Swimming for Sticks

These may just be words to you, but to Dusty, they convey a specific meaning. One of the special walks we do together is at Crathes Castle, where we basically walk from one water source to the next and I dutifully fling sticks into the water which she enthusiastically retrieves.

Enthusiastic doesn’t do justice to the joy and excitement this dog has over a swimming for sticks walk. It is probably what her ears itch to hear daily. When the second stick goes into the water (she only ever leaps in on the second stick going in, and then tries hard to herd both sticks into her mouth and back to the shore), she races and leaps with absolute trust and abandon into the water source.

She reminds me of a young child who loves to stand a few steps off the ground and fling herself into her daddy’s waiting arms. She knows her dad and trusts him not to let her fall. Dusty is full of faith that she is leaping into a safe place, too, where there awaits a welcoming landing, and that the exercise will refresh and invigorate her.

As we age, many of us grow cynical and hard, disappointed by life and other people, sometimes doubting that God is always good, or that he does love us. In the Bible, Hosea wrote to the people of Israel, ‘Plant the good seeds of righteousness, and you will harvest a crop of love. Plow up the hard ground of your hearts, for now is the time to seek the Lord, that he may come and shower righteousness upon you.’ 

I’m in the middle of the summer months and beginning to flag a bit on keeping up with my garden. It’s a lot of work. Planting isn’t easy in itself. The ground has to be dug over, weeded, manure dug in, and then the good seeds planted. It needs to be watered on the rare dry days. Even gathering in the harvest is tough: I’m about to head back out to pick raspberries – a joyous task as they are so delicious, but still, taking an hour or so every day, not to mention time spent making jam or freezing or baking with them. 

So how do we plow up the hard ground of our hearts? 

I’m looking back to Jesus, who advises his friends, ‘...if you remain in me and I in you, you may ask for anything you want, and it will be granted. When you produce much fruit, you are my true disciples.’

How do we produce good fruit? 

I think it’s misleading to compare it all to the actual garden outside, because in the Kingdom of God the plowing and the breaking up of the hard ground all happens as we marinate in the Word of God, as we remain and abide in Jesus. He tells us his yoke is easy; he is the one pulling that plow through the hard ground of our hearts. 

As we learn to be still with him, to remain and abide in him, the hard ground of our hearts is softened. Seeds of righteousness from him drop into those fertile hearts, and watered by his presence, his Word, and prayer, they begin to grow and produce fruit, a harvest of righteousness which brings glory to God. He does it. We sit with him and allow him to do it. 

And the more we do that, the greater peace we know, the greater is our faith that when we race towards God and launch ourselves with great abandon in his direction, he will, indeed catch us.

These are the prayers that he answers. The ones he plants in our hearts. The ones we trust him to take care of. 

Lord, help me to fling myself at you today, knowing in my heart that you are just waiting for such enthusiasm and faith, and you will catch me.

Remain

Remain. Abide.

Dusty and I strolled along the road, her sniffing the grass and plants, and me picking some of the small wild raspberries which line parts of the road and make wonderful jam. 

Some of the plants looked challenged and the berries were tiny and not worth picking. Others flourished and the fruit was still small, but plump and juicy. All in the freezer now, waiting til I’ve combined them with some of the big berries off our own canes in order to make a few jars of jam.

Jesus told his friends to remain in him and they would bear a lot of fruit. He said, rather cryptically, that they could do nothing on their own, but needed to remain in him and then they would be very fruitful.

It’s a foreign concept to most of us. We feel we have to do things – it’s that protestant work ethic perhaps, that elevates busyness beyond where it should be. Jesus commended his friend Mary who sat at his feet and listened to all he had to teach her rather than helping her busy sister Martha. He’d have been happy for Martha to sit at his feet, too. I get the impression he’d have been happy to make do with a simpler meal and enjoy spending time with his friends, imparting some of the knowledge he had to give them. 

We can’t sit at the feet of Jesus anymore, literally, but when we read his words in the Bible it’s as though we are sitting at his feet, and when we do it prayerfully, with a listening and open heart, it’s amazing how we ‘hear’ him speak to us through what we are reading.

I heard him today. Remain in me, he said. Abide in me. I’m trying to slow down, and do that.

Walk on the Wild Side

We have been away for the weekend. We went south to a family wedding. 

We rented a very comfortable cottage on the island where all the celebrations were going on, sharing the house with Don's brother, sister and brother-in-law. There was the seaside atmosphere of a place the family used to own on the west coast of Scotland, with the same convivial family times, shared meals, good fish to eat and wine to wash it down. 

We were there for three days, and as we head back north now, I am reflecting on the fact that I only opened my Bible twice, never prayed with Don, missed church, and didn't say grace before meals. We slipped into the routines of those around us, those with whom Don grew up, and who don't share our faith.

It has made me think of the descriptions in the Bible about who we are...that we have been grafted in to the true vine, which is Jesus. I grow roses at home, and I know it doesn't take long for cultivated roses to revert to their wild state. Seven leaves instead of five. Different flowers. The grafting-in can revert to wildness.

I am the vine, Jesus said. You are the branches. Grafted in. If we don't stay in him, we revert to our default mode, our natural, wild state.

It takes thought and effort to remain grafted in. We can't assume anything. We can't presume to remain in Christ if we make no effort to remain in him, through building up our relationship with him in Bible reading and prayer.

I remember what I was like before I was grafted in. I remember the sense of emptiness and sometimes hopelessness. 

I don't want to go back there again. I want to remain grafted in. 

Glad to be heading north now, back to my own routine, my own wee prayer window. My routine walks with Dusty, which draw my thoughts to God. 

But I wonder, how long will it take before my default mode will always be with face turned upwards in worship, no matter the circumstances.

Of course I did pray. I did thank God for the food silently before I ate. I did pray for people and situations that I know of right now. So maybe I didn't so much revert to wild, to seven leaves, as just express my faith in a different way. Or am I just kidding myself?

Hmm.