Walking on Frozen Ground

Minus 5C. I’ve hung out a wash, standing on the frozen earth and looking at a leaden sky and wondering why I was bothering. In a few hours I’ll bring in stiff sheets and thaw them out. An exercise in futility I guess…

But my days are numbered, as are everyone’s, and every moment counts. So how can that time be redeemed? Is there anything of value to be gleaned from those moments wasted hanging out a wash on a frosty morning?

I noticed the birds, scavenging for sustenance. I connected with their plight in a way I couldn’t by looking at them out the window of my warm kitchen.

Native Americans have a saying to the effect that you should never judge someone until you’ve walked a mile in their moccasins. Jesus sat with the sinner. He ate with the outcast. He walked with the diseased and the rejected.

May the love of God in me impel me to take the time to walk a mile with those whose experience is different from mine, that I might better understand our shared humanity. May I be more eager to listen to others’ stories, to walk on the frozen ground of some of their lives, than I am to share my own opinion. May God help us all to hunger to know him, to know others, so that we can more truly know ourselves.

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?

Bunches of Roses

Don gave me a big bunch of multi-coloured roses on Saturday. I’m not very good at floral art, so as usual have stuck the whole bunch into my biggest vase, where they look colourful and beautiful and remind me of his love.

I have lots of greenery in the garden, though, and was thinking that with a bit of time and a modicum of talent, I could fill two or three vases with greenery and intersperse the roses through the house.

B&B guests would enjoy the beauty of the roses, on the landing or in the dining room.

It made me think of Christians, bunching together on Sundays in our church services. We probably look colourful and maybe even beautiful and remind the world of the love of God. If the world is even watching, or aware of us.

Come Monday mornings and we are scattered to our work places and neighbourhoods. We are interspersed amongst the greenery of non-Christian settings, where we can bring beauty and colour as we live out the life of Jesus in our daily lives.

It’s easier to bunch together and join our voices in praise of God. More challenging to show the beauty of Christ in a secular setting. 

But exactly what the world needs. To see Jesus in us. To experience his peace, his joy, his beauty. So this week, I am going to be more aware than ever of maintaining my integrity as a believer in the midst of my daily routines.

Fed by the Word of God, and the prayer that unites me with Jesus by the power of the Spirit.

Think I’ll be a red rose. A sign of love.

Torn Apart

One thing about being knocked down with illness: it gives you time to reflect. So today, as I lay in bed, I was thinking about that utter devastation on the roadside verge that I described the other day. 

You know, where the JCB driver had just ripped and torn his way through the branches of any trees or bushes which he thought were growing too close to the road.

The other day I’d been reflecting on the way our Father the gardener prunes us gently and thoughtfully so that we grow beautiful and fruitful. 

Today I realized that most of us have the experience of being pruned like those trees on the roadside. We’ve had people criticise us, belittle us, ignore us, abuse us, not believe us, and treat us as if we are worthless. 

Some of those times, it has felt as if a limb has been ripped off, an eye gouged out, or utterly gutted. We may readily recognise the roadside scene of utter destruction and carnage and identify with it in a painful way.

The good news is that God doesn’t see us like that. The good news is that God loves us rather foolishly because we don’t really deserve such lavish love. Maybe we think we deserve to have our sinful habits hacked off in a painful way, but he doesn’t. He doesn’t need us to be perfect in order to love us. He doesn’t require us to have everything right before he opens his arms and draws us into a loving embrace. And he doesn’t rip and tear through the things that are not quite right. He gently prunes us with loving care and wisdom.

His grace is enough to melt my heart and make me fall on my knees before him.

The Cross is Everywhere

Channel 4 television in the UK has an identifier which involves a camera focused on a series of lines – be they power cables, telephone wires, whatever – until suddenly they coalesce to form a recognisable ‘4’. From what initially looks like just a spaghetti junction of lines emerges something with a meaning.

I looked out the window this morning at the bare branches of a tree and saw a Cross. As my gaze panned round the view, crosses were evident everywhere. 

The news these days is bleak, but when we pause and prayerfully take a closer look, we can sometimes glimpse a cross amongst the wreckage of lives and property. A selfless act of courage. A kind gesture. A humble word.

My elderly mother lives alone thousands of miles away from me. I can’t do what I long to do – drop by with her shopping, take her to the movies, organise a weekend away. I can’t even pick up her daily newspaper which is thrown onto the grass about 4 am each day and put it on her front porch.

But someone on her street can. And has been. Two women, one whom my mother has never even met, try to make sure they put her paper up near the front door for easy access. 

These women are answers to my prayers that she would have people round her looking out for her. I have never met either one of them. Linda and Michelle. 

When I look at the potential for violence in the big city where Mom lives; when I think of the severe drought affecting that area and the obvious ramifications which that could mean for peaceful co-existence; when I am tempted to tread the anxious hallways of the mind which all open from the central point of ‘what if...?’; I remember the acts of kindness shown by these two neighbourly women who don’t really know my mother very well and who don’t expect any kind of reward for their thoughtfulness.

There are others in Mom’s life with whom she shares deep and loving relationships, and who also go extra miles to bring her a smile or an ice cream. When I look at Mom, I see crosses all around. Love. Service. Kindness. Gentleness. Patience. Protection. Advice. Friendship. Love. 

The cross of Jesus trumps every evil, real or potential.

God is in his heaven, and all is right with the world. I will not be anxious, but will trust him to do more than I can ask or imagine in the lives of those I pray for today.

Drink Deep

Those little gems I wrote about last week – the carnations with flower heads sprouting frequently up the slender stalks: they’re still going strong. 

I’ve just been reflecting on the short life of a lovely young woman, Stari, who passed away just before Christmas. Her strong faith in Jesus lives on in the blog she left behind and in the comfort her assurance gave to those who loved her. Looking at pictures of her through her life, I noticed how like her mother she had grown in looks; a picture of her being cradled in her mum’s arms shortly after birth startled me into thinking just how short life is.

I’m still struggling to come out from the effects of this nasty virus, trying to overcome the pounding headache which seems to be its legacy. I look in the mirror and feel that I’ve aged almost beyond my own recognition! It’s amazing how fast it goes.

Peter wrote, quoting from the Old Testament, that ‘all people are like grass and all their glory is like the flowers of the field; the grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of the Lord endures forever.’ 

Stari, a beautiful flower, fell before her time. Those of us who may live out a normal life span wither more slowly, less obviously perhaps, but we wither nevertheless. One day we will all fall, but how comforting and even exciting to know that as believers in Jesus we will join him and go on forever. 

Meanwhile, we want to accomplish all we are meant to do while we are blooming here on earth. I just noticed my little gems of carnations had sucked up most of the water in the vase, so I’ve filled it again with fresh, clear water. That should keep them perky and bright for awhile longer.

And while we are flowering here on earth, we need to ensure we suck up the nourishment provided by our heavenly Father through his word, which refreshes, restores, corrects and encourages us. That way, hopefully, the power and love of God will shine out through the weakness of a pounding headache – in the same way that the power and love of God shone out through the pain Stari suffered in her final illness.

I thank God for the encouragement and hope offered by this extraordinary young woman.

We Know

‘...and we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him...’

I have a family situation developing which is heart-breaking and will probably require intervention at some point. I was awake in the night thinking about it. (I guess that’s called worrying!) I love this person dearly and absolutely want to do the best I can for her, and I am afraid that I won’t be up to it, for various reasons. 

The main reason is that I live in a different country now, six thousand miles away, which is challenging. There’s only so much you can do by phone. 

Feeling anxious and fearful, I looked up our Bible reading for today. Romans 8:26-39. It reduced me to tears and left me squeaking through it as I read it out. 

In all things God works for the good of those who love him.

All things. 

God is working in this thing which we face. 

‘The Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express.’ 

‘If God is for us, who can be against us?’

‘Christ Jesus...at the right hand of God ... is also interceding for us.’ 

How do people do it without knowing the love of God?