Archives for 2011

The Willingness to Fail and Joy

http://sophiafine.com/main/2008/02/

My forties have been an amazing decade for me, so far. We left America after 17 years and moved back to Oxford, England, and are very happy here. It feels like the right place for us to be.

It also is a decade of experimentation, and trying several new things.
   * * *

In my teens and twenties, I didn’t want to do anything I couldn’t be really good at. At boarding school, run by German and Irish nuns, I had a relentless campaign to be excused from choir and games because I would never be good at them. I wanted to concentrate on academics, in particular literature and debating (and writing, though I didn’t say that) and become really good. Amazingly, the nuns agreed, and I was the only girl accused from compulsory sport, an hour a day, and choir practices.

But I think my old approach of wanting to be good at what I do, or not doing it at all, has often robbed me of joy. I was telling my husband, Roy, that writing this blog, a post a day, has been and is one of the things I have enjoyed most in my whole life.
   * * *

Then I stopped and thought. No, the work I have most enjoyed was the period in my twenties when I read reams and reams of poetry, and wrote poetry. I submitted a slender volume of poetry for my Masters Thesis in Creative Writing (at the Ohio State University) and was accepted for a Ph.D in Creative Writing at the State University of New York, Binghamton to develop, revise and expand it as a Ph.D thesis. (I quit my Ph.D to get married, and am not yet sure if that was a good decision–dropping the Ph.D which was SO, SO stimulating, I mean; not the getting married part).

For the first year and a half of married life, all I did was read poetry, and write poetry. I must have had 50 poems published in magazines around America in that period.

And then, silly girl, I showed them to John Frederick Nims, the editor of Poetry Magazine, then the leading poetry magazine. “So, are they really good?” I asked. “Do you think I might have a career as a poet?” He re-read them, pursed his lips, and said, “I don’t know. I don’t know if I would make major sacrifices for a poetic career if I were you.”

Something else was tugging at the bits: non-fiction writing. Annie Dillard says that moving from only writing poetry to writing “creative non-fiction” is like moving from playing a single instrument to working with a whole orchestra. And there is something to that.

And so, just like that, I gave up reading and writing poetry, which was the most thrilling and fascinating thing I have ever done.

The poet Donald Hall wrote that people abandon poetry, and then talk about it wistfully, as if poetry has abandoned them. So I did, whenever I met poets. “I used to love it too,” I’d say. “I used to write it too.” The poet Ellen Bryant Voight, who I met at the Bread Loaf Writers Conference at Vermont said encouraging, “Well, then, you will write it again, perhaps when the children are older.”

And so I will.
   * * *

Meandering. The point of this post is to say that the idol is broken. The idol of needing to be good at something if I am to do it seriously. The idol of doing it really well or not at all.

In my forties, I have taken things up which, odds are, I may not be brilliant at, but which I immensely enjoy.

My second and third languages at school were Sanskrit and Hindi, and so I have never learned French, but I adore the sound of it. So two years ago, I got a tutor who comes over weekly and works with me on my French, even though I can only dedicate 2-4 hours a week to it. He is a Parisian actor and playwright, living and working in Oxford, who directs his own plays, acts in other people, and adapts books for the stage.

We talk for an hour a week, on everything— films, plays, books, art and Europe, and it is amazing how much fun one can have–rowing far out of shore, talking in a foreign language about things which interest you, while knowing that you are probably making several erreurs per paragraph.

Zoe, 16, and I used to do French conversation together with a native speaker, but now she is seriously working for her G.C.S.E.s and I don’t want to spend more than 3-4 hours on French (an hour of conversation; a hour of grammar and reading a book and Le Monde; two hours on a French movie. So she has Jean-Patrick for her own hour. “Do you think I am now better than you, Mum?” she asked in delight. “Are you going to let me become better than you?” Yeah, I think I am, though it will be hard. The idol of competitiveness is being smashed, along with the idol of being really good at what I take up seriously. It’s freeing to enjoy something for its own sake, without it leading to anything that I can see.
   * * *

Another late-forties project of mine is to become a bit fitter. (To become really fit will be a project for my fifties.) Something else I have taken up recently is tennis, with a coach. There is not a snowball’s chance in hell that I will ever be good at it, as I can’t run fast enough. But that doesn’t prevent it being a lot of fun. Roy watches me in amazement and says, “Wow! You’re really enjoying it. You really enjoy exercise” And so I am.

The girl who hated anything physical now has a gym membership!! Again, I really enjoy yoga, zumba and body combat, while being, quite probably, and– quite probably, quite visibly–the
worst in the room.
   * * *

I don’t think I would have been able to blog in my thirties. I don’t think I would have been able to release work which wasn’t my best. Now, I do. In fact, I don’t even have a blog stack, but press publish as each post is written. Holding on to them, revising them, would be a sure way for perfectionism–and its evil twin, writers’ block–to show their faces again.

In the Shadow of your Wings, Psalm 17, Day 44, Feb 13th,

By Anita Mathias

In the Shadow of your Wings

Psalm 17

ESV notes–An individual lament for cases when the person suffering considers himself unjustly accused of wrong by a worldly enemy. It is a prayer for vindication, ending by expressing confidence in the true portion of the faithful.

A prayer of David.

¹ Hear me, LORD, my plea is just;
   listen to my cry.
Hear my prayer—
   it does not rise from deceitful lips.
² Let my vindication come from you;
   may your eyes see what is right.

³ Though you probe my heart,
   though you examine me at night and test me,
you will find that I have planned no evil;
   my mouth has not transgressed.
⁴ Though people tried to bribe me,
   I have kept myself from the ways of the violent
   through what your lips have commanded.
⁵ My steps have held to your paths;
   my feet have not stumbled.
The word of God has protected the Psalmist.

⁶ I call on you, my God, for you will answer me;
   turn your ear to me and hear my prayer.
⁷ Show me the wonders of your great love,
   you who save by your right hand
   those who take refuge in you from their foes.
⁸ Keep me as the apple of your eye;
Safeguard me as the pupil of your eye. A conventional Hebrew metaphor for protection against oppression.

hide me in the shadow of your wings
evokes a place of safety. Metaphor for the protective outreach of God’s power.
⁹ from the wicked who are out to destroy me,
   from my mortal enemies who surround me.
The Lord can keep one safe amid peril.

¹⁰ They close up their callous hearts,
   and their mouths speak with arrogance.
¹¹ They have tracked me down, they now surround me,
   with eyes alert, to throw me to the ground.
¹² They are like a lion hungry for prey,
   like a fierce lion crouching in cover.
Imagery of one’s opponents hunting one down.

¹³ Rise up, LORD, confront them, bring them down;
   with your sword rescue me from the wicked.
¹⁴ By your hand save me from such people, LORD,
   from those of this world whose reward is in this life.
The Psalmist sums up the world view of those who have no fear of God in this phrase.
May what you have stored up for the wicked fill their bellies;
   may their children gorge themselves on it,
   and may there be leftovers for their little ones.
ESV notes–In such an environment of threat, the proper recourse is prayer for the enemy’s defeat. Since they are unrepentant, deliverance for the pious requires defeat for the attacker. The specific type of defeat is left up to God.

¹⁵ As for me, I will be vindicated and will see your face;

when I awake, I will be satisfied with seeing your likeness.

In the Shadow of your Wings, Psalm 17, Day 44, Feb 13th,

By Anita Mathias

In the Shadow of your Wings

Psalm 17

A prayer of David.

¹ Hear me, LORD, my plea is just;
   listen to my cry.
Hear my prayer—
   it does not rise from deceitful lips.
² Let my vindication come from you;
   may your eyes see what is right.

¹⁵ As for me, I will be vindicated and will see your face;

when I awake, I will be satisfied with seeing your likeness.

The First Thing in the Morning!

By Anita Mathias

My preferred First Thing in the Morning activity

I wrote this years ago, when we lived in America and Zoe was a baby. It was published in The Washington Post in 1997! I thought you might enjoy it.

The First Thing in the Morning

Exercise first thing in the morning, my personal trainer says. The discipline will spill over to the rest of the day. It jump-starts your metabolism, so that you burn more calories, whether you read or cook or nap. And if you wake early enough, you can walk on the golf course.

Pray first thing in the morning, the radio preacher thunders. Jesus rose before the dawn to pray to his heavenly father. Pray before phone-calls and mail and frustrations jangle your spirit; pray while your mind is clear and tranquil, and you can hear what the Lord God has to say. The plug of prayer connects you to the power you need for the day.

“Write first in the morning,” my writing teacher advises. The only way to learn to write is by writing. And that way you’re sure you’ve done it. Your unconscious is closer to its dream state early in the morning. It can fly. He quotes Goethe: “Write at dawn, skim the cream of the day, then you can study crystals, intrigue at court, and make love to your kitchen maid.” Trollope rose at 5:30 a.m. to write; he wrote seventy books. Hemingway rose at six, wrote till midday, and then had fun.

But read before you write, the teacher adds. Books come from other books. The rhythms of your favorite writer will throb in your veins; they will pulse through your writing.

Study your dreams which offer you the wisdom of the unconscious, my therapist suggests. Your dream of arriving late to a party you’re hosting, arriving after the glutted guests couldn’t care less about you, is an admonition that you are working too hard. You are missing the party of your life. Record your dreams first thing in the morning. Delay ten minutes and you forget the dream; its details blur.

Do difficult things first thing in the morning, I note at the brown-bag lecture, “Organize Yourself.” The longer you delay, the tireder you grow, the harder seems the task. “Procrastination makes easy things difficult, and difficult things impossible.”

The alarm shrills at five a.m. The dog wants to go out. The coffee must be brewed. I must brush my teeth and wash my face and comb my hair. I must be quiet, or I will wake the baby.

Voices sound around me, mentors and tormentors. Drink lemon and honey the first thing in the morning; it purifies the blood. Pray, exercise, read, write, record your dreams–the first thing in the morning. The world comes at me. I duck under the comforter.

I wake, much later, to the baby’s first cry. I write this the last thing at night.

Joseph’s Dangerous Gift Lingers, Genesis 40, Day 40, Feb 9th, Blog Through the Bible Project

By Anita Mathias

Jozef Schenker, Joseph in Prison

Brilliant. God gives Joseph the interpretation of two dreams, which prepares the way for Joseph to be used by God to interpret the Pharaoh’s two dreams, leading to the subsequent fulfillment of Joseph’s two dreams.

Genesis 40

The Cupbearer and the Baker

¹ Some time later, the cupbearer and the baker of the king of Egypt offended their master, the king of Egypt. ² Pharaoh was angry with his two officials, the chief cupbearer and the chief baker, ³ and put them in custody in the house of the captain of the guard, in the same prison where Joseph was confined. ⁴ The captain of the guard assigned them to Joseph, and he attended them.

After they had been in custody for some time, ⁵ each of the two men—the cupbearer and the baker of the king of Egypt, who were being held in prison—had a dream the same night, and each dream had a meaning of its own.
God is beginning to prepare the way for Joseph’s rise in Egypt.

⁶ When Joseph came to them the next morning, he saw that they were dejected. ⁷ So he asked Pharaoh’s officials who were in custody with him in his master’s house, “Why do you look so sad today?”

⁸ “We both had dreams,” they answered, “but there is no one to interpret them.”

Then Joseph said to them, “Do not interpretations belong to God? Tell me your dreams.”

Joseph steps out in faith, trusting God. “God’s gifts and his call are irrevocable.” Even in prison, Joseph uses his special gift of understanding and interpreting dreams.
NIV Joseph presents himself as God’s agent through whom God will make known the revelation contained in their dreams. He is the prototype of Israel, God’s prophetic people through whom God’s revelation comes to the nations.

⁹ So the chief cupbearer told Joseph his dream. He said to him, “In my dream I saw a vine in front of me, ¹⁰ and on the vine were three branches. As soon as it budded, it blossomed, and its clusters ripened into grapes. ¹¹ Pharaoh’s cup was in my hand, and I took the grapes, squeezed them into Pharaoh’s cup and put the cup in his hand.”

¹² “This is what it means,” Joseph said to him. “The three branches are three days. ¹³ Within three days Pharaoh will lift up your head and restore you to your position, and you will put Pharaoh’s cup in his hand, just as you used to do when you were his cupbearer. ¹⁴ But when all goes well with you, remember me and show me kindness; mention me to Pharaoh and get me out of this prison. ¹⁵ I was forcibly carried off from the land of the Hebrews, and even here I have done nothing to deserve being put in a dungeon.”

R.T. Kendall comments on this that there is still a note of self-pity. Joseph is still not surrendered to God’s will and God’s timing. He is therefore still not completely a man whom God can use. He is still quite understandably attempting to work out his own deliverance.

¹⁶ When the chief baker saw that Joseph had given a favorable interpretation, he said to Joseph, “I too had a dream: On my head were three baskets of bread.^[a] ¹⁷In the top basket were all kinds of baked goods for Pharaoh, but the birds were eating them out of the basket on my head.”

¹⁸ “This is what it means,” Joseph said. “The three baskets are three days. ¹⁹ Within three days Pharaoh will lift off your head and impale your body on a pole. And the birds will eat away your flesh.”

²⁰ Now the third day was Pharaoh’s birthday, and he gave a feast for all his officials. He lifted up the heads of the chief cupbearer and the chief baker in the presence of his officials: ²¹ He restored the chief cupbearer to his position, so that he once again put the cup into Pharaoh’s hand— ²² but he impaled the chief baker, just as Joseph had said to them in his interpretation.

²³ The chief cupbearer, however, did not remember Joseph; he forgot him.

Joseph’s attempts to work out his own deliverance fail. The cupbearer is dreadfully ungrateful and forgetful.

The challenge to Joseph: Will he allow himself to become bitter?

Joseph’s Dangerous Gift Lingers, Genesis 40, Day 40, Feb 9th, Blog Through the Bible Project

By Anita Mathias

Jozef Schenker, Joseph in Prison

Genesis 40

The Cupbearer and the Baker

⁸ “We both had dreams,” they answered, “but there is no one to interpret them.”

Then Joseph said to them, “Do not interpretations belong to God? Tell me your dreams.”

¹⁶ When the chief baker saw that Joseph had given a favorable interpretation, he said to Joseph, “I too had a dream: On my head were three baskets of bread.^{Genesis 39
¹ Now Joseph had been taken down to Egypt. Potiphar, an Egyptian who was one of Pharaoh’s officials, the captain of the guard, bought him from the Ishmaelites who had taken him there.
² The LORD was with Joseph so that he prospered, and he lived in the house of his Egyptian master.
When the Lord is with us, when we are acting according to his direction, we will prosper. Either in our career–wealth, success etc.– or spiritually, in spiritual peace, happiness and fullness, and, not rarely, both spiritually and in our work and materially.

³ When his master saw that the LORD was with him and that the LORD gave him success in everything he did, ⁴ Joseph found favor in his eyes and became his attendant.
When God is with you–success in everything you do is a frequent result. Though not always–as we shall see as we follow Joseph’s story.
Though Joseph’s situation had altered dramatically, God’s relationship to him had remained the same.

Potiphar put him in charge of his household, and he entrusted to his care everything he owned. ⁵ From the time he put him in charge of his household and of all that he owned, the LORD blessed the household of the Egyptian because of Joseph. The blessing of the LORD was on everything Potiphar had, both in the house and in the field.
God’s blessing on Joseph extends to those Joseph works for. Laban, similarly, was blessed because of Jacob. The offspring of Abraham continue to be a blessing to the nations.
ESV notes–By indicating the divine blessing comes through Joseph, the narrator picks up an important element of the promises made to the patriarchs, Gen 12:3

⁶ So Potiphar left everything he had in Joseph’s care; with Joseph in charge, he did not concern himself with anything except the food he ate.
Joseph had full responsibility for the welfare of Potiphar’s house, as later he would have full responsibility in prison, and later still in all Egypt. Always, this Israelite came to hold the welfare of his “world” in his hands–but always by the blessing and overruling of God, never by his own wits as his father Jacob had so long attempted.
Now Joseph was well-built and handsome, ⁷ and after a while his master’s wife took notice of Joseph and said, “Come to bed with me!”
⁸ But he refused. “With me in charge,” he told her, “my master does not concern himself with anything in the house; everything he owns he has entrusted to my care. ⁹ No one is greater in this house than I am. My master has withheld nothing from me except you, because you are his wife. How then could I do such a wicked thing and sin against God?” ¹⁰ And though she spoke to Joseph day after day, he refused to go to bed with her or even be with her.
Lust will not be his downfall as it was for his relatives. He writes a new story with his life.
¹¹ One day he went into the house to attend to his duties, and none of the household servants was inside. ¹² She caught him by his cloak and said, “Come to bed with me!” But he left his cloak in her hand and ran out of the house.
¹³ When she saw that he had left his cloak in her hand and had run out of the house, ¹⁴ she called her household servants. “Look,” she said to them, “this Hebrew has been brought to us to make sport of us! He came in here to sleep with me, but I screamed. ¹⁵ When he heard me scream for help, he left his cloak beside me and ran out of the house.”
¹⁶ She kept his cloak beside her until his master came home. ¹⁷ Then she told him this story: “That Hebrew slave you brought us came to me to make sport of me.¹⁸ But as soon as I screamed for help, he left his cloak beside me and ran out of the house.”
¹⁹ When his master heard the story his wife told him, saying, “This is how your slave treated me,” he burned with anger. ²⁰ Joseph’s master took him and put him in prison, the place where the king’s prisoners were confined.

Hell has no fury like a woman scorned!! Joseph acts with complete integrity and rectitude and is lied about and framed. But, be of good cheer, when you suffer in the same way. This is not the end of the story of Joseph.
ESV–Implicit in this account is the idea that God’s presence with Joseph is linked to Joseph’s commitment to God.
As before, Joseph’s garment is used to deceive others.

But while Joseph was there in the prison, ²¹ the LORD was with him; he showed him kindness and granted him favor in the eyes of the prison warden.
God was with Joseph, and turned the most unpromising situations around–magically, miraculously, or God-likely.

²² So the warden put Joseph in charge of all those held in the prison, and he was made responsible for all that was done there. ²³ The warden paid no attention to anything under Joseph’s care, because the LORD was with Joseph and gave him success in whatever he did.
I think this is amazing. And have experienced it myself. One can be incredibly unfairly treated, “thrown into prison” metaphorically, and still the Lord can be with you, and give you success in whatever you do.
ESV By echoing the language of vv 2-5, these verses imply that Joseph’s experience in prison paralleled his earlier experience in Potiphar’s house. Again, because of the Lord’s presence with him, Joseph prospers.}

The Parable of the Sower, Matthew 13, Read Through the Bible Project

By Anita Mathias

Van Gogh The Sower

There is nothing more powerful than a story–than a parable. It grows with the reader, and we continue filling in the gaps with out own life experience.

This, one of Jesus’s five major discourses is called The Parabolic Discourse, because of its collection of parables. The English word parable comes from the Greek parabole, which means “a placing beside” and thus is a comparison or illustration. The synoptic Gospels have 30 parables, John none at all.

This is a rich and fabulous parable.

Matthew 13

¹ That same day Jesus went out of the house and sat by the lake. ² Such large crowds gathered around him that he got into a boat and sat in it, while all the people stood on the shore.
Sitting was the normal position for teachers. His parables use a narrative analogy to teach a moral or spiritual lesson. They produce different results–hiding truth from those not eager or ready for it, communicating truth to the disciples.

³ Then he told them many things in parables, saying: “A farmer went out to sow his seed. ⁴ As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. ⁵ Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. ⁶But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. ⁷ Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants. ⁸ Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop—a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown. ⁹ Whoever has ears, let them hear.”
One of Jesus’s favourite sources of parables was the natural world, which he created.

¹⁰ The disciples came to him and asked, “Why do you speak to the people in parables?”

¹¹ He replied, “Because the knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of heaven has been given to you, but not to them.

The secrets of the Kingdom, of how to live happily, of the knowledge of God, are not squandered but given to those who are willing to seek for them, and treasure them–like the first disciples were.

¹² Whoever has will be given more, and they will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them.

Those who have and treasure spiritual truth will receive even more. But those who do not treasure and live it–even the little truth they have will be taken from them.

¹³ This is why I speak to them in parables:

“Though seeing, they do not see;
though hearing, they do not hear or understand.

¹⁴ In them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah:

   “‘You will be ever hearing but never understanding;
   you will be ever seeing but never perceiving.
¹⁵ For this people’s heart has become calloused;
   they hardly hear with their ears,
   and they have closed their eyes.
Otherwise they might see with their eyes,
   hear with their ears,
   understand with their hearts
and turn, and I would heal them.’

God will heal those who truly try to see and hear and understand spiritual truth.
A hard heart will stand in the way of seeing and understanding spiritual truth.

¹⁶ But blessed are your eyes because they see, and your ears because they hear. ¹⁷ For truly I tell you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.
Jesus seldom interpreted his parables, but here he does so, because his disciples asked him to!! We see the power of the request again.

¹⁸ “Listen then to what the parable of the sower means: ¹⁹ When anyone hears the message about the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what was sown in their heart. This is the seed sown along the path.

Distraction works upon incomprehension.

²⁰ The seed falling on rocky ground refers to someone who hears the word and at once receives it with joy. ²¹ But since they have no root, they last only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, they quickly fall away.

Shallow roots, which means the word heard with joy is forgotten in a time of persecution.

²² The seed falling among the thorns refers to someone who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, making it unfruitful.

The word choked by hassles, worries, and giving too much importance to wealth. And who would have supposed that this text is 21 centuries old!!

²³ But the seed falling on good soil refers to someone who hears the word and understands it. This is the one who produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.”

But when the word is fruitful, its yield is exponential.
Typical agricultural yields were fivefold to fifteen fold, with a tenfold return considered a good yield.