Treading the verge of Jordan

On Easter Day this year Denise Inge, wife of John Bishop of Worcester, died. Last week Bishop John said thank you at the Diocesan Synod meeting. As a statement of resurrection faith it is really worth hearing, and so here is the link:
http://www.cofe-worcester.org.uk/news/news_n.php?i585.

When she was diagnosed with the cancer which was to kill her, she told her friends, "Whatever happens, Alleluia is our song!" I learned from the Dean's funeral sermon the Dean's funeral sermon that Denise Inge was something of an authority on Thomas Traherne, a Metaphysical poet about whom I'm shamefully ignorant. I have just begun to read some. Here's the last verse of The Recovery:
"The voluntary act whereby
 These (our gifts) are repaid is in His eye
 More precious than the very sky.
 All gold and silver is but empty dross,
 Rubies and sapphires are but loss,
 The very sun, and stars, and seas
 Far less His spirit please:
 One voluntary act of love
 Far more delightful to His soul doth prove,
 And is above all these as far as love." 

Bo and Steve Stern

I have mentioned this couple before in my blogs. Bo has chronicled their experience of ALS/MND in her own blog. Yesterday's was especially moving for me, because I find it so easy to transpose Jane for Bo. My form of MND is not the same as Steve's, not so rapid, but the "muscle" in our marriage is very much Jane's. Here is Bo's blog post, called A Letter to 1985 revisited - in our case the date would be 1974. Do follow the link to Steve's part of the story.

I can’t begin to describe this past week, but my husband has done a good job telling part of the story here. I’ve never known a season more emotionally demanding. After a sleepless night, turning decisions and memories over in my mind a million times, I finally came to this one conclusion: Life is harder than I ever dreamed it would be, but as beautiful as I’ll let it be. So, on this the 14th day of March, 2014, I declare to you that Life. Is. Beautiful. Here’s a post I wrote awhile back. I believe in it more now than ever: —————————————————– Dear Very, Very Young Bo, You are about to walk down the aisle and marry the love of your life. You will say vows that are made of fancy words like protect, honor and “troth” (pretend you know what it means). You will promise to love Steve. He will promise to love you. You will promise to take care of him. He will promise to take care of you. In your heart, you will feel love beyond all sense of reason and you will be ready to sacrifice anything for him. Anything. Then the laundry will pile up. And he will want to go golfing when you want to have a long talk about a subject that is only interesting to you. And that’s when you’ll start to build some bargains into your relationship and they will sound almost vow-like in their virtue. You will tell him he can go golfing on Saturday if he will also clean the garage on Friday. You’ll agree to fold his underwear if he agrees to wash your car. You’ll make deals and he’ll make deals and before you know it, you’ll be living in a world that is fair-and-square and even-steven. You’ll learn to expect all the emotional ledgers to be balanced with exactly the right ratios of give-and-take. But eventually, your fear will get the best of you and you’ll have no courage to bring into…anything. Steve will find that all the chips have been moved to his side of the table as he works triple time to assure you that you are loved and safe. It will make him weary, but don’t even worry, he’ll handle it like the champ you only suspect he is now. He’ll love you fiercely and fight for your freedom and you will never feel for a moment that he regrets choosing you. Never for a moment. His love will help you find what you need to become brave like you’ve never imagined you could be. And that newfound courage? Hold onto it with both hands. Because, sister, the future you see as you peer through your wedding veil is going to take a turn you cannot possibly see coming. You wouldn’t believe me if I told you. The day will come when you will be all the muscle in this marriage and you should stop laughing now, because I’m not actually kidding (but the comedy of the situation is not lost on me.) A dark day will come when you will steady his shaking hand as you sit in a hospital waiting room. You will button his shirt and help him shave. You will do the driving and the lifting and the working…but he will still be brave enough for both of you. Not gonna lie: some moments you’ll feel like you’ll buckle beneath the weight, but you won’t and neither will he. Because it turns out the vows aren’t perfect and they aren’t even-steven, but they are strong and real. They’re as strong as you’re willing to live them and as strong as the God who heard you say them. One day you’ll see a young, healthy couple make their promises, dressed in white. You will think about how they have all their days ahead of them and your heart will do a little squeeze because you remember that very moment in your life when the future stretched out so wide. But here’s the thing: you won’t envy them. Because you’ll know what you have is proven and true. It’s made of long nights and hard fights and a lot of giving when it seemed there was nothing more to give. In a world that is more comfortable with quitting than sticking, you will discover that the truest joy is not found in the shallows, but out in the deep. So, go say your vows. Eat the cake. Love your life. You will never regret this choice. But you might regret that dress. With courage, Much Older Bo

 "Many waters cannot quench love,
    neither can floods drown it.
If a man offered for love
    all the wealth of his house,    
he would be utterly despised" (Song of Solomon 8.7)

Hope at Christmas

When I was growing up in Bristol, one of the old buildings which always appealed to me was the Chapel of the Three Kings of Cologne, part of the Foster's Almshouses, at the top of Christmas Steps (full of exciting Dickensian shops!). It was built in 1504, by John Foster, a Bristol merchant, who, it's thought, had seen the Chapel of the Three Kings in Cologne Cathedral, named after the magi who came to visit the baby Jesus after the nativity - whose bones were transferred there in the 12th century. 

On my other blog, I wrote about being interviewed about the end of life by Channel 5, and received this comment from "Leafyschroder", which I liked and thought I'd repeat here.

"Coming towards the celebration of the coming into the world of Life itself, I find your article, and indeed all that is being said about this subject profoundly moving.
"It's difficult to comprehend just how difficult life must be for some and one wishes that they could be enveloped by Love and deeply feel how valuable their life is. I have been listening to this beautiful song about hope: Cologne Cathedral and the Jewish song, 'Inscription of Hope'". 

Suzette, from whose blog this comes, wrote this about the song:

"The basement (of the cathedral) also became the hiding place for Jewish families hiding out from Hitler. At the end of the war, fragments of a poem, believed to have been written by a Jewish child, were scrawled on the wall. Those words from the poem were taken and put to music, the melody coming from an old Russian folk tune, and was turned into the choral arrangement, 'Inscription of Hope.' The music and choral arrangement were done by composer Z. Randall Stroope. Below are the lyrics of the first stanza of the song, taken from the words inscribed on the wall of the Cologne Cathedral:
Inscription of Hope
I believe in the sun
even when it is not shining
and I believe in love
even when there's no one there,
and I believe in God
even when he's silent.
I believe through any trial
there is always a way."

There's a poignancy reading this again at the time when we recall another Jewish child being hunted down by an oppressive régime. Whatever your circumstances this Christmas, I wish you a hope-filled season and the knowledge within you that Love came down at Christmas. Emmanuel - God is with us

How do I look?

I love this prayer by Bo Stern. To appreciate it fully, it's worth reading the context. So here's the post she wrote yesterday.
"A Prayer for Seeing

Posted: 10 Oct 2013 06:20 AM PDT

A couple of weeks ago, I was grabbing some groceries at Safeway when I noticed a man in a wheelchair who was in very bad shape.  His pale face shook from tremors and from working to keep his head steady.  At first I thought maybe it was ALS, but his healthy weight made me think otherwise.  Steve had just gotten his wheelchair, and I noticed that this man’s chair was red instead of blue and I wondered what brand he had chosen and why and just as I looked up, I caught the eye of the woman behind him.  I don’t know if she was his wife or not, but it was clear from her angry expression that I had been looking too long.  She rolled her eyes at me in disdain, clearly sick of feeling gawked at by countless passersby and protective of the man she loved.

My stomach sank.  I wanted to talk to her — to apologize and explain that I wasn’t staring out of curiosity or even sympathy, but empathy.  I’ve been in her shoes.  In fact, her shoes are my regular footwear.  I know how it feels to want to scream that the man you love is so much more than his condition or his wheel chair.  And I hate that I made her feel like an oddity instead of what she was:  a fellow-soldier, living on the battlefield of sickness and disability and trying to function in a world that doesn’t always understand.

Later, I thought about how easy it is to look at someone and imagine we know their motives.  I have done it a million times.  I’ve settled for a surface-level understanding which is often more dangerous than no understanding at all.  I need to remember that behind every face is a backstory, a history, a struggle.  And those stories make some more beautiful and some more broken (and maybe, for some, a little of each.)  And so I wrote this prayer and I’m committing to pray it often so I can learn to see people more clearly:

Father of all who are breaking beneath the weight of war,

Straighten and strengthen my vision

to see past skin and shell,

 beneath bravado and bluster,

and into the long-buried story.

Focus my heartsight on what eyes can’t see

 to love without reason,

hope without limits,

and truly believe

that everything possible with You

is dwelling in me.

Christ,

the Hope of Glory,

let me see."

I rather enjoyed this cartoon recently! I'd rewrite the second line to say, "How God sees you means everything". 

As Psalm 139.14 puts it, "I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.

Wonderful are your works;

    my soul knows it very well." 

Even being disabled and maimed doesn't stop the flow of God's love to us.

Glory in the cave

I've been thinking about Psalm 57 today. It's one of those psalms where David tells God just what he's feeling. I don't know whether I'd have put verse 3 like that, but the great thing he keeps affirming is that "the God of all the earth will do right", as Abraham put it. God's character is both just and loving. As St John said of Jesus, "full of grace and truth". No one else combines both of those to perfection. When we hear of awful human atrocities, or even experience minor injustices ourselves, our reaction is naturally one of anger, which may well be appropriate, but maintaining love is beyond us.

I preached last Sunday about the Spirit in Prayer (Sermons at St John's/28th July), and quoted Maureen Greaves' testimony. The widow of the organist murdered going to Midnight Mass in Sheffield, at his funeral, said she had decided to forgive the two young men as it was what her husband would have wanted: “It has to be a daily act of saying ‘I place them in your hands, God’, so that I don’t have to worry about them, I don’t have to hate them. After the massive shock and heartbreak, this was probably the most difficult thing I have ever had to do, to go down the path of forgiving them.
“It has been a wonderful release that I have not had the burden of hatred towards them. I have to do it every day so I don’t lapse. It is not an easy journey to look two men in the face who have killed the person you love most in the world and hang onto that.
“When you are sitting there in court and you see them and you are heartbroken at what they have done to you, they have taken from you the person who is still your soulmate, it is very difficult to sit there and continue to forgive them and want to forgive them.
“One thing I have comforted myself with is that the God I believe in had a son who was beaten as Alan was beaten. The God I believe in had a son who was resurrected as I believe Alan will be resurrected to be with God.”

Only God's Holy Spirit can enable us to prayer from our hearts: "Your will (not mine) be done.... Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who have sinned against us." Only the Holy Spirit can give us the attitude of gratitude which David maintains, even in the blackness of his cave. Come, Holy Spirit.

Let Your Glory Be over All the Earth

To the choirmaster: according to Do Not Destroy. A Miktam of David, when he fled from Saul, in the cave.

57 Be merciful to me, O God, be merciful to me,
    for in you my soul takes refuge;
in the shadow of your wings I will take refuge,
    till the storms of destruction pass by.
² I cry out to God Most High,
    to God who fulfils his purpose for me.
³ He will send from heaven and save me;
    he will put to shame him who tramples on me. Selah
God will send out his steadfast love and his faithfulness!
⁴ My soul is in the midst of lions;
    I lie down amid fiery beasts—
the children of man, whose teeth are spears and arrows,
    whose tongues are sharp swords.
⁵ Be exalted, O God, above the heavens!
    Let your glory be over all the earth!
⁶ They set a net for my steps;
    my soul was bowed down.
They dug a pit in my way,
    but they have fallen into it themselves. Selah
⁷ My heart is steadfast, O God,
    my heart is steadfast!
I will sing and make melody!
⁸     Awake, my glory!
Awake, O harp and lyre!
    I will awake the dawn!
⁹ I will give thanks to you, O Lord, among the peoples;
    I will sing praises to you among the nations.
¹⁰ For your steadfast love is great to the heavens,
    your faithfulness to the clouds.
¹¹ Be exalted, O God, above the heavens!
    Let your glory be over all the earth!  (English Standard Version)

The secret of grateful hearts

Here are three contributions I've received this week which I'd like to pass on.  The first is from Ann (to whom I'm also indebted for the seasonal - let's hope! - photo). "We learn to let our neighbour be, just as we learn to let God be. Not to manipulate our neighbour, but rather to reverence him, to reverence his importance, the wonder of his being. In other words, to love him" (John Main).

The second comes from Alice Tremaine's Prayers for Health website.

Gratitude changes everything.

"Time and time again I learn that having a grateful heart really does make all the difference in how we live, how we are able to cope with life's tragedies, and whether we are able to bless others. There have been numerous studies on the positive effects of gratitude to one's mental and physical health. Gratitude is often associated with greater happiness and sense of meaning, and even overall health. 

"I remember the first time my father was hospitalized after being diagnosed with ALS. He had fallen and had developed a blood clot in his brain. I traveled to Brazil (where he lives) to be with him and help care for him during that transition from hospital to home. 

"Those first few days after his hospital discharge were very stressful and difficult. In a short time, my father had suffered significant losses in his ability to care for himself. 

"I remember taking a few moments to be by myself during those difficult days. There was an enormous temptation to feel sorry for myself and for my family; why has this happened? How are we supposed to do this? 

"I realized quickly that, if I were to be any help to my father, I couldn't wallow in self-pity for long. Some lamenting and crying and protesting is normal and probably healthy, but I decided I couldn't let myself stay there. I had to find the small and big things that I could be grateful for, like the good care my father received in the hospital and the fact that I had the chance to spend some meaningful time with him. "Gratitude really does change everything, and there is always something to be grateful for. We just need to look. 

"Verbal prayer: Merciful God, thank you for the gift of Life. Thank you for the beauty of nature, and for the love of family and friends. Help me to have open eyes to see the ways in which you are blessing me, and to offer thanks in every circumstance. Amen." 

And last but by no means least from Leafyschroder. "This prayer of Cardinal Newman's called the 'Fragrance Prayer' means a great deal to me...
Prayer of Blessed John Henry Newman
Dear Jesus
Help me to spread Thy fragrance everywhere I go.
Flood my soul with Thy Spirit and Life.
Penetrate and possess my whole being so utterly
That all my life may only be a radiance of Thine.
Shine through me,
And so be in me that every soul I come in contact with
May feel Thy presence in my soul.
Let them look up and see no longer me
But only Jesus.
Stay with me
And then I shall begin to shine
As Thou shinest,
So to shine as to be a light to others;
The light, O Jesus, will be all from Thee;
None of it will be mine;
It will be Thou shining on others through me.
Let me thus praise Thee in the way Thou dost love best
By shining on those around me.
Let me preach Thee without preaching,
Not by words but by my example,
By the catching force of the sympathetic influence
Of what I do,
The evident fullness of the love my heart bears to Thee.
Amen." 

I think Newman was echoing Paul in 2 Corinthians: "Thanks be to God, who in Christ always leads us in triumph, and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of him everywhere." Or maybe he's also thinking of Mary of Bethany in John's Gospel, "Mary took a pound of costly ointment of pure nard and anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped his feet with her hair; and the house was filled with the fragrance of the ointment." Whichever, they are both a heart response to Jesus' great love for us. May you receive that love tomorrow.

Divine Mercy

I wouldn't have known if my good friend, Mary, hadn't told me that today is the Feast of Divine Mercy.  (Hitherto I'd known it as Low Sunday, which seems a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy both of mood and attendance in church. Much better having a feast to reflect on the heart of the Holy Week story.)  I'd downloaded an app which I looked at before this morning's service, since we'd got to church early so that Jane could set up crèche. In the Litany for today there's this lovely line, "Divine Mercy, astonishment for Angels, incomprehensible by Saints - I trust in You". We see God's mercy personified in our Lord Jesus himself. It reminds me of the lines in Charles Wesley's And can it be:
"Tis mystery all: the Immortal dies! Who can explore his strange design?
In vain the first-born seraph tries to sound the depths of love divine.
'Tis mercy all. Let earth adore, let angel minds enquire no more." Sadly that verse isn't on my favourite version, by Lou Fellingham and Phatfish, though the new Archbishop had it near the end of his service (Justin Welby's inaugural service, 25+min in).

At the end of the Litany comes this prayer, "Eternal God, in whom mercy is endless and the treasury of compassion inexhaustible, look kindly upon us and increase Your mercy in us, that in difficult moments we might not despair nor become despondent, but with great confidence submit ourselves to Your holy will, which is Love and Mercy itself. Amen."

I'm chuffed to bits that my original hope for this blog, that others would contribute their own insights, has begun to happen with comments like those of Leafyschroder and others that have been sent direct to me - of which more tomorrow or soon!

The present moment

I've recently finished reading Stephen Cottrell's book Christ in the Wilderness which I've mentioned before. He used this quote from Jean-Pierre de Caussade's book The Sacrament of the Present Moment: "The present moment holds infinite riches beyond your wildest dreams, but you will only enjoy them to the extent of your faith and love. The more a soul loves, the more it longs, the more it hopes, the more it finds. The will of God is manifest in each moment, an immense ocean which only the heart fathoms insofar as it overflows with faith, trust and love." I very much like, by the way, the cover picture of Christ longing to gather his children as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings. It shows that look of attentive care which is the essence of love.

A dear friend of mine recently put this picture of Thérèse of Lisieux on her Facebook status. It's not great art; but she's got the point about love being expressed in the small details of life rather than the grand gestures exactly right.

Sunday is Advent Sunday when we look forward with binocular vision - to the first coming of Jesus which we celebrate in four weeks' time and to His return of which no one knows the day or time. It's a season to ensure that we are ready to meet Him whenever that might be.

Our version of one of my favourite Advent hymns is an adaptation by Charles Wesley and others of the original written in 1850 by Reading-born John Cennick. I rather like his last verse, with its reminder that what we're looking for is the destruction of evil and establishment of universal justice and love:
View him smiling, now determin’d,
Ev’ry Evil to destroy!
All the nations now shall sing him,
Songs of everlasting Joy!
O come quickly! Allelujah! 
Come Lord, come!

I'm intending to take Advent and Christmas off from blogging, as it has distracted me from my main business of book-writing. I wish you a joyful December. À bientôt.