Grown-up faith

I am reading a new novel by my friend, Karen Jones, called Sister Acts. It's the second in her "Babe's Bible" trilogy. It might not be to everyone's taste! It's about gritty contemporary issues and aimed for a younger readership than me. But I'm enjoying it. Among other things it does show that Bible is still highly relevant.

This passage really struck me, where a bishop is seeking counsel from his spiritual director, a nun.
"'Teach me how to take these thoughts captive, Sister,' he pleaded.
"'You must take each one to the cross in prayer. You must see yourself come to the cross, bringing each weakness, each longing, each unmet need. See yourself rise up and take your place on the cross with him. Let the nails be driven into your flesh with him. Die with him there, and then be laid in a tomb with him. Then, and only by his leading, rise with him and live by his Spirit the new life he gives you,' her face shone as she spoke."

Taking one's thoughts captive sounds easy. Oh yes, I can control my mind! The reality is much harsher. It's a matter of grim will, assisted by the Holy Spirit.

Abandoned?

I've recently come across an app of the Stations of the Cross produced by the Daughters of St Paul. This comes at the 13th, when Jesus is taken down from the cross. It reminds me of one of my favourite sculptures, The Pieta by Michelangelo. The meditation imagines God the Father speaking. “My only begotten Son, how my heart breaks for you. You perfectly accomplished my will. For love of me and love of humanity, you withheld nothing. You gave and gave and gave. With you I am well pleased. I sent you into the world as the very incarnation of my heart. You are heart of my heart. I could never forsake you, my Son, never. Though you did not feel my presence, I was there. I was with you in the garden, as you took upon yourself humanity’s sinfulness. I was there when you accepted the cross and fell on the road. I was there when the spikes pierced your body, and when you forgave those who brought you to the cross. I was there when you surrendered your life to me. I was there. And to your devoted disciples who have walked with you, I say I am with you as I was with my only begotten Son in his agony and death. When you can’t feel my presence, I am there. Grasp me through faith. That is how you grow – through faith. I could not and would not that forsake my Son; I will not and cannot forsake you, his disciples. I sent you my very own heart in my Son. I am with you always.”

God our Father, sometimes I feel like Jesus that I am all alone in my struggles. At those times you are closest to me, but my faith is weak. Faith is your gift to me. Help grow in faith and to remember that You are with me always.

Walking in Holy Week

Well, it's been quite a week. I've been really impressed by Pope Francis and by Justin Welby, who seem to me to share a humility and a simplicity which are refreshing. It was a shame about all the establishment paraphernalia of the Inauguration of the Archbishop's Ministry (as he chose to call it rather than "enthronement" - as the media still insist on saying), but at the heart of it was a straightforward man, aware of his own limitations, talking straightforward language. The text of his sermon is not easy to track down, but it is here. His sermon touched on many things, but was based around the account of Peter getting out of the boat on the Sea of Galilee. He said, "The fear of the disciples was reasonable. People do not walk on water, but this person did. For us to trust and follow Christ is reasonable if He is what the disciples end up saying He is; 'truly you are the Son of God'. Each of us now needs to heed His voice calling to us, and to get out of the boat and go to Him. Because even when we fail, we find peace and hope and become more fully human than we can imagine: failure forgiven, courage liberated, hope persevering, love abounding."

Coincidentally on Friday night when Pete and Jane were round for a FOF (Fellowship of Failure - see this blog FOFOF a fortnight ago), Jane (not mine) brought something to encourage us, while Jane (mine) produced an amazing chicken and mushroom vol-au-vent. I say coincidentally because Jane hadn't heard the new Archbishop, but has been reading John Ortberg's book, If you want to walk on water, you've got to get out of the boat - not the most encouraging of titles for us mere mortals! However Jane read to us from the chapter called "Learning to wait", which talks about the often quoted verses from Isaiah 40:
Why do you say, O Jacob,
    and speak, O Israel,
“My way is hidden from the Lord,
    and my right is disregarded by my God”?
Have you not known? Have you not heard?
The Lord is the everlasting God,
    the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He does not faint or grow weary;
    his understanding is unsearchable.
He gives power to the faint,
    and to him who has no might he increases strength.
Even youths shall faint and be weary,
    and young men shall fall exhausted;
but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength;
    they shall soar with wings like eagles;
they shall run and not be weary;
    they shall walk and not faint.

He wrote that "we must learn to live (the last three lines) - soaring, running, walking - one line at a time.

"Sometimes you will mount up and soar on wings of eagles. This is a beautiful picture. Ornithologists say birds have three methods of flight. The first is flapping - keeping their wings in constant motion to counteract gravity. Hummingbirds can flap up to seventy times per second. Flapping keeps you up in the air, but it is a lot of work...
"A second flight method is gliding. Here the bird builds up enough speed, then coasts downward a while. It is much more graceful than flapping, but unfortunately it does not get the bird very far. Reality in the form of gravity sets in quickly. Gliding is nice, but it does not last.
"Then there is the third way - soaring. Only a few birds, like eagles, are capable of this. Eagles' wings are so strong that they are capable of catching rising currents of warm air... and without moving a feather can soar up to great heights. eagles have been clocked up to 80 m.p.h. without flapping at all. They just soar on invisible columns of air.
"Isaiah says that for those who wait on the Lord, times will come when they soar. You catch a gust of the spirit - Jesus said, 'The wind blows wherever it pleases.... So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.'
"Sometimes in your life you will be in an era of spiritual soaring.... Be very grateful. Do all you can to stay in the Spirit's power....
"But there is another line in Isaiah's description. Sometimes we are not soaring, but we are able to run and not grow weary. If this is where you are, your life isn't feeling effortless. You do not see a lot of miracles. You have to do some flapping. But with persistence and determination you know you are running the race.... Do not try to manufacture spiritual ecstasy. Do not compare yourself with someone who is soaring right now. Your time will come. Just keep running.
"Then there is a third condition that Isaiah describes. Sometimes we will not be soaring, and we cannot run - because of doubt or pain or fatigue or failure. In those times all we can do is walk and not faint. This is not water-walking. It is just plain walking. All we can do is say, 'God, I'll hang on. I don't seem too fruitful or productive, and I don't feel very triumphant. But I won't let go. I will obey you. I'll just keep walking.'"

And as we noticed, according to Isaiah, the strength to soar, and to run, and to walk, all has the same source: God himself. As Justin Welby put it, "failure forgiven, courage liberated, hope persevering, love abounding." Holy Week is not about soaring or even running. It's about faithfully trudging the dusty road to the Cross with Jesus. It seems to me that we have to walk that way to get to the other end. 

Collar doves and the cross

I hope you had a good Easter. I must say that I have. It was lovely having all but one of our family with us (though we did miss him). Our grandchildren had great fun hunting for Easter eggs in the garden on Sunday morning. In Stanford we used to have them hidden round the graveyard and the children would hunt for them while the adults had a reading and sermon. It used to remind me of the angels on the first Easter morning, saying, "Why are you looking for the living among the dead? He is not here. He is risen."

Today we had Café Church, which is another family-sort of occasion. We'd moved on from the Easter theme. But not entirely. When we came out, we were met with a striking symbol. Sadly we didn't have a camera or iPhone to capture it, and when Jane cycled back with the camera they were gone. So I'll have to try and describe it.

On Good Friday in Grove we have an open-air service with all the churches together, at which there's a tall, rather flimsy cross. It's just a reminder of the cruel Roman means of execution to which Jesus was subjected. Afterwards it's put up in front of the parish church, by the roadside. It's still there - an empty cross. Today as we walked out of church (or at least Jane did and I chugged in my wheelchair), we noticed two dusky collar doves settled right down on the arms of the cross, one on each side, in the sun. It reminded me that the Easter story, and its meaning, doesn't end with the empty cross and the empty tomb. It doesn't even end with the risen Jesus appearing to the first disciples. It goes on to his ascension to be with God the Father - and to Pentecost, or Whitsun, when the Holy Spirit, the "promise of the Father", was given to the Church in order to enable it to live as the Kingdom of God and to share the good news of Jesus' love for everyone of all colours, languages, orientations and social status. One symbol of the Holy Spirit, of course, a dove. And so, there together were the signs of Jesus' sacrificial love for the world and his gift of his presence, strengthening, guiding and encouraging. The whole story of Easter.


I've learned that the Spirit likes to be welcomed in us, - he doesn't force himself on us -, and that it's possible to "grieve" him. I once read that a difference between pigeons and doves was that doves alight but are easily scared into flight, whereas pigeons are more phlegmatic. So it's not surprising the collar-doves had flown when Jane returned to photograph them. The writer noted that when Jesus was baptised the Spirit like a dove came and "settled" on him; in other words the Spirit was at home with him. You'll gather that I love George Herbert's poems, one of which is Whitsunday, which is a great prayer, starting:

"Listen sweet Dove unto my song 

And spread thy golden wings in me; 

Hatching my tender heart so long, 

Till it get wing, and flie away with thee."  We need to invite him to come and then continually cherish his presence in us.

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