Anita Mathias: Dreaming Beneath the Spires

Anita Mathias's Blog on Faith and Art

Archives for 2012

An autobiography in blog posts–II. Oxford, America, Marriage, Writing

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This continues my attempt to write an autobiography in 4 blog posts
1 Childhood, boarding school, a novice at Mother Teresa’s Convent

The city of dreaming spires (not my photo), Oxford, United Kingdom
Like many young Indians, I desperately wanted to leave India for wider, more adventurous and exciting horizons. When praying about where—the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand or England, I heard an inner voice—which I was somehow certain was God’s, though it was the first time I had heard it–say quite clearly “Just apply to Oxford.” So, I did, no contingency plans, and scrambled together scholarships from the university—the Radhakrishnan fellowship for Indians to study at Oxford and the Eckersley Trust fellowships for students of English at Oxford. I believe that Oxford is part of my destiny and God’s plan for me—though I still don’t know why!!
I earned have a BA and an MA in English from Somerville College, Oxford. My years in Oxford were intense and formative. I read a lot, learnt a lot, made mistakes, made life-long friends. I had been accepted for a Ph.D in English at Oxford, but didn’t get a First. I spent another formative year in Oxford after my degree, reading, and trying to write, and applying to America.
The nuns of the Sacred Heart in North Oxford had opened up their old novitiate to Christian (or barely Christian, as I was then) students, and living there was an intensely formative experience. In a place like Oxford, where many people are formidably clever, you learn as much from your fellow students and reading as from classes—and so I did!
I then moved to America to do a funded Masters in Creative Writing from Ohio State University. Didn’t care much for Columbus, but learned loads from the writing programme, especially from the Director, David Citino, who wasn’t then (though he bloomed later) a hugely talented poet, but one who had a formidable work ethic, the writers’ greatest asset. He woke at 4 a.m. and wrote, producing a prodigious output, but risking his health, and driving himself to an early grave.
And yeah, at the end of my degree, my faith which over those years at university moved from an activated-only-in-crisis SOS mode, to dormancy to near-death now revived. I recommitted myself to following Christ. That sounds grand, doesn’t it?–but becoming a Christian for me has never been the way a caterpillar becomes a butterfly, all in a summer’s afternoon, but the way an acorn becomes an oak. Very slowly.
I moved on to do a Ph.D in Creative Writing at SUNY-Binghamton, with permission to hand in a volume of poetry for my Ph.D as I did for my masters. I enjoyed the classes, but I was teaching two sections of undergraduate classes for tuition and $620 a month. No kidding! And all I wanted to do was read and write.
And so rather sooner than we had planned, after a four week engagement, I married to clever sweet Roy, who is also rather saintly (well, most of the time!)
Having earned a Ph.D in Maths from Johns Hopkins, he was then doing a post-doc in Computer Science at Cornell. He had a sweet fellowship, good anywhere, so once my Ph.D in Binghamton no longer tied him down, we moved to Stanford, Palo Alto, California, where he continued his post-doc in Computer Science. And I stayed home and read and wrote. 
Then we moved to Williamsburg, Virginia, in 1990. I was a fish out of water there, and hated it.
A year later, Roy won another post-doctoral fellowship to the University of Minnesota. I agreed to follow him. I basically felt any city would be better than Williamsburg, which offered no stimulation, no interesting writers, barely any cultural life.
And Minnesota was another of those incredibly fertile, blessed periods in my life. I was reading all the time, my head was buzzing with ideas. 
I had been writing poetry during that first year of marriage, and had pretty much written out all my ideas. (Wow, can’t imagine that happening with blogging or prose.) Around Jan 1991, I started reading women’s memoirs, Patricia Hampl, Annie Dillard, “Frost in May” Mary MacCarthy and a spring opened up within me, as I saw the deep buried world of childhood again, and saw the magic and poetry in it.
And as luck or providence had it, the Twin Cities, Minneapolis and St. Paul, had the largest concentration of memoirists and creative non-fiction writers in the US. I took an excellent, seminal creatively mind-expanding class in Creative Non-fiction from Charlie Sugnet. The work I did in his class during that term won a Memoir award of $6000 from the Minnesota State Arts Board. I also won an award from the Jerome Foundation which paid for a research trip to India. And an award from the Loft Writing Centre which linked me with a mentor. I took courses with Phillip Lopate, David Mura, and one on one with Carol Bly one on one, over several months.
It was one of those periods when most things I touched and tried turned to gold.  Cash grants, essay prizes, fellowships to writers’ conferences, a job teaching creative nonfiction at the Loft. I found a great writers’ group, who became my friends, loved church. And just before we left Minneapols, I went to a writers’ conference at Squaw Valley where I found a very well-known editor and agent Ted Solataroff and Ginger Barber interested in my manuscript.
I was so desperate not to return to Williamsburg that I persuaded Roy to buy a house in Minneapolis, figuring that if we had bought a house, God wouldn’t have the heart to move us. Yeah, sure. He’s not a tame lion. He’s wild and unpredictable. You can’t really control or manipulate him. All you can do is bow the knee.
We worshipped in John Piper’s church when then had a sign painted on its walls, Hope in God. “Yeah, hope in God that you’ll be able to stay in Minnesota,” I said to my soul. God smiled and replied, “No, no, Anita, hope in God because God is good.” But I did not hear him.
And then every job Roy applied to in industry, in academia turned him down—except for the professorship in William and Mary, which remained open.
And so to Williamsburg, we returned, mourning, mourning, mourning.
And stayed there for twelve years!
* * *

An Autobiography in Blog Posts I. Childhood, Boarding School, a Novice at Mother Teresa’s Convent!

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Sister Josephine, IBMV
St Marys Convent High School, Nainital India
St. Mary’s Convent, Nainital
Nainital
Nainital in winter
Looking at my stats, I’ve realized that my readership has increased by 350 percent since September, so I thought I would rewrite my About Me page. Well, it grew… so I am doing a series of four autobiographical posts, tentatively covering
I. Childhood, Boarding School, a Novice at Mother Teresa’s Convent,
II. Undergraduate days at Oxford, graduate school in America, Marriage
III. Minneapolis and Williamsburg, motherhood, writing
IV. Back to Oxford, business, blogging. So…

About Me
I was born in India and was born a Catholic, which was odd. My grandparents were born in Mangalore, a town converted by the Portuguese in the 16th century.
My childhood, I guess, could be summed up in two words: “reading,” a lot, precociously, and “mischief”.  I was known as the naughtiest girl in the school and was expelled from my first school, aged 8.
I then went to a Catholic boarding school run by Irish and German nuns, St. Mary’s Convent, in Nainital, a beautiful pristine hill-station in the Himalayas. It gave me a solid academic foundation.
The nuns required almost the same devotions of us as of themselves: daily Mass; Benediction: a cascade of hymns every Sunday evening; Adoration: silent prayer before the “Blessed Sacrament” every first Sunday; Confession, Rosary, and choir-practices.
One highlight of school was reading. We had 2.5 hours of silent study a day & I finished my homework quickly, then sat and memorized—poems, speeches, whole Shakespeare plays, passages of luscious prose. I had (probably still have, haven’t tested it) a freak verbal memory, and know a poem or scripture passage pretty much by heart after a few readings. But perhaps I wouldn’t have discovered this if we didn’t have to sit and study, all fiction banned, but not poetry or drama
The other highlight of school was my relationship with Sister Josephine, an Irish nun who invested in me, and said she loved me best of all the girls she had taught over the last 40 years. She would get me books from the nun’s library or the senior classes, train me in elocution, and discuss Scripture with me for hours, because I had dozens of sceptical questions. She was an Irish Protestant convert to Catholicism, and I think I absorbed a Protestant world view (the centrality of Jesus) from her. She quietly ignored all the add-on aspects of Catholicism (the dear departed in purgatory, saints, rosaries, novenas, making it easier to shed them later).
I was rebellious, an atheist, “the naughtiest girl in the school”, but after a sudden conversion experience decided to enter Mother Teresa’s convent and become a nun.
It followed the ancient Benedictine model, a mixture of work and prayer. Since I was still in training, we spent mornings in classes on theology, Scripture and their constitution, and in prayer. We worked in Mother Teresa’s homes in the evenings– in the home for dying destitute, orphans, and the mentally handicapped. (I’ve written about my work at Kalighat, the home for dying destitute in Zaleski’s Best Spiritual Writing series.
 The recitation of the Liturgy of the Hours–laud, none, vespers and compline, a melange of psalms and traditional prayers–ring-fenced the day in prayer. In addition, there was Mass; an early morning half-hour of silent meditation on scripture; an hour of “adoration,” or contemplative prayer; and a half hour of spiritual reading. A total of 3.5 hours in various spiritual activities. I did gain much familiarity with Scripture, which has been a blessing to me.
When I was there, 1979-1980, it was a young religious order, and eccentric, shaped by a visionary, who was revered, and apparently unquestioningly obeyed.
One of her dearly-held ideas was that one needed to voluntarily share the hardships of the poorest of the poor to have empathy for them.
The deliberate quest for extreme poverty meant that we were put 25 to a room, and there was a constant time-consuming shifting and re-arranging as the room became a refectory, a classroom, and a dormitory.
There was no running water which meant we spent half an hour every day in a crocodile, drawing buckets of water from the wells and transporting it to the bathrooms and kitchen. We had just 2 sets of white sarees, which meant daily hand-washing…
The food was simple, and nutritious enough, but, another peculiarity: there were large fixed quantities one had to eat, which were quite extreme: 5 chapatis for breakfast, and five ladles of rich for lunch and dinner. After a couple of her sisters caught TB on her original diet of salt and rice, rice and salt, she imposed this as a safeguard against disease.
Everything, even the pettiest details–subjects to meditate on as one dressed, mending sarees from thread unravelled from scraps, eating the skin of papayas– was controlled by rules. It was high-control, almost like a cult, legalistic and judgmental.  After a while, it becomes easier not to think for yourself, and instead do whatever would get you praised, or avoid what would get you judged.
We slept at 10, and woke at 4.40 a.m. for church, with a half hour mid-day nap. Since I was 17 when I joined, I was perpetually tired and felt constantly sleep-deprived. Sleep deprivation (used by cults, and authoritarian systems: labour camps, prisons) makes it easy to go along with authority and not question. My first thought on waking and predominant longing was for naps and bedtime. It wasn’t sustainable.
The first three years were a kind of boot-camp, deliberately harsh. The novice-mistresses had complete power over us (one of the vows was obedience) and I struggled with perceived injustice, and the authoritarianism with no recourse of complaint.
The nervous intensity of prayer, and scripture study and meditation can ironically heighten irritability, and the rub of community life 24/7 with 25 people sharing a medium sized room.
Two people had breakdowns when I was there. One just sat and giggled helplessly. Another was sent home and attempted to jump out from the bars of the train. Leaving the convent once you join was viewed as disgraceful in Indian Catholic society.
Eventually, I saw an image of myself in a train going ever further in the wrong direction, but afraid to get off for fear of looking foolish. I conquered my adolescent fear of looking foolish and asked for permission to leave.
And, in fact, my health was shattered, though no one realized this while I was in the convent. I returned home, deeply exhausted, and within the month was diagnosed with both early stage TB and hepatitis!

Continued–Oxford, America, Marriage, Writing

Seeking God in the storm of a marital quarrel

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St. John Vianney, the Cure of Ars, saw a French peasant visit his church every day at lunch, and sit motionlessly for an hour.

“What do you do?” he asked curiously.

“I look at him, and he looks at me,” the peasant replied.

                                            * * *

My prayer life moved from lists, intercession and busyness to a more contemplative resting after taking a “Catching the Fire” course with John Arnott (of the Toronto Airport Fellowship and Toronto Blessing) in Oxford, in May 2010. He taught us “soaking prayer” which really, really resonated with me, and felt natural.

And so now, I look at Him, and He looks at me. Ann Voskamp describes in One Thousand Gifts, how she cradled her plump 5 year old sleeping curly-headed daughter, feeling her warm, calm breath, feeling overwhelmed with love. And then the realization falls on her that that’s how God felt about her.

Yes, sometimes, when I am unreasonably delighted by something rather small in the big scale of things, I can almost see Jesus look at me, and laugh in delight, for he’s given it to me. I see him smile at me. I sense his love, affection and attention.

* * *

And sometimes, I sense him look at me with seriousness and
sadness,  and I squirm.

Like today.

Today was not a good day. I was exhausted by 9.30p.m. yesterday, but between excitable teens, emails, tweets, blog comments, social media, bubble baths, arranging tickets to Istanbul in April, reading, hanging out with Roy, it was past 1a.m. by lights out—without anything substantive being done.

Our pet ducks woke us up by quacking at 7 a.m. We were grumpy and friable, so I should have given Roy space and credit.

You know how when you’re tired small arguments can spiral out of control? Ours was about investing. Not the amount, or the instrument, but the frequency.

I handled both the company’s and our family’s accounts until last August, when I decided to focus more on my blog. It was silly me doing accounts, because Roy has a Ph.D and 3 post-doctoral degrees in Mathematics, and I—I dropped Maths at 15 (though I was rather good at it.)

But I doubted Roy would invest with steadiness, consistency and discipline–so I did the books!

I enjoy the things money can buy—travel, plants, being able to entertain friends, books, music, art, experiences—so I am not a natural saver. Knowing that, every week, I put some money into the mortgage, and twice that into savings and retirement, with a huge amount of pride and self-congratulation.

Roy is a naturally prudent spender and saver, and time-obsessed. He saves without thinking about it because he hates waste and unnecessary expenditure. He cannot see the point of this weekly squirreling.

“Let’s just put in a lump sum at the start of the month,” he said.

Me, “Oh, but then we’ll tie it up, and we might want a weekend away, or to catch a ferry to France, or we might have time to finally upgrade the sofa.”

He, “Well, don’t!”

Yeah, simple!!  Whoever said men are from Mars, women are from Venus got it wrong. Yeah, women are indeed from Venus. But men, men are from Pluto, or some perfectly dreadful distant planet.

“Do it my way, Roy,” I say, magisterially. “Slow and steady….”

Well, I don’t get to finish that sentence.

An explosion!

Now I get cross too, but it’s like a summer shower, heavy, and over in minutes.

He is generally quiet and patient, but when he’s had enough, well, it’s thunder, lightning, hail, the deluge all at once. And these atmospheric conditions are rather prolonged (until he gets his way).

Note the snarkiness of the last comment!
                                                             * * *

Ironically, I was working on a poem which flowed beautifully yesterday, which I almost felt Christ speaking to me, until the intensity of writing it exhausted me. I did not want to fight over trivia, and was annoyed by the fight. I wanted to get back into the zone, and overhear Christ dictate the rest of that intense, passionate poem.

So I kept my temper, and said quiet, calm but mildly sarcastic, mildly snarky things, which, of course, heightened Roy’s temper.

Okay, we are now factoring in New Year’s Eve fireworks to the thunder and lightning and hail which prevailed.

And eventually, the fireworks and weather die down. We reach a compromise on some of the thorny issues which have emerged, but not on investing. (“Come on, Roy, do it my way. Weekly,” I urge my blog, but not the Fearsome Man himself).

And I have quiet time. I look at Him and He looks at me. Sadly.

Oooh, and I repent.

I used to be a fiery girl. When did I become  passive-aggressive–the coward’s behaviour, which, above all others, I have the most contempt for?

So I kept my temper, but was as provocative as I had lost it. Didn’t fool Roy. Didn’t fool Jesus.

“Keep calm,” I tell myself, when Roy loses his temper. But that is not the right word to say to myself.

The right word, sigh, is

LOVE.

And if your blood is boiling, and you want to throw something at this infuriating stranger you loved last night, and this morning, and you now momentarily feel no love for? Well, say LOVE as a mantra, because that is what Christ would say to you, if he were physically present, counselling you.

And if you cannot say it, if you say, “If I have to love him NOW, I’ll burst”—well say other things.  Say, “Have mercy on me, O God, have mercy on me, for in you my soul takes refuge. I will take refuge in the shadow of your wings until the storm has passed. (Psalm 57:1)

Or  Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High
   will sing in the shadow of the Almighty.
I will say of the LORD, “He is my refuge and my fortress,
   my God, in whom I trust.” (Ps 97.1)

Yes, I will hide in Jesus in future, take refuge in Jesus, until the storm has passed. I will love if I can. I will not exacerbate matters with gently spoken snark, but speak the gentle words which turn away wrath.

Sounds good, doesn’t it? And not so easy when one is angry. And so I need to add, “So help me, God.”

* * *

Don’t you love the air after a thunderstorm? So clear, so full of promise. The birds and crickets sing.

So, our marital blowup has cleared the air…. Though this is not the best way. There has be a better one. We will seek it.


And okay, the next time that infuriating, adorable, clever, wrong-headed, exasperating and good husband of mine provokes me, hopefully I will be loving, rather than just controlling my temper; speak words of gentle life, rather than gentle provocation; and hopefully, the next time I look at other Man who loves me, I will look at him, and he will look at me, and there will not be reproach in his eyes. 

God in the cracks: A year in an earthquake zone: Christchurch, New Zealand. (Guest Post by Claudia McFie)

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Beauty among the ruins
Photo by Ross Becker, photographer 


24 February 2011, I was sitting beside a rural road near Christchurch, New Zealand, hugging my knees to my chest and trying to cry.
Two days earlier I had been running for my life as my city came crashing to the ground around me.  For the first two days I’d been concentrating so much on survival – walking 2 hours home, part of the way barefoot, then boiling rainwater we’d collected for using in the garden so we had something to drink, walking 5km to the only supermarket that was open to buy milk and bread.  


On this day, the emotions finally started catching up with me.
I sat surrounded by open fields and empty sky, yet every time I closed my eyes all I could see was the wall of a three story building toppling towards me in slow motion.  There is still gritty dust through my hair, ears and fingernails.  There is still no water supply, so no chance to wash, only hand sanitiser. 
Sitting beside that farm gate, my guts ached with grief.  It was a raw, bleeding, empty kind of feeling, like some part of my soul had been ripped out.  I was seeking solitude to cry and pray, but tears wouldn’t come, all I had was an aching pressure behind my eyes and a tightness in my chest.
I tried to pray, but words wouldn’t come, and all I could feel was the pain in my spirit.  All my mind can do is replay again and again my mind replayed the jolty jerky feeling in my stomach as the ground lurched beneath me. 
                                                                 * * *
I remembered a day in my late teens, more than 20 years ago, when I had also sought solitude, this time walking and sitting beside a river.  There I had prayed for the first time, “God, I can’t do this.  I’ve made a mess of my life, so I’m handing my life over to you.”  A promise came into my mind “Don’t be afraid.  I will never leave you or forsake you.  No matter where you go or what happens I will never leave you.
In February 2011 I couldn’t connect to God’s presence, but I held onto the promise that he was still with me, carrying me through this valley of the shadow of death.    Everything else has stripped away, but I cling onto Faith.
Since September 2010, my city has been experiencing an ongoing seismic event.  Some 10,000 aftershocks, 41 of them have been greater than magnitude 5.  The most recent “big” one was a magnitude 6 on 23 December 2011.  Even as I’m writing this I feel a vibration rumble past beneath me.  I inhale and my stomach clenches, then it passes. (That was a magnitude 3.4, at 3km depth about 10km south of my house).  Prior to September 2010, there had not been any significant earthquakes in the region for more than a century.
The past year, I’ve experienced the anxiety of going about life, never sure when the “next one” will come.  I would go into shopping malls, and scan around to work out where the best “safe place” would be.  I avoid brick walled buildings, crossing the street if I need to.
I’ve experieced watching the cranes and diggers and “munchers” demolish my city.  Nearly 1400 commercial buildings either have been or are being deconstructed, many of them heritage buildings.  The Cathedral that was the heart of my City lies in ruins, as the debate continues among both believers and non-believers for its future. 6,500 homes in the suburbs have been abandoned, the land unable to be rebuilt on.  Others still await the assessment of their fate.
As the days and weeks went by.  The tears came in their time, and I learned to grieve and lament.  But prayer remained beyond my reach.  I offered my tears as prayers, but the emptiness within me remained.  “I know there is more than this.  I’ve experienced God’s presence in the past, and I long to find that again.”
And the quakes kept coming.
Winter came, and our house was not weathertight – our chimney had collapsed leaving us without heating, and our roof covered by a tarpaulin.  Rainwater dripped through the ceiling.I was so thankful that our chimney was replaced by a steel flue and our woodburner repaired in time for the “once in 50 years” blizzard that hit mid year.  A month later we lived through a “once in 70 years” snow storm.
I strived to pray.  I tried to find my soul again, but the sense of connecting with God was simply not there.  I still felt hollow, like a part of me was missing.  Then I realised I was trying to find God with my own effort.  It’s like trying to pull myself up with my shoelaces.  “Lord, I can’t do this.  Only you can.  I’m letting go.  I am here, and I trust you.”
I was burnt out and exhausted.  I had run out of “cope”.  I went to work, I looked after my children, then once they were in their beds I would curl up on the sofa or on my bed.  I’d try to lose myself in reading fiction.  Anywhere but the here and now.  I didn’t even want to log onto my computer.  I stopped writing and blogging.  Everyone else I spoke to in Christchurch was experiencing the same kind of fatigue.
Recovery has come slowly.  It has taken over a year since that day beside the rural road.  Counselling has helped, as has asking as many people as I can to please pray for me.  The difference came as I found myself space to be quiet and still.  As I stopped trying to pray, I just sat and waited.  “I am here, Lord.”  In the stillness, I started to feel the smallest flicker, no more than a whisper of life within my spirit again.  I found that I could pray again, and feel the response within my spirit again.
2012 is the year my city will begin its rebuild.  It will never be the same as it was before the earthquakes, and tears come as I write that sentence, but what it will be is stronger, and better.  My life will never be the same again, but God has stayed true to his promise.  He never left me, and I know I will come through this stronger and better.
How you can help Christchurch recover:
1.     Pray.  Pray for those who grieve for the 185 lives lost on 22nd February 2011.  Pray for the injured, who are still recovering.  Pray for those traumatised, the emotional wounds that for many are still raw.  Those burnt out and exhausted. Pray for those struggling with insurance issues, and uncertaintity about their future.
2.     Donations can be made through:
*  The Christchurch Earthquake Mayoral Relief Fund  provides funding toward projects that contribute to the rebuilding of the social and physical infrastructure of Christchurch following the earthquakes.
*  The Red Cross 2011 Christchurch Earthquake Appeal is focused on welfare issues providing emergency & hardship grants as well as bereavement grants.
* The Christchurch Earthquake Appeal (NZ Government) will help rebuild those things that are at the heart of Christchurch communities, the places and services that make a city worth living in; community facilities which took decades of fundraising to put in place, such as sports fields, parks, community buildings and historic buildings, which were ruined within hours.
*******
Claudia McFie
Claudia is a working mother of three children (aged 3, 5 and 8) living in Christchurch New Zealand.  She started blogging in 2010 as Adulcia – Beneath the Surface.  You can see news footage of her experiences in the Christchurch Earthquake of 22nd February 2011 here. 

When your Blog is not on a Blogroll

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The Lamb’s Book of Life (Image credit)

You know that awkward moment, when you check a blogroll, kind of hoping you’ll be on it, and well…you’re not?

And your heart sinks.

And you say….

* * *

Well, 30 years ago–forget that, 3 years ago, if I were blogging then–I would have heard the word of torment, the word of the accuser of the brethren, the word of demand: MORE.

Blog more, comment more, network more. Get your name out there more.

Demon whispers.

I hear them, I hear them, and as Odysseus poured wax into the ears of his sailors so they’d be proof against the song of the sirens

I pour honey into my ears,

The honey of truth.

* * *

For this is what the Lover of Anita says.

“Who gave human beings their mouths? Is it not I, the LORD? 12 Now go; I will help you speak and will teach you what to say.” Exodus 4:11-12

And I still say More, but it is no longer a fist-clenched anxious more.

It’s a hands-open, humble one.

* * *

Help me to follow you more closely, Lord. May my blog develop in tandem with my spiritual life.

More of your spirit, Lord, more of you. Help me believe more deeply for you said:

Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him.”(John 7:38).

Ah, give me that, Lord. Streams of living water flowing through my blog, flowing to find readers to bless. And if my blog blesses people, well, I guess I don’t deeply care about blog-rolls.

Ah, let me swim, oh Lord, in the waters from your sanctuary. For it is written of the river which flows from your sanctuary: Fruit trees of all kinds will grow on both banks of the river. Their leaves will not wither, nor will their fruit fail. Every month they will bear fruit, because the water from the sanctuary flows to them. Their fruit will serve for food and their leaves for healing.” (Ezekiel 47: 12).

To grow in the waters of Spirit which flow from your sanctuary, and to bear fruit each month, fruit for food and leaves for healing—fruit from the Spirit!! And when you are swimming in the waters which flow from the sanctuary, when the tree of your life grows in it, and bears fruit every month—well then, blogrolls are secondary.

* * *

And I bring you again the two loaves and five fish of my talent. And I see you bless it. And, ouch, I see you break it.

And it doesn’t resemble the way I hoped to write, the way I planned to write, the way I was taught to write, the way I used to write.

And you—YOU distribute the loaves of words which have come from brokenness and quietness, words you have whispered to me in my distress—and seeing them read, I am satisfied.

I smile if I am on a blogroll,

And am content if I am not,

Because hearing, overhearing and recording your whispers, Lord,

That is the greatest work you have ever given me!!

 

 

 

 

“Laying Out”: A Guest Post by Jennie Bishop

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Jennie Bishop, author of
The Princess and the Kiss

 

 
My husband and I are worship leaders—him by position and career, me by example—and thus have come to know the human ego intimately. The best musicians are always those who know how and when to “lay out.” They can step back and let someone else take the solo, or recognize that their particular instrument’s voicing isn’t adding to the song during certain measures.
It’s not always easy to take your hands off a guitar when you’re itching to play a screaming solo, but the results are more satisfying to the audience. All it takes is the willingness to recognize that serving on the worship team is a privilege, not a right. We are instruments of service, and not stars in the making.
I know that I struggle similarly with writing. There have been many times when I haven’t been willing to “lay out.” My identity has been too fiercely tangled with my story making. I published my first compilation on the school ditto machine in sixth grade. I wrote my first (bad) novel in high school. I signed my friends’ yearbooks “Great Author of the Future.”
When I’m not working on a new project, I tend to be anxious. My discipline is worry, and I have a General Anxiety Disorder and medication to prove it. A few years ago, God mercifully exposed my anxiety issues by allowing me into a chaotic, unpredictable life in Orlando. This year He has turned the tables to the extreme by gifting my husband with a wonderful position and our family with a small condo on the beach in Daytona.
You would think life here is idyllic. My writing desk looks right out the window onto the Atlantic. I can count the dolphins or pelicans as they make their way up and down the shoreline. The waves provide a constant, mesmerizing background of music, even worship.
But since October, I’ve barely sat at that desk.
God, in His desire to stretch and form me in yet another direction, made it clear upon my husband’s acceptance of this new position that I was to separate myself from writing for a time to simply be a mother and wife. My tenth grader was making a hard school transition, and my graduate moved home to work and prepare for college. My husband needed my support at home and in his position.
I am aware of the daily need to be willing to scrub floors or sing a solo at a moment’s notice. I concur with Brother Lawrence in the necessity of  practicing the presence of God, in prayer, dish-doing and laundry-folding. But the long season of non-writing became difficult, especially with a finished manuscript on my desk, awaiting a home. I began to ask what all that work had been for. I wondered if I was simply being lazy or my rest was actually a gift of God. I slipped intermittently back into worry, even depression.
One day I discovered a blog from Anita when I was searching for information unpacking the “weaned child” passage in Psalm 131. How I longed to rest this way, satisfied in my Father’s lap, without the anxiety of analyzing every moment of my existence.
Anita’s “Working Restfully” blog spoke deeply to my heart as God assured me, again, that my writing Sabbath was good, that I did not need to push and shove my way into a publishing situation.
* * *
About the same time, Randy asked me to lead a song, one of my favorites, in a coming worship service. I had agreed—until practice, when I tried out the key. I wanted to sing with passion, but instead was distracted by uncomfortable notes in my lower range. I waved the instrumentalists down.
“Um, I think Tiffany should sing these verses,” I suggested. I knew Tiffany had sung the song beautifully at another service when I had been absent.
“But this is your favorite song,” my husband reminded me.
“It is,” I agreed. “But just because it’s my favorite doesn’t mean I’m the best one to sing it. I’m going to lay out.”
Tiffany was delighted, and so was I—the results were so much better. I’ve removed a distraction that would have affected not only me, but possibly our whole congregation. Now the way is open for us all to freely worship.
Godliness with contentment is great gain. This is my quest: not to long for “star quality,” in singing, in writing, in speaking or in homemaking (is that possible?) … but to be fully content to “lay out,” to wait, to relax like a weaned child in my Father’s arms. There is the only place where any lasting satisfaction can really be found. There is the place of constant rest, as I find my identity fully safe and complete in Christ.
                                                                                      ***
Jennie Bishop is the author of the best-selling children’s book, The Princess and the Kiss. She is also the founder of PurityWorks, a not-for-profit that provides resources for the development of good hearts in small children as preparation for them to embrace sexual purity as they grow.

 

First Things First

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 C.S. Lewis  in his essay First and Second Things says, “When first things are put first, second things don’t diminish, they increase.” You can’t get second things by putting them first; you can get second things only by putting first things first. 

In other words, it’s the counter-intuitive paradox at the heart of the Christianity.
Want success as a blogger or writer? Put God and your duties as wife and mum first; run an orderly home; contribute to the happiness of your husband and children; take responsibility for your physical health, and you are more likely to be able to write and blog at full steam with God’s blessing.
Want friends. Again, put God, and your family first. A sense of peace, order and happiness will pervade your life, and friendships will be easier to form.
It’s the same with money or a career. Put them first, ahead of your spiritual life, health, family and friendships, and you will quite likely jeopardise all of these. But if the foundations are firm, you are free to set about making money with all your imagination and strength—and there are times in life when extra money has to be made!!
“Seek first the kingdom of god, and all these things will be added unto you.”
In other words, First Things First.

Putting second things first is a recipe for disorder in one’s finances, housekeeping, or personal and life organization.
Even in the micro-level of a day by doing our most important tasks first, relative peace and order pervades our life, and we have more mental peace for second things. It is the foundation of successful time-management.
(And as somebody, who is not naturally highly organized and disciplined, I can testify from the experience of failure that this is trueJ)

Forgiveness and Forgetfulness, a guest post by Tanya Marlow

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Forget-me-not
by bill_canada
Last night I told my husband (slightly sheepishly) that I had bought some MORE children’s books.  
I like to buy children’s books and my boy likes to read them. It is not just a purchase, it is an Investment. So I am reasonably sure that although we didn’t discuss this purchase together beforehand (as we are accustomed to doing) that Jon won’t mind. 
“Do you mind?” I asked.
“Well, no – except that – do you remember the discussion we had where I asked you to stop buying books and you agreed?”
My face fell. I had forgotten that conversation.

He was right. We had agreed not to buy any more books just at the moment. After the last belletristic bundle (Dr Seuss! How can you say no to Dr Seuss?) I had promised to restrain my trigger-happy internet-purchasing finger. I had promised – and then I had forgotten. 

He smiled. (I think, deep down, he agrees that they are an Investment).

We are a forgetful people.

*********


The Israelites hated their slavery in Egypt, but they had forgotten that by the time they reached the desert. “At least in Egypt we had meat!” they complained.  Already they had devalued their freedom.

Peter denied Jesus three times, and then wept when the cockerel crowed. He had forgotten the loyalty he had sworn just hours before.

In the time of the Judges they forgot about the Lord, and served other Gods.  God executed judgement; they remembered. Then they forgot that they had forgotten, and did it all again.

We are a forgetful people. 


******** 

Every time I write in my spiritual journal I find I am writing the same things again and again. Why have I not learnt this lesson?  Why do I always fall into the same sin, the same patterns? 
I wonder if I am the only one who always seems to return to the same place with God, repenting of  those same sins I was battling a year before.

We are a forgetful people.

 ******** 
I watch my boy playing in the kitchen.  He opens the cupboard, and I am poised, rebuke at the ready.  He looks at the cupboard, looks at me; his eyes glinting with defiance and hope.  I return his gaze with steadfastness and warning. Then he reaches a hand in –
“No, darling. You’re not allowed to touch.”

He closes the door and plays elsewhere.  Two minutes later he returns; opens the cupboard, reaches inside.
“No darling – what did Mummy say?”

I don’t get too cross. We are a forgetful people.  

******** 
So much of my sin is tied up in forgetting; forgetting who God is, what He has done for me, who I am before Him. I forget His nature, His goodness, His commands. I forget my vows, my resolutions, my debt of gratitude.  I forget the break-through revelation I had last month, the one that would make all the difference to my spiritual discipline and restore my enthusiasm and fervour. I forget the sermon that I heard this morning. 
I am grateful for the repetition of the Bible.  I need to hear the consistent cadence of fall, grace, atonement, redemption that recurs throughout the symphony of His revelation, reiterating time and again the promises of a generous God.   
I am glad that I have a God who remembers.  I am glad that I have a God who reminds me. 
But I am also glad, that for some things, I have a God who forgets:

“For I will forgive their wickedness
and will remember their sins no more” (Jer 31:34)

For those days when I am more aware than usual of my wickedness, my fallenness, my foolishness, it is a relief to know that God is not sitting keeping score of my failures.  He has promised to forgive them and wipe them out.  He has forgotten them.

We are a forgetful people. We need a forgetful God. 

Over to you: 
 – What are the ways that you see sin and forgetfulness intertwined in your life? 
 – What things help you to remember God’s character?
*******


Tanya Marlow

Tanya Marlow is passionate about teaching the Bible, answering tricky questions of faith and training others to do this.  In the past she has done this in student and church ministry and as Associate Director of the Peninsula Gospel Partnership (PGP) Bible training course. Right now she does it by reading Bible stories to her toddler, as she learns what it means to be a stay-at-home mum who is also housebound with severe M.E. Her blog is called Thorns and Gold: on the Bible, illness, emotions, life.