thus deliver love through our fingertips or lips or arms has begun to be a stunning thought. The ability to feel textures and to smell is amazing. But the most incredible thing of all is that I want (I really want) to laugh and smile (and think that there are things to laugh and smile about).

See, I agree with Martha Beck's assessment - "I am endlessly grateful for the fact that I was lucky enough to learn something Virginia Woplf never realized: glass can melt." It makes me think of the phrase, "Our God is a consuming fire" and how I've always seen that as terrible or punishing. Perhaps I will see it that way again, but for right now it gives me great comfort that He is able to burn away any barrier I erect in the name of "safety".

Silence in the Desert

Maybe the true test of faith is in the times when the silence of God is deafening. You've once heard His voice...but now...nothing. And that nothing is the biggest something in your life. The silence follows you wherever you go, it goes ahead of you and you find it waiting when you arrive. It mocks you, scorns you and everyday makes you question your sanity. In silence, the very air you breathe is thin. Everything is thin. You feel stretched tight across the circumstance, only millimeters thick - expecting to rip apart at any moment.

The silence of God.... Abram heard it. For years it taunted him as he watched his virility slip away. And Abram learned that God is in no rush to fulfill His promises.

But perhaps, just perhaps, these silent times are where real faith is built. Perhaps it is in this desert where our leaves dry up and are carried off by harsh winds. Perhaps even our branches become brittle and snap off. Perhaps, in this dry land, our roots must search for new sources of water. Perhaps they, with every reserve of energy, reach - extending out, grasping, desperately clawing for a source of relief.

Perhaps there becomes no more fuel for the large root system and so, tiny fragile tendrils are grown to seek out Life. Perhaps it is in these miniscule extenders and their to-the-death search for water that underground something miraculous takes place. These delicate babies work their way through dry desert clay that even shovels cannot break and they find sources of water.

In the process, they have expanded the root system and made it possible for the dead old tree to not only live, but to now grow larger than before. The drip line of the tree has been extended.

Maybe the silence of God produces a different kind of faith. Or perhaps real faith isn't about a few solid, close to the surface, big roots, but rather in little shoots who claw after nourishment that is far below the surface and far beyond the borders of what has been. Maybe it develops an intricate faith web that is far more fundamental than we realize.

The Daily Offices

I have been trying to follow the "discipline" of the daily offices lately. I really enjoy the idea of stopping periodically to arrest the compulsiveness of the day and to challenge the idea that my working is somehow what keeps the universe from falling apart (whatever sort of work I happen to be doing at that moment). (How do I fall into such self-centeredness?) It leads me back to, as Phyllis Tickle says, remembering that the "Watchmaker and I have a conversation about the clock and my place as a nano-second in it".

But I do long for a group, a community of like minded ones, who would actually like to engage in the act of midday prayer together. One in which we all choose to stop what we are doing, go against the flow of our fast-paced, me-centered world and have a conversation with the Watchmaker. Is that possible in our society? How much energy and discipline would it take from all members of the community? (for even though I dream about it, I know that my part is far from effortless).

Perigrinatio

I love this word (although I spelled it wrong because the real spelling was already taken). Here is an explanation I came across:

Green martyrs' refers to Celtic missionaries - the wandering peregrini - who set out from home never expecting to return. There was no "term of service", no furloughs - they went forth as they were led and were eventually buried in some foreign field at the end of their lifelong peregrinatio: their pilgrimage for and with God.

I want to be a "green martyr". I want to set out from my home never expecting to return. I want my life to be a pilgrimage for and with God.