More remarkable predictions from Fahrenheit 451

Prediction... such a word... is it an educated guess at the future? Or is it understanding the times and extrapolating the consequences that will result? Or is it an absolute knowledge of what will come? The Webster 1812 Dictionary says this of the word "A foretelling; a previous declaration of a future event; prophecy". Dictionary.com gives this sort of description, "The act of telling or declaring in advance." Think of the breakdown of the word "pre" and "diction." Pre means "before" and diction refers to speech. It is a speech about something before it actually occurs.

One facet of predictions however that is not as malleable as its connotations is that predictions can always be judged rather clearly once an event has already occurred. (Mind you, there are still plenty of ways to spin a story that still makes history an imperfect standard, but we operate with the tools we are given.)

Well here is what Bradbury said about the politics of the future from where he stood...
________________________________________________________________________
Woman #1
"I voted last election, same as everyone, and I laid it on the line for President Noble. I think he's one of the nicest looking men ever became president."

Women chattering among themselves:
"Oh, but the man they ran against him"..."kind of small and homely and he didn't shave too close or comb his hair very well"..."You just don't go running a little short man like that against a tall man"...."Fat, too, didn't dress to hide it. No wonder the landslide was for Winston Noble. Even their names helped. Compare Winston Noble to Hubert Hoag for ten seconds and you can almost figure the results."

Montag the protagonist:
"Damn it! What do you know about Hoag and Noble!"

One of the women:
"Well, they were right in that parlor wall (wall-sized, interactive TV), not six months ago."
_________________________________________________________________________

There is a commonly held belief that the greater number of people that vote, the greater the outcome will be. It is generally believed that an increased voter turn-out is positive.

The British Psychological Society Research Digest said, "The political parties don't agree on much but what they do all agree on is that the more people who exercise their right to vote, the better."

At International IDEA an article talks about a conference topic called "How do we increase voter turn-out?"

At the radical Garlic and Grass the author proposes making election day a national holiday and paying people to vote. That's right, pay people to vote... his example gave a figure of $100 per person.

Why did we start at "How" and skip over the "Why"?

Is it an appropriate assumption that increasing voter turn-out is a worthy goal? Why do we accept at face value that "more equals better"? Go ahead and do an internet search... Everything on the web will tell you that indeed it is such a good, noble and healthy proposition to increase voter turnout. Do you believe everything you read?

So, let's start at the very beginning, as Maria Von Trapp would say (at least in Hollywood), its a very good place to start.

What is the worldview behind wanting high voter turnout? I propose that it is generally a humanistic, evolutionary world view. Afterall, if you believe man, at his core, is naturally good, then the more "good" people you get together to voice an opinion, the better the result will inevitably be.

If however, you believe, as the Bible says, the man is inherently sinful and evil, then it does not follow that the more people you get together, the better the decision will be. The Founding Fathers did not leave us with a democracy, but with a representative republic... One government funtions on the foundational belief that man will choose rightly, the other creates checks and balances to account for depraved man.

Now I am not saying that high voter turnout is a bad thing, in itself, but I propose that it is a result of good citizens, an outworking of good citizenry, not a worthy goal on its own.

"Whatever makes men good Christians, makes them good citizens." -Daniel Webster

"Whatever makes men good citizens, makes them turn out to vote." -Rebekah Zeerip

This logic only runs one way... it does not work in reverse... a person may be a good citizen without being a good Christian and likewise a person may turn out to vote without being a good citizen.

I believe that a Biblical worldview requires us to make the distinction that more voters does not ensure a better turnout and therefore voter turnout for its own sake is a worthless goal.

But I digress... let me tie this little soliloquy off by relating it to Fahrenheit 451... Bradybury worked it so seamlessly into the dialogue of this "future world" when Woman # 1 (Mrs. Bowles is her name) said, "I voted last election, same as everyone..."

In Bradbury's world, high voter turnout has disasterous results.

Then Bradbury's women go on to discuss the candidates' physical appearances, ending their arguement with the lynchpin that their decisions were rational because they saw it on TV.

Maybe I am a statistics/research geek, but this awed me:

Here is a very recent new study from MIT (the MIT News Office just released this article less than two weeks ago) which says that beautiful/handsome candidates have an advantage over homely ones when it comes to uninformed voters...

But here is where Bradbury truly amazes... It isn't simply voters who are uninformed, but voters who are uninformed AND watch a high level of television.... Do you hear the echoes from Fahrenheit 451??? The women pick the candidate apart on his physical appearance and then cite their media exposure as proof to back them up. Wow.

So in one small page of seemingly easy dialogue of Farenheit 451, Bradbury NAILS this scene writing it in the 1950's and in 2011 MIT produces the research to back it up.

THAT'S WHAT I CALL PREDICTION!

Another Book Worth Blogging About...

Yes, I am still here. In fact, not only am I still here, but I have been voraciously reading. Fun books, interesting books, historical books, Christian teaching books, the Bible and more. Since I put down Ann's book, I have probably picked up another 8 or 10 bundles of words, paragraphs, thoughts, paper and glue. And the one I picked up yesterday has quickened my pulse and set my mind to processing. Another book worth bloggin about, so I thought it was high time to do just that and sort out my thoughts.

What is the book, you ask? It is call Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, partially published in 1950 and published in its current format in 1953... NOTE THE DATES... the 1950's. The days when I Love Lucy and The Ed Sullivan Show and Dragnet topped the ratings programs.

In that "American as Apple Pie" culture, Bradbury imagined a world where books were prohibited and burned when found. A world where the ultimate pursuit was "happiness", even if only achieved through deadening the senses to anything less than "pleasant."

There are several exerpts I want to ruminate on, but for tonight this one is all I have time for:

The protagonist, Guy Montag, is talking with his fire chief (incidently the job of firemen in this world is to start fires, not put them out) and his chief is trying to explain to him how they are altering society and why they are altering society. Particularly why books, specifically books that spur CRITICAL THINKING, are bad ideas:

He starts by saying, "You can't rid yourself of all the odd ducks (read critical/ logical thinkers) in just a few years. The home environment can undo a lot you try to do at school. That's why we've lowered the kindergarten age year after year until now we're almost snatching them from the cradle."

BRADBURY WROTE THAT 60+ YEARS AGO... And where are we now? The US government is funding Headstart Progams and numerous daycare programs. Where will it lead?

The chief continues less than a paragraph later:

"Luckily, queer ones [the odd ducks] don't happen often. We know how to nip most of them in the bud, early. You can't build a house without nails and wood. If you don't want a house built, hide the nails and wood. If you don't want a man unhappy politically, don't give him two sides to a question to worry him; give him one. Better yet, give him none. Let him forget there is such a thing as war. If the government is inefficient, top-heavy, and tax-mad, better it be all those than that people worry over it. Peace, Montag. Give the people contests they win by remembering the words to more popular songs (anyone remember the show Don't Forget the Lyrics?)or the names of state capitals or how much corn Iowa grew last year. (Hhhmm. Sounds eerily like the show Are You Smarter than a 5th Grader?) CRAM THEM FULL OF NONCOMBUSTIBLE DATA, CHOCK THEM SO DAMNED FULL OF 'FACTS' THEY FEEL STUFFED, BUT ABSOLUTELY 'BRILLIANT' WITH INFORMATION. THEN THEY'LL FEEL THEY ARE THINKING, THEY'LL GET A SENSE OF MOTION WITHOUT MOVING. AND THEY'LL BE HAPPY BECAUSE FACTS OF THAT SORT DON'T CHANGE [ANYTHING]."

Ray, what reflection did you see in society three generations ago that you predicted such an awful and accurate reality?

Friends, go pick up a copy of Fahrenheit 451, take a few hours to read it, and join me in a few weeks of digesting it.

All God

Funny how quickly I become dependent on other things besides God-grace. Well, not really funny, shameful is more accurate. The past few days have been hard. I have had some physical things going on, missed church on Sunday (again) because Surprise Girl wasn't feeling well but much more that any of the physical circumstances, I have abounded in sin -revelled in it -rolled around in it and covered myself. I have yelled at my kids. I have believed the lie that I just needed more selfish down-time to be refreshed. I have been unkind and harsh. I have not served my husband well. Ugh!

Why did I not begin to preach truth to myself sooner? Why did I not repent faster? Why did I continue in Satan's methodologies instead of applying grace in my life?

One clue is in the story that Blogger went down. I know, how could that possibly derail me for days on end? Well, I process best in writing and this is my online journal... my web-log. Blog. I put my trust for me to receive nourishment from God's Word in my ability to process by my writing. Did you read all the "I's" and "me's" and "my's" in that paragraph?

The short of it is that I depended on a tool (and we know all technology... it WILL let you down) and on self (say it again... and we all know self... it WILL let you down) instead of relying on grace. I did not believe in the sufficiency of God, but pinned my hopes on my own formula for godly living. After all, will God supply grace if I have not gone through the motions?

So here I sit at the very beginning... it's a very good place to start. I am a sinner saved by grace. I must decrease so He must increase. "Where sin abounded, grace did abound more..." (Rom. 5:20) Andrew Murray called it, "the displacement of self by the enthronement of God."

Look at the beginnings of all those sentences:

A sinner

I must decrease

Sin abounded

Displacement of self

Let me remember that God did not leave me there. Think of the ends of the sentences:

Grace

He must increase

Grace did abound more

Enthronement of God

In combination, the thoughts keep before my eyes this truth: "It was not sin, but God's grace showing a man and ever reminding him what a sinner he was, that will keep him truly humble." -Murray

My humility, my walking in the way of Jesus, is dependent on me not depending on me, but on God. God's grace is the only reason I can see my need for grace. God's grace is the only reason I can remember I need grace.

Sit back, take a deep breath, and say it outloud:

IT IS ALL GOD, ALL THE TIME.

Someday we are going to get to heaven and have those crowns to cast down before Jesus' feet. And with every jewel in those crowns, we will point and say, "This one, this was all God. It was Him at work in me. This is when I decreased and He increased in me. This is proof that God was in possession of me."

God, be in possession of me today.

Yes, I am still writing and processsing by writing on this blog.

But God help me see, help me remember that it all comes back to YOU. You are the supply of all that I need. IT'S ALL YOU, ALL THE TIME.

The Last Review Online, One of Many Reviews in Life

So the end of One Thousand Gifts - Chapters 10 & 11. I must confess that I think this book was meant to be a ten chapter book. The book is wonderful but for some specific analogies in the 11th chapter to which I have an aversion and afterall 10 is such a nice round number. :-)

Here are the quotes that God used in the last two chapters to provoke and encourage me:

10

"A life contemplating the blessings of Christ becomes a life of acting the love of Christ."

"Eucharisteo is giving thanks for grace. But in the breaking and giving of bread, in the washing of feet, Jesus makes it clear that eucharisteo is, yes, more: it is giving grace away."

"The moment you think of serving people, you begin to have a notion that other people owe you something for your pains... You will begin to bargain for reward, to angle for applause." Dorothy Sayers

"Passionately serving Christ alone makes us the loving servant to all."

"It's the astonishing truth that while I serve Christ, it is He who serves me. Jesus Christ still lives with a towel around His waist, bent in service to His people . . . in service to me, as I serve, that I need never serve in my own strength....He calls us to serve, and it is Him whom we serve, but He, very God, kneels down to serve us as we serve. The servant-hearted never serve alone."

"God extravagantly pays back everything we give away and exactly in the currency that is not of this world but the one we yearn for: Joy in Him."

"[W]ith every one of the thousand, endless jobs, I become the gift to God and to others because this work is the public God serving, the daily liturgy of thanks, the completing of the Communion service with my service."

11

"With every grace, He sings, "You are precious to me. You are honored, and I love you" (Isaiah 43:4).

"[T]he most fundamental thing is not how we think of God but rather what God thinks of us:"

"How God thinks of us is not only more important, but infinitely more important." C.S. Lewis

"The one thousand presents wake me to the presence of God- but more so, living eucharisteo, living in thanks, had done the far harder work of keeping me awake to Him."

"Little had I known that counting one thousand gifts would launch me on a thousand-year-old journey of transformation."

"He's calling me to graft on, become one with the True Vine, the vine the biblical symbol of joy, festivity... fullness."

"Before I ever breathed or the earth ever spun, the love within the Godhead orbited, Father loving Son 'before the creation of the world' (John 17:24 NIV) and when I am in union with Christ, I too am lavished with the love the Father has for the Son. In union, that love is mine- ours!"

"Eucharisteo-communion- that hound of heaven, He won't relent, always, everywhere, eucharisteo, opening the eyes to God."

"Is there a greater way to love the Giver than to delight wildly in His gifts?"

"Communion with God, what was broken in the Garden, this is wholly restored when I want the God-communion more than I want the world-consumption."

"O my soul, thou are capable of enjoying God, woe to thee if thou are contented with anything less than God." Francis de Sales

"He will break bread and I will take and the world is his feast! and He is love! and nothing will keep my hand from filling with His."
________________________________________________________________

Blessed be the Lord, who daily loadeth us with benefits, even the God of our salvation. Selah.
-Ps. 68:19

Do I believe it? Do I live it? Oh God, I am grateful! Help thou my ingratitude!

Join me.

Echoes of Murray

Solomon said, "The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun." (Ecc. 1:9)

Reading the little biography of Andrew Murray, I recognize a man that God's Spirit had filled to overflowing. And journeying in that place of joy, he wrote, and wrote some more. And now we are blessed in the reading.

Thank you Ann for sharing your journey with us. May God continue to fill you and surround you with the joy of His Presence. You wrote and we read. You were blessed and became the blessing.

*The italicized quotes are from Murray's book Humility.

Chapter Nine:
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"How much larger your life would be if your self could become smaller in it!" G.K. Chesterton

"The word humility itself comes from the Latin root humus - the kind of earth that grows good crops. God give the earth to the humus-people, the humble ones. Humility is that good humus that grows gratitude that yields abundant joy."

"Humility is not so much a grace or virtue along with others; [humility] is the root of all, because it alone takes the right attitude before God, and allows him as God to do all."

"I used to think that God's gifts were on shelves one above the other, and that the taller we grew in Christian character the easier we should reach them. I found now that God's gifts are on shelves one beneath the other, and that it is not a question of growing taller but of stooping lower, and that we have to go down, always down, to get His best gifts." F.B. Meyer

"When our own heart is set upon this (humility)...no place will be too low, and no stooping too deep, and no service too mean or too long continued, if we may but share and prove the fellowship of him who spake, 'I am among you as he that serveth.' [Luke 22:27]"

"Receiving God's gifts is a gentle, simple movement of stooping lower."

"Brethren, here is the path to the higher life. Down, lower down!"

"[I]n that place of of humble thanks, God exalts and gives more gifts and more of Himself, which humbles and lays the soul down lower. And good God responds with greater gifts of grace and even more of Himself."

"God wished to reveal himself in and through created beings by communicating to them as much of his own goodness and glory as they were capable of receiving...[and] the relation of the creature to God could only be one of unceasing, absolute, universal dependence."

"He must increase and I must decrease - not because that is burden but so that my joy might increase with more of Him!"

"[T]he first and chief mark of the relation of the creature, the secret of his blessedness, is the humility and nothingness which leaves God free to be all."

"The river of joy flows down to the lowest place."

"Just as water ever seeks and fills the lowest place, so the moment God finds the creature abased and empty, his glory and power flow in to exalt and to bless."

"God holds us in the untamed moments too."

"Lament is a cry of belief in a good God, a God who has his ear to our hearts, a God who transfigures the ugly into beautiful. Complaint is the howl of unbelief in any benevolent God in this moment, a distrust in the love-beat of the the Father's heart."

"Joy is God and God is joy and joy doesn't negate all other emotions - joy trancends all other emotions."

"His humility is our salvation. His salvation is our humility."

"Pride, mine - that beast that pulls on the mask of anger - this is what snaps this hand shut, crushes joy."

"In Heaven and earth, pride, self-exaltation, is the gate and the birth, and the curse, of Hell."

"The theology is putting on skin."

"Fullness of joy is discovered only in the emptying of will."

"This is the true self-denial to which our Saviour calls us... self has nothing good in it, except as an empty vessel which God must fill..."
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Pride is a behemoth in me. I need to live in the words above, soak them in, apply, put them on, marinate in them. I need to live in this subject of humility for a lifetime.

I behold my sin, and I behold a Savior greater.

Greatest Hits

Skimming through Ann's book, looking for the succint truths that I want to have before my spiritual eyes throughout my day, here is my list of "Greatest Hits" for chapters 7 & 8. God, help these truths to hit me in a way that gives You greatest glory.

Chapter 7:


"Christ incarnated in the parent is the only hope of incarnating Christ in the child..."


"Obvious and immediate transfigurations exhilirate the faith, but the faithful can forget transfigurations, faces that once changed appearances. We betray Who we know. Didn't Peter?"


"You would be very ashamed if you knew what experiences you call setbacks, upheavals, pointless disturbances, and tedious annoyances really are. You would realize that your complaints about them are nothing more nor less than blasphemies - though that never occurs to you. Nothing happens to you except by the will of God, and yet [God's] beloved children curse it because they do not know it for what it is. -Jean-Pierre de Caussade"


"[Do I believe] that Satan's way is more powerful, more practical, more fulfilling, in my daily life than Jesus' way? Why else get angry?"


"Who's the real sinner... with the stinking pig in temple?"

"Can I be so audacious? To expect to see God in these faces when I am the blasphemer who complains, who doesn't acknowlege this moment for Who it is?"


"I look for the ugly beautiful, count it as grace, transfigure the mess into joy with thanks and eucharisteo leaves the paper, finds way to the eyes, the lips."

"I am Hagar lost with boy... I want to step back, flee. Who can witness the dying, but how can I leave him? 'Then God opened her eyes and she saw a well of water' (Gen. 21:19 NIV)....What insanity compels me to shrivel up when there joy's water [is] to be had here?"



"You have to want to see the well before you can drink from it. You have to want to see joy, God in the moment."


"Love is not blind; love is the holy vision."

Chapter 8:

"Worry is the facade of taking action when prayer really is." - I love the idea here, but isn't this a hanging participle, or somthing of the sort?! :-)


"Anything less than gratitude and trust is practical atheism."


"...I know I can't experience deep joy in God until I deep trust in God."


"Trust is the bridge from yesterday to tomorrow, built with planks of thanks. Remembering frames up gratitude. Gratitude lays out the planks of trust. I can walk the planks -from known to unknown- and know: He holds."


"...gratitude is not only the memories of our heart; gratitude is a memory of God's heart and to thank is to remember God."


"Jesus! [The Father] gave Him up for us all. If we have only one memory, isn't this one enough?"


"I either take the 'what is it' manna with thanks, eat the mystery of the moment with trust, and am nourished another day, -or refuse it . . . and die."


"I clutch soul bread and a Perfect Love that knows no end."

Intercession

Our Seder table was full this year.

Three families: six adults and fifteen children.

So many interruptions, distractions, explanations and corrections, but it was worth it. There is something sacred about entering into holy rememberances with fellow saints. During the festival meal, seeing all the foreshadowing and types of Christ in the Passover, we marvelled that so many Jews do not see how Jesus fulfill the prophecies of the Messiah.

We see because because God has given our souls the vision. How many prayers and petitions were offered to God that we have that revelation? In my case, my parents, my grandparents, and my great-grandmother all uttered appeals for my salvation, even before I had a congnitive awareness of my need for it.

It put me in mind of how in the past couple years I had knowlege intellectually of my need for refreshing and reviving from God, but I did not push hard for it. I did not press into what a refreshed person would have obviously seen, diagnosed, and acted upon... that I needed face-time with God. Revival begins with prayer. Often times it is

the prayer of one

that leads to

the revival of another.

Isn't this the definition of intercession; interposing or pleading on behalf of another person? Christ is THE Intercessor. Are we not to imitate Him? At this moment in my Christian walk, I see clearly, I am pushing hard into God, and pressing for the finish line. I see clearly. That places me in the perfect position to intercede for others. I know what they are missing. I have missed it before myself. I am experiencing the fullness, but can remember the feeling of empty. Can I now sit back, satisfied?

No, this is my time to plead on behalf of others who because of their weariness or emptiness or blindness are not pleading for themselves.

I was impressed with this thought after our Passover meal: to simply wonder at a person's lack without acting to help is the person James writes about (2:15-16), "If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute of daily food, and one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit?"

I don't personally know any of my spiritual siblings that are lacking physical food, but I do know some who are not being nourished on the Word and withering from spiritual malnutrition. I may not know one who lacks physical clothing, but I know MANY who have not put on the spotless garment of Christ. These things that are so much more needful. Will I dismiss them with momentary thoughts and speculation, or will I give them those things which are needful: My pleas on their behalf to the One who satisfies completely.

My faith work of the moment: I Timothy 2:1,3 - "Supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks be made for all men...for this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour; Who will have all men to be saved and to come unto the knowlege of the truth."

Recounting Chapters 4-6

Count and recount -it reminds me about the joke of Pete and Repeat...

Remember, recall, remind, retell, relate, recollect and, of course, recount all the that God has done for us, both personally and colletively throughout time. It is the joy duty.

Well, One Thousand Gifts is certainly a gift from God that needs to be recounted. Here are my favorite quotes from chapters 4-6.

A Sanctuary of Time (4)- Here was my own practice and process of this chapter: Time Dayenu.

Now on to quotes...

"On every level of life, from housework to heights of prayer, in all judgment and efforts to get things done, hurry and impatience are sure marks of the amateur." - Evelyn Underhill

"Hurry always empties a soul."

"Weigh down this moment in time with attention full..."

"This is where God is. In the present. I AM - His very name."

"...time is only of the essence, because time is the essence of God, I AM."

"Thanks makes now a sanctuary."

"When I'm present, I meet I AM, the very presence of a present God."

"Entering fully into the moment can overwhelm, a river running wild. I will forget, and again, and again, but today I do remember. I breathe and I reel and I hold my ground and my tongue in this torrent coming down. I've staked my claim to the miracle." (emphasis mine)

"How long does it take your soul to realize that your life is full?"

"I want to slow down and taste life, give thanks, and see God."


Chapter Five - The inspiration for Secret Garden.

"Joy and pain, they are but two arteries of the one heart that pumps through all those who don't numb themselves to really living."

"Eventually, I am guaranteed to lose every earthly thing I have ever possessed...I will lose every single person I have ever loved... You may suffer loss but in Me is anything ever lost, really? Isn't everything that belongs to Christ also yours?"

"And every moment is a message from the Word-God who can't stop writing his heart."

"To read His message in moments, I'll need to read His passion on the page; wear the lens of the Word, to read His writing in the world."

"...I know all our days are struggle and warfare (Job 14:14) and that the spirit-to-spirit combat I endlessly wage with Satan is this ferocious thrash for joy. He sneers at all things that seem to have gone hideously mad in this sin-drunk world, and I gasp to say God is good. The liar defiantly scrawls his graffiti across God's glory, and I heave to enjoy God . . . and Satan strangles, and I whiten knuckles to grasp real Truth and fix that beast to the floor." (emphasis mine)

"Without God's Word as a lens, the world warps."

"And it's the Word of God that turns the rocks in the mouth to the loaves on the tongue."

"Out of the darkness of the cross, the world transfigures into new life. And there is no other way... It is suffering that has the realest possibility to bear down and deliver grace."

"He became ugly that we might become beauty. The God of the Mount of Transfiguration cannot cease His work of transfiguring moments - making all that is dark, evil, empty into that which is all light, grace, full."

"And if all work of transfiguring the ugly into the beautiful pleases God, it is a work of beauty."

"...and mourning and dancing are but movements in His unfinished symphony of beauty."

"All is grace only because all can transfigure."

Chapter 6 - This chapter was not a one-day read for me. I didn't walk away with one neatly wrapped nugget, rather, echoes of this chapter permeated the days following the readings.

The White Load and Learning to Speak reverberated from this chapter.

"I am beset by chronic soul amnesia. I empty of truth and need the refilling."

"The only place we have to come to before we die is the place of seeing God. This is what I am famished for: more of the God-glory. I whisper with the blind beggar, "Lord, I want to see" (Luke 18:41)."

"Beauty is all that is glory and God is Beauty embodied, glory manifested. This is what I crave: I hunger for Beauty. Is that why I must keep up the hunt? When I cease the beauty hunt, is that why I begin to starve, waste away?"

"Eucharisteo is everywhere and I want to see eucharisteo everywhere and I want to remember how badly I really want to see. Here. How could I have forgotten how badly I wanted this? To bow down and rightly worship." (Bolding added.)

"How we behold determines if we hold joy. Behold glory and be held by God. How we look determines how we live... if we live."

"The only way to see God manifested in the world around is with the eyes of Jesus within. God within is the One seeing God without. God is both the object of my seeing and the subject who does the act of all real seeing, the Word lens the inner eye wears."

"It is strange, how joy pains... God expanding, widening and deepening my inner spaces. Is that why joy hurts - God stretching us open to receive more of Himself?"

"For God is happiest of all."

"How do you open the eyes to see how to take the daily, domestic, workday vortex and invert it into the dome of an everyday cathedral?"

"Praying with eyes wide open is the only way to pray without ceasing."

"I could live blind, either in black or in blaze. I'll be all eye, all blinded by glory."

Orthodox Paradox

Christianity is brimming with paradoxes.

What Webster termed "a tenet...contrary to received opinion, or seemingingly absurd, yet true in fact."

Ever-living God lying cold in a grave.

Justification- perfect in standing before God- joined at the hip with sanctification -working out salvation with fear and trembling.

A single God, in three persons.

Dying to self to truly live.

Finding greatest personal satisfaction outside of our person.

In light of today being Resurrection Sunday I read: "So I will sing praise to thy name forever, that I may daily perform my vows." Ps. 61:8

David rejoicing in praise always in order to complete required ceremonial ritual.

JOY: THE BACKBONE OF DUTY. How seemingly absurd...

But right there in the Psalm, the Hebrew for "sing praise" is zawmar: to celebrate, CELEBRATE with song and music. And the word for "perform" (shawlam) has all the implication of duty: to requite, to pay up, to make good, to make restitution.

Like John Piper said when he tweaked the Westminster Catechism, our chief end is "to glorify God by enjoying Him forever." To celebrate God in order to fulfill our duty. It is our joy -and the fulfilling of our charge -to be:

remembering

recalling

reminding ourselves

this day of that day... one of the most basic orthodoxical and paradoxical moments of our faith.

When Jesus defeated death with death and lived to tell about it. How seemingly absurd...

Have you done your duty by God today by celebrating? Are you a reveller? Has there been delight this holy day?

We have been at home all day, in sweats,

Resurrection Sunday outfits still neatly hung in closets, unused.

One child with a cold,

one with a fever,

one still undiagnosed.

Sickness and sleep, no gathering with the local Body.

Rain, no Easter egg hunt.

Chicken soup, not traditional hamballs and mashed potatoes.

Messy house, no beautifully-set dinner table.

Yet inspite of our best-laid plans being in ruin around our ankles

we have sung and read, remembered and REJOICED. How seemingly absurd...

That is our little, beautiful ORTHODOX PARADOX.

The End of the Book

Between Sunday and Tuesday, between loads of laundry and a sick baby held between my arms, I finished One Thousand Gifts.

In the book Ann tells about recording the 1000th gift. As she gets close she says "it has seemed like it might be over all too soon... Come early winter [she] jotted haltlingly, not wanting it to end."

I relate. Except it's not the end of my list I am approaching, but the end of the book. And so, by way of prolonging the joy and challenge found in this book, here is a compilation of some of my favorites quotes from the first three chapters of One Thousand Gifts (favorite quotes from the other chapters will follow, too):

CHAPTER ONE

"We don't see the material world for what it is meant to be: as the means to communion with God."

"From the very beginning, that Eden beginning, that has always been and always is, to this day, His secret purpose, - our return to our full glory."

"For forty long years, God's people daily eat manna- a substance whose name literally means "What is it?" Hungry, they choose to gather up that which is baffling... More than 14,600 days they take their daily nourishment from that which they don't comprehend. They find soul-filling in the inexplicable... They eat the mystery."


CHAPTER TWO

"Do we truly stumble so blind that we must be affronted with blinding magnificence for our blurry soul-sight to recognize grandeur?"

"The root word of eucharisteo is charis, meaning "grace." Jesus took the bread and saw it as grace and gave thanks."

"Eucharisteo, thanksgiving, envelopes the Greek word for grace, charis. But it also holds its derivative, the Greek word chara, meaning "joy." Joy."

"The only place we need to see before we die is this place of seeing God, here and now."

"Sozo means salvation. It means true wellness, complete wholeness. To live sozo is to live the full life. Jesus came that we might live life to the full; He came to give us sozo. And when did the leper receive sozo- the saving to the full, whole life? When he returned and gave thanks."

"And the miracle of eucharisteo never ends: thanksgiving is what precedes the miracle of that salvation being fully worked out in our lives. Thanksgiving - giving thanks in everything - is what prepares the way for salvation's whole restoration."

CHAPTER THREE

"Long, I am a woman who speaks but one language, the language of the fall - dicontentment and self-condemnation, the critical eye and the never satisfied."

"A nail is driven out by another nail; habit is overcome by habit." Erasmus

"Naming is Edenic...naming offers the gift of recognition."

"I am Adam and I discover my meaning and God's, and to name is to learn the language of Paradise."

"God is not in need of magnifying by us so small, but the reverse. It's our lives that are little and we have falsely inflated self, and in thanks we decrease and the world returns right."

"Prayer without ceasing is only possible in a life of continual thanks. How did I ever think there was another way to enter into His courts but with thanksgiving?"

The Bathwater

***This post is a continuation of the posting Uncomfortable. I do not think it is suitable for young unmarried persons***


After taking some more time to mull over Ann's last chapter -mull has two meanings: to ponder, or to make a mess of- I think I know the bathwater. There is a big baby in that book, but I -hopefully humbly- submit that here is the bathwater:

There are two ways to interpret the Song of Solomon. I don't know if one is exclusively correct, but I don't think either supports Ann's analogy in the last chapter. SOS is either a practical handbook on sex - a gift from God- in the context of marriage, or it is a picture of God and his love for Israel and by extension Christ and his Bride, the church.

As far as my memory serves, I do not see that God ever uses, in His Word, the analogy of marriage or the marriage bed to describe the unity of God with an individual believer. The picture of the husband and wife, Bridegroom and Bride, is always reserved for God and the CHURCH. I think Ann erred in applying the analogy to God and the individual believer.

Not that there is not intimacy with God for the individual believer. Taking the cues from Scripture, though, and I find that the description of intimacy between the Trinity and an individual is that of platonic or non-sexual relationships: Father to Son, Brother to brother, adopted heirs, children, family. In the parable of the bridegroom we are likened -as individuals- to bridemaids, not the bride. There is an extreme connotation of closeness in these relationships. I think, based on David and Jonathan, that some brothers or close friends are considered closer in some respects than spouses.

So, YES, we can, as individuals, enter into close fellowship and communion and union, and co-habitation with God. We are called to abide. We are ingrafted into the vine as branches.

And, NO, we, as individuals, should not imagine ourselves as an individual bride to The Bridegroom.

The Baby: a call for me as an individual to dwell in gratitude with God. An inspiring personal challenge to go deeper in fellowship with God through thanksgiving.

The Bathwater: using an analogy of sexual love and marriage to convey the above-mentioned ideas.

This is my currently held position. I desire discussion. If you see a different perspective that is defensible from Scripture, I invite it. Please join me in processing these thoughts.

Uncomfortable

***This post is not suitable, in my opinion, for young unmarried persons.***

***Also this is a Spoiler Alert for One Thousand Gifts***

Reading Ann's last chapter was uncomfortable.

"It's our making love."

"To know Him the way Adam knew Eve. Spirit skin to spirit skin."

"The intercourse of soul with God is the very climax of joy."

Even Ann admits, "I feel this burn too, flush of embarrassment up the face."

Her writing here is very... ahem...sexual. Maybe it is the way I am reading it. I am conflicted.

I believe the picture of a marriage is not referencing God and a single believer, as it seems Ann is inferring here. Rather, it is referencing Christ and his Church. Yes, there is still an intensity and intimacy, but somehow it is one degree removed. There is less tension. I wonder how a man would read this chapter?

I would like to read Spurgeon's rendering of Song of Solomon. I know Matthew Henry interprets the book from an allegorical perspective. Is there crossover? Can it be about both human, sexual love and a love between Christ and a believer? I wonder what Ann thinks of it?

I know we, even in our current morality-free, anti- "absolute truth" culture, still hold vestiges of the "Victorian Prudishness." Is that the akwardness I am feeling? After all, Abram bedded Sarai's servant. David was a barbaric king who had multiple wives, who also danced exposed in public. Charlemagne was a great Christian king of the Middle Ages and his principal wife was only 13 when he married her and he too had concubines.

Is it simply a cultural norm that Ann insults in her last chapter, or has she unintentionally crossed a line because of an error in a theological analogy?

I don't know.

I know I am challenged to " live in God."

I know I want to be in closer communion with God as a result of reading this chapter.

I know I wouldn't want an unmmarried child of mine reading that chapter.

I know I won't recommend this last chapter to a few choice friends.

I JUST DON'T KNOW.

Is this a call not to throw out the baby with the bathwater?

God has used this book in my life. He has revived me, quickened my spirit, restored the joy of my salvation. And this book was a pathway, a gate, a means to that grace.

I have searched my Bible more, prayed more, seen more of God in this season that I have in the last couple of years -the dormant years.

I am still conflicted, but also, I am refreshed.

I'll keep the baby.

I have more time to figure out what's the bathwater.

Intertwined

I was chatting with a friend on the phone, scraping leftover breakfast eggs from my cast-iron pan. Same friend who inspired the writing of my Time Dayenu .

Thank God for the gift of good friends and good conversations.

This friend tells me how she never clearly understood the difference between Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread before she had started researching it for a co-op class she was going to teach.

Well, educate me. I don't know the difference either. Her answer is only a springboard for a hundred jumping questions. On both ends of the line, we start flipping pages. Exodus 12, Leviticus 23:5-7, back to Leviticus 12, and so on. Phones crooked in our necks, talking over each other at times, discovering, and confirming in our minds, TRUTH.

The passover meal foreshadows -in amazing detail- the Passion of Christ: his last supper and his trial and torture, the crucifixion and his death. The original Passover was observed because God was on the eve of executing his judgment on the Egyptians and passing-over the sons of Israel who had substitutionary lambs slain on their behalves. They were passed-over. God's judgment upon us was substituted on the slain Lamb of God and we have been passed-over.

REMEMBER THE PASSOVER BECAUSE ISRAEL WAS PASSED OVER PHYSICAL DEATH. REMEMBER THE CRUCIFIXION BECAUSE WE ARE PASSED OVER FROM SPIRITUAL DEATH.

ISRAEL DID NOT GET WHAT THEY DESERVED AND NEITHER DO WE.
-A Definition of Mercy

What next?

Have you ever tried to imagine yourself at the first Passover as it was being observed? Israel has seen God plague the Egyptians NINE TIMES. They have been shielded from the plagues, yet they remain in slavery. Did they believe God when he said that the tenth plague would be the final plague, that it would finish it, that it would LEAD TO THEIR FREEDOM? He told them ahead of time. Did they believe?

God tells them to get rid of the leavening and pack up. Get ready to leave.

What if the Israelites had been passed-over from death, but remained the bondage of Egypt? The words of Paul in 1 Cor. 15 come to mind: the most miserable of all men. But no, God promises them freedom! The second observance God commands to the Israelites in Exodus 12 is the Feast of Unleavened Bread. In verse 17 God says, "Ye shall observe the feast of unleavened bread; for... I brought your armies out of Egypt." They left in strength. FREEDOM FROM THE SLAVERY.

What if Jesus took the punishment for our sins, but then remained in death's bonds, not rising from the dead? In 1 Cor. 15 Paul says, "And if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain, ye are yet in your sins." We would be left in sin's bonds, indeed making us most miserable of all men.

No, God says you are freed from sin's power: Get rid of sin, and get yourself prepared to leave this world. Get prepared for the place I am preparing for you.

The Feast of Unleavened Bread reminds us of the PROMISE IN THE RESURRECTION! It is our promise of freedom from sin and life everlasting. (I Cor. 15:20-23) He broke the bonds of death and sin, he built the bridge, we can be with Him and the Father and the Spirit FOREVER.

REMEMBER THE FEAST OF UNLEAVENED BREAD BECAUSE ISRAEL WAS FREED FROM PHYSICAL BONDAGE. REMEMBER THE RESURRECTION BECAUSE WE ARE FREED FROM SIN'S BONDAGE AND GIVEN LIFE ETERNAL.

ISRAEL GOT MUCH MORE THAN THEY DESERVED AND SO DO WE.
-A Definition of Grace


TWO EVENTS: The Passover Meal and the Feast of Unleavened Bread

TWO REMEMBERANCES: Being passed over from death and delivered from bondage.

TWO EVENTS: Crucifixion and Resurrection

TWO REMEMBERANCES: We are passed over from the penalty of death and we are delivered from the bondage of sin, being prepared for eternity with God.

ALL INTERTWINED. ALL ETERNITY.

Mixed Motives

I just finished the 10th chapter of Ann's book. I am challenged and encouraged... and envious, and self-righteous and critical. My life is shot through with sin. Yet, mixed motives and all, by God's grace I can still preach truth to myself.

My husband and I are almost entirely opposite of the major stereotypes of men and women in marriage. I enjoy televised sports much more than my husband. I like my steaks rarer than he does. I GRILL BETTER. He is always wishing men talked more and I am always wishing women talked less and just "did stuff" together. I am a lot less observant about the dirt in our house and he really notices it. That is a big one...

I want to be like Ann Voskamp.

I am a lot like her: I married a Dutch man, I write, I have five munchkins that are being homeschooled, I have chickens, I visit the elderly with my children.

I want to be a lot like her: I want a published book someday, I want to go harder after God (isn't that telling that I thought of a published book first), I want to give my time to the eternal things, I want to be an advocate for Gospel for Asia, I want to reach out to the needy in my community... the list goes on; I am ambitious.

I married a man who values (Thank God!) humility and servanthood. He also values orderliness and cleanliness. God has not called me to be Ann Voskamp and he has not called me to make her my standard. I am walking a fine line, and crossing it sometimes, between being provoked by her example and making an idol of her. My heart is an idol factory, just like John Calvin said.

What God has called me to:

To LOVE God, to love, serve and submit to my husband, to love and train my children, to be a student of the Word, to be a keeper of my home, to be a part and participant in my local church, to be hospitable, and to contribute time, money and prayers to missions work and mercy ministries... in that order.

Ann says "I can bless, pour out, be broken and given in our home and the larger world and never fear that there won't be enough to give."

YES!

And no.

This holds true when my life is strained through the filter of the Word and my husband's leadership. I am not called to do everything. There are times when I would rather be serving God by visiting the sick, giving away my worldly possessions and reaching out to the lost and God leashes me instead (through my husband's leadership) to polishing glass and steam-cleaning carpets.

If I do the first things, when I am called instead to the second set of things, there WILL NOT be enough time, energy, enough ME to give. God places these safeguards in my life to show me and help me flee the temptation of worldly ambition and mis-placed priorities.

It is good for my soul to go lower, to be lower. All God gives me IS GOOD.

As Ann advocates for these good works, she laid the groundwork and built the fences. She is certainly not advocating legalism. But I am, in my heart of sin. I want to do the good works, the public works for recognition, for praise, *of course for God's glory, too*. All this reveals my own pride and intense need for the Cross-applied humility in my life. And so I preach truth to myself. Again, and again and again.

I thank God *now* that I have a husband who likes pristine toilets and dusted mantels. It helps to clearly reveal my heart and gives ample opportunity to practice this truth in my life. Ann said in chapter 10 that she wants "the contentment, the real happiness, the touching of Christ in the work..." and so do I. Even when, or especially when, that work is almost entirely comprised of low servitude, menial work for and to my family.

I want this truth heart-branded: God IS magnified as I become less.

LOVE GOD.

BE HUMBLE.

SUBMIT TO MY HUSBAND.

SERVE GOD IN MY SMALLEST, TRANSIENT TASKS.

COUNT THE JOYS.

TRUST GOD.

BE HUMBLE.

Passover is coming!

"Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit to the small and arrogant oligarchy of those who merely happen to be walking about."

-G.K Chesterton, friend and contemporary of C.S. Lewis, in his book Orthodoxy

I love the tradition of a passover meal. I love how the symbols are so chock-full of God-things. We have held a Seder meal anually for a few years now. We also celebrate a fairly traditional Protestant Easter, too, with new Easter outfits, Easter baskets, and an egg hunt. As I was thinking over our various tradition, it occurred to me that our passover meal -with all its rememberances- on Thursday or Friday was utterly disconnected from the celebration and brightness of Easter morning. If the traditions are so compartmentalized in my reasoning, adult brain I can only assume that my children will suffer the same dis-connect. I was sharing this thought with a dear friend the other day and she offered this wonderful idea that I cannot wait to implement this year:

Our Seder meal, representing both the deliverance from Egypt and our deliverance from sin, also puts us in mind of Jesus celebrating His last passover before the crucifixtion. So we (in a mind of grace, not requiring exact days to match) will celebrate our Seder this year on Friday evening. Saturday, we are going to wear mourning clothes. As black and plain as I can find.

The followers of Jesus were grieving. Their hope of a Messiah was lying dead in a tomb, only a shadowy promise left. Would Jesus really rise from the grave? They were grieving, questioning their faith, scattered and dis-heartened. I want to remember. It was the darkness before the dawn, and I want my children to know. Pain and blackness. Clothes plain and black.

And this will then be the setting from which we wake Sunday morning to the glory of the resurrection: the brightly colored Easter dresses and ties, colored eggs and the SWEETNESS of His life.

Em-PHA-sizing the Wrong Syl-LA-ble

Had I read Ann's 9th chapter, Going Lower, a bit earlier, I probably wouldn't have written the post on dying to self. Her whole chapter was on humility, but written with more flair and better developed analogies. Ahh, there is nothing new under the sun.

Well, this post is certainly nothing new, but as "A Thomas Jefferson Education" by Oliver DeMille asserts, the best way to learn something is to read it, write it, and discuss it. I have read my Bible this morning, a chapter in Ann's book, and now I am writing about it. I invite you to help pursue the last tenet by discussing it with me here, so feel free to leave a comment.


Ps. 63:1 "O God, thou art my God, early will I seek thee: My soul thirsteth for thee, my flesh longeth for thee in a dry and thirsty land, where no water is;"

I have always read it like this: Oh God, thou art my God, early will I seek thee: My soul thirsteth for thee, my flesh longeth for thee in a dry and thirsty land, where no water is;

But like our pastor reminded us on Sunday, the Bible is not about us. It is always and unrelentingly revealing GOD to us. He gave the example of the David and Goliath story. How many of us have been taught that the application to that story is that we, through God's help, can slay the giants in our lives? Yet Pastor Geoff posited that the proper way to read that story is like this: The sheep-herder of Israel goes to fight his enemy, this shepherd wins the victory and his victory is imputed to the entire nation of Israel. What a foreshadowing! It IS all about God.

So I re-read the verse from this morning with this emphasis:

O God, thou art my God, early will I seek thee: My soul thirsteth for thee, my flesh longeth for thee in a dry and thirsty land, where no water is;

I had always read that "dry and thirsty land" figuritively. But David did not write this in a palace, looking out over the Judean desert, thinking "I want to desire God like I would desire water in that dry land." According to Spiros Zodhiates, the editor of my study Bible, David was IN THE PHYSICAL WILDERNESS being hunted like an animal (1 Sam. 22&23). Early in the morning is a prime-time to travel and gather food, before the heat of the day takes your strength. Water and food are critical to physical survival. And in these actual literal circumstances what does David want? GOD, GOD, more of GOD.

I glanced the title of a book the other day "Made to Crave" and yes, we are made to crave. What is David craving? Not gratitude, not understanding, not joy, not even life itself (63:3): GOD.

I have been thoroughly challenged and provoked by Ann's book. I needed this teaching, encouragement, and challenge. Ann mentioned a different book in a recent posting called "Thanks!: How the New Science of Gratitude Can Make You Happier" by Robert Emmons. This book seems to set out gratitude as the goal. Gratitude is a grand gateway. But a gateway to what? Not a gateway to better performance and better success and closer friendships. Those may be by-products, but for gratitude to be satisfying it must be a gateway to GOD.

Ann herself said it this way, ""The one thousand presents wake me to the presence of God- but more so, living eucharisteo, living in thanks, had done the far harder work of keeping me awake to Him."

Gratefulness is all about GOD. My life is, should be, must be, all about emphasizing that one syllable.

Theological Meat of Thanksgiving

I love this song: Christ is Risen by Matt Maher. It has all the theological meat of thanksgiving and for thanksgiving.

Thank you God for:

Rising from the grave

Trampling over death

Showing great love

Freely bleeding for us

Making us one with you again

Bowing only to Heaven's will

Reigning in strength

Defeating the night

Calling us to stand in your light.

Thank you.

Learning to Speak (Pray) Again

Before I had babies, I marvelled and (to my shame) scoffed at times, that so many women I met in child-rearing years and beyond couldn't put a coherent, cohesive thought together into a sentence. Words would not come to mind when beckoned, mispronunciations abounded, reverse in words order... I mean, words in reverse order, and more.

AND THEN I BECAME ONE OF THEM. Along about my 3rd baby, the sleepness nights, the hormone surges and the pace of life got to me, too. One day I was speaking with a dear friend, when I heard myself speak. I hope you can follow this in print, "Uh, uhum, yeah, the watchamacallit, well, I was thinking, um, you know, yeah!" And between the sound, the tones, and the gestures I had cobbled together some form of communication. I had gotten my point across, but NOT IN SPEECH. For the first time in months, I really heard myself and it startled me.

I immediately started concentrating harder, forcing myself to compose complete thoughts in my brain before I let my tongue loose. The short story is that, yes, I learned to speak again. In fact, this blog is an extension of that story that pushes me to search the recesses of my brain for just the precise words to express rightly what the Creator has put in my heart.

Now I am determined to learn to pray again. I discovered my lack one morning this week. My version of a prayer while showering -what one friend calls "her thinking time"- was a virtual spot-on repetition of my non-speaking sentence above. I may have been thinking (even that is iffy), but I was not rightly expressing. Although I love Anne Shirley, I am pretty sure that her romantic idea of an open field and "just feeling a prayer" is not Biblical (at least not all the time).

Ann said, "Praying with eyes wide open is the only way to pray without ceasing." And then a few pages later she echoes Annie Dillard who said, "Seeing is of course a matter of verbalization. Unless I call my attention to what passes before my eyes, I simply won't see it."

So if praying without ceasing means praying while seeing, and seeing is a matter of verbalization, then I must have the discipline to verbalize - to focus my thoughts. I have an unfocused prayer life. And the reverse? If I do not verbalize (focus in mind), I will not see, and so will not pray without ceasing? Wasn't this what the Savior asked of the disciples in the garden: WATCH AND PRAY? (Matt. 26:41) The spirit in indeed willing, but the flesh is weak. (26:41 again) My fleshy gray matter between the ears is weak. Spirit, help my spirit to overcome the weakness, to hone the discipline of verbalization, to nail thoughts down, and glue words together to communicate, so I can obey the Savior's words: WATCH AND PRAY.

I want to watch and communicate with God through the white loads that comprise my days. On my small carousel that goes from laundry, to cooking, to schooling, to child-bathing, to dish-washing and around again, I want to see and pray throughout.

God, help me to galvanize my thoughts, help me to talk to You with focus, teach me to express rightly, show me how to pray.

The White Load

I was up late, laundry scattered over chairs and sofa, piles of chaos waiting for my ordering hand. Being folded in expectation of company's arrival. I whipped through the bath towel load in no time at all, feeling a small degree of triumph at the neat stacks, now shelf-ready. The red load was similar, made up mostly of girls dresses, a couple of my knit shirts and boys' shirts, all laid out smooth and ready to be hung. The dark load contained many pairs of little boy jeans, too short after a season of wear, with holes ripped in every knee. And then came the white loads...

No-match socks mutliplied, wadded undershirts, underwear caught and balled in the corners of fitted sheets, washcloths strangled in the grasp of Sunday's white tights... ahhh, the white loads that cannot be avoided, these bleached waters must be navigated.

Easy triumphs rarely comprise the necessities of life. Life will go on even if Surprise Girl doesn't have her favorite red dress. Hunter Boy can always wear another pair of hole-pocked jeans. But life stops just short of toppling into the abyss, toes curled over the precipice, fighting for a shred of saving balance, without clean underwear. Yes, these are the trenches of a mother.

Some days are blizzards of white loads. The mundane, the tedious, the daily, the necessary.

Do I see God in the white loads? Ann said it this way, "The only way to see God manifested in the world around is with the eyes of Jesus within. God within is the one seeing God without." IT'S ALL GOD. That's a new layer on the onion. Not only is God in the white load, the ability to find God in the white load is God at work. It's like looking in two mirrors at once and seeing your reflection in the the reflection in the reflection, ad infinitum. No matter how far you look, you will always see God at work at the heart of it.

Yesterday the mundane took shape as greasy globs of Vaseline in Hurricane Baby's hair. Washing after washing, shampoo, grease-cutting dish soap, scrubbing and rubbing, red-rimmed swollen eyes and wailing... and no avail. He still looks like a q-tip full of earwax.

God, what do you have for me here? What eternal truth? Where are You in this white load? What a great picture of us being washed in the Word. You know its working, you see the suds and feel the scrub, yet, rinse the soap, step out into "the real world" and there sin is, sticky, icky, still present. Welcome to sanctification: to sanctify, to be set apart, be sacred. And to KNOW THAT IT IS PROGRESSIVE, SOME DAY IT WILL BE ACCOMPLISHED. Hurricane Baby's hair will eventually come clean. So will my nature. On THAT day. In the meantime, sing along with Dory, "Just keep washing, just keep washing." Yes, God is certainly present in this white load.

When God purifies the heart by faith, the market is sacred as well as the sanctuary; neither remaineth there any work or place which is profane. -Martin Luther (emphasis mine)

My heart is purified, being sanctified and the white loads are sacred.

Psalm 27:8, "When thou saidst, Seek my face; my heart said unto thee, Thy face, Lord, will I seek." I can find it. Even, or especially, in the white loads.

The Secret Garden

Chapter Five. I am not even finished reading it. Ann - I won't add her last name anymore, she feels like an old friend now - is talking about going deeper in her understanding of thanksgiving, eucharisteo, into what she aptly terms "hard eucharisteo." What to give thanks for when, from the human perspective, it all just looks bad. When the going gets tough. When we need the Eternal God perspective.

John 16:33 says "In the world ye shall have tribulation..." I know my time for gut-wrenching, brutal loss, sadness, and trials will come. I will have tribulations. Ye shall have. Not IF, WHEN. But that time has not come for me yet.

So, as I pondered hard eucharisteo, I asked God, what does this mean for me now?

And then I went to church. Our beloved local body of congregating saints and

GOD ANSWERED.

Not all hard eucharisteo is because of circumstances He calls us to walk through, sometimes it is the posture He calls us to assume.

Pastor Geoff spoke on Isa. 66:2, "...but to this man will I look, even to him that is poor (humble) and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word."

This posture of the heart, this draws the gaze of the All Mighty Who inhabits eternity. Humility, humbleness, being set low willingly.

But I am strong, and brave and intelligent, not humble. My flesh rises, indignant, that this is what God wants. But God knows my pride, knows that I have forgotten my place. He has reminded me in 66:1, heaven is His throne, not mine. Me, where I dwell, this is just His footstool. BE HUMBLE.

There is crumpled, worn and faded piece of paper in my bedside drawer. It has been with me half my life. This poem is written on it. This poem, that somewhere on my journey I stopped reading because it was just too hard. Right now, THIS IS MY HARD EUCHARISTEO.

And God be praised - For the first time in years, I look at the necessity of dying to self and say, with tears welling in my eyes, God, YOU ARE A GOOD GOD, AND EVERYTHING, EVERYTHING YOU CALL ME TO IS GOOD. It is your banner over me: Love; the very essence of the goodness of God.

DYING TO SELF (anonymous)

When you are forgotten, neglected, or purposely set at naught, and you don't sting or hurt with the oversight, but your heart is happy being counted worthy to suffer for Christ;

That is dying to self.

When your good is evil spoken of, when your wishes are crossed, your advice disregarded, your opinion ridiculed, and you refuse to let anger rise in your heart or even defend yourself, but take it all in patient, loving silence;

That is dying to self.

When you lovingly and patiently bear any disorder, any irregularity, any annoyance; when you can stand face to face with waste, folly, extravagance, spiritual insensibility, and endure it as Jesus did;

That is dying to self.

When you are content with any food, and offering, any raiment, any climate, any society, any solitude, any interruption by the will of God;

That is dying to self.

When you never care to refer to yourself in conversation or record your own good works or itch after commendation, when you can truly love to be unknown;

That is dying to self.

When you can see your brother prosper and have his needs met, and can honestly rejoice with him in spirit and feel no envy, nor question God, while your own needs are far greater and you are in desperate circumstances;

That is dying to self.

When you can receive correction and reproof from one of less stature than yourself and can humbly submit, inwardly as well as outwardly, finding no rebellion or resentment rising up within your heart;

That is dying to self.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I used to wonder how anyone could really, honestly walk this way. I have found the doorway, behind the years of tangled vines, to this secret garden. It is thanksgiving. And the key? Yes, it is the God-perspective He gives in His Word. Yes, He makes a way.

Dayenu

A glimpse of yesterday...

Capable Girl went out with grandparents for a birthday morning breakfast at IHOP. She got everything sweet her little heart desired, evidenced by her comment when she got home, "The only healthy thing I had for breakfast was two pieces of bacon!"

Hunter Boy... I hope I never forget this image... him flying down our little grass hill on his bike, proudly sporting his camo shorts, cowboy boots and ski goggles.

Surprise Girl running to me in her too-short dress bringing me most precious weed flowers.

Sunshine Boy's conversation with me by the camp fire: "Mama, am I cool?" Me - "Yes, YOU are cool, how did you know?" Sunshine - "God told me, cuz I forgot."

Hurricane Baby learned to say "Bye."

I read chapter four of Ann Voskamp's book yesterday. A Sanctuary of Time. I don't think there is a single person who doesn't feel press and heat of the rush, who doesn't feel the need for more time. Ann shares her insights into how thanksgiving helps us focus on the present, where I AM inhabits the praises of his people, in thanksgiving. She shares how in our thanksgiving God can multiply our lack into abundance. She gives the example of Jesus and the account of the loaves and fishes and sheds a fresh ray of light on it, " Jesus embraces His not enough... he gives thanks... and there is more than enough."

Not enough, enough, more than enough. In the Passover Seder Dinner, there is a segment called Dayenu. Its meaning in Hebrew, "It would have been enough." In the traditional Seder Meal it goes like this:

If He had only brought us out of Egypt. DAYENU... It would have been enough.
If He had only executed justice upon the Egyptians. DAYENU
If He had only executed justice upon their gods. DAYENU
If He had only slain their first born. DAYENU
If He had only given to us their health and wealth. DAYENU
If He had split the sea for us. DAYENU
If He had led us through on dry land. DAYENU

There are eight more verses taking the reader through the history of the escape, the giving of the law and the establishment of the nation of Israel. Our good friends, in their Seder meal, continue the tradition every year, extending the Dayenu song to the history of redemption, and beyond that to their own history of God's workings on their behalf.

MY TIME DAYENU

If He only gave me time to read His Word. DAYENU
If He only gave me time to give my husband a loving touch. DAYENU
If He only gave me time for a meal with my family. DAYENU
If He only gave me time to see one child reach 8 years old. DAYENU
If He only gave me time for one conversation with one child. DAYENU
If He only gave me time to savor one baby's accomplishment. DAYENU
If He only gave me time to soak in the dancing flames of a campfire. DAYENU
If He only gave me time to forge these thoughts into words. DAYENU
If He only gave me time for His Beloved to sleep. DAYENU

It would have been enough. Thank you Father.

Aching with the Beauty

A CD was on yesterday as I did housework. A particular verse of a song by Steve and Vicki Cook called I Count It All Joy resonated, and like Lucy listening to Mr. Tumnus play, it made me want to laugh and cry all at once.

Lord, I'll count it all joy
When the weight of sorrow
Drives me to my knees.
Every heartache and pain,
In Your mighty hand,
Is forming Christ in me.

Weight of sorrow driving me to my knees. Heartache forming Christ in me. Psalm 57:2(KJV) says "I will cry God most high, unto God that performeth all things for me." Yes, he performs the incredible, astounding act of forming Christ in me. Giving me a oneness with God, returning me to my Edenic state. Can I count it all joy, can I give thanks in every circumstance? This truth crept up on Ann Voskamp walking down the aisle of a grocery store, "... eucharisteo (thanksgiving) always precedes the miracle." What miracle? Sometimes small miracles, sometimes big miracles, BUT ALWAYS the miracle of CHRIST BEING FORMED IN ME.

My last little baby, at 18 months, just figured out how to climb out of his crib. Small miracle. One that makes me ache with the beauty of it. How blessed I am to have a healthy child with stong limbs and an active, exploring mind that tries new things. A beautiful thing... with the ache of knowing that he is growing up. The beauty and the blessing is mine, but so is the pain. Something that makes me want to laugh and cry all at once.

My Saviour, 2000 years ago, submitted himself to the Father's plan, was scourged and beaten, and fulfilled his destiny of making a way for my reunion with God. THE MIRACLE. Thru himself, he is now being formed in me. The beauty and the blessing is mine, the pain was his. The magnitude cannot be comprehended... "which things the angels desire to look into." 1 Pet. 1:12 Something that makes me want to laugh and cry all at once. Laughter with joy, and tears of thanksgiving.

Can I give thanks in all things, can I count it all joy? When I behold the beauty of my Saviour, my whole inner being, aching for the Day of fulfillment, urges, compels my answer: YES.

No one reads this blog except me, who writes it, and my mother (so much is encompassed in that one little word - mother). At least right now. If these words are only written to draw my own heart to my Saviour, I rejoice. Beholding the beauty of my Savior is worth the cost of crafting them.

There is a conference called She Speaks, the purpose of which is to connect the hearts of women to the heart of their Father in heaven. There is a scholarship available to attend this conference, the details of which are here. Should God ever use my words to encourage others and bless them, then my fruit is multiplied. But I am not responsible for the result, only to my calling of faithfulness.

Silver Linings or Refined Treasures

As I am purposefully practicing the grace of giving thanks, having been spurred to such action by Ann Voskamp's book One Thousand Gifts, I had my own little personal epiphany last night.

I was tired and a bit weary, nothing overwhelming, just regular life at the end of the day. I was aware that my attitude was stuggling and I thought to put to use the good advice of giving thanks. When one of my munchkins got up - again - and asked for some water, I found myself leaning over the sink, filling her little sippy cup and thinking to myself, "Well, I suppose I can be grateful that my children like to drink water, some children only like juice or pop." It was a slim sliver of a silver lining.

And then I began to think on it some more. I did not want my thanksgiving to be ridiculous. Not that giving thanks for small things is ridiculous, but I don't want to be this chipper, bubbly optimist in the face of all odds. If our car breaks down, I don't want "to look at the silver lining" that at least it wasn't our house that burned down. After all, the car IS more easily replaced. This kind of thinking to easily deteriorate into a "No matter how bad things get, THEY COULD ALWAYS BE WORSE" mindset. Can something be accurate and not truthful? Maybe. The "It could always get worse" mindset (or perhaps mindtrap) can be accurate, but it robs God of his deserved glory and us of our joy.

As I truly look at my day, I don't want to see the silver linings. I don't want to be satisfied finding the doggie scraps. I am on the lookout for the refined treasures. For the feast. He prepares a table for me, can I find it? (Ps. 23) I want to give thanks for the circumstances, knowing that every individual circumstance is from GOD'S HAND... and HE IS FOR ME. My day, my cup, is full to overflowing with moments that are ordained for my sanctifying, that can lay up treasure for me in heaven. This is the life for me. TRUE THANKSGIVING.

Why the title?

I am thanking God right now that we are so blessed in this age of prosperity and the printing press to have access to the wonderful and godly thoughts of others, that fuel our own thought trains. I picked up the book One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp about a week ago, in addition to my regular Bible reading and the mass of reading I do to prep for homeschooling. Thank you God for a well-fed mind. One with rich, nutritious food for my soul.

If you haven't read One Thousand Gifts yet, it IS wonderful and provocative. It is all about giving thanks as a means to glorify God and receive grace in our lives.

Today while reading, I was put in mind of something I read years ago -I can't find the exact quote at the moment- the gist of which is that we wear paths in our souls (and our childrens' souls) by our actions. I remember reading it mostly in light of my children's actions. I was inspired at the time to be diligent to train my children in self-control, obedience, and choosing the interests of others over themselves in the hopes of these things becoming common trails on their hearts.

It struck a different chord today in light of Ann's book. I want to model for my children the habit of thanksgiving. I want to train my children to have a well-worn soul path of gratitude. I have walked that path for distances in my own life before straying into critizism and complaint. I want to more faithfully keep to the path. And as my children follow me in the daily movements, I pray their souls will follow mine in the path of gratitude. And hopefully in my life and in theirs it will become a well-trod, familiar walk, and by God's grace, one less-strayed from in the future.