Unbelievable

When the stars threw down their spears,
And watered heaven with their tears,
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the Lamb make thee?

Tyger! Tyger! Burning bright

In the forests of the night,

What immortal hand or eye

Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

-William Blake, 1794

At small group the other week, we talked about the story of Jonah, and how it is so unbelievable, it's believable. The aspects are so "out there", it must be true. You can't make this stuff up.

It's like the questions William Blake poses in his euphonic poem, The Tyger. He is asking, pondering, wondering if it is possible that we are made by God. The possibility of an eternal being with all power, knowledge, control, one who created heaven and earth would create us. How does that make sense, especially  given that we all have free will, which is how God intended it? This leaves the choice to follow Him or not.
Of course that doesn't make sense! We cannot possibly fully understand God.
It's so unbelievable, it must be true.

I believe.
Because it is love. It is true because of the love shown to us, given to us, in Christ.
Unbelievable.
Yet, so irresistibly believable.

Pocket Full of Showers

The clouds build and darken as we drive

Branches, in their swaying, come alive

Droplets fall in a sudden sheet

Asphalt glistens, wet with heat

Legs curled up with journal in hand

Studying contours of the sky and land

A pocket full of showers

While in the car a few hours

Leaves my mind to wander wide

In simple words I tend to hide

Deeper meanings in my heart

Sailing around this windy part

Restless

Why am I so restless?
Could it be that after such a good weekend it is a little bit challenging to wake up early and go to the office all day? Or that I feel like I didn't sleep at all last night? Or that I had strange dreams?

And yet, deep down, I am whole, and I know I can rest in God's arms. I know I am loved and none of the annoying stuff that might come along will get to me if I let God rule my heart. When I give Him the totality of my heart's desires, joys, and wistful thoughts as well as the darkness, sadness, and annoyed thoughts I can rest fully in Him. Knowing it is because I freely gave myself away. Isn't it strange that the only way to truly feel whole is to give yourself fully to God?

Another paradox.
Another layer of mystery.
Jesus always did things that to us, seem backwards, like loving the weak, the poor, and all those outcasts that nobody liked. Saying that blessed are the meek (not the strong), and how it is they that will inherit the earth.

So, instead of feeling restless, I can rest fully in God's love.

Soundtrack I keep hearing in my head as I write this post- Click here for Audrey Assad's song, Restless.

Sinking Deeper

Sinking deeper into thankfulness
With such a good thing

Juxtaposed in a messy world

This, a tiny offering

A word from my heart

Flowing because of Your grace

In unalloyed appreciation of

The foundation of this place

It's funny how sinking deeper

Into Your trust and love

Is actually the way out of clouds

That hover around and above

Blossoming and Withering

O trees of life, when does your winter come?
We're not in accord. Not attuned, like
the migrating birds. Overtaken and late,

we abruptly crowd ourselves on a wind

and come down on some uncaring pond.

We're conscious of blossoming and withering

both at once.

And somewhere lions rove, all unaware,

while still in their splendor, of any weakness.

-from "Die Vierte Elegie", Rainer Rilke

In Rilke's elegy, we are late. We are not like the birds who migrate at the right time every year, we learn things late. We are faulty, and end up at the wrong spot sometimes, well after the proper time. So we are left to feel the withering of the blossoms. Time after time. Leaving us cold and stranded by a dull lake unaware of our weakness. Yet it is when we are made aware of our weakness that we can change it.

How do we get to be late, and why did we miss the opportunity? Are we comfortable in our own complacency? Or do we talk ourselves out of the opportunity presented? Like Jonah, we lose track of what is truly important. Jonah was more concerned with seeing the wicked people of Nineveh get what they deserved (meaning God's wrath), while God was concerned with that generation of people. Jonah forgot what he really deserved as he maintained his "high and mighty" mentality, upset with God that He showed mercy to the people of Nineveh. Jonah saw the plant blossom to give him shade, then wither again as he got angry with God and His compassion. He lost sight of the big picture, as we all tend to do, and came into that understanding a bit late. I am so thankful that our God is compassionate and loving, even if we arrive late. 

Sunlight

Dreamily I gaze
As if in a daze
At the sunlight through the glass

Splashing off the sill

Jumping to my skin

Leaving vibrant bows against cream

Tea steams from my cup

And the moment fills me up

Cool Spots of Oxford

Here is a spot in Oxford, England you wouldn't expect me to blog about. A McDonald's restaurant. Hip. Modern. Two floors. It's crowded at lunchtime because it's located on Cornmarket Street, which is a pedestrian-only street with lots of cafes and shops.

Hey, when you splurge a little bit on a few nights at the Randolph MacDonald Hotel in Oxford, you're going to have to save some cash here and there, and get a quick burger at the Golden Arches. That's why, for the other nights, my Mum and I stayed in campus housing, in a building by the Continuing Education Department, and even that was a beautiful building. But the room was just a basic dorm-style room.

Since I tend to focus most of my attention on the historic places of Oxford (why wouldn't you want to see the Bodleian Library in several angles??), I am showing this as proof that Oxford has a few other things and is modern, too. I shopped in the Waterstones Bookstore (England's version of Barnes & Noble), ate at Jamie's Italian (Jamie Oliver's first restaurant), and took pictures of BMWs, like a cool Touring 320d BMW. See? I can pay attention to things in Oxford that are not steeped in history, 12th century architecture, or books......But only for a moment.

Oxford on-campus housing, where we stayed to save £

The Randolph, where we stayed and did not save £, but loved it!

Glass and Mirrors

View of the Martyrs' Memorial from our hotel room, Oxford, England

He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world. -1 John 2.2

*Propitiate- pacify, do something to take away the anger of; (-tion) atoning

Each writer of the Bible has a specific style. Just like today, you know when you are reading something by Max Lucado or C.S. Lewis. There is a definite difference, as they are from different generations, different countries, different cultures, so therefore their word usage, sentence structure, and voice is easily decipherable. They both write about Christianity but in their own way. I appreciate each author's style. They are unique and reach people differently.

When I read 1 John, I can pinpoint his style of writing. He's very black + white. Straightforward. Blunt. In a way, reading his book is difficult because it hits you so straight on, it leaves you feeling convicted because you know his words need to penetrate deep inside of you. He writes:

Whoever says he is in the light and hates his brother is still in darkness. Ch.2, v.9

Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. Ch.2, v.15

These are extreme, indeed. So he's saying we are in the darkness when we hate those who murder and steal? Yes. Is he saying that when we find our place in this world and feel perfectly content with being here, we living without God in our hearts? Yes.

Woah. A sense of urgency is in these words, and throughout the book, with the message that these are the last hours. No watered down words, here. No misinterpretation is possible.

I love the poetry of the Bible. The Psalms. The language in letters of Paul and Peter. The personification and euphony of Isaiah's passages ("The mountains and the hills before you shall break forth into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands". Isaiah 55.12). But sometimes we need to be shouted at, so to speak, by words that shake us up a bit. Getting us out of our complacent state of mind where everything revolves around me.

Max Lucado wrote a book called It's Not About Me, and it's probably my favorite of his writings because it is so personal and gripping, like 1 John. One of the biggest struggles of us all is to get over our me-centeredness. And that's a hard thing to do.
The quick summation of 1 John, I think, is reflected in Max Lucado's words:

He's the source; we are the glass. He's the light; we are the mirrors. He sends the message; we mirror it. (It's Not About Me, Max Lucado)

Hollywood

Hollywood Studios, that is. I used the last day of my 3-day Disney pass with Jason at this park on Saturday evening. We arrived later in the day, to have dinner at the 50's Prime Time Cafe. With the long summer nights, the light faded slowly. The restaurant is like stepping into a house from the 1950's There's a kitchen, a living room as the waiting area, and you eat in the dining room. The people who work here are completely in character, it's hilarious. The guy who took our name was dressed in a nerdy sweater, had an old fashioned camera around his neck, big geeky glasses, and hair slicked back. He must love his job. All the waitresses act like moms, so you will get in trouble if your elbows are on the table, or if you don't eat your greens. It's quite funny when you see others get in trouble.
Did I mention that it was Star Wars weekend? We came across some evil guys backstage, where a little boy was ready to take on the Stormtroopers. And one lady looked like she was in trouble with the Stormtroopers. They had a dance-off, between the good and evil characters. Darth Vader was dancing like Michael Jackson in Smooth Criminal.
Jason visited the fake San Francisco while I said hello to fake New York City. We rode a few rides, ate some ice cream, and watched the Mickey's Fantasmic show at 10:30. It was fun to have some brother sister time with Jason.

Prayer

Lord, help me pray boldly so I can see
All the wonderful plans you have written for me
Catching glimpses of your plan from time to time
Keeps my focus on You, even the smallest sign

Lord, grant me wisdom in decisions I make
And joyful obedience in every step I take
Uncertainty surrounds me, creating fog in my head
Be the light breaking through so I follow You instead

It's so easy to stray
And look the other way
To find our own chance
Or choreograph our own dance
But His words are true
He loves and cares for you
When we doubt all we know
It's tough to stand tall and grow

Gray

Today was a gray gray day
And I didn't wish it to go away
In contrast to our bright, hot sun

A relief from burning was a welcomed one

Soon the clouds let loose their hold

Releasing rain drops that had grown bold

Falling softly and landing with a splash

On my shoulder, my nose, even my eyelash

Little rain globes form puddles on the ground

And echo 'pitter' 'patter' as their sound

Otherwise in silence they fall fast

And keep one day gleefully overcast

Supplement your Faith

I show you my shoe only to act as a comparison to the dictionary I wanted to buy at the Gainesville library book sale. I wanted the Oxford English Dictionary, seen on the right in 2 volumes. Oh, and it is the Compact Edition of the OED. I cannot imagine what the expanded edition might weigh. Not sure I would have even been able to lift both books, so I left them behind for some other nerdy soul with a forklift to purchase it. Someday, my OED will come along.

In 2 Peter 1.5-7, Peter provides a list of qualities that we should have to supplement our faith to keep us from falling into the corruption of this world. Lists are easy to by-pass in the Bible. We tend to think we've heard it, we know it, move on. But sometimes we need to stop and focus on the information and really think about what each of these qualities means to us today. I don't want to just know what the verses say, I want to be able to incorporate each of these qualities in my life.

Virtue- goodness or excellence, prudence, fortitude, temperance, justice, faith, hope, charity, chastity

Knowledge- understanding, familiarity gained by experience, range of information

Self-control- control of one's own feeling and behavior

Steadfastness- firm and unchanging, keeping firm

Godliness- loving and obeying God, deeply religious

Brotherly affection- kindly feeling, love

Love- have strong affection or deep, tender feeling for, worship, very fond of, find pleasure in

Suffice it to say, I have work to do in these areas. My faith will be a lot stronger if I take Peter's advice to supplement it with these important elements. I may do well in my self-control but how am I doing in my brotherly affection? Am I showing kindly feelings to others, or does my independent lifestyle cause me to be too cold sometimes, instead of showing warmth to people?

And while I read excessively to gain knowledge about many things, that is only part of the whole. Am I gaining knowledge through different experiences? Am I staying firm and unchanging in this wavering, crippled world?

I know the answers to these questions in my own heart and these verses opened up some new things that need to be opened. Peter is telling us that without these qualities we are fruitless. We may have faith but what are we doing with it? Can we bear fruit if we are not nourishing our faith? Peter says no. He says if we practice these qualities we will not fall, because we will be established in the truth in everything we do.

Bookish nerd that I obviously am, you should not be surprised that I turned to my dictionary to look up each word in order to better understand what they mean specifically. I find it to be helpful to apply the qualities to my life when I fully comprehend the meaning of a word. Hopefully, this is helpful to you, too.

Appreciate by Contrast

Rain and sun. Contrasting in the sky. Leaving a rainbow behind. And isn't the rainbow a reminder of God's promises to us? Promises that we can trust in?

The book of Job is, of course, the epitome of suffering and asking God "why?" While Job was a good man the calamities were brought onto him and allowed to continue. So a question that is most brought up by Christians and non-Christians is how could a loving God allow bad things to happen to good people? Why must we all go through life and endure such suffering?

Job asks all sorts of great questions, and God doesn't answer a single one of them. He says, basically- if I may summarize his great rhetoric in a few much less great words: "Hush, child, you couldn't possibly understand. Who do you think you are anyway? I'm the Author; you're the character." (Peter Kreeft)

It makes sense. We are not the authors of this big story. We are tiny pieces of God's immense story, and as we are characters written on the pages, we do not know what the author has written on the next page. We can only live in that present momentary sentence on page 62, and we won't find out what happens about this situation until page 70. Or maybe on page 68 we will get a foreshadowing of what is going to happen, and a new door is opened. One that we never thought possible, only because we cannot see ahead.

What we are getting wrong is our hypothesis that if there were no suffering we would all be happy. Without realizing it, we are taking the stance that happiness and suffering are mutually exclusive. That we can treat them as totally separate entities, not related to each other.

How wrong we are in that. How can one be happy if one hasn't suffered? If you are always getting everything you want in life you are spoiled and appreciate nothing. It is only when we suffer that we can truly appreciate things.

We appreciate by contrast.

A rainy day is enjoyable only because we've had months of intense sunny heat. Those who live in the blustery north appreciate their short summers because they endure harsh winters.

When we work hard and save money for a trip somewhere, we enjoy it immensely because we had to work hard in order to take time to play.

When we are rejected. When we feel like failures. All it takes is one opportunity to change everything. It doesn't matter how many times we fail, as long as we keep trying and working to improve ourselves so that our gifts are even better than they were a few months ago. We are then able to trust that something better is on the next page.

Much to Learn

Even if you're on the right track, you'll get run over if you just sit there.
-Will Rogers, American humorist

Genuine love is invited, not forced, motivated by faithfulness rather than fear, counts not as "loss" but gain in some deeper way, and leads to more just and loving relationships. 
-Bonnie J Miller

I will always be learning. A work in progress.
It's funny how as we age, we realize this more and more. How little we really know.
This is so different from the young (high school age) self we all once were. One who knew it all and thought the sun revolved around them.
But as I get older (late 20s is ancient, haha), it is so clear that I know and see so very little in this lifetime, and each moment is precious. It is not to be wished away. Yet it is a good and joyful thing to admit knowing nothing and making the most of every opportunity to learn, grow, and love. The true happiness doesn't come from living off of wishes for the future, but in living in the present moment and being wrapped in it. 

The mighty future is as nothing, being every thing! The past is every thing, being nothing! 
-Charles Lamb

From a Daughter's Perspective

Not being a mom myself, I can only articulate my mother's day thoughts with a perspective of a daughter. From a daughter's perspective, I am overwhelmed with thankfulness to have such a caring, loving mom in my life. A mother's love is so deep, I think it is not fully understood unless you are a mom. It will remain elusive until I am a mom. Until then, I will be the daughter surrounded in a warm, comforting blanket that mom is.

Moms want their kids to reach for their dreams, and help us along the way. Moms foster and encourage dreams, using our talents, and learning.
Mom helped me write my first story. I must have been 4 or 5 years old, and I wanted to write a book. What else would I want to do at 4 or 5 years old?
I didn't know how to write, yet, so I dictated the story to mom and she wrote it out in her flowing, graceful handwriting. I was the illustrator. Drawing pictures that set the scene so well (complete with crayon drawings). The story was about a girl who lost her pumpkin, and all that she went through to locate her pumpkin before Halloween. It's a suspenseful story. You never know what is going to happen! Ok, not really. I did not develop my plot very well.
I still have that handmade book, somewhere. I should dig that out.

So, thank you, mom, for always encouraging my love of writing. Even from before I could write. You helped harness something in me that continued to grow and pour out of me. God has blessed me, indeed, with my mom.
HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!!

Thursday Next

The taxi slowed down and stopped as the traffic ground to a halt. The cabbie made some inquiries and found out that a truck-load of "their" had collided with a trailer containing "there" going in the opposite direction and had spread there contents across the road. 

"Their will be a few hiccups after that," said the cabbie, and I agreed. Homophone mishaps often seeped out into the RealWorld and infected the Outlanders, causing theire to be all manner of confusion. 

-One of Our Thursdays is Missing, page 133

The book series of Thursday Next encompasses six books written by Jasper Fforde. This one, One of Our Thursdays is Missing, is the newest addition to the collection. I don't know how I ran across the first book years ago, but it was so humorous and book-nerdy, I grew attached and read all the rest. The stories are so creative, full of grammatical puns and characters from classic fiction and other books. Thursday Next is a detective of the literary world. She gets thrown into the Bookworld, where characters are alive and wrecking havoc in ways somehow related to their books. Thursday solves mysteries of murder and kidnapping while trying to keep order in the written world and get back out to the real world.

It is just pure, fun reading. To someone who loves the book world and the written word, these books are full of new, funny situations with characters already known. It has a British flair because the author is from Wales. So, that kind of humor always makes me chuckle. That also means a lot of coffee and tea is drunk. Or, in this newest book's case, not drunk. Here's what I mean:

"Could I not have a coffee?" I said, meaning I wanted an empty cup. Stubbs had become so expensive that no one could afford the coffee, but since the ambience in the cafe was so good and the establishment so fashionable, it was always full.
"What would you not like?" ask Paul...
"Better not give me a latte," I replied, "and better not make it a large one."
(page 101)

I know. I am such a book nerd. It's quite clear. So, I will just journey back down the Metaphoric River to the book world where I belong. 

Bright and Beautiful

Bright and beautiful starts the hours

With lingering droplets from last night's rain

Breathing fresh air, creating plans

Cause and effect leaves no day so plain

Each has a tone, a feature, a mood

A rough sketch dawns, drawn in chalk

Hours slip by and a drawing emerges

Stagnant we are not, making changes in our walk

A Worthy Try

Rush through the day
And we miss moments along the way

That slip through the spaces

Just barely catching traces

Ending in the arid and dry

Leaving dreams to question why

When we lose sight of the joy

At the heart of all we employ

We end up feeling empty and cold

When our talents are left untold

But moments we pass by

Wait for our worthy try

Sunny Day

We spent the day at Epcot on Saturday. Here are some fun photos of the hot, sunny day. On a day like Saturday, a hat and sunscreen was essential. The Flower and Garden Festival was going on, so flowers were everywhere! Bold colors on so many varieties of flowers. Epcot must hire hundreds of gardeners to take care of all the flowers, plants, and topiary around the park shaped like Disney characters. 

How long would it take to drink a cup of Earl Grey this big???

It's Winnie the Pooh, of course! Had to stop by his dwelling in England.

This was an entertaining street-performer in France. Stacking one chair on top of another, and another, as he climbed each one and did some handstands.

While at Disney, one must act like a child sometimes. So, here's Ryan playing with a marionette in China with Mom.

Jason and I wandering around the outside of a building in Norway.

We had a yummy dinner in France, where Ryan was embarrassed when the waitstaff all came and sang happy birthday to him in French. That was so great.....and I could not help but wish I were standing in this spot in the real Paris. One day I will....

Stranger Than Fiction

God's love is strange.
We cannot fully comprehend how deep His love is for us. We imagine and experience love from a human perspective, which is full of faults (it's not our fault), so it's hard for us to understand an infinite love that has no end. No faults. No conditions.

I have read some strange fictional stories. What comes to mind first are the English classes I had in high school and college. I sometimes wondered how the teachers picked out certain works to assign to their classes and why. Many of the assigned readings I enjoyed (such as Shakespeare, which was difficult to understand, but I loved to learn how to read it and understand it) while some were so disturbing or odd that I really wondered why on earth it was considered a classic (such as Kafka's "The Metamorphosis", which was the most disturbing story I think I had ever read).

No matter how strange any fictional story may be, God's love tops it all, because it is not made of us. God's love wasn't created here, as all our stories are, so His love isn't going to fit into our expectation and presuppositions. It's going to blow them all away.

And through God's love we are able to catch little glimpses of the heavenly realm that we were made for. How joyful to know this it not it! That God intends us to join Him in the most glorious place.

Grounded

How dull it is to pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnished, not to shine in use!
-"Ulysses", Alfred, Lord Tennyson

My attempt to fly was grounded again
Stopped by the forces behind the wind
So I skid on the ground and scrape my knee

Early eagerness accelerated me to high speed

Moving toward the mirage I had created

It's funny how visions are never belated

When in pursuit of a dream so dear

We pray for God to say, all clear

Believing He placed the dream inside me

Along with necessary tools for the journey

So each time I am grounded, I wince

With my heart battered, but ever since

I learned to place my flight in the hands

Of the insuperable, who rules all lands

Though my desire only grows,

Being rooted in Him, who knows,

An instantaneous understanding envelopes me

With an odd sense of feeling free

Zwischen den Hammern besteht unser Herz

(Between the hammers our heart endures)

Here is the time for the sayable, here its home.
Speak and avow it. More than ever
things that can be experienced fall away,
shunted aside and superseded by
unseeable acts,

acts under crusts that readily shatter

when the inner workings outgrow them

and seek new containment

Between the hammers

our heart endures, like the tongue

between the teeth, which yet

continues to praise.

-from "Die Neunte Elegie", Rainer Rilke

Rilke's poetry has captured me this morning. I know not what time it is, as the poems somehow flow continuously on the pages and I just keep reading and underlining lines from his "Duino Elegies", where he writes of losses in such beautiful language. A German writer, the poems are all in his native tongue, so I am reading a mere translation, which probably does not match up to the German language. I like the book I have of Rilke's poetry because it includes the full German text on the left side of the page and the English translation on the right side. This way, when I learn German (one of my goals is to learn French and German) I will be able to compare words and attempt to read the German side.

Rilke's "Duino Elegies" is a collection of 10 elegies, or long poems lamenting losses. Traditionally an elegy is full of sorrow and lamenting over the loss of something, but Rilke's elegies are also mixed with questions:

O trees of life, when does your winter come?

Who hasn't waited anxiously before the heart's curtain?

He doesn't provide answers to such questions, but writes with elegant description further musings on human nature. Alongside those questions are lines of truth that grab my attention.

But we, giving ourselves to one thing,

feel it's at the expense of another. Conflict

is our nature.

And while I have read many poems lamenting loss, it can leave one with a desolate feeling when the poet doesn't have the hope in Christ. But Rilke's underlying sense of hope is obvious, reminding us that while a sadness can consume us, we can still offer praise to God. Life is a fleeting vapor, at times passing through darkness, yet there is always hope.

But it seems everything

keeps us in the dark. Look, the trees are; the houses

we live in still stand. We alone

go past them like an exchange of vapors.

And things conspire to tell us nothing, half

in shame, perhaps, half in unspoken hope.

-from "Die Zweite Elegie"

Good Kinds of Unexpected

I can see the wind: can you do that?
I can see the dreams he has in his hat,
I see him shake them out as he goes,
I see them rush in at man's snoring nose.
Ten thousand things you could not think,
I can write down plain with pen and ink!
-George MacDonald

When talking about travelling, the word "unexpected" may invoke fear to some people, but I delight in it. I just like it when I run across interesting things that are unplanned, yet that quickly become stories that are meant to be shared. Generally, when I travel, I have a basic plan for the day. A direction and ideas of things I want to do, but it is all easily alterable. One of the best things about travelling is running across some cool section of town, or a random event, or a concert of local musicians. A sudden connection to that place is established, and good memories build from there.

Most recently, on my road trip, Jen and I ran across 2 different Earth Day festivals. The one in Habersham provided us with recycled artwork, the best kettle corn ever, fresh lettuce, potatoes, carrots, and bread pudding that become our dinner that night. The one in downtown Savannah offered probably 50 booths of learning opportunities, a lot of interesting hippie-like people to watch such as the guy playing a huge didjeridu made from a tree trunk, and a perfect picnic place.

On Tybee Island we happened to be there on the day Fort Pulaski was free, and as we got there the canon fire demonstration was just beginning.
We came across 2 bookstores during the week that I didn't even know about, which is a bit like finding a treasure chest for me, full of shining temptations.
We found a riverside park with swinging benches in Beaufort and then had a coffee break at the coffee shop overlooking that park. Sitting on the covered wooden porch with iced coffee felt very southern (though iced tea would have fit the part better, but I prefer coffee). 

I guess I like being on my toes. I like discovering the secrets of a place and being delighted in what it has to offer. If disappointed, I move on, but if it's fabulous, linger a bit longer. Allow a little exploration because oftentimes the most amazing spots are not on the main street and not advertised.