Caution!

Carefully, I tucked each trouser leg into a long sock. I didn’t look sophisticated. I didn’t care. I didn’t want a tick bite.

I thought I was safe. Then last night, a few hours after our walk, I felt a sharp pain on my calf. A tiny tick somehow found its way through the trousers, or up the leg, or whatever, and there he was, sucking my blood. I tweezered him out, put on the TCP, and now pray there was no Lyme’s disease in him.

We can take all sorts of precautions in life. But life itself is risky. It’s worth taking the precautions, but then it’s worth taking the risks. Jesus came to give us life to the full. He doesn’t want us to stress out, nor to play it safe.

Have a great day.

Lens of Grace

Awhile ago, we got a comic book for Flick which had a ‘camera’ attached, a camera which showed pictures of various fairy-tale princesses. It took Flick a little while to figure out how to see through the finder and view the pictures, but she mastered it. It’s not easy learning to close one eye while keeping the other open.

Paul wrote that we see ‘through a glass darkly’. We don’t get the full picture, and can be disappointed and discouraged because our perspective is narrow and our focus can be more on ourselves than on those we are feeling disappointed in.

It is hard to distance oneself from events so that the outcomes don’t seem personal, but usually there are valid reasons for other peoples’ actions or reactions. I heard a powerful talk once in which the speaker declared she decided never to allow anyone, or anything, to offend her.

It’s called grace. It’s the way God sees us, through a lens of grace. And it’s the way we should see others. Like Flick trying to see through the finder, it takes practice to allow God to broaden our vision and erase our own expectations and feelings from the picture. A lifetime of practice, and the help of the Holy Spirit.

Living in grace, though, is living life to the full. Which is what Jesus died to give us.

Wild Waters

Inky black was the ocean one day, breaking into white froth as the huge ship churned through the water. Black and white: the colours of the evening’s formal ball.

But no, not just black and white. As I wrote yesterday, as the black gave way to white, or settled back again to grey-black, there was a moment of vibrant, breath-taking colour. A swirl of aquamarine, a shade not seen if the water is unfurrowed. Shades of colour revealed as the blackness is fracked.

Now the layered canopy of cloud overhead begins to break, slits of blue sky revealed beyond. All day the sky has remained grey, a thick mosaic of light and dark, but now, near dusk, the lighter shades are pulling apart, unravelling like a loose-knit afgan, and hinting at more. More colour in this world than observed at first sight.

More colour in the heights. More colour in the depths. A beauty – a delicate, pastel beauty. The sea stretches to the grey horizon, dark grey lining against lighter grey. 

The loose-knit weave of cloud continues to tear, but not disappear. It is not dissolving before my eyes, leaving behind a tropical scarf of pale blue. Instead, as it pulls apart in one place, it seems to grow denser in another. Denser, darker, reflecting back the darkness of the sea.

No fish break the surface. It appears as arid and devoid of life as a Saharan landscape. But like a Saharan landscape, not all is revealed, not all is apparent. What lies beneath? Beneath this massive conveyance ploughing through the matrix of water.

Jesus said he came to bring us fullness of life. As I stood on the balcony watching the vast ocean beyond, songs of praise giving glory to God filled my head. I am so thankful for the opportunity to glimpse a part of his creation that I hadn’t imagined seeing in my lifetime. This world is beyond amazing. It is such a gift, how can anyone doubt the love of God?

Live Large

I have had an unusual day, hitting one of the sales and replenishing some of my tired wardrobe (will that help my tired body?). I was also looking for a special wedding present which I didn’t quite decide on, but it was a very pleasant morning.

Came home and did a bit of sprucing up of the pots of flowers for the winter, and while throwing out the detritus I ended up by Dusty’s last resting place. It is a lovely spot, overlooking the field but the long view takes in the hill over Banchory called Scolty. The Hill of Fare also looms large-ish and grounds this area in Scottish history. Maybe Mary Queen of Scots stood here while watching the rout of the Catholic faction in a decisive battle a few hundred years ago.

But I digress.

While pausing by Dusty’s grave, I reflected on the joy she brought me during her life. She was a dog who lived large. Undeterred by a particularly nasty leg break at 7 weeks old, her speed when chasing a ball (or a deer for that matter ;-( ) was remarkable. She derived ecstatic happiness from leaping with complete abandon into any body of water into which someone obligingly threw a stick or two. 

I have spent many happy moments laughing like a lunatic perhaps as she raced and sprang into the loch at Crathes Castle or the River Dee. She didn’t pause to consider any possible reasons for not leaping with such commitment, to her shocked bruising one winter when a certain person who shall remain unnamed mischievously tossed a stick onto the frozen loch...ouch!

Factoring in the ice, or any other hazards, just did not occur to nor hinder Dusty. Just a week before her death, she managed half a walk at Crathes Castle, wading in after sticks with the same determination but with an unobliging body which gave her much grief for a couple of days afterwards in the form of stiffness. Her spirit remained strong and her joie de vivre only evaporated over her last weekend.

It’s a bit odd taking a lesson from your dead dog, perhaps, but I am. I want to live my remaining days LARGE. I want to throw myself into whatever project I feel called to do with total commitment. I don’t want to hang back hesitating, considering the possible problems. I don’t want to live by the guidelines of proper Health & Safety procedures but by the guidelines of God, whose Word (the Bible) is a lamp to my feet, guiding me through the sometimes dark present into the unknown future. 

His Word confirms that we have been given a spirit of boldness and not timidity. 

So, thank you Dusty for living so large and leaving the memory of that as a real legacy for me. I just need to keep receptive to other sources of joy and laughter which abound in each of our lives.

Thank you God, for such a gift of life, and thank you Jesus for coming so that we might live life to the full in the power of your indwelling Spirit.

This is the Air I Breathe

It’s early July and the sun is shining outside, with a brisk breeze stirring up the trees and bending the flowers. I’m sitting inside, in a cool interior room, wearing, among other items of apparel, a cardigan and wool socks. In July.

I grew up in southern California, where sockless sandals were de rigueur all summer long. Where tank tops and shorts exposed the skin to the warm sea breezes in July. I have to say that, even after all these years, I still miss that sense of summertime freedom.

However, when I step outside my back door and inhale deeply, I catch the fragrance of the flowers, or sometimes of the farm, but either way I catch natural fragrances. When the wind wafts into my face I sense its cleanliness and purity. 

When I have an appointment in town, I don’t need to factor in time of day with its probable traffic congestion. I rarely sit in a car idling in a traffic jam, where I would be breathing in all sorts of noxious fumes. 

The air may be cool, but it is clear. I sense that my lungs may be pink rather than black. 

All over the world, people are on the move. Migrating because of conflict or economic disasters, which makes their migration essential. But even in the developed nations, indigenous populations are migrating to the cities, to join the urban sprawl and breathe deep of the polluted air. Seeking a better life. The good life.

What is the good life? Jesus said that he came so that we would enjoy fullness of life. So just what is that, and how does Jesus coming facilitate or enable it to happen? Does it mean moving to clump together with others in the crowded cities of our time?

It has nothing to do with where we live.

Because Jesus lived and died for me, I can be filled with his Holy Spirit who, when he moves into my life, brings a deep inner peace and contentment and a sense of safety and fulfilment. I no longer need to chase after elusive dreams which draw me to pile into cities congested with people and fumes and negative energy and crime. 

I can step outside my door, wherever it is, and breathe deep. And revel in the moment of just being. Wool socks or none.

It's a Cinch

Speaking to a neighbour a few days ago, she told me about a recent experience she had horse riding. 

An experienced rider, she knew what she needed to do before she got onto the horse’s back. She needed to check that the saddle was properly cinched, because apparently when the saddle is first put on, the horse’s belly can swell and then return to normal after a few minutes, requiring the leather strap which passes underneath to be cinched tighter.

My friend asked the person who had prepared the horse for the ride if it was properly cinched, and rather than check it herself, she took the person’s word for it. Yes, it was ready to go. Off she went on her horse ride when suddenly she was aware that the saddle was slipping and she was going with it, and had to grab hold of the horse’s head to keep herself on until she could rectify the situation.

She knew she should check the leather strap but she didn’t. She took someone else’s word for it.

As a Christian, my relationship with Jesus is up to me and Jesus. He is the one who keeps me safe, who keeps me erect, who supports me. If I let my relationship with him slip; if I depend vicariously on other people’s relationships with Jesus, then I am in danger of slipping. When the going gets tough, when the hills rise or valleys deepen, I am likely to slide off and come to grief. Of course I may be able to cling on to Jesus as she did to the horse’s head, but it’s hardly an ideal way to live my life.

So, every day, first priority for me must be to refresh my relationship with Jesus, to know his will for me each day, to hear his words and let them sink deep into my soul.

Then living life to the full should become a cinch.

Spiritually Stunted

My friend was searching for a package in her friend’s home. She opened an obscure cupboard and reported there was a white plastic bag inside, tied at the top.

On opening the bag, she discovered a long-forgotten amaryllis. It had been removed from its box and the bulb placed on top of the unopened plastic bag of compost. 

Without nourishment from the compost, without water, and without light, this bulb had sprouted, grown and produced three amazingly beautiful flowers.

But the stem was like the neck of a swan, twisting and curved and rather weak, as the plant sought the light.

It’s now planted in the compost in a pot, supported with two knitting needles and watered with care, set in a place where it is bathed in the light from a window.

Jesus counsels that we should abide in him, be planted in him, be nourished by him. He tells us he is the light of the world, a light which warms and draws life to itself. He declares he is the water of life, that he gives refreshment to all who are thirsty. 

People may look ok from the outside (though perhaps a bit twisted like the stem of the amaryllis). They may seem to be growing fine, but they may be weaker than they look. To develop and bloom with all the strength and vitality Jesus planned for us, we need to be planted, watered, and lit correctly. 

Jesus said he came that we might have life to the full. We’ll never have a full life if we are tied up in a bag in a dark cupboard, so to speak, with no access to light, water and food. We’ll be spiritually stunted.