Really Woolly

On Thursday we had our friend, Tony, from Stockport with us. He's a great hill walker. He's bagged all the Munroes and knows the Lakes like the back of his hand. Well, we don't have many hills in Grove, and anyhow my speciality is low-level walking. So he had to make do with one of mine, that is the meander through the estate to Cornerstone, my favourite coffee shop, and back. It was, as they say in the north-west, a manky day. But with coffee and cake in prospect we made it through the murk. While he browse through the books, I looked for a card for a friend who's having a really tough time, and I came across this "Really Woolly" card.

It's from America, and so rather more expressive than we'd tend to be in the UK. You might say it was sentimental, imagining the words of God; but I think sentiment is underrated. After all it basically means "feeling" - which is an important part of human experience. The whole script is based on a psalm:
Dear one of Mine,
I see you need encouragement today.
I actually see you every day, all day.
I'm the One who watches over you
and even planned your birth
a long time before I made the earth or Milky Way.
I couldn't wait to see you born and to see your life unfold.
I love you so much and have since before anything existed.
I've poured out My love on you from heaven above and earth below.
I've poured out my love from a manger and down from a cross.
Both today's enjoyments and today's difficulties are real,
but they are temporary.
Your forever rejoicing will come soon -
when I do.
Until then, know that you are loved,
and let that love fill you with peace this very day.
(Based on Psalm 139.1-18, by Rose Mary Harris © DaySpring Cards Inc)


On the back of the envelope is "The Lord is my shepherd; I have everything I need." Psalm 23:1. I'm hoping my friend will appreciate it. "Difficulties" is hardly an adequate word to describe what she's going through. They are real and no doubt seem interminable, but it's true, they are only temporary, and there is an eternity of being loved - which has already started in the manger and on the cross.

What's the point of pretending?

I enjoyed this exchange (below) on Facebook this morning, which I came across through my friend, the internet curate, Sally Hitchiner. I appreciated J's response, acknowledging that total honesty is the best, in fact the only, policy in prayer, and I liked the Nuns' prayer. Our children make fun of the way we used to tell them, "You're tired," when they were grumpy and out-of-sorts, but it's true that our physical state does affect our spirit and emotions, and vice versa.

The nuns live in Oxford, and I must say they look a jolly bunch. They describe themselves: "We are a community of contemplative Benedictine nuns with a special interest in using the internet for spiritual outreach. We run Veilaudio, a free audio book creation and loan service for the blind and visually impaired, a dedicated email prayerline, and offer online retreats."  Their mission is to live "a life of prayer and praise, to the glory of God and in the service of others". 

It's not unusual to hear people write nuns and monks off as being out of touch. Nothing seems further from the truth. I've just finished reading Anthony Howard's biography of Basil Hume - the Monk Cardinal. An impressive unpretentious godly man who had a pastor's heart and grappled with the thorny issues of his day. I'll be very interested to see tonight's BBC1 programme, "Young Nuns". "Filmed over 6 months, the documentary gives a unique insight into a rarely seen world, challenging stereotypes and exploring what convent life can still offer young women today." It follows two women in their twenties following their sense of calling. I trust it will be inspiring.

Benedictine Nuns, Holy Trinity Monastery

Today we pray for everyone who is feeling tired, grumpy, cantankerous or out-of-sorts: may the Lord have mercy on us and all we meet.

• •  J I do know that we can pray to God exactly as we are , for what's the point of pretending? It's good to have a reminder though and I smiled ruefully at "May God have mercy on ...all we meet." I never realised, when I started using Facebook to keep in touch with young relatives that I'd be using it as part of my daily prayers too.

    2 hours ago
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    Benedictine Nuns, Holy Trinity Monastery J, life is full of surprises, isn't it? We don't have to let social media be 'trivial' — though I'm far from sure that our offerings don't often come into that category! Jawbones of asses spring to mind . . .

Being a clay jar

I don't know whether I have any Syrians among my ancestors; I certainly have some Isaacs. Whether this comes from one of them I very much doubt, but it made me think: "Blessed is the man who knows his own weakness, for this knowledge becomes for him the foundation, the root, and the beginning of all goodness.... When a man knows he is in need of divine help, he offers up many prayers" (Isaac the Syrian). You don't need to be strong or self-sufficient, because the point of life, as I said to one of my friends frustrated by MND last week, is not to achieve, but to be loved and to love. To be more precise, it's to be loved by God and to love him.

What are you praying for?

I read this story this morning:
"There was once a judge in some city who never gave God a thought and cared nothing for people. A widow in that city kept after him: 'My rights are being violated. Protect me!'

  "He never gave her the time of day. But after this went on and on he said to himself, 'I care nothing what God thinks, even less what people think. But because this widow won't quit badgering me, I'd better do something and see that she gets justice—otherwise I'm going to end up beaten black-and-blue by her pounding.'"

Of course this was the story that Jesus told to illustrate persistence in praying. And then he said: "Do you hear what that judge, corrupt as he is, is saying? So what makes you think God won't step in and work justice for his chosen people, who continue to cry out for help? Won't he stick up for them? I assure you, he will. He will not drag his feet. But how much of that kind of persistent faith will the Son of Man find on the earth when he returns?" If the corrupt judge will in the end grant the widow's request, is it conceivable that God, who is pure love, would be harder to persuade to answer prayers?


Then I fell to thinking, what is it that I'm really praying for when I'm longing for diseases to be healed, or injustice to be sorted, and famines and floods and wars to end? In fact I'm praying for God's Kingdom to come quickly - when there'll be no reason to cry. Sorrow and sighing will be a thing of the past. And that, of course, is exactly what Jesus told us to pray for: "Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your Name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven...."


Prayer isn't just a matter of pious longing. It's more than that, just as worship is more than singing along with "Songs of Praise". Somehow, prayer is active engagement with the need.... maybe just telling the person they're in your thoughts and prayers, or visiting them; or if it's a cause lobbying your MP! But it always includes, and starts with engagement with our loving Heavenly Father, "who loves to give to his children good things." And he will.

The question Why?

"It often seems that God will answer a simple need before a great one. We can pray for car parks, and we do, but we still unload our wheelchairs from our cars. Why is that?" Roderick Mallen commented a couple of days ago on this blog. Strangely enough, I'd been thinking about that sort of thing after Jane and I had been reading about Jesus healing the ten lepers. Because I have to say there are times when I wish he'd just do the same for my friends with MND and that sort of thing (and, yes, for me). It's really not a picnic, you know. At the moment, mine's not bad, but in the advanced stages.... 


I know I wrote about the question in I Choose Everything, and I should really be sorted. And on the whole I'm content to live with the mystery of it all. I don't believe there are easy answers or easy solutions. I really like the folksy song There is a reason, not least because I think Alison Krauss has a lovely voice, and because, in its simple-faith way, it represents someone struggling with the question "Why?" "There must be a reason for it all." I don't believe that hurtin' is designed in order to bring us to God, though it may have that effect. However in the middle of the song is the nugget where the answer lies hidden: "The love that shed His blood for all the world to see -
This must be the reason for it all". It doesn't explain it. It simply points to the cross as the proof that Love not only underpins everything, but also allows Himself to be impaled with us in pain.

I also like the song because, despite that glimpse of the mystery of love, just as it starts with a question, so it also ends with an admission of doubt. "I do believe but help my unbelief... I've been told
There is a reason for it all." Someone said, "Faith without doubt isn't faith." 


That really doesn't answer your question, Roderick, why God doesn't answer the really big ones. I guess you and I would willingly trade the parking spaces for our wheelchairs. But then I think of Bruce Almighty and the mess he made of answering prayers, and have to admit it's way beyond my competence. I have a feeling St Paul was right: "For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known." I like the translation: "Now we see puzzling reflections in a mirror." I suppose that God is working out THE REALLY BIG ONE. Then we'll know, and be amazed. Till then it's a matter of hanging on in there - like He did.


I've seen hard times and I've been told
There isn't any wonder that I fall
Why do we suffer, crossing off the years
There must be a reason for it all

I've trusted in You, Jesus, to save me from my sin
Heaven is the place I call my home
But I keep on getting caught up in this world I'm living in
And Your voice it sometimes fades before I know

Hurtin' brings my heart to You, crying with my need
Depending on Your love to carry me
The love that shed His blood for all the world to see
This must be the reason for it all

Hurtin' brings my heart to You, a fortress in the storm
When what I wrap my heart around is gone
I give my heart so easily to the ruler of this world
When the one who loves me most will give me all

In all the things that cause me pain You give me eyes to see
I do believe but help my unbelief
I've seen hard times and I've been told
There is a reason for it all

Persistence

"The reason why God calls for perseverance is not... that he wishes to test our faith... But he may wish to deepen it. The thing that will most deepen it is to persist with faith through disappointment" (William Temple).

What's the point?

Sometimes I get an email which really makes me examine what I believe and why. Recently someone wrote. He'd read my article in the Guardian about Stephen Hawking's view that believing in heaven was a fairy story for people "afraid of the dark" ("I'd stake my life that Stephen Hawking is wrong about heaven"). He thought I might have something wise to say in the face of the apparent meaninglessness and randomness of life - and asked me how I regarded the prospect of death. Sometimes you get the sense that a person is raising awkward questions just to trip you up - but not in this case.

So during these wonderfully sunny warm autumnal days, I thought about my answer and this was a large part of it:

"To be honest most of the time I feel very small and vulnerable in a vast and perplexing universe. I think you have expressed the ultimate questions well and succinctly. To shuffle off this mortal coil, as Shakespeare put it, for another transcendental existence or else to be snuffed out for good seems a kind of waste and a denial of the rich sense of meaning that we have in our present existence. I can understand why some people choose to believe in reincarnation, so that there's at least some continuity of biological life. 

"You probably know the 17th century Englishman's famous description of life as "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short". You aren't alone in struggling! I have no idea where you're coming from philosophically or personally, so I hope you will excuse me if I tread on any of your cherished notions. I don't mean to. As I've indicated, I don't feel I have all the answers. I feel more like I'm on a journey of exploration - which some people find an uncomfortable experience, but just happens to be the case with me. 

I identify with the poet who wrote: 

'We shall not cease from exploration

And the end of all our exploring

Will be to arrive where we started

And know the place for the first time.'

 That means that I'm on a journey of exploration in my disease - and of course it started before then! - which will lead to my death, I know. However, as I indicated in my Guardian article, I don't believe it will end there, which relates to where it started. As I wrote then, it was at university that I examined the evidence for the resurrection, in particular of Jesus Christ, and couldn't find any convincing reason that it didn't happen. The case for the defence was overwhelming. The documents were historically sound, the tomb was empty, no body was ever produced, independent witnesses saw him, hundreds of them, the disciples changed, and the Christian church 'happened'. The case was well argued by the leading lawyer, Professor Norman Anderson. If it was true, then the idea that life ends with death falls apart.  

"believing in nothing is just as
problematic!"

"However there's more to a journey than having one radical idea! Intellectually I didn't find it hard to believe in God. Certainly He can't be proved, but believing in nothing is just as problematic. I suppose you could say that my faith was largely cerebral for some years. It made sense. Its morality wasn't easy but was compelling. I reckoned it provided the most compelling worldview on offer. It was that in the end that took me into the priesthood. I won't bore you with a step-by-step account of the journey, but just point out a couple of milestones on the way. One was being diagnosed with ALS/MND nine years ago. That took me into a world of profound and disturbing questions, about meaning and suffering - I suppose to do with what you describe as randomness. But the other happened about seven years earlier. That was what I can only describe as an unexpected encounter with the Spirit of God when I was overwhelmed with the love of Jesus Christ. The effect it had on me was to transform my largely intellectual faith into a life conviction. It also meant that when my diagnosis came I had a different perspective on the questions concerning suffering and so on. I suppose I'd had long enough to prove that not only did faith make sense but it also worked in practice. And I'd also found that I was not alone in life.

"So although I've not had answers to all the perplexing questions, I've been given a sense that life is not pointless or random. I know that the process of dying will not be simple or pleasant for me, but so far the hard things of my life have had unexpectedly positive outcomes. I think if you stop learning and stop striving to learn then you've an impoverished approach to life. As for the nature of life after death - well, the two compass points I go by are the accounts of the nature of the risen Jesus, whose body had a continuity with his body before death; it was tangible and recognisable, yet transformed, unlimited and superior. That seems to indicate that there's a continuity between us as we are and us as we shall be. The second compass point is that Jesus seemed to indicate that there will be 'a new, or renewed, creation'; in other words there will be some sort of continuity between existence as we know it now and existence as it's going to be. Somehow everything won't go to waste or be lost to oblivion.  

"Recently I've read something a truly wise man wrote about spiritual life. He compares life to a race; it has a start and an end. Its 'rules' are quite confusing. But God wants everyone to "win": 'So don't just listen to people talking or writing about religion. Some do it well, others do not. When they are concerned only with the externals of religion, they make it all sound so boring. Listen again...: "the best way to explain it is to do it". So get involved, even if your attempt to do so seems a blundering one.'

"I'd say something similar, like I feel I've been invited on this journey into the unknown, and all I know is that I've been invited by supreme Love. I'm relying on Him. I left a line out of that poem earlier:

'With the drawing of this Love and the voice of this Calling

We shall not cease from exploration

And the end of all our exploring

Will be to arrive where we started

And know the place for the first time.' That's what makes the difference.

"I don't know whether that's of any help."