Anita Mathias: Dreaming Beneath the Spires

Anita Mathias's Blog on Faith and Art

In Which There is Always Room

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Neapolitan presepe with classical ruins - photo

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How He changed everything,
The One for whom there was no room.

And now, it’s forever
Different.

“Come in,” he says,
“Welcome.”
“There’s always room.”

“Room for the straight, and room for the crooked,
Room for the queer and room for the odd,
Room when you’ve messed up, and are so sorry
Room when you cannot see why you should be sorry.”

Room for the kind ones, and room for the mean ones,

Room for the “Don’t know why I am so mean ones.”

Room for the sleek, always-praised-and-loved ones

Room for the abused, bruised, and knocked-about ones.

 

“Room for those whose knock is timid, tenuous:
‘I’ve messed up,
I need you
I want you
I can’t do without You!’ ”

“Come in,” he says,
To us who so long for his coming
Into our fainting, faltering hearts.

“Come in.
There is always room,
There is always enough.
I died to ensure it.
Come, eat me,
Drink me,
Dance with me.
Welcome.”

The Favourites of the Lord

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Correggio

Who wouldn’t want a unique vision of angels?
Who wouldn’t want a cutting-edge vision of Jesus and to hear his compelling, electrifying, history-making, immortal words?
Who wouldn’t want to be the first to hear the biggest story of all time? To be entrusted to sharing it with the church and the world?  To have the most compelling vision and revelation there ever was? And be eternally famous as a result?
* * *
Ah, who would want to hang out alone in a place where there is no guarantee Jesus will show up, but where you last saw him?
And if he is not there, then there is no reward, nothing achieved from your trek to the secret place, no church status gained, no literary or blogosphere status gained.
It is time wasted; it is self wasted; it is discouraging.
You will perhaps have expended time seeking him whom your heart loves in the secret places—and returned without honey. As all spiritual seekers sometimes ostensibly do.
* * *
To whom did the Risen Christ reveal himself? To those who sought him, even though, evidently, there was nothing to be gained from the quest. To those who sought him for himself. 

To Mary, who went to the garden tomb, because that was where she had last seen Jesus, without any thought that she might see him there again. Alive!
To the three Marys who come with spices and perfume to him they loved so much in the place they last saw him with no expectation that they would see or hear the living Christ.
In The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Lucy and Susan are the first to see the risen Aslan, because they were there on the morning after.
Did he pick out Mary (or Lucy or Susan) because they were his favourites?
No, I believe anyone who loved him enough to take the time to be there would have seen and heard the risen Aslan/Jesus.
Revelation and blessing come to those who hang out, slow down and linger.
* * *
Many seek significance in the church, and the Christian world. Many want to be someone, to be praised, respected, admired. To be important.
And these are instinctive human desires. Each of us is significant in God’s sight. And he designed us to be born into little circles of significance: the apple of our parents’ eyes, our friends’ beloved friend, and to steadily grow circles of significance and influence in which we can be a blessing.
But significance cannot be grabbed; it has to be given to us. It is given to us as we put first things first; as we seek the significant.


And if the tree of our life is to tower high, to bless many, to be significant in the body of Christ, our roots must go correspondingly deep into the secret places of Christ. We must drink of his sweet words, his life-giving waters.
Mary seeks Jesus in the garden tomb with perfume and spices because she loves him. She has no thought of reward. He rewards her with himself. She sees him, he speaks to her; she pounces on him. He gives her a vision, which spread far and wide among the disciples and reverberates twenty centuries later.
So if you feel unknown, unheard, insignificant, put first things first.
Go to him who has never doubted your significance, just hang out with him,
God gives himself, his wisdom, his vision, his revelations to those who hang out with him.
Just as Pharaoh’s magicians could mimic what Moses did, many can speak thundering or eloquent words. What ultimately cannot be mimicked is the validation of God, the blessings God showers on you, and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon your life and ministry making it powerful. What cannot be mimicked is love, joy, peace, and the gifts of the Holy Spirit.
And these things come, in the measure that pleases God, to those who take the time to hang out with him for no reward other than his sweet self. 

And to those who thus seek him in a noisy world of competition and hustling (even within the church), he has promised a reward.
When you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you openly. (Matthew 6:6).
  

What I am taking up and giving up for Lent

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I don’t believe I have given up anything for Lent (well, for the whole of Lent) since I was a novice in Mother Teresa’s convent. (Entering that convent was my teenage rebellion!)
As I’ve written, I had entirely too much of Catholicism and Catholic practices, so it’s been almost 30 years since I’ve bothered with Lent, which has connotations for me of forced, smarmy piety. The nuns used to give us a big heart with little coloured hearts. We were to fill one of these in whenever we made an “act,” a little sacrifice. Bit our tongues, picked up scraps of rubbish we saw, passed up a sweet. (Actually come to think of it, all these practices could still be useful to me today).
But this year, a friend suggested to me that I practice Lent traditionally because there is something special about the 40 day preparation in Lent for the glory of God to be revealed. To see his incomparably great power for us who believe which is like the working of his mighty strength when he resurrected Jesus.
I have decided to do Lent properly. Give up something to make room in my heart for God. And put on something to fill the void.
First, I thought I would give up sugar (anything sweet or desserts) and chocolate. But you see, following a health scare which left me disinclined to eat anything which does not bless my body, I have already given those up, and will continue through Lent (though I will probably have the occasional treat after Lent).
So I have decided to try modified fasting as detailed in this online course I’m following. It’s not water fasting—one has milk, veggie juices, and veg soup. However, fasting does simplify life in that one has more time for God and contemplation.
I have tried fasting before, and it’s always been a blessing. In breakthroughs with caffeine addiction, in breakthroughs in my writing, with good ideas and clear thinking.
It makes me a bit grumpy and cranky though!
A bad habit or an addiction, such as comfort or emotional eating is not easily broken in a vacuum, as Jesus points out in this little illustration.  The unhealthy crutch and coping mechanism has to be replaced by a healthy crutch or coping mechanism, as detailed in Colossians 3.
 5 Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. 8 But now you must also rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. 9 
 12 Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. 13 Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. 14 And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.
So, what am I going to put on?
Well, the same friend I mentioned earlier suggested praying for the comfort and the filling of the Holy Spirit whenever I am tempted to eat when I am not hungry (but am bored, stressed, angry, sad, worried, restless, excited, hyper, happy). It has been amazing, and just cutting that habit of eating when not physically hungry has helped me shed 3 pounds this week.
I am also going to continue blogging through the words of Jesus in the Gospel of John which I started in Advent. (See Let Nothing be Wasted or Friend, Come Higher.)
What’s that, Anita? More blogging? But you are too sedentary already. Nooooo.
Well, okay, since, I intend to read through the Bible again this year, and am a bit behind, I am adding in a 20 minute walk to my regular exercise, listening to the Bible on my iPod through Lent. And the extra help will ensure I finish it by the 31st of DecemberJ
So that’s me. What about you?
Trivia: Lent comes from O.E. lencten “springtime, spring,” from W.Gmc. *langa-tinaz “long-days.” Lent refers to the increasing daylight. And welcome lengthening daylight. I love you.
Lent is 46 days, since Sundays do not count as fast days.

How Blogging Connects me to the Church’s Liturgical Year

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Epiphany

Years ago, a friend of mine, married to a pastor, said happily, “Oh, I love Advent.” Advent? Christmas was all that concerned me—cards, letters, presents, parties.

One of the things I have enjoyed about Christian blogging is being connected to the church’s liturgical year. Several of my fellow Christian bloggers in England are Anglican clergy-people ; their  blog posts, many of which are trial runs or second helpings of sermons —steadily troll through the church year: Advent, Christmas, Epiphany, the Annunciation, Easter, the Transfiguration, Pentecost, as well as the feasts of Saints, from Scripture and real life.
A true communion of saints.
The Cambridge poet, pastor and theologian Malcolm Guite goes even further. In a series of brilliant, luscious sonnets, he sonnetizes through the liturgical year; no, I am not kidding! Check out his multi-media blog posts: he reads his wonderful sonnets, which are accompanied by thoughtful text and images.
The liturgical calendar brings balance to one’s engagement with Christ. We are continually considering him from different angles—in the powerlessness of infancy; the obscurity of childhood and young adulthood in which his character was forged; his brief meteoric years of fame and celebrity; his tragic, unbearably painful death; his glorious resurrection, and his gentle empowering post-resurrection ministry.
While, sadly, I find liturgy itself boring, and my mind wanders while we recite those ancient words, the liturgical year is different. It provides new subjects for meditation or contemplation, and thus serves to broaden a spiritual life which might otherwise narrow into a celestial shopping list, or a dry trolling through Adoration-Contrition-Thanksgiving-Supplication.

“The Nativity” by C.S. Lewis

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 Image
The Nativity

by C.S. LewisAmong the oxen (like an ox I’m slow)
I see a glory in the stable grow
Which, with the ox’s dullness might at length
Give me an ox’s strength.

Among the asses (stubborn I as they)
I see my Savior where I looked for hay;
So may my beast like folly learn at least
The patience of a beast.

Among the sheep (I like a sheep have strayed)
I watch the manger where my Lord is laid;
Oh that my baaing nature would win thence
Some woolly innocence!

Plucked, dazzling, from the eternal heavens into time… Luci Shaw, “One”

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 http://www.abrahampiper.com/

One by Luci Shaw
Winter, and very cold,
and the night at
its deepest. The politicians,
as usual, double-tongued.
The town chaotic, teeming
with strangers.
And tonight, as often
in winter, in Bethlehem,
snow is falling.I always love how each flake,

torn from the sky,

arrives separately,

without sound, almost

unnoticed in

a flurry of others. How

each one (on a clear

night) lies there glittering

on the swelling breast

of snow, crisp

and intact, as wholly itself

as every radiant star

in a sky sparkling

with galaxies.

 

How many new

babies tonight

in Judea, coming

like snowflakes?

 

But plucked,

dazzling, from the

eternal heavens,

into time,

tonight is born

The One.

 

It was like God (Mary of Nazareth, by Clive Sansom)

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Mary of Nazareth

by Clive Sansom

It was like music:
Hovering and floating there
With the sound of lutes and timbrels
In the night air.

It was like waves,
Beating upon the shore:
Insistent with a rhythm, a pulsing
Unfelt before.

It was like wind:
Blowing from off the seas
Of other, far other
Lands than these.

It was like wings,
Like whirring wings that fly
The song of an army of swans
On the dark sky.

It was like God:
A presence of blinding light,
Ravishing body and soul
In the spring night.