The Earth is the Lord's

 

Last day of June. Jamie and Chrisie’s anniversary, (Happy Anniversary to a lovely couple), as well as the day before I start trying to live Plastic-Free July. I scooted through the grocery store this morning, just needing dinner for tonight, and found that in potatoes, I could only buy baking or sweet that were loose, and veg was limited to a few choices such as broccoli, squash and aubergines. No soft fruit.

It’s going to be a long month. But I will proactively seek out greengrocers, a thing of the past for Banchory, or other supermarkets that might be more environmentally aware. Meat, when we have it, from the butcher’s into my own box (probably plastic, I admit); fish from the wonderful fish shop. Where will I buy milk and yogurt?

I’ve already changed to plastic-free deodorant, shampoo and conditioner bars, silicone lids for storage, but the biggest space is taken, in my recycling bin, by plastic fruit and veg containers.

I want to clean up my act so I am not actively bequeathing to my children and grandchildren a depleted world where bio-diversity has completely diminished, floods and wildfires are common and the poor are paying for my wasteful lifestyle.

The earth is the Lord’s and everything in it.

Visit https://www.tearfund.org/campaigns/rubbish-campaign/rubbish-bin-go if you want to join in their Plastic-Free July campaign. Our individual efforts may seem like small potatoes, but as a supermarket awash with plastic says on its tag line: every little bit helps.

Flickering or Blazing

 

Don’t sit with your legs crossed, I was reminded by a cousin-in-law recently. It’s bad for your circulation.

Sitting in the prayer window this morning, those words came to mind as I prepared to spend a few minutes continuing to practice meditating on ‘Be still and know that I am God’. As I uncrossed my legs, it struck me that my posture with legs uncrossed was more open and receptive to God. I am someone who naturally worships with my body – not too wildly, as I am an introvert, but quietly raising my arms in worship, clapping, dancing as inconspicuously as possible! So, for me, body posture is important.

With the talk of Elton John having performed, possibly, his final public concert at Glastonbury this week, I’ve had ‘Candle in the Wind’ in my head. I often pray that the light of Jesus will shine through me today, and this morning I asked that that light would not be as fickle and frail as a candle in the wind, but rather the blazing flare beaming from a lighthouse.

To bear such a flare consistently, I need to be consistently open to receiving the love, the grace, the mercy and the power which the Spirit brings to those who ask. I ask that in all I do today, the powerful light of Jesus will shine into every situation of grey murk and darkness, into every wavering and breaking heart, into every frightened and unstable mind, and that Jesus’ light will enlighten, comfort and console all those I encounter. Shine, Jesus, shine!

Everyone who asks, receives, pressed down and flowing over. Thank you, Lord.

Arc in the making

 

Various issues have arisen over my Mom’s care, all made more challenging because of the distance between us and the fact I am ‘abroad’. I love having Mom still here, still able to converse and laugh, remember things from the past, tell me she loves me. What a blessing.

Sometimes, though, I flag. I feel alone, and it’s almost too much. Elijah moment.

I took a walk last night, trying to follow the trails we have walked round here for years, but which I’ve not tramped for awhile. Thought I’d go down the path to the ‘fort’, but discovered it has overgrown with tall grasses and weeds and is totally obscured. A game keeper used to drive his jeep down there regularly, and others perhaps walked it besides us. No longer is there a ‘gamey’; the trees either side of the path all broke and fell during Storm Arwen, and have been logged and removed. It’s nothing like the way it used to be.

So I carried on, deciding to go through the Forest of Endor instead. Across the raised ground, then I encountered the deep gouges left by the logging machines a year or two ago. They are so deep, and filled, after yesterday’s rains, with such rank-looking water. I managed to skirt them but after a few more steps this former well-loved walk petered out, lost in the long grass. With ticks a problem in this area, even in wellies I’m reluctant to dive into the long grass.

I turned back, continuing along the semicircular route we have often taken, but two huge trees have fallen and blocked the path totally. When we tried to get round them a few months ago, my foot went into a hole and I twisted my ankle.

Again I turned back, and as I re-emerged onto the paved road, I saw the broken rainbow over Aberdeen. It was vibrant, glorious, but only half an arc.

In every teardrop, a rainbow, God once said to me as I dealt with difficult things. May I rejoice today in the glory of even half a rainbow. May I view it as an arc in the making rather than an arc broken.

 

If only ...

 

Oscar, mouth stretched open round a ball, eyed us hopefully as we approached. We stopped to chat with his walker, Sandy. For ten minutes, Oscar, on a pretty short lead, pushed the ball towards us, dropped it in front of us, wagging his tail constantly, eyeing us hopefully with a doggie smile on his face.

Sandy kept him on the lead. The fields were filled with crops, so there was no open space to throw a ball. Oscar remained cheerful, ever hopeful, as Sandy chatted on. We separated and he resumed a sedate pace, tail still wagging, ball still clutched in his mouth.

I was reading of the woman who bled for twelve years. She slipped in close to Jesus in order to touch the tassel of his cloak, hoping to claim the promise for healing. Instantly, she was healed and restored to fellowship in her community. The story says that for over a decade, she had approached many doctors, hoping for healing, but had never been healed until she reached out to Jesus in faith, trusting for his healing.

May I be persistent in my prayers today, Lord, never doubting your power to heal, never questioning your love for me and others for whom I pray, always looking for, expecting to see, your divine touch – whether in ways I request, or in better ways you have chosen.

(I do hope that Sandy found a place to throw that ball for Oscar.)

 

Cornucopia of Colours

 

A cornucopia of colours, pastels and vibrants, cluster round the front door. All the colours cradled in a nest of greens of all shades. Ah, summer.

A warm breeze ruffles the trees and flowers, and we prepare to go to friends for lunch.

We have guests from Nevada, who are loving the lush greens and even remarking on how clean Scotland is compared to their area of Nevada, where rubbish lines the highways and byways and there is no recycling and an endless supply of free, flimsy plastic bags at every supermarket.

Sometimes seeing what is familiar through different eyes is so encouraging.

The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it. On a day like today, how could anyone think anything else?

Sweet Fruit

 

Nearly 9 pm and it’s still 70F outside. The air is still; the sun is thinking about sinking below the western horizon, so the shadows stretch out. Although summer is busy with all the gardening and outdoor jobs, there is something so relaxing about just being warm.

Most of the year I wear multiple layers and still shiver. Not only do I hail from the warm climate of southern California, but now I’m on medication which thins my blood and I think – or is that an old wives’ tale? – thicker blood keeps you warm.

I am disappointed that the cooking apple tree, and the plum tree, are both bearing little fruit this year. Was there a late frost that killed the blossom? I don’t remember one. Did I feed them the wrong kind of food? The leaves look luxurious so maybe I did.

If I am going to bear spiritual fruit, I need the right kind of food. I need enough of it consistently, and I need the warmth of friendship for it to blossom. Then I need to be out there mixing in the world, offering fruit to those who are spiritually starving. Or do I/

A tree doesn’t rush around with an over-full To-Do list. People know where to go when they are hungry. May I be content to rest in God, trusting him to grow and sweeten fruit that will satisfy.

Be still and know that I am God.

 

I AM

 

I was drawn to look at the variety of trees and bushes outside the window this morning, lining and clustered round this part of the drive. Each one has a different shape and shade of leaf; each one bears a unique fruit or flower or seed; the gentle breeze ruffles each one just the same, nudging and swaying through the foliage, lifting and dropping the twigs and branches.

It is mind-blowing that every individual person in this world, from the beginning of human history, is unique. Each has her own appearance and characteristics; each bears a different flower or fruit or seed; each has a unique calling on her life. And yet the same gentle wind of the Spirit ruffles through each of us, nudging us forward, holding us back, beckoning us into new ways.

Be still and know that I am God. I Am. He is consistent, reliable, never-changing. The God of Abraham is the God of Justin Welby. The God of Paul is the God of Michele. He hasn’t changed, and he won’t change. The wind of his Spirit which fired up the disciples on Pentecost, is the same wind of the same Spirit who fires me up today.

We are all so different and unique, and yet we are all united by our creator, Father God.

Absorbing the shocks

 

Silence is hard to find.

With Mhairi needing silence to record a book yesterday, we were painfully aware of every noise. It seemed everything conspired to disturb the silence. The farmer decided to spray slurry on his field surrounding our house. A helicopter went over. Then a plane, which seemed to groan on for so long I thought it might even be thunder.

When a herd of cows started approaching along the road, I just couldn’t believe it. Thankfully, they were put into the field away from us.

Despite the cacophony of our neighbourhood, yesterday’s session went well.

Be still and know that I am God. Never have I relied on that verse more heavily perhaps.

This morning, continuing to consider it, I had a picture of what I at first thought to be a spring. But no, it wasn’t so flexible and flimsy. It was strong steel, robust, yet able to receive knocks without breaking. A shock absorber.

God is our shock absorber. When we turn to him, he is more than able to receive whatever it is, and to cushion us from cataclysmic collapse.

Be still and know that I am God. Our loving Father, able to receive whatever we bring to him, with love and understanding.

In the Hurly Burly

 

Be still and know that I am God.

It is one thing to sit in the peace of my prayer window, withdrawn from the hurly-burly, and contemplate this verse. I had a rich week contemplating it, and feel I will be bathing in it for the rest of my life, still soaking in the wordless richness of it.

But, it really came into its own over the weekend, when serious technology issues arose to challenge all serenity and send me begging for God’s intervention. Immediately, this verse was in my head. Be still and know that I am God.

What a calming comfort to cling to when the boat starts to rock. Not as a child clutches a favourite teddy bear or blanket, but as an adult who recognises the truth of this verse.

Nothing surprises the great I Am. He looks with love and benevolence at us, his creation. He sees our struggles and is in them with us. However mundane or trivial they might be in the grand scheme of things, he understands that at this moment in time, to us, they are major.

Technology issues may or may not be fixed: we’ll know by Wednesday if our internet was stable enough for Mhairi to rely on. Her Plan B rests on the kindness and willingness of a sister and brother in Christ. The family of God at its best.

Whatever the outcome, even as things are in flux, I aim to be still and know that He is God.

How blessed we are.

A clear mountain lake: Be still and know that I am God

 

A clear mountain lake nestles beneath majestic mountains, and my eye is drawn to the space between, where the water is channelled into a stream or waterfall and disappears into apparent infinity. It’s just a picture on my laptop, but it draws me towards God.

Be still and know that I am God. I am God.

Those final three words seem to cohere this morning, resisting being divided at all. What do I learn from this phrase? Where does it take me?

I see the gracious humility of the Almighty God himself, who doesn’t require me to fall down and worship, or get up and serve, but rather to be still and receive. To roll back the ceiling I’ve constructed between my own thoughts and God, and allow myself to be immersed and saturated in knowing that He is God.

What else is there to know?

Yesterday I said, what a relief! Again, yes, a relief to know that I am not God, nor am I expected to come up with all the right answers. That releases me into freedom, which brings with it joy and fullness of life. I can sing like that bird I’m hearing, sing in the shadow of His wings, knowing that He is God,  and I can fully trust in Him. He has no beginning; he has no end; he always is God. Outside of time.

It invites me, draws me, to consider again his attributes, his character, and try to understand something of the depth of his love for me, and for all creation.

And so, in wonder, awe and praise, I want to continue in the stillness He invites me to, throughout this busy Saturday, rejoicing as a child does in the pure delight of the knowledge that He is God, and that He has the whole world, from its vastness to its minuteness, from its beauty to its cruelty, in His love-scarred hands.

Be still and know that I am God.

What a relief!

 

Be still and know that I am God.

Be still and know that…

My stillness this morning was an inner stillness as I walked. Maybe touching on the stillness one is seeking on pilgrimage.

Listening to the hum of insect life, the chirrup of some, the buzzing of others, the melody of birdsong: there is nothing still about nature. Something is always moving, stalking, hunting, nesting, feeding, seeking food or a mate. Even inside now, the stillness is broken by the crazed buzz of a fly circling the centre of the room.

But somehow, cradled by the voices of nature, I retained a stillness – not, perhaps, very deep, but still nevertheless.

Thinking on about that verse, it seems there is a knowing that is beyond words, a knowing that is deep, and positive, and assured. A knowing that is comforting and strengthening. So what about ‘that’?

Perhaps ‘that’ is an indication that there is a specific knowing God wants us to have. Be still and know that… what follows is obviously key, profound, and life-changing. It is also not something to trip off the tongue or be given a nodding assent: it is something to ruminate on, to taste and see, to marinate in, to be changed by.

The truth is coming, and the truth is the gift of God.

We need only be still. Theological studies may be helpful, but God’s main call on us is to sit with him, waiting on him, relaxing in his presence as his Spirit massages our spirit with the message of God:

Be still and know that I am God.

What a relief.

Know

 

Be. Still. And. Know.

Knowing leads my thoughts to knowledge, academia, theology, understanding. No, I don’t think that is the ‘know’ here.

Knowing, then, takes me down paths of relational knowledge, the Biblical, intimate understanding between two people, or a person and her Lord. No, I don’t think that is the ‘know’ here, either.

Knowing is a gift of God, received most fully when we are just being still.

When we found this house which we have made home for nearly 43 years, it had nothing to commend it. It was smaller than our flat, and cold: a real fixer-upper. But standing at the back door before we even put the key in the lock, I knew. I just knew it was the home God had prepared for us.

That knowledge was a gift. A gift of God.

This ‘know’ encompasses all of God’s attributes. Especially his goodness and love.

This morning, my mind’s eye perceived both of His eyes, but this time they were not fixed on me. They were looking away, first to the right, later to the left. A tear glistened in the corner, full but not yet fallen.

Our loving Father is suffering still, as he sees the injustices and atrocities perpetrated globally. He is wounded to the quick by the careless ingratitude of humanity, receiving his shower of gifts with indifference and recklessly trashing his world and his little ones, the apples of his eye.

When I hear the news today, from the radio or the mouths of others, I will be still and know. May that level of knowing cause the Light within me to blaze bright, driving out the darkness experienced and expressed.

The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

Be. Still. And. Know.

Amen.

And ...

 

Be still and…

I tried to slide across the and to land on the ‘know’, but the Lord wouldn’t let me. I stalled at ‘and’.

In my mind’s eye, I perceived a beautiful, benevolent brown eye gazing at me in love. The eye was fringed above with a thick canopy of blond eye lashes. Blond. It was incongruous with the deep brown iris. God is not limited to our understanding of what colours go together – dark eyes with dark hair, light eyes with blonds or reds. He is infinitely creative and in him all our myriad traits are beautiful.

I tried again to slip on to ‘know’. But again, I stuck at ‘and’.

The blond eyelashes lengthened and began to shimmer and sparkle. Beams of light provided protection for me. God’s eye is on me, and in that look of love is all the protection I ever need for anything and everything.

A look is so important, so communicative. May all my looks be benevolent and life-affirming, encouraging and filled with love. Forgive me, Father, when my ‘look could kill’ as my mother used to say to me when I was growing up. I pray that I might outgrow and abandon that terrible trait, as I bask in the look of love beaming from you this morning.

Be still and …

 

Be Still

 

Be still …

We live in a place where Mhairi can measure the noise in negative decibels – making the cupboard under the stairs the perfect sound studio for recording.

And yet, this morning, when there seemed to be Velcro on the second word of the verse, Be still and know that I am God, I realised how alive the stillness is. A bee buzzed past my head, swirling round the room seeking nectar. The breeze rustled the clusters of blossom, tickling the branches into a gentle, swaying dance. And the birds! I can’t tell you which birds I heard, but there were many lovely songs – high and low and fast and slow, pausing and rising, singing a tune and hammering out a staccato.

I don’t hear the recognisable repeat of the cuckoo. Have they moved on now?

As lovely as all that is, I don’t think outer stillness is what God is calling me to notice, or not notice. After all, that’s all beyond my ability to control. It’s the inner stillness I’m struggling to attain. I want to arrest the arrows of anxiety which suddenly shoot a concern into my head. I want to hush the mundane mediocrity of wondering what to make for dinner, or if there’s enough bread for lunch. I want to silence the snatch of song, or the bite of a phrase someone said which still perturbs. I even want to temporarily turn from the joy which brings a smile to my face.

So that I can be still and know that God is God.

I may be stuck on that second word for awhile, and I definitely need God’s help to silence the inner voices which chatter and distract.

Be still and know that I am God.

I think when I can really be still, I will know that he is God, who calls and enables me into the stillness, the deep stillness, so resonant with the presence of our loving Lord.

Just BE

 

Multiple bunches of heady white flowers cluster voluptuously (too strong a word?) on the rowan tree outside this window. As I gaze, I see a variety of busy bees, bugs and butterflies. I was going to say ‘Red Admiral’ butterflies: googled ‘common British butterflies’ to confirm and find that these ones could be Red Admirals, or they could be Peacock, Orange Tip, or even Painted Lady (perhaps voluptuously was the correct word after all?!) Some are orange as in these species; others are white cabbage butterflies whose larvae make lace from my vegetables every year.

My neighbour, a talented gardener, has been laid aside this year, having broken her wrist in spring. She was complaining that her flower beds are now full of weeds and she isn’t quite up to pulling them all. I commiserated as my flower and vegetable beds are all full of weeds, but in these days of trying to recover a healthy bio-diversity, we’re just doing our bit.

Someone close to me mentioned she is meditating now, for a few minutes each morning and night, on the verse, ‘Be still and know that I am God.’ In my prayer window this morning, I thought I might give that a go myself. I repeated it as a sort of mantra once or twice, slowly, but then I seemed to just stick on the word ‘Be’.

I found that as I relaxed, focused on the word ‘Be’, I felt no urgency to press on with the rest of the verse nor, in fact, with the rest of the day. I was able to slump into the word ‘Be’, and just be. I didn’t even repeat it. I just sat.

Those insects, busy on the rowan blossom, haven’t the luxury of just ‘being’. I imagine they work hard just to gather enough food to stay alive. Other human beings are stuck in the same relentless cycle, and for them today I pray.

Bless all those sisters and brothers of mine who, today, have no opportunity to just ‘be’. Those caught in the turmoil and trauma of war; those caught in the horror and injustice of slavery; those driven by fear to earn enough to buy food for the table and pay the rent; those whose thoughts assail them so they seek constant distraction.

The Sabbath is a gift from God. I know it is Monday morning, but for five minutes this morning I entertained just ‘being’. Those five minutes are lingering with me, hours later.

I am so grateful for the gift of God this morning. ‘Be still, and know that I am God.’ Perhaps, you, too will linger and just BE.

 

Footprints in the Sand

 

Footprints in the sand.

My usual walk after visiting Mom each day in CA was along Redondo Beach. There is a paved pedestrian path, parallel to the paved path for everything with wheels, from bikes and e-bikes to scooters, skates, skateboards, and some little motorised balls controlled, I think, by balance.

Often, I would leave the paved path and approach the shore. There is more of a workout walking in the dry sand, but once along the wet shore the walking eases again. There is something so therapeutic in gazing at the waves, washing in, pulling back, washing in, pulling back: watching the sea birds and occasional dolphins: hearing the music of children’s laughter.

On the paved path, the walking was easy and I left no footprints. In the sand, both dry and wet, impressions of my heels and toes formed as I passed through. There they would have lingered until other feet, or incoming tides, erased them.

Mom embroidered the words from the famous Footprints poem for me years ago, and it hangs in the living room. ‘Why,’ the poet asks Jesus, ‘Why, at the difficult times in my life, when I needed you most, did you leave me?’ Jesus replies, ‘I never left you, my precious child. Where you see only one set of footprints: it was then that I carried you.’

I woke up this morning feeling like a rag doll, flopped onto the back of my Saviour. A major disappointment in the longed-for purchase of an apartment, changes in the ownership and management of Mom’s residential facility creating uncertainty, more banking issues for her, and an email from the car rental company saying they’d concluded that the damage done on the rental car, which had been noted on the pink slip when I picked the car up, had been attributed to me: sometimes it’s pretty clear that the only way forward is on the back of my Saviour.

 

Amber Lights

 

Amber lights flash continually, warning approaching traffic that there is a blockage. That there is no way through.

For weeks now, our little road has carried signs that the road is closed except for access. We have been permitted in and out by the bored drivers slumped in the cabs of flatbed trucks carrying cones. Hour after hour, at either end of the worksite, a man spends his working day waiting. Waiting for an on-coming vehicle, now even a pedestrian or a cyclist, so that he can challenge, explain, allow through or turn back.

What are they doing? Half a mile from us, major power lines carry electricity from generating station to end-user. They have reinforced the giant pylons, giving them concrete ‘shoes’ to help them withstand the increasingly powerful winds coming with climate change. Now they are replacing the thick cables themselves, carefully lowering the old, connecting the new, and raising them. A time-consuming, possibly sometimes tedious but always dangerous job.

But they need safe conduits for such high voltages. Safety is the order of the day.

After the resurrection, Jesus told his followers to remain in Jerusalem until they were filled with power from on high. Power which would come not in a cable or a bolt of lightning, but in a person, the person of the Holy Spirit.

Jesus had spent three years preparing the cables – his disciples – so that they could safely carry this heavenly power. They needed the teaching and experience of being with Jesus to strengthen them for the winds of persecution which would threaten them as they shared the gospel with others.

When he came at Pentecost, the Spirit’s signature described in the Bible was flames of fire above each of the disciples’ heads. They’d been prepared, and they were anointed, set on fire with purpose and conviction and love.

I’m wondering this morning whether I, and some churches, have been more concerned with health and safety than willing to trust Jesus’ promise that the Holy Spirit is our helper, our encourager, our enabler, so that we can be powerful witnesses to the truth.

Help me today, Lord, to speak out your words of truth into this ‘post-truth’ generation, without fear and empowered by the divine fire of the Spirit.

Wouldn’t it be great if people felt a need to put amber warning lights round our churches, so that people entering would be aware of and anticipating a powerful encounter with Almighty God?

 

The Last Word

 

I drew open the curtains to reveal a flawless blue sky, with only the slightest breeze ruffling the spring leaves and blossom. Still I took a light jacket as I headed down the drive for my walk, but quickly abandoned it by the side of the road as the warmth of the sun penetrated, welcome and warm.

Ah.

There are times I enter the prayer window wearing a ‘jacket’. Shielding myself from what? Being fully known by the Lord? Being left in the cold, ignored by the Spirit? What is wrong with me?

Jesus invites us into the warmth of his loving embrace. Nothing can separate us from the love of God. As I enter his presence, I invite his Spirit to fully fill every part of me, so that I can live out of the goodness of God, so that, despite the darkness in the world, I can be a lampstand set on a hill. Whether by word or by being in the peace that passes understanding, may I bring encouragement and hope to those today who are frightened and wounded, huddled and hopeless.

Come, Lord Jesus, and fill me with your blessed Holy Spirit – pressed down and overflowing, slaking the thirst of those who see only a bleak and weary landscape today.

Thank you, Jesus, that you are the last Word.