New Nest

A pale blue sky is scattered with individual white clouds, like a Monet painting. The flowering cherry tree is full and heavy with blossom. There is no wind this morning, just the lightest of breezes.

We watch a robin fold himself into the birdhouse opposite the kitchen window. The birdhouse nestles amongst a holly bush, planted there by a bird or the wind. He’s out again. Then she emerges and darts off. They are busy arranging their nest for the new life they expect any day.

Walking through this week with Jesus. Walking towards the cross. Death, not life. But Jesus didn’t hesitate to embrace the cross, because of the ‘joy set before him’. His focus was not on the death and struggle but on the life and glory beyond.

He had been busy for three years, preparing the nest for those who would believe and love him.

In these dark days of lock-down and endless news coverage of pestilence and death, when fear of becoming one of the statistics sits heavy on our minds, may we focus instead on the joy set before us. Because Jesus endured the cross, and entered glory after he was powerfully raised from death to life, so we, having endured whatever we are called to bear, can be assured that eternity in his glory awaits.

Jesus has gone ahead to prepare a place for us. His was an eternal perspective. As we share in that perspective, joy overwhelms and peace fills us. There is no room for fear. Only love, deep love and gratitude.

Backpacks and Dodgy Knees

Backpacks and sleeping bags at the ready. Wardrobe carefully thought out. Prayerful approach to pilgrimage. Looking good to go … except …

Bodies aren’t co-operating. Colds and coughs that have lingered for weeks and refuse to shift. Now a dodgy knee. Physio tomorrow. Help!

Preparation is everything, and it’s easy to overlook a part of the prep which turns out to be critical.

Paul advises we train ourselves spiritually, that we are well-prepped for eternity. It’s easy to overlook some things which turn out to be critical.

We two kings

We two kings ...

The third king has come unstuck. He’s dropped the light, and awaits repair upstairs. He dropped it last Christmas, and has awaited repair all year. But we’ve been too busy, one way and another, to even take time to apply a bit of glue to his upturned arms. A whole year hasn’t been long enough somehow...

It’s easy to drop the light. To become unstuck, too busy with preparations for everything, everyone,  except the King. I just had a wee chat with our postie Paul, who said he is madly laying floors and painting walls before family arrive for the holidays. Today I am pretty focused on getting the traditional Potica to rise – always a challenge in a cold house. Then I want to check the gift situation, do a bit of wrapping, a lot of cleaning, some more baking ... the prep goes on. Busy busy.

And the prep can snuff out the light. We can even drop it as our hands fill up with all sorts of things.

I’ve just come out of the prayer window, and a rendezvous with the King. Time to confess, to be cleansed, to be refilled and relit with the Light of the World. Advent is the season of prep, but we – I – so often replace the important inner, spiritual preparation of a place fit for the King of Kings to live, with outer, relatively unimportant prep.

May your light shine bright throughout the busy preparations. Especially in this world of turmoil and uncertainty, as the darkness nips at our toes, the prep that is really needed is that time in the prayer window, or wherever you call your sacred space. 

Whatever gift you have been given by the King, let him fill your arms with it this Christmas, as you offer it back to him in utter trust and joy.

Be prepared

It’s all about the preparation, our guest said in describing the weaving course she is doing. If the prep is done right, the end product will be sound and not skewed or squint in any way. 

Into my head popped the old hymn, ‘Will your anchor hold in the storms of life?’ It’s all about preparation. 

Storms hit us all, and if we have planted our anchors in Jesus they will hold, though we may be tossed and turned. How do we plant our anchors in Jesus? Nurturing that relationship with him through Bible reading, prayer and hanging around with other believers. 

It’s all about preparation.

Just Wait

Advent is the season of preparation, but also the season of waiting. Waiting for God to show his hand, so to speak, by revealing his master plan for our salvation, a plan devised before the creation of the world and carried out by a helpless infant born to a virgin in a dirty barn two thousand years ago.

He showed his hand in Jesus, God made man, fully human, fully divine, impossible for us to fully understand but possible, through the Holy Spirit, for us to fully love. 

My readings today have reflected the idea of waiting. Psalm 33:22: Let your unfailing love surround us, Lord, for our hope is in you alone. There is an expectancy there, as well as a quiet waiting. Patient. Trusting that God will not let us down.

The Lord watches over those who fear him, those who rely on his unfailing love. 

It’s not always easy to rely on his unfailing love. Sometimes we are caught in the grip of anxiety, of grief, of depression, of disappointment, of pain, and he seems to tarry. But Isaiah 30:18 also celebrates the faithfulness of God to deliver: For the Lord is a faithful God. Blessed are those who wait for his help.

Blessed are those who wait for his help.

It’s not easy to wait. May he strengthen us all to wait for his help and prevent us from trying to devise our own, woefully inadequate, solution ourselves.

Life

Advent, the season of preparation. Preparation of one’s heart to welcome the Christ child in, if you are a Christian. To ponder afresh the meaning of God incarnate, of Jesus laying aside the majesty and glory he had in heaven and becoming a vulnerable human being. To wonder and marvel at this truth, so that on Christmas eve and day, when we really celebrate, there is that meaningful dimension of amazement and love and joy.

The run-up to Christmas, the season of preparation. For those whose thoughts of Christmas are confined to the eating, drinking, exchanging of gifts, a time of hassle and rush, of expectations and expense.

And for those facing imminent death, also a season of preparation. Preparing to meet their Maker. While all the world rushes round in a flurry of tinsel and glitter, some have stopped, confined to beds perhaps, waiting. 

Walking Dusty this morning, I stopped behind the woods and gazed at the rosy hued dawn. I tuned my ears to the noise – mostly birds, though a dim whoosh of traffic could be heard, too, and a plane flew overhead. I had just poured out my heart to God – been brutally honest about how I feel about a young woman in the prime of life languishing at death’s door, a young woman who has much to offer, not least her incredible faith in the face of adversity and pain. I feel upset. I feel angry. I feel confused as to how this can be.

So I listened. And this young woman’s own words came to my mind. ‘It’s not about me. It’s about Jesus.’

Courage. Faith. She’s done more – in her blog and her relationships – to show the love of Christ than most of us will though we live a full four score and ten.

http://iwontbewanting.blogspot.co.uk/2013/12/the-bucket.html

Curtains

           

The last gasp in redecorating our bedroom is making the new curtains. The others have done service for 27 years so it’s time...

We’ve had the fabric for a few weeks now, and finally today I got down to it. I have been avoiding tackling the job because it involves sewing two curtains each one and a half widths wide – meaning I need to be careful about getting seams matching, nap going the right way, and so on. 

Somehow I wasn’t as careful in my preparation as I intended to be, and spent several minutes pondering which was the outside, which the inside, of the fabric. Eventually I decided that if it is that difficult to tell, it can’t really matter much! And anyway, we’re the only ones in the bedroom usually, and usually we’re asleep when we’re there.

So, I’ve now done the cutting, done the machine stitching, and am about to iron in the hems and sides for both curtain and lining. Then I will sew the curtain hems by hand, because that’s what I always do. I know it takes longer. I know it means my left hand, already prone to carpal tunnel, will be wakening me up in the night with ‘pins and needles’ – as they say in the UK – or ‘asleep’ as I would say. But I will do it anyway because that’s the look I like.

Preparation is crucial. I know that from many years of painting rooms. I know that from cooking. I know that from sewing curtains. 

How much more should I know that in spiritual terms? Now is the time to prep for eternity. If we’re going to be able to discern between the ‘right’ and the ‘wrong’ side of many decisions we have to make, we need to have something to distinguish them by. It would have helped in cutting the curtains if I had marked the ‘right’ sides with a pin. It helps me in my lifestyle choices to know what God thinks about things. 

There is always a right and a wrong side. It’s not always easy to tell the difference. But unlike for my curtains, in life, it always does matter.