What Stew Can Do, or How to Make a Baby

I've been rolling a metaphor around in my head recently, and finding it useful in my attempts to articulate several different things. I think it began - at least in its current form - with another metaphor, in a discussion I had several months ago with my friend Nancy, about being and doing. We talked about stew: the steaming, savoury stuff of winter afternoons. "What does stew do to make itself taste better?" asked Nancy. It cannot toss in a few more carrots or (in my kitchen) more garlic. It cannot reduce the amount of salt that's been added. It can't even change the temperature from a simmer to a boil. A stew is in fact rather limited in what it can do. The real power, the real artistry, is in the skill of the cook. He or she knows just what the stew needs - and when (because soggy vegetables are an abomination) - to make it delicious.

So what can a stew do? Well, it can...stew. It simply must be, and trust that eventually it really will turn into a delicious stew, a worthy meal to nourish the hungry. And stew, to fully accomplish its purpose, must be served to others. There is always the element of doing. But half-stewed stew - lukewarm and crunchy, flavours as yet unmingled into perfect harmony - is a work in progress and not ready to be served.

This forced me to take a closer look at the ideas of being and doing. I had been talking to Nancy about how I "ought" to be reading my Bible more regularly. Her retort caught me off guard: "Well, I guess that's just one more thing you're failing at." Her issue, of course, was not with the idea of reading the Bible more, but with that little word "ought." I had taken the life-giving, soul-nourishing, spirit-refreshing act of Bible-reading and turned it into one more bothersome little "chore" that needed to be done. To be sure, there is a place for duty in the Christian life, but it is a starting place, a way for the beginner to set foot on the Way or for the doubter to walk forward into renewed or deepened faith. Duty, like the Law, is a form that tells us what we must do. But what God most desires of us is that we do what we do because we want to do it, because we can't help but do it, because our love of Him is so great.

"I desire to your will, O my God; your law is within my heart." My struggle is to keep moving from duty to desire, to let God's law work its way into my heart. Or maybe it's the other way around: my heart works its way into the law, transforming my motives and perspective. The question is, how does one move from duty to desire, without making that goal into yet another duty?

Sacrifice and offering you did not desire,
but my ears you have pierced;
burnt offerings and sin offerings you did not require.
Then I said, "Here I am, I have come—
it is written about me in the scroll.
I desire to do your will, O my God;
your law is within my heart." --Psalm 40:6-8

For me it has meant trying to release myself from the guilt trips of what I "ought" to be doing. I am learning to say No a little more often, at least until I can say Yes with sincere desire. I am giving myself space and time to discover what it means to abide in Jesus. Eugene Peterson describes it as, making "yourselves at home with [Jesus]" (John 15, the Message). Clement of Alexandria used the phrase "keeping company with God." The point is to focus on my relationship with God (what it means to be a child of God), not my "results" (the stuff I do that authenticates that relationship). Relationship will ultimately point me to God, as the giver of His love and His blessings, which includes the gift of my status as His child. Results, in their best form, should naturally flow out of that relationship and draw us closer to God and point others toward Him. In their worst (and more common) form, results will begin and end with us - striving in our own strength to do what we feel we have to do to find favour with God.

It is this connection between relationship and results that got me looking for a metaphor. As soon as someone talks about being, another feels compelled to speak up for the necessity of acting out ("doing") our beliefs. Emphasize faith and another will defend works. Each perspective is valid, and the two truths are perfected when held in tension. But how can we hold that tension?

I have always been a doer, largely because I like lists, I like to check things off. I like the feeling of control that comes with doing. Also, being freaks me out a little bit. It's so abstract, and I am a concrete kind of thinker. What does it mean to be in Christ apart from what I do? What kind of intimate human relationship would be even remotely satisfying for either individual if results were the main theme of its existence? How much more so with God? Surely He must occasionally wish we would ditch the deeds long enough to hang out with Him and get to know Him better, to find out what's on His heart, and let Him show us what's in ours. Faith and works must indeed go together but not in such a conscientious way as I'd always thought. I shouldn't be making works happen, they should just be happening on their own without so much forced effort on my part.

Here's where my new metaphor comes in. Picture two lovers, a husband and wife bound together by love and commitment. Because they are in love, their time together is characterized by joy and contentment and comfort. Because of the time they spend together and their promise to each other, their relationship is secure against all threats. There is no place they would rather be than in each other's presence. Eventually, during their most intimate expression of love for each other, a child is conceived. Over the course of nine months, their love will blossom and deepen in recognition that this child is the wonderful - and inevitable - "result" of their love for each other. Further, if we were to ask the couple about what they did to "make" the baby, they would probably not start speaking about zygotes or the dividing of cells. They would speak of the act of love that is at the centre of their relationship. Ultimately, this child "happened" because they love each other, not because they consciously thought about matching up sperm and egg.

I think this is similar to how we are meant to be in relationship with God. As our love for God grows and matures, our deeds will be the inevitable result of that love. If we obsess about "making" deeds happen, we have missed the point entirely. If we instead will pour our energies into loving God and growing in our relationship with Him, those deeds will begin to happen without so much thought or effort on our part. Our deeds will be the fruits of desire instead of duty.

In his essay entitled Lilies That Fester (from The World's Last Night and Other Essays), C.S. Lewis talks about words such as refinement and religion, and how people who speak in such terms are in fact the ones least likely to be defined by them. That is, the one who speaks most about piety is the least likely to be truly pious, the one who speaks most passionately about culture is the least likely to in fact be cultured. He writes, "The talk is inimical to the thing talked of, likely to spoil it where it exists and to prevent its birth where it is unborn." (33)

And so it is with deeds. The more time you spend talking about doing them - what you should be doing, what you don't need to do, what you don't want to do, what others are doing or not doing - the less time you're spending in your relationship with God, which is the only source of truly good deeds. I have found this to be true in many areas of the Christian life, just one example being the obsession of some believers about submission (a flawed result of imposed duty rather than a generous outpouring of love). Darrell Johnson's book Fifty-Seven Words brought up another one. In the fifth petition of the Lord's Prayer, believers are told to pray and ask God to forgive their debts, "as we also have forgiven our debtors." Many have struggled with the apparent suggestion that we might not be forgiven by God if we haven't first forgiven others who have sinned against us. Consequently, we can get lost down the familiar rabbit trail of insecurity or indignance about faith versus works.

As Darrell points out, the issue is not about a formula we must complete in order to earn favour and forgiveness with God, rather it is about whether or not we truly understand forgiveness. He quotes John Stott (who so often makes profound statements with few words): "God forgives only the penitent, and one of the chief evidences of true penitence is a forgiving spirit." Like the unmerciful servant of Matthew 18, if we dare to ask God to forgive our mountain and yet refuse to forgive another's molehill (so to speak), we have missed the point entirely. If we don't understand forgiveness enough to give it, how can we pray to receive it? The two are in fact one and the same.

I think that's almost the end of my ramblings, for today anyway. I guess my point is that our human tendency is so often to try and reduce the complexities of relationship with a simple formula for results. Rules are so much easier and more efficient than the demands of relationships. They may limit the chance of messing up (with regard to the letter of the Law, anyway), but they also limit the potential for true Love to do its - His - own work in us. Why play with a ragdoll of our own making when we're able to give birth to real babies with God? Or, to borrow from Jesus' analogy, why fiddle about with plastic fruit when He can produce real fruit in us - as we learn what it means to abide in Him.

"Live in me. Make your home in me just as I do in you. In the same way that a branch can't bear grapes by itself but only by being joined to the vine, you can't bear fruit unless you are joined with me. I am the Vine, you are the branches. When you're joined with me and I with you, the relation intimate and organic, the harvest is sure to be abundant."
- John 15:4-5, The Message

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Back On Track, Book #5

Amazing Grace, by Kathleen Norris
--progress: 138/384
A World Lost, by Wendell Berry
--progress: 99/151
 
Yikes! It's been almost three weeks since I've written. I've been thinking a lot, however, and I've tried writing but found my thoughts to be too full of blather to share. I suspect that our recent social engagements are perhaps less responsible than our recent spate of television watching. We don't have a TV, mind you, but itunes has been so kind to provide the latest episodes of LOST and a Christmas gift card to Best Buy has (over)fed our movie habit.

I've also been a bit overwhelmed by how many others' good thoughts are already out here in cyberspace. What can I contribute? I've been feasting at others' tables recently, and enjoying it. See my links (bottom right of the blog) for a few recent favourites - among them http://www.frontporchrepublic.com/.

Lastly, I've been a bit overwhelmed by my own thoughts - there is so much swirling around in there, it's hard to stay focused. This presents a good opportunity for me to learn to articulate and prioritize the many strands of consciousness floating about in my head. I've taken to commenting on a few blog articles here and there, just for practice. It's risky, though, to be disagreed with, or even attacked by total strangers. I tend to get a bit riled. I'm less concerned with strangers disagreeing with me than thinking I'm stupid and just blowing me off. I tend to like a good argument when it can be done in a friendly sort of way.

Anyway. Enough. I will begin writing again. Today, if possible. As hard as it is to even feel like writing sometimes (let alone to find time for it), it is so good once I start.

Lastly, you may have noticed that I have listed Book #5 - A World Lost, by Wendell Berry. I was in the mood for a novel, and I happened to have this one on my shelf, unread. So far, so good. Stay tuned.

Thanks for those of you who stop by to read my ramblings and share a few of yours. I appreciate it!

Becky

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The Answer To All Our Prayers

Fifty-Seven Words That Change The World: A Journey Through The Lord's Prayer, by Darrell W. Johnson
progress: completed

I first met Darrell Johnson at Regent College. Because the courses he taught were primarily in the area of pastoral studies, I unfortunately never had the opportunity to take one of his classes (I was working on a Master of Christian Studies with an emphasis on Christianity and the Arts; strangely, if I were to go back at this point in my life, I might consider switching to the Master of Divinity). He once gave a guest lecture in my class on the Book of Revelation, and I remember thinking what an amazing teacher he was; he taught in a way that jived with the way my brain works. I also got to hear a number of his talks in Chapel, and realised what a great preacher he was. Then, towards the end of my time at Regent, Steve and I were in a Community Group for young married couples with him and his wife Sharon. The two of them spent an hour a week encouraging us in our marriages and welcoming us into their lives, as well as their home (I still have Sharon's delicious recipe for Bacon and Spinach Salad). He became an example to me of what true pastoring looks like: he was smart, humble, approachable, vulnerable, and available, among other things. Not to mention the fact that when Bono came to Vancouver and happened to stop by Regent, it was Darrell he stopped by to see. It turns out he'd attended Darrell's previous church in southern California a few times, and liked what he'd heard. How cool is that?

So when I read a book by Darrell, I expect to be educated, informed and challenged. I read his Discipleship on the Edge: An Expository Journey Through The Book of Revelation (buy it here with my heartiest recommendation) two years ago and he did the impossible: he made the Book of Revelation make sense, in a practical and life-transforming way. I had been interested to read his book on the Lord's Prayer and was pleasantly surprised to find a used copy at a Value Village store in Edmonton. Coincidence? I'm inclined to call it Providence.

I've never felt very "good" at prayer, if such a thing can be measured, and so it was with great relief that I read Darrell's reminder that this is the one specific request for instructions made by the disciples and recorded in the Gospels: "Lord, teach us to pray." They didn't get it, either! Certainly, they prayed, but they saw something uniquely different in Jesus' prayers. Darrell writes, "Others in Jesus' day were praying 'Holy One,' or 'Almighty,' or 'Rock,' or 'Lord of Hosts.' Jesus was praying 'Father.'" (105) The disciples saw that all that Jesus was and all that He did sprang out of His relationship with His Father, and the key to that relationship was prayer. He writes

"I understand the disciples' request to mean more than, 'Jesus, teach us some new spiritual techniques that will help us stay awake when we pray and make us feel that your prayers matter.' I take their request to mean, 'Jesus, will you teach us how to relate to the one you call 'Father' the way you do?'

"So Jesus teaches his disciples - and us - to pray fifty-seven words that are brilliant in their simplicity. These fifty-seven words change the way we understand God, ourselves, and the world. Indeed, they are fifty-seven words that, when prayed with even a modicum of faith, end up changing the world. (12)

As we pray the Prayer, we begin to discover what's on God's heart, and what He is doing in our world. And more than that, we are somehow granted the privilege of becoming partners with Him: "We are joining the living God in bringing about the realization of his heart's desire for the world." (14) As with the Book of Revelation, the veil is being pulled back to reveal the mighty happenings that are going on behind the scenes. "Our Father in heaven" is a reminder that God - our Father! - is indeed on the throne of the universe, working out His good purposes throughout the course of history. "On earth as it is in heaven" tells us that heaven is invading earth, and we are invited to participate in the Great Reversal of all that is wrong in our world.

Darrell expounds on each of the six petitions, and sums it all up with the amazing revelation that Jesus himself is the ultimate answer to each of the requests. He is the ultimate hallowing (revealing) of the Father's name (which is His character). He is the King, ushering in the kingdom of God, a new world order. He is the Son who lived His entire earthly life in complete submission to the Father's will. Jesus himself is our "daily bread," the true nourishment of our souls. He is the Redeemer, who cancelled our debts and paid them off with His own blood, and the Reconciler who empowers us to forgive others. Lastly, He is the one who once and for all defeats the Evil One, who would lead us astray. "The answer to the Lord's prayer is as sure as the Lord himself." (112-113)

There is so much wisdom here, so much time needed to soak it all in. What Jesus is saying in this prayer is essentially, "You want to get to know the Father? Get to know me. Walk with me. Work with me. Abide with me. Begin to look like me." Therefore, while I am convinced that God welcomes my honesty in prayer, my requests of what I think I need, His deepest desire is to show me that what I most need is Him. It's a lesson that's been breaking into my heart for quite some time now - I'm finally starting to get it. As with any intimate relationship, God wants to be loved for who He is, not just for the benefits of His friendship. He gives generously, and nowhere does He gives so generously as when He gives Himself. As Brother Lawrence would say, there is no greater blessing than finding ourselves in His presence, and losing ourselves in His love.

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Mystery and the Idolatry of Ourselves

Amazing Grace, by Kathleen Norris
progress: 88/384

After finishing my very difficult article on wrath yesterday afternoon, I returned to reading Book 3 - Amazing Grace by Kathleen Norris - and was pleased to read her comments on mystery so quickly after writing my own thoughts on the subject. In her  article on "Annunciation," she writes about the discomfort modern Christians have with the concept of mystery, and their (our) tendency to resort to comforting and therapeutic language when worshipping. She uses words like "trite" and "impoverished." The consequence of this unwillingness to to be content with mystery and replace it with shallow interpretations in turn shifts the focus from God, whom we worship, to the worshippers themselves. She writes,

"Such language reflects an idolatry of ourselves, that is, the notion that the measure of what we can understand, what is readily comprehensible and acceptable to us, is also the measure of God." (72)

The question is, what kind of God would we have if we could fully understand Him with our own limited and broken thinking? He'd look a lot like us, in all the worst ways. We would be attempting to create God Himself into an idol of our own making. Yikes.

***

"'When you realize there is something you don't understand, then you're generally on the right path to understanding all kinds of things.'" — Jostein Gaarder (The Solitaire Mystery)

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Wrath: The Fluid That Love Bleeds

Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer, by CS Lewis
progress: completed

In Chapter XVIII, Lewis challenges Malcolm's view of God's wrath, which denies that God experiences wrath as anything akin to an emotion (he uses the phrase "fit of temper"), rather it is an inevitable, impersonal response of holiness to unholiness. Malcolm compares it to what happens when one touches a live wire: "The live wire doesn't feel angry with us, but if we blunder against it we get a shock." (96)

"My dear Malcolm," writes Lewis in his typical winsome way, "what do you suppose you have gained by substituting the image of a live wire for that of angered majesty? You have shut us all up in despair; for the angry can forgive, and electricity can't." (96)

It's no secret that most believers are not entirely comfortable with the idea of God's wrath, especially as it relates to God's love. Those who are zealously at home with God's wrath tend to scare the rest of us off - the hellfire and brimstone may frighten us into repentance, but it does little to encourage us into relationship with God. Some would much rather ignore the fact of God's wrath completely, insinuating perhaps that God's love cancels it out. Still others, such as Malcolm, attempt to reimage wrath into something more tolerable and less terrifying.

Malcolm and Lewis both agree that God's wrath can only be understood in terms of analogy; as with all divine attributes, the human versions are too polluted and self-aggrandizing to do more than offer guesses as to what the perfected version of wrath (or love or jealousy or holiness) is truly like. Lewis reminds us of the danger of becoming overconfident in our attempts at defining God: "Every idea of Him we form, He must in mercy shatter." (82) Nor should we ever think that our finite minds can ever fully comprehend the character and ways of God, who is infinite - in the end we must accept as incomplete our attempts to define and systematize God's personality, and bow down before His divine Mystery, believing that what He has revealed of Himself is enough.

Malcolm mistakenly attempts to reduce God's wrath to a sort of predictable, scientific reaction of a divine Force instead of the personal, relational response of the Persons of the Trinity. What Lewis points out is that if we strip away the nuances of relationship, will, and emotion from our idea of wrath, we must also strip it away from our idea of love and all the rest of God's attributes. He cannot be a Force in one area and a Person in another. Wrath may be gone, as he says, but forgiveness, too.

Surely the attributes of love and wrath inform each other? No man could be said to truly love his wife if wrath was not a possiblity. Can you imagine a lover responding with indifference to the other's confession of unfaithfulness? Surely such "love" would be proven a fraud? Lewis writes,

"Anger - no peevish fit of temper, but just, generous, scalding indignation - passes (not necessarily at once) into embracing, exulting, re-welcoming love. That is how friends and lovers are truly reconciled. Hot wrath, hot love. Such anger is the fluid that love bleeds when you cut it...Wrath and pardon are both, as applied to God, analogies; but they belong to the same circle of analogy - the circle of life, and love, and deeply personal relationships. All the liberalising and 'civilising' analogies only lead us astray. Turn God's wrath into mere enlightened disapproval, and you also turn His love into mere humanitarianism. The 'consuming fire' and the 'perfect beauty' both vanish. We have, instead, a judicious headmistress or a conscientious magistrate." (97)

I believe that God's love and wrath are intimately connected to each other; we need them both if we are to have any hope of understanding God and His ways. The problem arises when we draw too heavily from human examples of either: human love can be shallow, selfish, and temporary; human wrath can be unfair, unwarranted, and cruel. In humans, wrath and love can rarely if ever coexist. With God, they must, for He never contradicts Himself. He IS love (always and forever), and yet He is also revealed in Scripture as a God of wrath and vengeance. He loves us and yet - and so - He pours out the wrath we deserve on His beloved Son, on Himself. What can we make of this? It is mystery.

We dare not play favourites with His attributes lest we pollute them all. Without wrath, God's love would become sentimental and uninvolved. Without love, His wrath would be cruel and inescapable. God loves, God avenges, God judges, God forgives. He is love, He is just, He is holy. It's a tightrope act that we are called to walk, constantly holding these truths in balance. Only then can we have any hope of becoming wise.

"The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom..." - Proverbs 9:10a

"The one who fears God will avoid all extremes." - Ecclesiastes 7:18b

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The Next Course(s): Books 3 and 4

I think I'm going to write one more post about Letters to Malcolm, but I'm not sure when I'll have the chance. In the meantime, I thought I'd announce my next two books, in case anyone is following along.

Book 3 will be Amazing Grace: A Vocabulary of Faith, by Kathleen Norris. I'm 60 pages into this one and enjoying it quite a bit. Since the book is a collection of 60+ short word-stories, I thought it would work well to read and comment alongside other reading.

Book 4 will be Fifty-Seven Words That Change the World: A Journey Through The Lord's Prayer, by Darrell Johnson. I've been reading this for the Bible study I am teaching, and thought it would be good to process a bit more here on Bookmeal.

I'm looking forward to growing fat with more spiritual soulfood!

Becky

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Roses and Daffodils: In Honour of Personality

Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer, by CS Lewis
Progress: completed

Some of my difficulty in presenting Lewis' Letters to Malcolm more coherently is due to the fact that 1) he tends to ramble (which is appropriate, since these are letters, after all) and 2) he is so dang smart. Sometimes he just loses me for a paragraph or two, and not just because I'm reading in bed. Case in point:

"The abstraction's value is almost entirely negative. It warns us against drawing absurd consequences from the analogical expression by prosaic extrapolations." (51) - My brain is slow to digest comments such as these.

I also had to look up the word "concupiscence" today. It means "lust," but I suppose it looks better in print. I've now bookmarked the Oxford Dictionary website on my computer to keep up with such colourful words and expand my vocabulary.

The statements which I do understand are so profound that each one deserves more time than I have to give the entire book:

"There is danger in the very concept of religion. It carries the suggestion that this is one more department of life, an extra department added to the economic, the social, the intellectual, the recreational, and all the rest. But that whose claims are infinite can have no standing as a department. Either it is an illusion or else our whole life falls under it.We have no non-religious activities; only religious and irreligious." (30) - My world gets bigger every day as I work out with more clarity what this really means. I am still discovering walls that have sprung up in my life, barriers that seek to segregate and compartmentalize what was never meant to stand alone or apart from my faith. I break them down, brick by brick.

"Some people feel guilty about their anxieties and regard them as a defect of faith. I don't agree at all. They are afflictions, not sins. Like all afflictions, they are, if we can so take them, our share in the Passion of Christ." (41) - This is a new idea to me, and I think I like it. Anxieties are not the ideal, but neither are they sins. They can become pathways which lead us to Christ - if, as Lewis writes, we allow them to do so.

"One of the purposes for which God instituted prayer may have been to bear witness that the course of events is not governed like a state but created like a work of art to which every being makes its contribution, and in which every being is both an end and a means." (56) - I love any statement that imagines God as an Artist. This image, for me, represents love, passion, foresight, attention to detail, beauty and goodness. How much more - beyond the limits of our human imaginations - must divine creativity (Lewis would say the only creativity in an ultimate sense) demonstrate these things!

"Creation seems to be delegation through and through. He will do nothing simply of Himself which can be done by creatures. I suppose this is because He is a giver. And he has nothing to give but Himself. And to give Himself is to do His deeds - in a sense, and on varying levels to be Himself - through the things He has made. In Pantheism God is all. But the whole point of creation surely is that he was not content to be all. He intends to be 'all in all.'" (70) - This passage emphasizes at once the complete superfluity of creation (in and of itself) and the deep pleasure God derives from creating, and interacting with his creation in love. He needs nothing, so He gives, and that brings Him pleasure.

His humour keeps me smiling. Not-so-random tidbits of information from his vast storehouse of knowledge tickle my funny bone:

"You remember that the ancient Persians debated everything twice: once when they were drunk and once when they were sober." (45)

Here is one of my all-time favourite quotes from Lewis:

"If grace perfects nature it must expand all our natures into the full richness of the diversity which God intended when He made them, and Heaven will display far more variety than Hell. 'One fold' doesn't mean 'one pool.' Cultivated roses and daffodils are no more alike than wild roses and daffodils." (10)

This is a message that has shone like a beacon into the stormy waters of my spiritual journey: Personality matters to God. It was created by Him and is honoured by Him. The closer I move toward Christ, reflecting Him inside and out, the more unique I will be. In my black-sheep days of rebellion I felt that the more Christian one became, the more that person would begin to look like every other Christian: Christian robots. Predictable. Homogeneous. Standardized. Uniform. Eventually all individual thought would disappear in order to make room for more quotes from Scripture. CD and book collections would shrink until all that were left were hymns and devotionals. I wasn't sure movies would even make the cut.

In more recent years, as I have endeavoured to move out of rebellion and into obedience, I have embraced these words as a life raft. These passions, these dreams, this sense of humour, and even these limitations - are part of who God made me. They may need refining, prioritizing, postponing or redeeming, but they are part of me, and God loves all of me. These things will be perfected, not deleted, as I move closer toward Christ in obedience.

I have always taken secret pleasure in the picture of C. S. Lewis that adorns that backs of my Harvest Book/Harcourt Brace & Co editions of Lewis' books: he doesn't look robotic, does he? In fact, he looks rather impish. C. S. Lewis has always served as a sort of poster boy to remind me that people much smarter than I have struggled with the demands of Christianity and found it worthy of their lives - personalities and brains included.

Lewis has plenty more to say and I have plenty more to digest, but now it is time for bed. Goodnight, and thanks for journeying with me!

Becky

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To Clarify

Apparently I am still not talking enough about Letters to Malcolm. Steve would like to learn more about the book itself, and so I'm trying to figure out my specific purpose for this blog. I would like to introduce people to good books, I would like to encourage discussion, I would like to be challenged by the authors I read and the people who read my posts. These are all important to me, but I suppose my primary purposes are selfish ones: I want to write, I want to engage with the authors I'm reading, and most of all I want to process my own thoughts as I read. So, sometimes there may be an abundance of quotes and interaction with specific thoughts of my author friends, but other times (as of late) I may go chasing rabbit trails of my own making. I hope there will be a balance of both.

With approximately two weeks to devote to reading, processing and writing about each book, I have to pick and choose which worthy thoughts I will engage and which tasty morsels I will have to ignore (at least, in print) for now. I have been tempted to post the occasional list of good quotes, but so far have resisted. Perhaps it would be helpful. At any rate, it would help me to remember all the good stuff I've found. With some books I will discuss an overall theme, with others I may end up exploring one specific quote or passage. I may also bring in other authors I'm reading concurrently and enter them into the conversation, with or without much introduction.

What I endeavour most to accomplish is my own integrity in writing. I'm trying to be honest with myself and whomever else is reading. I'm trying to let go of worrying about what I write because of what someone else might think - of whether they will disagree or think I'm unintelligent, ignorant or uninformed. I'm trying to flesh out ideas about which I'm not always 100% convinced. I will try to be honest in admitting when I don't agree with or understand what appears to be an orthodox idea. Other times my honesty will take the form of preaching to myself something I know to be true but haven't yet fully absorbed into my spiritual walk. At any rate, please don't think I'm preaching to you!

Last of all, this honesty is forcing me to be vulnerable. As much as I would like to have something profound to offer, I am painfully aware that there are many who are infinitely more capable. This willingness to be vulnerable also brings freedom. I release my fears, insecurities and failures and entrust myself to the One who called me onto this journey in the first place. My hope is that through this blog and my fumbled attempts at engaging far superior thinkers, I might just have something profound to say by the end of the journey. Wisdom is what I seek.

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Undragoning: Praying As We Are, Not As We Ought

Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer, by CS Lewis
Progress: 56/124

"Oh dear, how ever many skins have I got to take off?" - Eustace Clarence Scrubb

Okay, so as my husband pointed out regarding my last post, I didn't actually mention Letters to Malcolm. True. It was meant as a sort of preamble to some more specific thoughts on his writing, which I have not yet put down on paper. The Letters are there, though, informing my thoughts and attitudes about prayer. This is a second or third reread for me, and the words in this book have come like old friends to visit me many times through the years.

The most specific words I've been thinking about recently are in his statement that "We must lay before Him what is in us, not what ought to be in us." (22) Instead of simply being known by God, prayer is an opportunity for us to reveal ourselves to God, to unveil what is in us. Of course He already knows us better than ourselves; the point is that we become participants in the knowing, the revealing, and consequently, the confessing of our sins to God. There's no point in going to the doctor if we won't admit what's wrong. The doctor may know we're sick, our friends may see our disease, our very flesh may be wasting away, but healing will not happen until the patient himself is ready to admit it and receive the help and support that has always been available to him.

So, we must reveal, unveil ourselves to God. We must come to Him as we are, lovehandles and all. We might as well get it all out - all the frustration, longing, failing, needing, wanting, denying, resisting - for He already knows it's there, and yet He still desires to meet with us. There is no sin too scandalous, no request too trivial, to reveal to God. Lewis' comments revolve around the latter (innocent desires), but I believe the former (sinful desires or actions) also applies. The concern I think we both would have is that of irreverance before God. Is it proper to complain to God? No, of course not. But at the same time it is honest to admit that we have complaints, and where better to have those complaints put into proper perspective than at the feet of God? If I wait until I have no complaints before talking to God, I might be out of touch for a while. I can stew about them on my own, cut off from God by my own unconfessed sin. But if I admit my frustrations to God, they will find their answer in Him - just as Job finally got his answer from God:

"Who is this that darkens my counsel without knowldege?
Brace yourself like a man;

I will question you, and you shall answer me." (Job 38:2-3)

"Will the one who contends with the Almighty correct him?

Let him who accuses God answer him!" (Job 40:2)

God put Job in his proper place, and that made a proper man out of Job: he agreed with God and acknowledged his own unworthiness. I find hope in the fact that although Job struggled with God and the assertions of his unhelpful friends for thirty-seven chapters, in the end, God defended him against his friends as "one who has spoken of me what is right" (Job 42:7,8). All those words of despair, complaint, depression, and challenge, and what God heard in the end was that Job agreed with Him. And then He blessed Job.

So, if we will give our brokenness to God, He will set the bone aright. We have the choice to leave the broken bone to heal on its own, sewing its cells back together with the crooked stitches of a child, forever a handicap in our lives. We also have the choice to allow Him (and yes, I believe He generally prefers to have our permission) to restore our broken bones and make them new again, so they can continue to serve our bodies as they were meant to do.

Having emphasized the importance of our willingness to be truly honest about who we are, the question remains as to what extent we are capable of doing so. As with Eustace and his "undragoning" in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, God rewards our attempts at revelation with His own truer, deeper revelation of who we are (as well as who we ought to be). Would it be fair to suggest that Eustace's first attempts at undressing himself was in part what led him to a willingness to be undressed by the Lion?

"Then the lion said - but I don't know if it spoke - 'You will have to let me undress you.' I was afraid of his claws, I can tell you,but I was pretty nearly desperate now. So I just lay flat down on my back to let him do it.

"The very first tear he made was so deep that I thought it had gone right into my heart. And when he began pulling the skin off, it hurt worse than anything I've ever felt. The only thing that made me able to bear it was just the pleasure of feeling the stuff peel off." (from The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by CS Lewis, page 108-109)

If are to know God, we must strip and be stripped of all that hides the truth in our lives. As The 77s song says, we are to "Pray naked." What beautiful costumes have we rigged up to adorn ourselves in an attempt to feel better about ourselves and to make others think better of us? If must all come off, if we are to be right with God, who "reveals the deep things of darkness and brings deep shadows into the light" (Job 12:22), and He in His mercy will not leave us exposed, but will dress us in New Clothes of His own making.

"You say, 'I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.' But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked. I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire, so you can become rich; and white clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful nakedness; and salve to put on your eyes, so you can see. Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline. So be earnest, and repent." - Revelation 3:17-19

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Prayer in the Field

Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer, by CS Lewis
Progress: 56/124

It shouldn't be surprising that when one sets out to learn about prayer, opportunities for practicing prayer will reveal themselves with increasing intensity. On Sunday, it was my three-and-a-half-year-old son, R, with a gash on his forehead, just about to the bone. Without naming names, I prayed that God would let there be a "good" doctor on call - that is, not one of the mean or incompetent ones I've encountered there in the past. God answered favourably, and provided a very kind doctor, whom R dubbed the "Daddy Doctor," and who was so gentle in his manner that R fell asleep on the table even as he was being stitched up (four stitches, for those interested in such things).

Tuesday brought turmoil of a more personal nature, and in my despair I went for a walk. There, under cover of darkness and in the blessed privacy of stars and snowy fields, I yelled. I accused. I was even, momentarily, sarcastic. It was not a pious prayer, but it was honest, and I hope that, at least, honoured God in some way - that I didn't lie to His face (so to speak) and try to sound submissive when in fact I was feeling about as rebellious as a goody-two-shoes like me can get. Amazingly, after the drama, I walked home with a renewed sense of peace and trust.

Tuesday also brought the devastating earthquake in Haiti. I sat transfixed before the computer, assaulted by images of pain and suffering, and unable to turn my eyes or attention away for a very long time. It occurred to me later that tragedy of this magnitude should have rendered my own problems irrelevant, at least for a while, but it didn't. I just made room in my heart for more sadness. Eventually, I remembered to pray about Haiti, too, instead of just feeling sad but helpless.

Tuesday is also my Bible study preparation day, and so I read the first few chapters of Regent College professor and Vancouver pastor Darrell Johnson's book, Fifty-Seven Words That Change The World: A Journey Through The Lord's Prayer. I read about prayer a lot more than I prayed that day, for all my woes.

On Wednesday morning I drove to Bible study, and in the silence of my car, prayed the Lord's Prayer, for the first time really praying it, letting the words draw out of me the sadness, despair, and longing that needed to be given over to those fifty-seven words and the One who hears them.

In Bible study, I taught about prayer, as a blind person leading others who could surely lead the way more capably. At the end, I burst into tears, and heard the heartfelt and teary prayers of other women on my behalf. I experienced the solidarity and community of the body of Christ at that moment, after I had been more honest and vulnerable than I've ever been with them before.

On Wednesday night I had a phone appointment, which I had arranged before my week had begun to fall apart. I was tempted to cancel, as my specific reason for calling seemed moot in light of the recent events and I felt drained. But by God's grace I did call, and was ministered to by a friend and fellow-pilgrim who had previously walked a journey similar to the one upon which I am now travelling, stumbling and grumbling along the way. She prayed through a passage in Jeremiah with me, and I saw glimpses of myself and my situation in those words of Scripture. I felt solidarity with the exiles in Babylon. I ended the phone conversation with a renewed sense of my identity and of God's purpose and plan for me in light of (no longer in contrast to) that identity. I could breathe a little deeper. For a little while I experienced joy.

Thursday brought more turmoil, although a remnant of the peace and trust from my walk on Tuesday hovered nearby, protecting me from despair.

Friday allowed me some respite from my woes and I focused again on the more pressing needs and desperate suffering of Haiti. After a growing sense that more than my prayers were required in response to the catastrophe, I donated money to aid in the relief efforts, and set my mind to thinking what else might be done on behalf of the Haitians.

On Saturday, peace came to my home. Giving and receiving, hearing and understanding, dreaming and planning were the agents of that peace.

And all these, things, I believe, were fruits of the many prayers made by me and for me this week, a personal response from Our Father, who art in heaven.

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The Second Course is Served: Book #2

I've considered several books as the next course for bookmeal. Houston's Transforming Friendship carries on the idea of "keeping company with God," Tozer 's Pursuit of God does the same, but in the end I choose C. S. Lewis' Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer, because I feel drawn to something with a bit of humour after Brother Lawrence's serious take on spirituality.

In a Facebook conversation with my friend Rosie, we got into a brief discussion about Brother Lawrence and whether he was super-spiritual or only seemed so because he lived in a monastery and we do not...Perhaps our lives seem more mundane, as Rosie pointed out. Or perhaps it was easier because he lived in a monastery. Was Brother Lawrence as honest about the trials of spirituality as he was the joys and rewards of it?

Here is my response on Facebook:

"I still have my moments of doubt...I was browsing Lewis' Letters to Malcolm this evening and felt impressed by the earthy honesty of his statment: 'Well, let's now at any rate come clean. Prayer is irksome. An excuse to omit it is never unwelcome. When it is over, this casts a feeling of relief and holiday over the rest of the day. We are reluctant to begin. We are delighted to finish. While we are at prayer, but not while we are reading a novel or solving a cross-word puzzle, any trifle is enough to distract us' (113). Now THAT I can relate to!"

So, because he is a funny, earthy guy who also calls me to deeper, truer levels of spirituality, intellectualism and imagination (often all at the same time), Lewis wins the coveted slot of Book 2! It's a reread (this will be my third time, I think) but as Lewis himself said, rereading books is a sign of a true book lover. I wonder if he ever imagined how many would read and reread his own books?

Stay tuned!

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Presence and Perspective

The Practice of the Presence of God, by Brother Lawrence, Part 3
progress: completed

"Do not forget Him! Think of Him often; adore Him ceaselessly; live and die with Him. That is the real business of a Christian; in a word, it is our profession. If we do not know it, we must learn it." (48)

Before I move on to the next book on my reading list, I owe comment on the topic of the presence of God, which tis he primary subject upon which Brother Lawrence so passionately expounds. In his own words, it is:

"the concentration of the soul's attention on God, remembering that He is always present...[It] is the life and nourishment of the soul, which can be acquired with the grace of God" (67, 68).

He resolved to do whatever he could for God - big or small - and to banish from his life anything that would offend or displease God. When he wandered in his thoughts, he would simply recall them back to God, gently and without condemnation from himself or God. When he was troubled by something, he simply released his concerns to God and lost himself in His love. When he was successful in his attempts at practicing the presence of God, he thanked God for the grace to do so. His life was a fleshed-out attempt at abiding, or dwelling, in Christ (John 15).

It all sounds good. It makes sense. Focus in on God and everything will fall into its proper place, and life will work. I even get that life will work because at that point you'll have transformed definitions for what it means for life to "work" (as with the delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart passage in Psalm 37). What I don't get is how to do this with children. I've had this blog entry in process for several days now, because I've been interrupted by:

• R trying to attach a Mega-blocks sword to a non-Mega-blocks Spiderman figure (they don't fit, so I have to keep reattaching the sword for him)
• T telling me about a monster in his dream with "powerful snot"
• L getting into my paper trays and swatting at me when I tell her no, then collapsing on the floor in an impressive tantrum display. This is already her fourth one of the day...or more.
• T needing me to open the tin where he is storing his fallen pine needles from the Christmas tree "for crafts"
• T telling me his grand plan for an amazing outer space picture, which will be a present for Steve tonight
• T needing me to draw, then cut, then redraw stars for his outer space picture
• R and T fighting over their new Christmas present

And that's just the last ten minutes. Add to that the endless cacophony of three little people wanting to talk, needing to be heard and acknowledged, and waiting for a response from me, and focusing my mind on spiritual things get hard. True, Brother Lawrence experienced much grace in being able to "turn his little omelette in the pan for the love of God" but did he have three chattering monks in need of constant assistance in the kitchen with him at the same time?

I don't know the answer to this, but I suspect Brother Lawrence would tell me that practicing the presence simply means inviting God to join me with my three little chatterboxes, and going off to play with a thankful and grateful heart that he's entrusted them to me. He would say that motherhood is God's portion for me at this point in my life and that I can show him my love by doing it (motherhood, that is) to the best of my ability. I liked this prayer:

"My God, since You are with me, and since, by Your will, I must occupy myself with external things, please grant me the grace to remain with you, in Your presence. Work with me, so that my work might be the very best. Receive as an offering of love both my work and all my affections." (82)

Somehow it still feels like it's going to make me feel guilty rather than blessed. The truth is that it's hard to get your headspace right when your headspace is not your own - it's being bombarded by chattering, stuttering, crying, whining, grumpy and often very sweet (hence the guilt) little voices, fighting for airtime inside my consciousness. Maybe I should've figured out this whole presence thing before I had kids and then I could've been the calm, fun, intentional, idealized mother I'd always figured I would naturally be.

And yet, the only way to experience true comfort is in Christ. Brother Lawrence said that "God won't allow a soul that is searching for Him to be comforted anywhere other than with Him" (31-32). All other attempts to find comfort will fail. I think the same can be said for contentment, joy, peace, etc. So, unless I believe that being a mom makes practicing God's presence impossible, I've got to keep trying to figure it out. What does practicing God's presence look like to me at this point in my life - a wife and mother of three children, a woman struggling with guilt and failure and discontent? How does God's presence transform and redeem and alter my perspective on these things?

***

"Faith gave Brother Lawrence a firm hope in God's goodness, confidence in His providence, and the ability to completely abandon himself into God's hands. He never worried about what would become of him; rather he threw himself into the arms of infinite mercy. The more desperate things appeared to him, the more he hoped - like a rock beaten by the waves of the sea and yet settling itself more firmly in the tempest. This is why he said that the greatest glory one can give to God is to entirely mistrust one's own strength, relying completely on God's protection. This constitutes a sincere recognition of one's weakness and a true confession of the omnipotence of the creator. (89)

"Brother Lawrence saw nothing but the plan of God in everything that happened to him. Because he loved the will of the Lord so much he was able to bring his own will into total submission to it. This kept him in continuous peace." (89)

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