Anita Mathias | Anita Mathias: Dreaming Beneath the Spires

Make Straight Paths for the Lord

^{Mark 1, Blog Through the Bible Project}

¹ The beginning of the good news about Jesus the Messiah,^[a] the Son of God, ² as it is written in Isaiah the prophet:
   “I will send my messenger ahead of you,
   who will prepare your way”—
³ “a voice of one calling in the wilderness,
‘Prepare the way for the Lord,
   make straight paths for him.’”

What does it take for you to make straight paths for the Lord?

These are some things which help me clear a pathway for God

1 Silence

2 Brutal honesty about where I really am, what I am really preoccupied about.

3 Prayer, a beseeching for aerial support in my hour of conflict and trouble.

4 Limiting busyness. Being intense and highly strung, I try and limit social things to two a week, maybe three. More than that, I don’t enjoy them, and it does effect my inner dialogue with Christ.

5 Scripture, which introduces fresh ideas, insight and conviction into the petri dish of my thoughts.

6 Most of all, repentance helps me create a straight path for God to enter my soul.

The Dances of Intimacy and Anger

By Anita Mathias

About twenty years ago, when we were newly-weds, Harriet Lerner’s books, The Dance of Intimacy and The Dance of Anger were recommended to us.

Essentially–it’s been a while since I read them–the books view relationships as a dance. The longer you are in a relationship, the more it becomes automatic and conditioned. A: says/does; B responds in anger or pique. Which gives A what s/he was looking for if s/he is passive-aggressive.

B is having a bad day. Says/does what is guaranteed to push A’s buttons. A obligingly reacts as expected.

A dance. It gets nowhere. Spinning round and round the dance floor in circles.

The good news is that it takes two to tango. Two to continue in an unsatisfying, unproductive dance.

And either one can just change the steps.
* * *

Since Roy took early retirement last year to run our family business, we’ve been together a lot. Not in the same house, but in the same property. (We had presciently bought a property with a self-contained ensuite granny apartment in the garden, which is now my study.)

And so working on our relationship is becoming more important.

I am slowing down in various ways; one positive way is that I have begun to interrogate the way I act and react rather than responding instinctively. Begun to slow down, and ask myself why I am feeling the way I am.

I am realizing that I do not need to react in the way I always used to–instinctively, from the gut. That I can step back, take counsel with the Lord, and determine what the best thing to say and do is. That I can change the steps of the dance.

It’s an amazing realization for me–that at any time we can change habitual ways of reacting that might have become so engrained that we think of them as our personality or character.

That in Christ, we are free to change at any time of our lives.

A Voice Calling in the Wilderness

By Anita Mathias

Mark 1: 1-3–Blog Through the Bible Project

¹ The beginning of the good news about Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God, ² as it is written in Isaiah the prophet:

“I will send my messenger ahead of you,
who will prepare your way”
³ “a voice of one calling in the wilderness,

A voice calling in the wilderness.

For me, there is hope in that phrase.

Would the wilderness–solitude, no human companionship, none of the works of art, civilization, learning, the absence of iron sharpening iron, an absence of everything but you and God–be considered a suitable training ground for the development of a unique voice, which has something real, and of urgency to say to the world?

Apparently so.

The voice which comes out of the wilderness is uniquely your own.

But if it is to have something of lasting value to say to the world, then it must also be a voice which has clearly heard God’s voice in the wilderness, and is tempered, modulated and profoundly influenced by that other voice heard in the wilderness.

The voice which has heard God’s voice in the wilderness can cry with an unforgettable power, poignancy and urgency which will echo through the centuries.

All Power

By Anita Mathias

All Power on Heaven and Earth is Given Unto Me–Blog Through the Bible Project

The Great Commission

¹⁶ Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. ¹⁷ When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. ¹⁸Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.

The scope of Christ’s authority is the entire universe.

And so the boundaries of what is possible and what is impossible are very thin indeed. Because Jesus has the authority to shift these seemingly intractable boundaries.

And therein lies the point and power of prayer: That Christ has the power to shift anything.

¹⁹ Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, ²⁰ and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.

His last commission, to teach people to obey his commands.

ESV The name, not names of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit is an early indication of the Trinitarian Godhead, and an overt proclamation of Jesus’ divinity.

And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

And so Matthew ends with the reassuring and empowering words of him who came to earth to be “God with us” and the Gospel of Matthew ends with the wonderful affirmation of the constant presence of Jesus with us until the end of the age.

Lonely? Afraid? Full of foreboding?

Christ walks beside you. He is with you always.

ESV Jesus concludes the commission, and Matthew his Gospel with the crucial element of discipleship: the presence of the Master who is “God with us.”

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All Power on Heaven and Earth is Given Unto Me.

By Anita Mathias

The Great Commission

The scope of Christ’s authority is the entire universe.

And so the boundaries of what is possible and what is impossible are very thin indeed. Because Jesus has the authority to shift these seemingly intractable boundaries.

And therein lies the point and power of prayer: That Christ has the power to shift anything.

¹⁹ Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, ²⁰ and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.

His last commission, to teach people to obey his commands.

ESV The name, not names of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit is an early indication of the Trinitarian Godhead, and an overt proclamation of Jesus’ divinity.

And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

Lonely? Afraid? Full of foreboding?

Christ walks beside you. He is with you always.

ESV Jesus concludes the commission, and Matthew his Gospel with the crucial element of discipleship: the presence of the Master who is “God with us.”

Enough: Random Thoughts

By Anita Mathias

John Bogle, founder of the mutual fund, Vanguard, wrote a book called Enough, in which he says “not knowing what is enough leads us astray in life leading to the subversion of our

character and values.”

He got his title after overhearing a a conversation between Kurt Vonnegut and Joseph Heller at a party hosted a billionaire hedge fund manager. Vonnegut tells Heller that the manager made more money in a day than Heller made over the lifetime of Catch-22.

Heller quips: “Yes, but I have something he will never have: Enough.”
* * *

Enough. One rarely meets anyone who has it. And when one does, one is charmed by a merry twinkle in the eye, a sense of peace and freedom.

Over the last few months, Roy and I have been hanging out with an alternative Christian community called MayBe, people who are embracing voluntary simplicity. What strikes us is that they do have a sort of gaiety and simplicity–and, especially, have so much more time: time to read, time to think, and time to offer hospitality often and simply in houses that apparently haven’t been tidied up for guests. (Perhaps one just needs to do that–have people over in a house which hasn’t been tidied up– to be able to have them over more more often. I still tidy a bit before guests arrive, but less and less each time, just 10-15 minutes.)
* * *

I have been thinking about the word, “Enough” with some worry. I hope I will have the wisdom to know when I have it.

We decided we had enough last year, when Roy decided to get off the academic treadmill. He had a chair in applied mathematics, and was a researcher. The cruel thing about academic research is that the concept of Enough is foreign to it. There is always more one can do–more papers to read, more papers to write, more things to learn, more stuff in a constantly evolving field to keep up with.

* * *

Ars longa, vita brevis is an aphorism attributed to Horace. Art is long but life is short. It takes a long time out of a short life to learn an art. If one is perfectionistic as a writer or artist, again, enough will prove an illusion. You will never be good enough. There will always be more to read, more to learn, more practice. For years, this perfectionism dogged me, sapping the joy out of writing.

I have found peace as a writer by making peace with the best writing I could produce in a reasonable time frame. Making peace with “good enough.” One might not create pitch-perfect writing, but will have a lot more fun doing it.
* * *

We have owned a small, but steadily expanding business for four years. Suddenly, it becomes important to know when enough is enough, so that one is not guilty of another kind of wage-slavery, working for money one does not need.

We decided to set a figure, a net worth figure, after which we will put the business in maintenance mode, rather than slow expansion mode.

We both sat down and worked out what we thought this figure should be, and then compared notes.

Roy’s figure, amusingly, was almost exactly ten times what mine was. And there lies the difference between our characters. I had figured on us maintaining the same level of health–pretty robust–and expenditure, as at present. He made provision for increasing medical expenses, and the increased expenses of an aging house!! Duh! Never thought of that! We’re going with his larger figure, since he is the mathematician, after all.
* * *

So what does Scripture have to say about when enough is enough?

A few things. I love this proverb. “Do not wear yourself out to become rich. Have the wisdom to show restraint.” Proverbs 23:4.

Jesus cautions, “Be on your guard against all kinds of greed.”

And then there’s Jesus’s wonderful parable of the fool who built bigger barns!! He lives in the future tense. I will build bigger barns. And then, I will say to myself, take life easy, eat, drink and be merry.

God calls him a fool, because in fact, death overtakes him before he does any of these things. And God interrogates him, “All these things you have stored for yourself, whose then will they be?”
***

I liked the New Yorker cartoon which shows vulturous relatives gathered as a will is read. The will says simply, “Being of sound mind, I have decided to spend it all now.”

There is something sane and healthy about that, though I would not like to die with my finances quite so neatly balanced. A good man leaves an inheritance for his children’s

children. Proverbs 13:22 An inheritance is a sweet and

magical thing–goodness one hasn’t earned!!–and to bless

your children with it that plays a part in people working for

longer than they need to.

* * *

I was interested in following the Galleon hedge fund scandal,
partly because almost all the key players were from the Indian sub-continent. I listened to some of the wire-tapped recordings of high-level shenanigans, all highly fraudulent, of course. I have heard men talk like that all my life, but with some internal amusement. I would have assumed they were showing off, and wouldn’t have taken them seriously. “You wouldn’t have taken them seriously?” Roy asks, astonished. Yeah, which is why I suppose I don’t work on Wall Street, unlike my younger sister, who is a highly successful director of a Wall Street firm of venture capitalists.

What got these guys, all of whom had a net worth of billions, or at least tens of millions, into trouble was not knowing the meaning of enough.
* * *

Few people do. The editor Ted Solotaroff who read and commented on my essays when I was starting out as a writer used to say that success as a writer is an exchange of one level of frustration, anxiety, difficulty and doubt for another. So it is in any career. The once coveted recognition is taken for granted, as one begins to crave the next rung on the ladder, and envy those on it!!
* * *

For me, the only way to learn the meaning of enough is to work for the love of God–trying to make the most of the gifts he has given me, within the constraints of a balanced life–and leaving the success or failure of my enterprises to him.
* * *

And learning the meaning of enough opens up many things–time for relaxation, time for friends, time for hobbies. Time to simply be.
* * *

The write A.N. Wilson wrote somewhere that writers make the most awful revelations about themselves in their good characters– for it is hard to create a fully rounded character who has a depth of goodness which you have not achieved yourself.

Preachers and bloggers make the same revelations about themselves in the subjects they choose to speak or blog about. They thereby reveal their Achilles heel.
* * *

The concept of enough has a particular piquancy for me because I find it hard to know when enough is enough, whether it is with buying books, or plants for my garden, or laying off the chocolate, or giving someone who has fascinated me space, or stopping work on something which fascinates me, or expanding my business, or …. whatever…
* * *

Fortunately, for those born restless, like I am, there is a source of Enough.

“Thou hast made us for thyself, Oh Lord, and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in you,” Augustine wrote.

There is rest, there is enough, in Infinity, in God, who has Enough, and Enough and Enough for even the most restless spirit.
* * *

Recycling: How Public Policy can change Private Behaviour

By Anita Mathias

Forced recycling in South Oxfordshire

I am a bit of a fan of Flylady, the somewhat annoying American Domestic Organization goddess. She suggests that one should not get caught up in guilt about recycling until one has one’s act together, domestically, and is running a smooth and efficient household.

And so I did not. I was an extremely sporadic recycler.

In my travels around Europe however, I was impressed by how European local governments used carrots and sticks to get people to recycle.

* * *

In Switzerland, for instance, household waste can only be discarded in small black plastic bags, which can only be bought from the council, for 8 francs, I seem to remember. Dropping stuff off in the recycling was free. Guess what? Precious little household waste went to landfill.

Supermarkets had machines at which one could return cans and bottles and get one’s deposit. Everyone seemed to be doing this, the well-dressed and posh, and the scruffier.

* * *

Last year, my county, South Oxfordshire, decided it did not want to be fined for over-use of landfill.

So it limited us to ONE wheelie bin of rubbish a fortnight, and one wheelie bin of recycling a fortnight.

However, they would clear as much recycling as you put out. If you put out more trash than would fit in your bin, they would refuse to clear it, as we learnt by experience. And you would need to drive to the tip, or somehow generate a lot less rubbish in the next fortnight.

* * *

In the days when the bin men collected as much as you put out, our family generated four or more bags of rubbish a week, don’t ask how.

Now, it’s become a bit of a challenge to try to fit two weeks worth of rubbish into one bin.

We’ve started recycling regularly, for the first time, but are probably still scratching the surface of what can be recycled–70 percent of household waste, some say.

We’ve started composting, and I, in particular, am fascinated by this garden magic, turning food scraps, garden clippings, and cardboards into black, rich crumbly earth.

We used to have ducks and chicken, but after one was eaten; one terrified to death after being grabbed; and one mauled horrifically by a fox, we took a break from poultry keeping. We are now going to try again, with a larger movable arc and more vigilance. I like the idea of a domestic eco-system–food scraps given to the ducks, eggs produced for humans, duck waste and egg shells to the compost for further human and duck food.

* * *

South Oxfordshire has certainly stumbled upon a very effective way of changing people’s behaviour by limiting the amount of rubbish–but not the amount of recycling they’ll clear. It’s forced us to learn to slow down, and learn what’s recyclable and what isn’t, and then to actually do it.

The Resurrection–Blog Through the Bible Project

By Anita Mathias

The Resurrection

The hands of the Risen Christ, Jacob Epstein

Matthew 27: 57-66

The Burial of Jesus

⁵⁷ As evening approached, there came a rich man from Arimathea, named Joseph, who had himself become a disciple of Jesus. ⁵⁸ Going to Pilate, he asked for Jesus’ body, and Pilate ordered that it be given to him. ⁵⁹ Joseph took the body, wrapped it in a clean linen cloth, ⁶⁰ and placed it in his own new tomb that he had cut out of the rock. He rolled a big stone in front of the entrance to the tomb and went away. ⁶¹ Mary Magdalene and the other Mary were sitting there opposite the tomb.
ESV–Joseph was a member of the Sanhedrin who did not consent to the actions against Jesus (Luke 23 50-51). His high standing within the Jewish community gave him access to Pilate.

Isaiah 53:9 “He was assigned a grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death, though he had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth.”

The Guard at the Tomb

⁶² The next day, the one after Preparation Day, the chief priests and the Pharisees went to Pilate. ⁶³ “Sir,” they said, “we remember that while he was still alive that deceiver said, ‘After three days I will rise again.’ ⁶⁴ So give the order for the tomb to be made secure until the third day. Otherwise, his disciples may come and steal the body and tell the people that he has been raised from the dead. This last deception will be worse than the first.”

⁶⁵ “Take a guard,” Pilate answered. “Go, make the tomb as secure as you know how.” ⁶⁶ So they went and made the tomb secure by putting a seal on the stone and posting the guard.

Matthew 28

¹ After the Sabbath, at dawn on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to look at the tomb.

² There was a violent earthquake, for an angel of the Lord came down from heaven and, going to the tomb, rolled back the stone and sat on it. ³ His appearance was like lightning, and his clothes were white as snow. ⁴ The guards were so afraid of him that they shook and became like dead men.

⁵ The angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus, who was crucified.
The discourse between angels and humans always begins with the same injunction, “Do not be afraid.”

⁶ He is not here; he has risen, just as he said. Come and see the place where he lay. ⁷ Then go quickly and tell his disciples: ‘He has risen from the dead and is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him.’ Now I have told you.”
Galilee: The central location of Jesus’s earthly ministry continues in importance during his post-resurrection ministry.

⁸ So the women hurried away from the tomb, afraid yet filled with joy, and ran to tell his disciples. ⁹ Suddenly Jesus met them. “Greetings,” he said. They came to him, clasped his feet and worshiped him.
ESV The women take hold of his feet showing that this is no mere vision or hallucination, but a physical resurrection. By allowing this act of worship, Jesus accepts the acknowledgement of his deity, since only God is to be worshiped.

¹⁰ Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid. Go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me.”

And he returns, full of kindness. Do not be afraid, he tells the women, and in total forgiveness of the brothers who deserted him arranges a rendez-vouz in Galilee.

The Guards’ Report

¹¹ While the women were on their way, some of the guards went into the city and reported to the chief priests everything that had happened. ¹² When the chief priests had met with the elders and devised a plan, they gave the soldiers a large sum of money, ¹³ telling them, “You are to say, ‘His disciples came during the night and stole him away while we were asleep.’ ¹⁴ If this report gets to the governor, we will satisfy him and keep you out of trouble.” ¹⁵ So the soldiers took the money and did as they were instructed. And this story has been widely circulated among the Jews to this very day.

ESV–Faced with the reality of Jesus’ resurrection, the religious leaders are forced once again to conspire together in order to preserve their religious and political influence.

The Christians said. The Jews said. So someone is lying–the guards or the disciples.

Whom do you think is more likely to be lying–people who would lose everything if they told the truth, or people who would lose everything if they lied? The soldiers faced possible execution for dereliction of guard duty, one of the most severe offenses while occupying foreign territory.

The disciples would be in danger of being whipped, cast out of the synagogue, and losing their very lives by lying about the resurrection. Would a bunch of liars write such beautiful books as letters as Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Peter and James have written? Would they be so utterly transformed?

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