modern plumb lines

Eugene Peterson’s interview, "Spirituality for All the Wrong Reasons" has received more than a little attention since it appeared in the March 2005 issue of Christianity Today (interviewed by Mark Galli). My husband emailed it to me on Saturday night, and after reading a few lines I knew it was a keeper. I printed a copy and immediately defaced it thoroughly with yellow highlights.

Here are some parts which particularly resonated with me:

[...] CT: Many people assume that spirituality is about becoming emotionally intimate with God.

Peterson: That's a naïve view of spirituality. What we're talking about is the Christian life. It's following Jesus. Spirituality is no different from what we've been doing for two thousand years just by going to church and receiving the sacraments, being baptized, learning to pray, and reading Scriptures rightly. It's just ordinary stuff.

This promise of intimacy is both right and wrong. There is an intimacy with God, but it's like any other intimacy; it's part of the fabric of your life. In marriage you don't feel intimate most of the time. Nor with a friend. Intimacy isn't primarily a mystical emotion. It's a way of life, a life of openness, honesty, a certain transparency.

[...] CT: You make spirituality sound so mundane.

Peterson: I don't want to suggest that those of us who are following Jesus don't have any fun, that there's no joy, no exuberance, no ecstasy. They're just not what the consumer thinks they are. When we advertise the gospel in terms of the world's values, we lie to people. We lie to them, because this is a new life. It involves following Jesus. It involves the Cross. It involves death, an acceptable sacrifice. We give up our lives.

The Gospel of Mark is so graphic this way. The first half of the Gospel is Jesus showing people how to live. He's healing everybody. Then right in the middle, he shifts. He starts showing people how to die: "Now that you've got a life, I'm going to show you how to give it up." That's the whole spiritual life. It's learning how to die. And as you learn how to die, you start losing all your illusions, and you start being capable now of true intimacy and love.

It involves a kind of learned passivity, so that our primary mode of relationship is receiving, submitting, instead of giving and getting and doing. We don't do that very well. We're trained to be assertive, to get, to apply, or to consume and to perform.

Repentance, dying to self, submission—these are not very attractive hooks to draw people into the faith.I think the minute you put the issue that way you're in trouble. Because then we join the consumer world, and everything then becomes product designed to give you something. We don't need something more. We don't need something better. We're after life. We're learning how to live.

"Learning how to die...losing all your illusions....learned passivity, receiving, submitting....repentance, dying to self, submission..." These remind me of Oswald Chambers, A. W. Tozer -- and a blog I read.

As I See It Now gives me daily food for thought, often along these lines. (It’s also a visual treat.)

"Then the Lord said, ‘Look I am setting a plumb line among my people...’" (Amos 7:8)

Thank God for modern plumb lines like A.W. Tozer, Oswald Chambers, Eugene Peterson, many others--and Debra.

and life moves on

Our 19-year-old son moved out yesterday.

It was sudden, and yet it wasn’t. He’s been spending less and less time at home, so that sometimes if felt as if he really didn't live here anyway. Then he talked last week of moving into a house in Fort Langley with a bunch of Trinity Western students.

This afternoon he came home, after spending the weekend away, with his buddy in a pickup right on his bumper. They loaded up his bags and bags of Valu-Village clothes, his drum kit, his mattress, his dresser, his TV, game system and DVD player into the car and truck and away they went. He's planning to live in a tent in the basement of the boys’ house. He's happy. Am I?

My feelings are mixed. On one hand I feel sad. It reminds me of all the other severings I’ve had from him. The first one came at birth. For nine months this person lived inside me. I can’t say I wasn’t relieved after birth, when I had my body to myself again. And yet, in some way I missed the company.

Many partings followed--weaning from breast feeding, sending him off to school, the first overnight at a friend’s house, two weeks away on a mission trip, a whole summer away when he worked at camp. Now this.

In another way it feels natural--and inevitable. One wouldn’t want one’s kids hanging around forever, would one (especially a kid like my son–-the king of slobs, if I do say so myself, despite my efforts and nagging to the contrary)? I feel I’ve been prepared for this, and almost holding my breath for it to happen. But now that it has, it does underline again how life moves on. Things will never be quite the same again for our little family.

But as my friend Jean says: "Nobody should have empty nest syndrome for more than 20 minutes, tops." Twenty minutes is long past, so I guess it's on to her next bit of advice: "It's party time!"

gods and kings - by lynn austin

A package came in the mail a few weeks ago – books from Dave Long at faith*in*fiction. These were a prize of sorts for having the short story (My Messiah) chosen and posted on the faith*in*fiction blog the week after Christmas.

I’ve decided to post a review of each of these books as I read them. I finished the first one on the weekend. Here, then, is my review of Gods and Kings by Lynn Austin.

********************

Gods and Kings is Book 1 in the biblical fiction series "Chronicles of the King." It begins in the early years of Judah’s King Ahaz, just as Aram is about to lay siege to Jerusalem, and ends with the coronation of King Hezekiah.

The cast of characters follows the biblical account pretty closely. It includes King Ahaz, his wife Abijah, her father the priest Zechariah, the high priest Uriah, prince Hezekiah. Minor appearances are also made by Hezekiah’s wife Hephzibah, and the prophets Micah and Isaiah. Shebna, Hezekiah’s Egyptian teacher along with many other bit-players, are fictional.

Several elements worked together to make this book a worthwhile read for me.

One of them is in the area of plot, and Austin’s interpretation of how godly belief lines are preserved in ancient Israel. Often when reading the stories in Kings and Chronicles, I’ve been struck by how a God-fearing king is followed by one who is idolatrous. I’ve questioned how that could be. The fictionally expanded events of this story illustrate that possibility in a believable way.

A theme element I really appreciate is the analysis of compromise as shown through the character Uriah (Ahaz’s high priest). Promoted from priest to palace administrator, Uriah starts out with the intention of using his position to influence Ahaz away from idolatry. But a series of forces including his own lust for power, greed, and international pressure serve to make him, at the end, a promoter of idol worship instead of an opponent.

Finally I feel the book's setting is handled masterfully. This book succeeds in informing me about a different time and place – one of the reasons I enjoy reading historical fiction. The descriptions of the idol worship ceremonies are especially compelling, as is the description of the meeting of King Ahaz with the Assyrian King Tiglath-Pileser in the captured city of Damascus. Here is some of that section, to give you a flavor of the setting and Austin’s writing style:

"...they mounted his chariot riding in silence to the ruined city. Ahaz struggled to conceal his shock and horror as he saw evidence of the Assyrian’s atrocities. On either side of the road that led to the main gate, row after row of bodies hung from tall stakes.

"The emperor would like you to meet the chief elders of Damascus," Jephia said. "They were impaled alive and left to die, watching the destruction of their city."

Ahaz gazed straight ahead, holding a linen handkerchief over his mouth to keep from vomiting. A sign above the gate read: This is the fate of the enemies of Assyria..... (p. 141)

[...]Ahaz...followed Jephia to the top of the hill. Not one stone of the former temple remained upon another, and the paved courtyard was bare except for a massive bronze altar standing in the center. Pictures of Assyria’s gods decorated all four sides of it, but the central figure on each panel was the god Assur – a warrior armed with a bow and riding a winged sun.(p. 143)

[...]At last he walked forward, his knees threatening to buckle beneath him. "I am Ahaz Ben Jotham, king of Judah and Jerusalem – Your majesty’s humble servant and vassal." He fell before the king with his forehead pressed to the ground, as all the other kings had bowed. The dust of Damascus filled his nostrils and throat. When he felt the touch of the royal scepter, he rose again, resisting the urge to wipe the dirt from his forehead and robes. He understood what he was – a pathetic puppet king, sworn to serve the Assyrians for the rest of his life. And if he rebelled or failed to send tribute, his punishment would be the same as the tortured king’s had been. (p. 146)

If the book has a weakness, I feel it is in the development of character. In several places, the characters’ perceptions seem exaggerated to me – as if the author is putting thoughts in their minds, thus manipulating them to tell the story her way. One instance of this is where Uriah observes the expression on the face of Abijah, his former love interest, and in that look reads whole volumes of meaning: "He (Uriah) glanced at Abijah again and saw the depth of her grief in her unguarded expression. He knew then that her hovering concern for Ahaz was an act, just as his own conduct was. They were both playing parts in this drama....both pretending to be someone they weren’t." (p. 100)

In other places, the viewpoint character’s observations (the story is told through multiple points-of-view) seem inappropriate. When child (at most young-teen) Hezekiah meets his Egyptian tutor, we discover through his consciousness that "He (the tutor) appeared to be in his early thirties." (p. 182) From my knowledge of tweens, they don’t categorize adults with this specificity, but would say, instead, ‘he looked old.’

Finally, there is the odd anachronism. One that jumped out at me was when Abijah is observing her father, who has been freed from his thirst for wine, and has the thought, "He was no longer the pitiful alcoholic she’d known ..."(p.190) Somehow ‘alcoholic’ seems way too modern a word to use here.

Aside from these minor irritants, I found Gods and Kings an engaging and worthwhile read. It left me with the sense of how God was capable of working in the life of a nation, and in the lives of individuals. And Austin left just enough loose ends at the end of the book that I’ll be really tempted to buy Book 2 (Song of Redemption) when it’s due out at the end of May 2005.

daily thots on prayer - March 1-7

Rebecca at Rebecca Writes has declared March a month to focus on prayer at her blog. Kim at The Upward Call will also be posting on that subject. I would like to make it a Canadian threesome.

I own a wonderful book called Prayer Powerpoints - a collection of quotes on prayer. Every day this month, I will post a new quote on prayer from that book.

• March 7

Prayer is like any other work; we may not feel like working, but once we have been at it for a bit, we begin to feel like working.

- Richard Foster (The Celebration of Discipline, 1978)

• March 6

Why cannot an omniopotent God, knowing our needs, supply them without waiting for our prayers? He could, of course, but that is not His plan for His children on earth. Instead He has dared to arrange it so that He is actually dependent upon us in the sense of prayers being necessary and all-important to the carrying out of His will on earth.

- Catherine Marshall (The Helper , 1978)

• March 5

I am often praying for others when I should be doing things for them. It's so much easier to pray for a bore than to go and see him.

-- C. S. Lewis (Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer, 1963)

• March 4

We're under instructions to change the world. Once you have been rescued from it, you'll need power to become a threat to it. The world which contained you in its grasp until now will not release its hold on others without a fight. Power is the key to victory, and prayer is the pathway to power.

- Jack Hayford (from Prayer is Invading the Impossible)

• March 3

"Intercession is truly universal work for the Christian. No place is closed to intercessory prayer. No continent -- no nation--no organization--no city--no office. There is no power on earth that can keep intercession out."

-Richard Halverson ("Intercessors for America Newsletter," 1986)

• March 2:
  

Get out your atlas and your National Geographic and a good newspaper and start praying for the basic needs of people so much more desperate than most of us. Let your heart be broken for a world in need. Stretch yourself to reach out beyond your own requirements. And make sure that you are ready to help meet needs when God wants to use you. For prayer is never meant to be a substitute for action and action always needs the stabilizing influence of prayer.

- Bryan Jeffrey Leech (from an unpublished article "The Lord’s Prayer," 1992)

• March 1:
  

It’s so easy to promise to pray for people or just plan to pray for people, and forget. So many afflictions, so many tragedies or desperate hopes that cry out for intercession. Only an instant of my time, only a few minutes, a thought – and who knows? It may be the only word of prayer that person will get."

– Marjorie Holmes (How Can I Find God?, 1975)

left, right or missing?

You Are 50% Left Brained, 50% Right Brained

The left side of your brain controls verbal ability, attention to detail, and reasoning. Left brained people are good at communication and persuading others. If you're left brained, you are likely good at math and logic. Your left brain prefers dogs, reading, and quiet. The right side of your brain is all about creativity and flexibility. Daring and intuitive, right brained people see the world in their unique way. If you're right brained, you likely have a talent for creative writing and art. Your right brain prefers day dreaming, philosophy, and sports.

Are You Right or Left Brained?

i don't want to pray

"I don't want to pray,"
slap words sting
from my four-year-old daughter.
How have I millstoned God to her
so she won't bringher earaches to Him?

I remember, "Are you saved?"
evangelistic, zealous aunt
cornered me, seven.
Next time she visited
I hid.

Jesus is different
His words a compelling beckon
lure-and-bait questions
irresistible Pied-Piper-tune stories.

I see my little girl
one of that eager wriggling crowd
pressing too close
for disciples' comfort.
His eyes draw her near
she leans, trusting, against Him
He lifts her on His knee.
While He talks
she watches the way
His chin moves
fingers His beard
catches His eye
whispers,
"I have an earache."

Copyright©2003 by V. Nesdoly

packrat

Today I did a very good thing and threw out some stuff!

I have packrat tendencies. Especially when it comes to papers and articles and information. It’s because I have this problem, two problems actually.

The first is that in the past I’ve read stuff and sometimes though I’ve found it interesting, haven’t saved it. Then, hours to days later I’ve realized it was important, nay, vital. Mostly I get ideas of articles I could write and then kick myself for not saving the relevant info. And so I’ve got into the habit of clipping or printing and saving whenever something twigs with me in the least way.

The second problem happens when I finally decide I’ll never need some article or clipping or magazine. I throw it out, then hours later find I do need it after all.

Accomodating these two things has led to a very stuffed file drawer. So today, in order to make room for more stuff that’s been accumulating in a ‘To File’ folder, I decided I really should tackle that drawer.

I did it in the livingroom in front of the TV. It turned out to be practically painless because I was distracted by curling. It took the whole curling match, but now, my files no longer contain clippings about computers from 1985, or things that went on in Canadian politics in 1996, or the prophesied doom of Y2K.

So what writing ideas do you suppose will come to mind just after the recycle truck has roared out of our cul-de-sac Tuesday?

costello calls to buy a computer from abbott

(No, I DIDN’T write this.)

ABBOTT: Super Duper Computer store. Can I help you?
COSTELLO: Thanks. I'm setting up an office in my den and I'm thinking about buying a computer.
ABBOTT: Mac?
COSTELLO: No, the name's Lou.
ABBOTT: Your computer?
COSTELLO: I don't own a computer. I want to buy one.
ABBOTT: Mac?
COSTELLO: I told you, my name's Lou.
ABBOTT: What about Windows?
COSTELLO: Why? Will it get stuffy in here?
ABBOTT: Do you want a computer with Windows?
COSTELLO: I don't know. What will I see when I look in the windows?
ABBOTT: Wallpaper.
COSTELLO: Never mind the windows. I need a computer and software.
ABBOTT: Software for Windows?
COSTELLO: No. On the computer! I need something I can use to write
proposals, track expenses and run my business. What have you got?
ABBOTT: Office.
COSTELLO: Yeah, for my office. Can you recommend anything?
ABBOTT: I just did.
COSTELLO: You just did what?
ABBOTT: Recommend something.
COSTELLO: You recommended something?
ABBOTT: Yes.
COSTELLO: For my office?
ABBOTT: Yes.
COSTELLO: OK, what did you recommend for my office?
ABBOTT: Office.
COSTELLO: Yes, for my office!
ABBOTT: I recommend Office with Windows.
COSTELLO: I already have an office with windows! OK, lets just say I'm sitting at my computer and I want to type a proposal. What do I need?
ABBOTT: Word.
COSTELLO: What word?
ABBOTT: Word in Office.
COSTELLO: The only word in office is office.
ABBOTT: The Word in Office for Windows.
COSTELLO: Which word in office for windows?
ABBOTT: The Word you get when you click the blue "W".
COSTELLO: I'm going to click your blue "w" if you don't start with some straight answers. OK, forget that. Can I watch movies on the Internet?
ABBOTT: Yes, you want Real One.
COSTELLO: Maybe a real one, maybe a cartoon. What I watch is none of
your business. Just tell me what I need!
ABBOTT: Real One.
COSTELLO: If it's a long movie I also want to see reel 2, 3 & 4. Can I watch them?
ABBOTT: Of course.
COSTELLO: Great! With what?
ABBOTT: Real One.
COSTELLO: OK, I'm at my computer and I want to watch a movie. What do I do?
ABBOTT: You click the blue "1".
COSTELLO: I click the blue one what?
ABBOTT: The blue "1".
COSTELLO: Is that different from the blue "W"?
ABBOTT: The blue "1" is Real One and the blue "W" is Word.
COSTELLO: What word?
ABBOTT: The Word in Office for Windows.
COSTELLO: But there's three words in "Office for Windows"!
ABBOTT: No, just one. But it's the most popular Word in the world.
COSTELLO: It is?
ABBOTT: Yes, but to be fair, there aren't many other Words left. It pretty much wiped out all the other Words out there.
COSTELLO: And that word is real one?
ABBOTT: Real One has nothing to do with Word. Real One isn't even part of Office.
COSTELLO: STOP! Don't start that again. What about financial bookkeeping? You have anything I can track my money with?
ABBOTT: Money.
COSTELLO: That's right. What do you have?
ABBOTT: Money.
COSTELLO: I need money to track my money?
ABBOTT: It comes bundled with your computer
COSTELLO: What's bundled with my computer?
ABBOTT: Money.
COSTELLO: Money comes with my computer?
ABBOTT: Yes. No extra charge.
COSTELLO: I get a bundle of money with my computer? How much?
ABBOTT: One copy.
COSTELLO: Isn't it illegal to copy money?
ABBOTT: Microsoft gave us a license to copy Money.
COSTELLO: They can give you a license to copy money?
ABBOTT: Why not? THEY OWN IT!

A FEW DAYS LATER

ABBOTT: Super Duper computer store. Can I help you?
COSTELLO: How do I turn my computer off?
ABBOTT: Click on "START"..

i love my church

"Christian Dropouts–Some believers have quit church to practice their faith alone. Is this a healthy trend?" questions the February 2005 cover of Charisma Magazine.

The articles in Charisma, as well as this recent blog post on Nick Queen’s series "Out of the Wilderness" - Series 2, his interview with the blog 'Mommy Life'

Q [5.] to Mommy Life: "What denomination do you consider yourself? "

A: "...we haven’t been hampered by loyalty to a particular church or denomination. And I don’t make apologies for "church hopping." We go where the Spirit leads us. I also thing that writers have a broader view than the general church population..."

got me thinking along the lines of how do I feel about my church and what’s the point of the local church anyway.

I’ll say right off, I don't share this blogger's feelings!

I’ve been part of three denominations in my life, and would not consider my association with any of them ‘hampering.’

I grew up in the Mennonite Brethren church. There as a youngster I got saved, was nurtured by a church family, had access to a church library, was water baptized at 14, attended their denominational Bible School after high school, and got a grounding in theology.

As an adult and then through most of our growing-up years as a family, we were part of the Christian and Missionary Alliance denomination. They grew in us a keen consciousness of and an appreciation for missions. As well we learned the value of Bible study and the importance of a life of intimacy with God.

Most lately we’ve joined a church which is aligned with the Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada. This latest step has been the continuation of our spiritual pilgrimage–on which we’ve had a sense of God gently moving us from one place to another. To make this step, though, we didn’t church-hop (though I am not denigrating church-hopping with a view to finding the right church and settling into it). We came to Christian Life Assembly in Langley first by attending their Sunday night Fire and Freedom services when our own church didn’t have anything going Sunday nights. We fell in love with the worship, the warmth of the people, but mostly the sense of God’s presence there. When we felt it was time to move on, there was no question in our minds about where we would go.

Being part of a local church is hugely important to me. Here are some reasons:

1. Corporate worship. There’s nothing like lifting my voice in praise to God with hundreds of others.

2. My life needs that weekly plumbline adjustment I get from the pastor’s sermon.

3. The church gives me a context in which I can discover and use my spiritual gifts.

4. The church is the storehouse to which I can bring my tithe.

5. The church is where I am equipped to minister.

6. The church gives me a place to go when I am in need–of prayer, or moral and spiritual support, or even in physical need.

7. The church is a place where I can find fellow-travellers who will keep me accountable.

8. The church gives me a venue through which I can impact the world. There is nothing like a month of missions’ emphasis to get one in touch with, and enthusiastic about, what can be accomplished if we pool our resources and work at this together.

The local church is God’s idea: "And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds. Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing but let us encourage one another – and all the more as you see the Day approaching." (Hebrews
10:24,25)

And speaking of "the Day approaching..." some days in church feel like what one imagines heaven will be like after judgement day ("After this I looked and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and in front of the Lamb." Revelation 7:9).

Last Sunday’s flag parade to celebrate the start of missions month was one of those foreshadowing-of-heaven days for me (‘fast’ connection needed for this. Fast-forward ‘seek’ bar to 4:30 to bypass first worship song).

this week's christian carnival

This week's Chriatian Carnival went up yesterday at Crossroads: Where Faith and Inquiry Meet. Diane set herself a daunting job when she went about organizing these 50 posts under Soap Opera titles. Wow!

I’m going to try to get through them all - one way or another. As I go, I’ll highlight the ones that catch my eye.


To this point, I really appreciated the post in which Ron Stewart of Northernburbsblog answers the questions about Christianity put to him by just-about-lawyer Not-crunchy in Answering Not-crunchy’s call.

Update March 4th

Catez at Allthings2all writes the article: Xenotransplants: Are Pig Cells in Humans the Answer? (Interesting fodder for sci fi fiction here methinks!)

...in the outer... on What is the Real Purpose of Prayer.

Weapons of Warfare discusses what can apologetics blogging hope to accomplish in The Point of it All.

wisdom from annie dillard

Yesterday I picked up Pilgrim at Tinker Creek by Annie Dillard from the library. I had put a hold on it a few weeks ago, because I wanted to read a whole volume by this woman, whom I’ve only seen quoted.

In fact, I have one of those quotes on the bulletin board beside my desk. (This to help me guard against the bad habit I have of mental squirreling away, then never coming back to exploit the hoard.)

"One of the few things I know about writing is this: Spend it all, shoot it, play it, lose it, all, right away, every time. Do not hoard what seems good for a later place in the book or for another book, give it, give it all, give it now...Some more will arise for later, something better. These things fill from behind, frm beneath like well water.

"Similarly, the impulse to keep to yourself what you have learned is not only shameful, it is destructive. Anything you do not give freely and abundantly becomes lost to you. You open your safe and find ashes."

I’m partway through the second chapter of Pilgrim. Oh my. She is good. Here are a few bits from the chapter "Seeing"

"Unfortunately, nature is very much a now-you-see-it, now-you-don’t affair. A fish flashes, then dissolves in the water before my eyes like so much salt. Deer apparently ascend bodily into heaven, the brightest oriole fades into leaves. These disappearances stun me into stillness and concentration; they say of nature that it conceals with a grand nonchalance, and they say of vision that it is a deliberate gift, the revelation of a dancer who for my eyes only flings away her seven veils....

"It’s all a matter of keeping my eyes open. Nature is like one of those line drawings of a tree that are puzzles for children: Can you find hidden in the leaves a duck, a house, a boy, a bucket, a zebra, and a boot? Specialists can find the most incredibly well-hidden things..." (Harper's Magazine Press, 1974, p. 16,17)

I wonder, what seven-veil dancer will I see today– if I keep my eyes open? What images will leap from a tangle of lines? How will I use my gift?

my frustrating, run-around, exhausting, very-good day

Yesterday was one of those days where I knew, from when my feet hit the floor, I couldn’t waste a minute. I had bought a ticket for a women’s missionary luncheon at our church, and in the evening we had cell meeting at our house – this on top of my usual several hours of typing. So I planned to start out in efficient mode by picking up my work early (the building opens at 7:00 a.m.). Of course I immediately set out on the wrong foot by taking too long posting in my blog.

I was merrily typing by 8:30 though. My first email break at 9 o’clock (I check my email on the hour - "haloscan - you’ve got a comment" is such a nice break from the doc’s droning voice), handed me another hiccup... or two.

A note from a friend, telling me her dad was now ill too, and this on top of her mom in the hospital the last four months, broke my concentration.

And this email from my daughter re her wedding photographer: "She (the photographer) called me back last night to say that she is very, very sorry but something that she was booked for on May Long weekend got moved to the weekend of my wedding. She won't be able to do my pictures. So I hung up the phone and had a little cry," put me in a mother-spin, as every cell in my body cried out I’ll rescue you! I’ll rescue you! But at the moment I was three hours’ drive away and had work to do. So I forwarded that email on to hubby, to deal with if he wished, and pushed on toward my goal to finish my work by the time I had to leave for the luncheon.

My 10 o’clock email check handed me another interruption. It was from one of my March Treehouse column contributors. The poem he’d submitted was missing a line. Yikes! So my typing went on hold again as I searched back through our email exchange and discovered - he was right!

(Now I thought his poem read ok without that line, though he insisted it didn’t make any sense at all. But, I know the frustration of having my work appear not as I’d submitted it. A year ago I had a poem published on the back cover of Bird’s and Blooms. The first stanza, as I’d sent it in to them went, in part: "To-whit, to-whee, to-whit, to-why, / Sunrise has come and gone, now I / Remember autumn with a sigh..." But it was published: "To-whit, to-whee, to-whit, to-why, / Sunrise has come and gone, no I / Remember autumn with a sigh..." Argh!)

So trying to fix my blunder meant another flurry of emails as I contacted him, got his approval of how it should be, then wrote the editor, cap-in-hand, pleading, could she get it changed somehow, please?

By now it was time to leave for the luncheon, in fact I was running late. It didn’t help to arrive to a gym-full of women and not recognize anyone (ours is a large church, we live a fair distance from it so don’t attend everything, and have only gone there under five years). But then (sigh of relief) there was Jean, from my cell group, and Ardeena, whom I’d met through a class we took together, and an open spot at their table.

The luncheon was fabulous – interviews of six fascinating women, and a multi-ethnic meal (samosas, some kind of oriental roll, curried rice, Russian cabbage salad – and Canadian lemon slice for dessert, washed down with jasmine tea! - yum), served on a banana leaf.

Then it was back to reality. I stopped by Sears on the way home to check out something to do with mom’s proposed wedding gift to Sonia (duvet, duvet covers - that sort of thing), and discovered that, as usual, my interpretation of items in their latest flyer was faulty – another dead end. But all in all, I got home safely through the building late-afternoon traffic and was back in my home cubicle by 3:00.

Before I lit into my typing again I opened my email (of course!) and discovered the dropped line had been added (whew!!), and that Hubby had written a reassuring response to his distraught little girl.

I finally managed to finish those letters, before dinner, and got through the whole routine of printing labels, backing up work etc., after the dishes were done. By 7:00, I’d tidied the kitchen, put up coffee and all associated paraphernalia, chosen a worship song for our meeting but was exhausted.

"I feel bruised," I remarked to Ernie. "This is the kind of night I’d like to do nothing more than go up to my room and lose myself in a book."

"But you can’t do that," he said to me.

True.

Our cell group members came right on time, and immediately I began to re-energize. Who wouldn’t with this great group of friends and fellow pilgrims? Last night joining our usual seven was Steve.

Now Ernie prayed at the altar with Steve several Sundays ago, when he came to re-dedicate his life to Christ. In a manner that would make Pastor Anne (DON’T DROP THE BABIES!) Donkers proud, Ernie has kept in touch with him in the last weeks, encouraging him, praying with him, and helping him through the stuff that new Christians face as they deal with the grunge of a messed up life.

It was a great evening of laughing, singing, talking, crying, praying, hugging!

I read one whole page in my book last night – before I fell into a deep and peaceful sleep. Real life, as in a frustrating, run-around, exhausting, very-good day, is definitely not always as neat as fiction, considerably more tiring, but all in all a heap more satisfying!

fw mag

Just got to give a heads-up about a great little ezine - FaithWriters Magazine - which comes out once a month. The March issue came online today.

Here’s what I’ve read so far, and can highly recommend:

Book review of Obessed and interview with Ted Dekker
(by E. Dian Moore - Dian, what great questions!)

Karen Treharne’s article explaining all those forum/email/comment acronyms.

This great (light) poem "Cyber Space Explorer" by Dean Herring .

The Table of Contents page has links to all the articles. (Yeah, I know... as if one doesn’t already have enough to read!)

Deb Porter (editor) - Another great job!

free books!

Fellow blogger Stacy Harp has recently started a company called Mind & Media with the purpose of publicizing authors, filmakers and other forms of media through blogs. And she’s looking for help – our help! Mind & Media needs all kinds of bloggers to review upcoming material.

It’s free books, guys! And a graphic for your website while you review the book, which you can do in one shot, or blog it as you read it. Then later, you might even want to do an interview with the author.

So, check out Stacy’s several sites:
MediaSoul
Mind & Media
E-Involved.org

If you think you’d like to help out with reviews, email her. (Free books guys!!)

greg sczebel nominated for juno

Greg Sczebel's CD "Here To Stay" has been nominated for a Juno award (Canada's premiere music awards) in the Contemporary Christian category. (It's the CD I wrote about here: and some have the audacity to question the taste of 50-something women- even implying they may not be hip enough!?)

fishing

FISH ARE UNAWARE
"Come follow me and I will make you fishers of men." - Jesus

Fish are unaware
that they’re
a catch,
preoccupied
with seeking food.

Wily angler uses
every angle
casts a wide net
sets irresistible trap
obsesses on fish-study
where they eat,
and what and when.

Not above pursuing them
waist-deep in water
or sitting cramped for hours
in a boat
he goes where fish
are known to be
then casts and casts again...

and should a school of hungry fish
swim by, what overjoyed confusion
reeling in, resetting bait
and casting out once more
before that multitude moves on
and it’s too late

Copyright © V. Nesdoly - 2004

makes one think

Have you noticed how ideas one comes across often seem to complement each other? This happens to me a lot--in Bible reading and then in my Oswald Chambers devotional. Also in the blog world.

Yesterday I read this anecdote by Robin Lee Hatcher, about how books she’d written a few years ago, when she was drifting from God, are still around and have come back to bite her.

Today I read "Second Chances" by John Zimmer (letter from babylon).

Makes one think...

i'm being interviewed!!

This is another in the continuing web of blogosphere interviews.

Professional radio personality Cindy Swanson, who blogs at Notes in the Key of Life asks me these questions. (And I think my answers are way too long-winded. In real life, I’m sure she’d have to cut me off for important stuff like commercials or just 'get on with it'. Oh well...)

1) I know you are a published writer. How do you handle rejection slips?

I’ve had my share, and I handle them pretty much in three ways.

a] I try to handle them philsophically. The first rejection slip I ever got was for some craft ideas I submitted to Hopscotch. This was way back when I was still taking a writing course. Some weeks later, a familiar-looking envelope arrived (my SASE) containing a form letter saying ‘no thanks.’ I pretty much took this in stride. I was new at this business, still had much to learn and at least I was submitting.

b] But rejections have immobilized me. That’s what happened after one I got from gp4k.com. By that time I’d already pitched and sold an article to editor Roseanne Tolin, so when I got her go-ahead on another one, and worked weeks to get the thing thoroughly researched and enticingly written, I was shocked when, less than 24 hours after I’d emailed it to her, I got a to-the-point reply which said, in effect, research is impressive, but this is boring. Talk about a sucker punch. I was pretty much out of commission for weeks after that.

c] My relationship with Pockets typifies the perseverence I try to cultivate. Right from when I first started submitting stuff for publication (circa 1997), I’d send them things. Always they came back. But the sample magazine of theirs was so beautiful (and their pay rates so good - for children’s), I was determined they would publish me. Finally one day, instead of my SASE, I got a postcard (on their dime) telling me they were holding my story for their editorial meeting in November. Yes! But, sadly, November came and so did the manuscript, back to me with a note: ‘Not suitable for our needs.’ With Pockets, though, I was a bulldog. And it paid off. They finally accepted one of my pieces in the spring of 2003. I’ve since had another acceptance from them, and a few weeks ago, another postcard telling me they’ll be holding a manuscript of mine for further consideration - until (get this) March of 2006!

2) What do you enjoy most about blogging?
I love being my own editor! It is so fun, writing what I want, as long or short as I want, on whatever subjects I want. And I also thoroughly enjoy the interaction with other bloggers–the way it stimulates ideas and keeps one thinking and on one’s toes.

3) What's your favorite holiday and why?
It’s got to be summer vacation. My favorite thing is to go away for a week or two with hubby, rent a cottage or a hotel room by a lake somewhere – say Osoyoos or Shuswap on the mainland, or Lake Cowichan on Vancouver Island– and simply veg - read, play games, listen to music, have long devotions, sun, go for walks, drives, sightsee. I love the change of pace and scenery and how I come back to the work-world mellowed and with a changed perspective.

4) You're going to a desert island, but you get to take five things with you.
What would they be?
I would take five kits: a food preparation kit; a shelter kit; a communication kit; a writing kit; a Bible study kit
(This is NOT cheating. Though these kits contain more than one thing, every solitary item one could choose contains many things as well. A book, for example, contains two covers, many pages and a ton of words.)

5) What do you like best about your husband?
There are so many things I could pick–his sense of humor, his loyalty, his helpfulness... But I will pick one thing that overrides all those–his integrity. He does not play games, is not sneaky or underhanded (although he does know how to drive a hard bargain when wheeling and dealing e.g. buying a car). You know where you stand with him. He’s straight with you and he expects you to be straight with him. If he says he will do something–he’ll do it. He’s a rock and I love that!

************

Would you like to play the interview game? Here's how:

1. Leave me a comment saying “interview me.” The first five commenters will be the participants.

2. I will respond by asking you five questions.

3. You will update your blog/site with the answers to the questions.

4. You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the same post.

5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions. (Write your own questions or borrow some.)

friday goody bag

For those who love a delicious irony: there is a proposed anti-abortion legislation to protect gay-gene carriers: New Maine House Bill Would Protect Fetuses Carrying the ‘‘Gay Gene’’ (Hat Tip - The Crusty Curmudgeon)

Mind on higher things: Rebecca Writes continues to unearth treasures from the Puritan era. This post contains a sermon segment from "Christ Altogether Lovely" delivered by John Flavel, which is certainly worth some meditation.

For writers:

- first impressions DO matter: Dave Long at faith*in*fiction has written a series of posts (Monday to Thursday - starts here) giving writers of book-length fiction a behind-the-scenes look at how an editor reads and processes that pile of unsolicited manuscripts.

- Terry Whalin at The Writing Life is doing a series on article writing. Now we no longer have the excuse to say, I don’t know how. (Part 8 with links to the other segments.)

christian carnival is up

at Wallo World.

Wallo World’s blog holds a place of high esteem for me and I owe him a debt of gratitude. A few months ago, when the blogosphere was going through yet another session of navel-gazing, Joe at the evangelical outpost featured a series on blogging. In that series he linked to this article by Bill Wallo, from a previous and similar ‘why-am-I-blogging’ -type cycle. When I read these words of Mr. Wallo, something pinged! He articulated exactly why I too was blogging:

As I looked at other blogs and saw the types that were successful, I recognized a couple of things. First that I didn’t have the time to blog like many top bloggers do. Second, that my interests were varied and I wanted to say things about quite a variety of topics. I wanted to do a general blog, not a law blog or a Christian blog or a comics blog, or whatever. I wanted to be able to write about whatever suited my fancy.

So thank you Wallo World (not, of course, that I could write a law or comics blog - but I can do 'whatever')! If I ever rename my blog, I will call it Miss Elaineous (and how fitting–seeing as how Elaine is my real second name!).

the first step

Today Donna at The Master’s Artist writes about lessons in perseverance to be learned from by writers from the book of Nehemiah. She says, in part...

Before Nehemiah began his mission to rebuild the walls around Jerusalem, he prayed and fasted. But he didn't stop there. He made a plan. But he didn't stop there. He followed through on that plan. He put not only feet, but hands, brain, and hard work to his prayers.

I’ve been reading Nehemiah in my personal devotions since Sunday and have had some of the same thoughts. I’ve wondered, though, whether the secret of Nehemiah’s success didn’t come in the first step.

During those days Nehemiah spent in fasting, weeping and prayer, it seems something happened between God and him. His passion to see the walls of Jerusalem rebuilt led to the sense that God was fingering him for the assignment and in some way making him personally responsible and accountable. That personal call led him to jeopardize his well-being as he requested of his boss Artaxerxes, not only for time away from his job as a cup-bearer, but for help with the project in the form of protection and letters.

He would need that knowledge of divinely decreed vocation in the days ahead. For the rebuilding of the wall was riddled with setbacks, discouragements, naysayers, outright opposition. I believe it was in large measure the knowledge this was an assignment from God that kept him on-task.

I’m thinking the reason some of my writing projects fizzle may be that I have skipped that first step. If I’m beginning projects on my own without knowing this is an assignment from God, is it any wonder when the fire in my belly cools, when the project feels too big for me, when I compare my meager talents with the talents of others, or a myriad of similar obstacles loom, I give up?

is Terri Schiavo living her final hours?

The clock is ominously ticking down for Terri Schiavo--unless someone intervenes with a reversal of the court order to remove her feeding tube. This New York Times article explains the situation today.

Catez at Allthings2all explains what we can do in yesterday's post: "Terri Schiavo: Will You Help to Wash Her Feet?" She also provides background in Terri Schiavo: Who Crushes a Butterfly With a Hammer."

how to resist the redecorating craze

Directions for writers (0r bloggers):

Do you live in a house whose walls are still builder-beige after all these years? Do you return home from visiting friends to find yourself entertaining the nagging thought - I should do something with this place?

Now I’m not talking about adding the odd picture, bookshelf or file cabinet. I’m referring to serious redecorating where you move all the furniture, replace flooring, paint or paper walls, build stuff – in other words, bring major disruption on yourself. For though part of you knows you should redecorate, another part argues, why would you plunge yourself into such chaos when all you really want is the peace and quiet to write?

If this is you, take heart. Help is at hand. Do one or all of the suggestions below and house-guilt will forever be a thing of the past.

1. Watch lots of redecorating shows. Even a few of these will exhaust you and leave you feeling that you yourself have been redecorating for days.

2. Have a husband who, the first time you mention redecorating goes apoplectic and ever after asks for complicated things like a cost-benefit analysis (well, actually no, but he does ask if it fits in my budget - what budget?!).

3. Hang around with friends who are perpetually redecorating. You’ll soon find that in all the time it takes to collect and consider paint and carpet swatches, visit drapery stores and home shows, you could have finished your novel - or at least come up with an article idea.

4. Redecorate one room as a trial run. When you see how much work it is, you’ll be cured forever.

5. Scrub your house till it glows. Who’d want to improve on such a lovable place anyway?

6. If you should happen to find that lonely decorating article that lauds the hodge-podge look of your home, keep it handy against the next time the urge to redecorate resurfaces.

7. Buy one or two trendy accessories to make you feel better (no matter that they don’t fit the 80s decor of your home).

8. Stay the course and one of these years the house fashion trends will come full circle. All those mulberry, taupe and navy walls of your friends will find themselves beige again, faux wood will be all the rage again and your house will be fashionable again without you ever raising a hammer or paintbrush.

9. Stay the course and before you know it your house will be a community heritage treasure with by-law protection against change.

10. Write instead, make lots of money and hire a professional decorator or your decorator-savy friends.

11. Write instead, make lots of money and move to a house that comes pre-decorated.

12. Memorize every Bible verse about contentment that you can find. Start with: "If we have food and clothing, we will be content with that" (I Timothy 6:8 - NIV).

(BTW - This isn’t new. I wrote it about a year ago in response to a weekly FaithWriters.com weekly Writing Challenge. I think it’s part of a book collection somewhere--yes it's in volume 1. Of course I still live by these principles!)

taking stock

I don’t know whether it’s a recent funeral or all the birthdays celebrated in the last little while, but my thoughts have lately gone to the brevity of life. Not in a macabre way, but more in an urgency, check-up-on-myself way. I think this focus also has to do with other changes I’ve experienced.

My kids (at 19 and almost 22) don’t monopolize my time and attention like they used to. A few years ago I simplified my job by working for only one client instead of several. And when my husband a year ago and took over some of my housework jobs, I suddenly found myself free to do what I’d always dreamed of doing - actually writing for a chunk of time every day. I expected that when this happened the projects I'd always hoped to complete would somehow start coming to pass. It hasn’t been like that.

Instead, I've experienced the fact that just because you have some time to write doesn't mean you'll spend it doing the hard stuff...getting those ideas, writing those first drafts, sending out those manuscripts. Lately the cold breeze of reality has blown across my life as I consider what I’ll probably get done if I carry on at the same pace. I've become more realistic and sober in what I fantasize I’ll accomplish. To grapple with this sense of time slipping away I’ve started asking myself questions like:

• What, of all the things I’d like to do, will I, at the end of my life, feel disappointed if I haven’t achieved?
  
• If I knew I could do just one or two or three more projects, what would they be?
  
• How will I account to God for the talents, opportunities and assignments I’ve been given?
  

Now I’m not sick, and I am expecting to live a good many years yet. But at the same time, I’m becoming more aware of how easy it is to procrastinate and fritter away hours and days. When I look back over recent weeks and months with my list of sensed assignments and ‘must dos’ in mind, and see what little I have to show for time spent, I realize it’s a good thing to take stock.

The grass withers, the flower fades beneath the breath of God. And so it is with fragile man. The grass withers, the flower fade, but the Word of our God shall stand forever. Isa.40:7,8 (TLB)

What, after all, is your life? It is like a puff of smoke visible for a little while and then dissolving into thin air." James 4:14 (Phillips)

"...our days on earth are like a shadow, gone so soon, without a trace." I Chronicles 29:15 (TLB)

tournament of hearts - YES!!

Canada’s premiere women’s curling bonspiel - the Tournament of Hearts - begins today! I curled a little myself one winter when I lived in Hazelton. A group of us went to Smithers to curl every week. Predictably, I was lousy at it - as I am at every sport! (For an explanation of how it works, Kim of The Upward Call has explained it very nicely here.)

But I love watching others do it well. Here are some reasons to watch (and love) curling:

1. It’s a smart game. It’s been called chess on ice. Each skip works on setting up the house to their advantage several ends away - anticipating what shots the opponent has, and trying to block them while at the same time, getting their own rocks-in-a-row, for that the final button shot.

2. It’s a polite game. No bashing people around, getting penalties, bloody noses and broken necks (like some other games we know).

3. It’s played by ordinary folks. Where else do people who in real life are clerks and accountants and technicians and housewives get a chance to be in the sports spotlight?

4. It’s easy to watch. No guessing where the rock is. No missing the play. No question about who’s who. Also, the close-up television shots of players’ faces give watching it a huge human interest factor.

Here’s a ditty I wrote about curling a couple of years ago - a little work done in an attempt to placate my conscience for those hours frittered in front of the TV...

Curling

In the hack and grip your rock
crouch so low and glide so nice
eyes on broom across the sheet
send the stone along the ice.

Skip is yelling form the house
to the sweeper, Hurry hard!
Rock is light and slowing fast
comes to rest, a perfect guard.

Rival stone sits in the rings
(they would dearly love to steal)
Throw a bullet, is the call,
Sweep it clean, we want to peal.

Now the house is getting full
stones in twelve-foot, four-foot, eight-
try the double, watch the jam
need to throw a lot of weight!

It’s our hammer and last rock
draw to button a clear shot
sweep for line and watch it curl –
it looks easy, but it’s not!

friday pocketful

It’s a beautiful Friday afternoon and I’m going to take a few minutes to dump my pocketful of treasures in here

We kept to our Friday routine thing today and drove out to Abbotsford, stopping at Superstore along the way to pick up groceries for Mom, then detoured to MacDonald’s to pick up three coffees and Fruit ‘n Fiber muffins.

Mom was good. She’s been making more cards. We put away the groceries, then sat around having coffee and chatting. Before we left, I set her hair.

Traffic on the Number 1 coming home was heavy both ways, as it usually is. We decided not to take the time to go into Fort Langley and do the Fort-to-Fort Trail. Instead, we came straight home, had a quick lunch of toasted bagels, cheese and apples, and then drove to Elgin Park for our walk.

Signs of spring are everywhere! The alder twig ends are dripping with chubby rufus-colored catkins-in-the making. Under the old oak tree a patch of snowdrops was in full bloom. Beside the Stewart Farmhouse where we parked, a stand of early daffodils will open probably tomorrow or Sunday. Even the birds sound energized.

Let’s see if I can remember all the birds we saw today:

herons
a kingfisher
a hawk
ducks
- green-winged teals
- widgeons
- mallards
- buffleheads
a loon eating a fish
sandpipers

It’s just lovely walking along the banks of the Nicomekl! Today the air was crisp, the breeze fresh, the sky blue, the sun grinning. The day has a just-out-of-school feeling.

Thank You, Lord, for pleasant interludes, for a hubby with whom to enjoy them, for the innocent and un-selfconscious world of nature, for this beautiful spot on earth we call home...

Now for a shot of reality. I must clean my house.

Pray for Meeting with Cdn. P.M.

We just got this message via email from our church:


Pastor Brent (Cantelon) and several other Christian leaders are going to be meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin tomorrow (Friday morning) in Ottawa. The purpose of the hour-long meeting is to discuss the proposed same-sex marriage bill. Please take some time to pray for this meeting and for Pastor Brent in particular as he joins others in expressing the biblical view of marriage.

*****************

On a related topic - Joel at Proud to be Canadian has posted leader of the opposition, Stephen Harper's speech to parliament given on the first day of the same-sex marriage debate. (This after the CBC.ca posted a link to the transcript of PM Paul Martin's speech but refused to do the same for the leader of the opposition.) It is long but an excellent read showing how the party in power has flip-flopped on their former position and why same-sex marriage is not a fundamental human right, among other things. (Or read it in context from Hansard, February 16, 2005.)

'rebecca' by daphne du maurier

I am reading Rebecca – for the third time!

It’s the rare novel I read twice - so this book is exceptional-- in my books.

I read it the first time for the story. I read it the second because I remembered I had enjoyed it a lot the first time. I’m reading it for the third time to figure out - how does (did) Daphne du Maurier do that?

The book is an oldie - copyright 1938. I can’t think of any other books of this vintage I like. I’ve even read one other book by Du Maurier and it wasn’t memorable. But Rebecca I like. Here are some reasons:

1. The person who tells the story - the ‘I’ of the book - is unnamed. She isn’t Rebecca - that’s the other woman. I find this first-person narrator sympathetic - shy, not pretty (or at least not in her own mind), not society bred, so she does clumsy things like spills glasses of water. Yet she has a refreshing honesty and ability to see through pretense. I found myself on her side all the way.

2. I love the way the author takes us on detours from the action onto trails in the storyteller’s head. There are parts that are downright stream-of-consciousness. Here, for example, is the part where, after two wonderful weeks spent in the company of Maxim de Winter, Mrs. Hopper her boss decides it’s time to return to the States. She and Maxim will be parted:

I went into the bathroom and locked the door, and sat down on the cork mat, my head in my hands. It had happened at last, the business of going away. It was all over....I should say good-bye to him in the lounge, perhaps, before we left. A furtive, scrambled farewell, because of her, and there would be a pause, and a smile, and words like, "Yes, of course, do write," and "I’ve never thanked you properly for being so kind," and "You must forward those snapshots," "What about your address?" "Well, I’ll have to let you know." And he would light a cigarette casually, asking a passing waiter for a light, while I thought, "Four and a half more minutes to go. I shall never see him again."

3. There’s a gothic quality to parts of the book. The evil maid, Mrs. Danvers, for example, is always described in the language of death. Here’s our young bride's first impression:

"Someone advanced from the sea of faces, someone tall and gaunt, dressed in deep black, whose prominent cheek-bones and great, hollow eyes gave her a skull’s face, parchment-white, set on a skeleton’s frame....when she took my hand hers was limp and heavy, deathly cold, and it lay in mine like a lifeless thing."

All through the book, things are double-sided, not as they seem - rooms are locked, pleasant places feel sinister, people shield secrets.

4. The setting, the Cornwall estate Manderley, is gorgeous. I love living (vicariously of course) the life of an English estate wife – seeing the hedge of blooming red rhododendrons and the azaleas on the path down to the beach (although in this book the azaleas have a scent - are there scented azaleas? I've never come across any!), having Frith and Robert at my beck and call, and Clarisse, and Frank Crawley and Annie, and the quantity and variety of food served each breakfast and the tea brought in each afternoon at four, and changing each evening for dinner...

Sol Stein in his book Stein on Writing says:

"...the correct intention (for the writer) is to provide the reader with an experience that is superior to the experiences the reader encourages in everyday life. If the reader is also rewarded with insights, it is not always the result of the writer’s wisdom but of the writer’s ability to create the conditions that enable pleasure to edify."

du Maurier in this book certainly succeeds in providing that experience for me. (The Cornwall setting and portrayal of life has shades of the English domesticity of another of my favorite writers Rosamunde Pilcher.)

5. Most of all, though, I’m fascinated with the skill of the storytelling. Ms. Du Maurier has chosen a clever way to do it - using the viewpoint of the person in the story who knows the least - about the man she marries, the home he takes her to and, the kicker, his first wife. The reader, of course, knows only as much as she does, so the entire read is a mystery.

I’m almost done this third read-through. I wish I weren’t. And it’s odd, because even though I’ve read the book twice, enough time has elapsed between readings so that I’m not precisely sure what happens next - I just have feelings of intuition like a kind of clairvoyance - ‘nothing to worry about here,’ or ‘that character is dangerous’ or ‘this is going to end badly.’ That’s definitely the way for someone to read a book who doesn’t like characters to pop from behind doors and yell "Boo!"

watercourse heart

The first part of Ezra (1-6) is the story of how Gentile kings - Cyrus, Darius and Artaxerxes - are the driving force behind having the Jerusalem temple rebuilt after the Jews are taken into exile.

The temple stands completed at last and the Jews celebrate by observing the Passover.

"So the Israelites who had returned from the exile ate it, together with all who had separated themselves from the unclean practices of their Gentile neighbors in order to seek the Lord, the God of Israel. For seven days they celebrated with joy the Feast of Unleavened Bread, because the Lord had filled them with joy by changing the attitude of the king of Assyria, so that he assisted them in the work on the house of God, the God of Israel." (Ezra 6:22 - bold mine)

This instance of God working in and through secular leaders is a great faith-builder for me, a Canadian citizen, living in a time when the legislators in my country are bent on passing laws offensive to God. I remind myself:

The king's heart is in the hand of the LORD ; he directs it like a watercourse wherever he pleases. (Proverbs 21:1)

Skirmishes in the war:

The pro-gay ads playing as part of the deluge of commercials before the feature performance at Famous Players Theaters in Canada, will end this Thursday.

But now, what’s with this - Canadian Tire sponsoring ‘My Fabulous Gay Wedding.’?!

(Hat-tip: Proud to Be Canadian)

mother of the bride

We got to Kamloops Friday afternoon, after the Kelowna leg of our trip, with the intent of helping Sonia with wedding plans. Up till now I’ve felt a little out of things. After all, the wedding is happening three hours’ drive from where we live, and since Sonia does event planning as part of her job, she seems to have it well in hand.

One of the first things she did was show us her invitations. My she’s gone to a lot of work - designing, printing, embossing, tying and trimming with ribbon. It suddenly hit me again how much work a wedding is, just considering all the hours she’s spent on those alone! (Each invitation has the name of the recipient printed on it - for starters.)

After dinner at a so-so Italian restaurant, we picked up Kate (Sonia’s bridesmaid) and went back to our motel room to put some more hours of work on those babies. I stuffed them into envelopes (making sure the name on the invite and on the envelope were the same - I hope I didn’t goof up anywhere!), then put in all the inserts - the info about Kamloops for out-of-town guests, the reply card and another card telling which stores they’re registered in for wedding gifts. Meanwhile Sonia and Kate were ribboning more invitation covers and centers together, and even Ernie got into the action by licking envelopes and putting on gold stickers.

Saturday morning we went dress shopping. This was something I’d been worried about - as a friend of mine told me these dresses usually have to be ordered in, can take months to arrive, and this puts a lot of stress on things. With Sonia’s wedding set for the end of May - we don’t have a lot of months.

Sonia had scouted out the wedding shops in town - or at least one of them. She’d tried on dresses one day with two of her friends along...and found the one. It sounded lovely when she described it on the phone - until it came to the price tag! So Saturday we were going to check out the other wedding shop(s).

At the first place we were met by a sign which told us to take off our shoes (the temple of the garment world after all!). Then it was digging through the racks to find prospective dresses. Efficient shop lady soon had half a dozen collected for us in the change room.

I went into the change room with Sonia. She showed me how to make a tunnel with my arms through the bodice and then she found my opening from the other end, by groping through trains and crinolines. All in all, it worked pretty well.

There were all types and if I knew my fabrics, I would be able to write about how they were organza, or satin or taffeta or brocade. I know this - they were all pretty, and all expensive, and all not quite right, at least not when compared to the dress. When one seemed particularly close, the shop lady got a sly look in her eye and threw out the info that she could give us 25% off - because it would be bought off the floor (not literally of course). When I quizzed her about this, it turns out that any dress bought ‘off the floor’ was discounted - but not all by 25%. It depended entirely on how long the dress had been hanging around. The older it was, the bigger the discount.

We soon exhausted the supply of dresses there, and then it was on ... "Let’s go see if my dress is still there," Sonia suggested. So it was down the street to the shop she’d been in a few days earlier (Rosa's) and straight to the row of dresses. The dress was still there (whew) and she put it on... Oooh and aaah and how wonderful it made her feel, and see how it was almost a perfect fit? I could tell by the look in her eyes and the plead in her voice that it would be nigh impossible to persuade her to forsake this wonderful dress and keep looking. (And could I get a discount? Ah yes, but one that was ever so small - as this dress had not been around long at all!) So pushover mom that I am, I gave in to the only bride daughter I’ll ever have and consented to a dress which cost about as much as my first car, but made my little girl’s day and will ensure she’s as pretty a princess bride as you’ll ever see.

We did other wedding things Saturday too. After breaking the news of the dress to her father, who had holed himself up in the library while we did the dress shops, we checked the fabric stores in town for bridesmaid dress fabric (she’s chosen a taupey pink color) in taffeta, which none of them had. So I’ve come from home with a swatch of pink bridal satin in my pocket and a mission to find that color in taffeta in one of the local stores. I also need to make about 40 dozen squares for the reception.

After this weekend I definitely feel like the mother of the bride!

browning - love poems

You'll Love Me Yet

You'll love me yet! -- and I can tarry
Your love's protracted growing:
June rear'd that bunch of flowers you carry,
From seeds of April's sowing.

I plant a heartful now: some seed
At least is sure to strike,
And yield -- what you'll not pluck indeed,
Not love, but, may be, like.

You'll look at least on love's remains,
A grave's one violet:
Your look? -- that pays a thousand pains.
What's death? You'll love me yet!

-- Robert Browning



Sonnets from the Portuguese - No. 14

If thou must love me, let it be for nought
Except for love's sake only. Do not say
'I love her for her smile -- her look -- her way
Of speaking gently, -- for a trick of thought
That falls in well with mine, and certes brought
A sense of pleasant ease on such a day' --
For these things in themselves, Beloved, may
Be changed, or change for thee, -- and love, so wrought,
may be unwrought so. Neither love me for
Thine own dear pity's wiping my cheeks dry, --
A creature might forget to weep, who bore
Thy comfort long, and lose thy love thereby!
But love me for love's sake, that evermore
Thou may'st love on, through love's eternity.

-- Elizabeth Barrett Browning

don't i know you?

On Wednesday we said goodbye to my Aunt Helen. I want to tell you a bit about her, so that when you meet her in heaven, you can say, "Don’t I know you?"

My first memories of my mom’s younger sister are the flannelgraph stories she told us and the Wordless Book song she sang. When she came for a visit, Mom had her hands full keeping us from barging into her room first thing in the morning to see what magic she had in her suitcase.

You see, Aunt Helen wanted to be a missionary. When she was turned down, she became a missionary to the kids of Saskatchewan where she worked with Child Evangelism Fellowship and organized and taught Good News Clubs wherever she lived.

She took me with her to Regina one summer when I was a kid. There I helped her for a couple of weeks with the games and songs and crafts and even told the odd story. I can still also recall the smell of those kids in that poor part of town (cigarette smoke, grubby clothes - like the smell of a thrift shop - and cooked cabbage).

She was one of my maiden aunts - a single state which, at the time, seemed irrevocable. So imagine everyone’s amazement when she announced, the year she was 61, she was getting married (to an also never-married Dutch farmer from Grande Prairie, Alberta). "I’m sweet 61 and never been kissed," she said with a self conscious giggle.

You never saw a more in-love couple than Uncle Dick and Aunt Helen. She was a little bit of a thing - about 4' 10" and under 100 pounds. Uncle Dick said about her: "She’s a little woman, but she fills the house." He was always telling corny jokes in his Dutch accent - and she rewarding him with her twinkly blue eyed smile. Together they supported missionaries all over the world with money, prayers and hospitality. She prayed for her nieces and nephews - and there were many - mentioning each by name at least once a week. She also never lost her adeptness at finding a place in conversation to slip in a question about how things were with you and the Lord, and then giving you a tract from her plentiful stash.

She and Uncle Dick would go for an early morning walk every day for years. Part of their route was along Highway 33 in Kelowna, between the seniors complex where they lived and Costco. The pastor officiating at her memorial said, "Any unsaved person walking that stretch of road was marked."

Aunt Helen’s world came crashing down when Uncle Dick died in 2002. Shortly after that, she went blind. But though she never had any natural children, the love she poured into others then came back to support her. Uncle Dick and Aunt Helen years earlier had adopted a young couple and their two kids. Now this relationship bore fruit as this family, as well as my brother, visited her - someone every day - to read the Bible, a devotional book, and then to pray with her.

She died a week ago today. I can just imagine how her face lit up as she caught sight of Uncle Dick, saw all the things her prayers and giving had accomplished, and then met all the people (kids and adults) she’d led to Jesus.

Aunt Helen’s memorial service on Wednesday made me aware, again, that though she was simple and unpretentious, she did many things right. By contrast, I see myself sidetracked with much that is seemingly unimportant (at least in the light of eternity). It makes me wonder, who will be in my receiving line when I arrive in heaven?

life trumps blogging

Blogging will be light the next four days - a funeral to attend, wedding arrangements to make...

If we come to mind, pray for safe travel as we (I) have

"miles to go before I sleep
miles to go before I sleep."

(from Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Day- Robert Frost)

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P.S. The 56th Christian Carnival is up at Dunmoose the Ageless

Powerful Defender - Elizabeth Bunyan (Part 4)

• Read Part 1
• Read Part 2
• Read Part 3

Part 4 (Conclusion)

Blind Mary gently patted Elizabeth’s hair and dress with her thin, sensitive hands. "You look wonderful, Ma," she said. "I will pray for you." Then the others hugged and kissed her goodbye, and she was on her way, walking toward the Embankment and the courthouse.

It was finally the August day Elizabeth had looked forward to and dreaded since returning from London. John had been ignored, no one else had come forward, today the judges arrived and it was all up to her.

"We must believe that this is how God wills it," John had kept encouraging her.

When Elizabeth arrived at the courthouse, the crowd was thick, with many already assembled. Elizabeth joined a line to await her turn. Through the long morning and into the afternoon, she inched forward as one after the other presented their petitions to the judge. When she got closer, her hands grew clammy and she felt her heart begin to pound. Too much was riding on the next few minutes.

She rehearsed again what she planned to say: Your Honor, my husband John Bunyan has been jailed these nine months for a crime he has never been tried for or pleaded guilty to. No, ‘crime’ was too strong. He has been jailed these nine months for a mere oversight, a misunderstanding –"

"Next," the clerk’s voice cut into Elizabeth’s thoughts. The judge looked coolly down on her.

"My name is Elizabeth Bunyan," she began, surprised at the strength in her voice.

"Judge Hale," he said, giving her a nod.

"I am here on behalf of my husband, John Bunyan. Here is his petition." She handed him John’s petition. "He has been in prison these nine months for a misunderstanding – for something he was never tried for or been found guilty of."

When Judge Hale looked at her she saw kindness in his eyes. "I will do the best good I can for thee," he said. "But I fear I’ll not be able to do anything."

Elizabeth’s heart dropped at his words. She opened her mouth to say something more, but the clerk was already calling out, "Next!"

She stopped at the jail on her way through town.

"How did it go?" John asked.

"I gave the petition to Judge Hale," she began. "He was kind, but he said he didn’t think he could help us."

"We must have faith. God can work the impossible,"

"Also," Elizabeth went on, "there were crowds of others with petitions. The place is so busy. Thy case may well get lost in a sea of papers."

"Perhaps we should give it to other judges as well," John said. "Here, take these." He handed her several more packets.

If only John were allowed to speak for himself, or someone else took up his cause, she thought again, as she made her way home. Please, send us some help, Elizabeth prayed all the way home.

The next day, Elizabeth went out again. She took up a spot along with others on the Embankment, near the courthouse. She wasn’t sure what she would do with the petitions she clutched in her hand. But as the carriages carrying the judges drew near, she had an idea. It was daring, but what did she have to lose? She elbowed her way to the front of the crowd, stepped up to the carriage and just as the door opened, tossed a petition inside.

A red-faced judge emerged and scanned the crowd. Then his eyes locked with Elizabeth’s.

Around her she heard a murmur of the bystanders.

He picked the petition off the carriage floor, deliberately unfolded it and skimmed its contents while she waited hardly daring to breathe. Then, looking straight at her with angry eyes and speaking with barely suppressed rage, he said, "This John Bunyan is a convicted person. He cannot be released unless he promises to preach no more!"

Elizabeth felt her face go red under the scrutiny of the judge and the bystanders. How could they not see that John was no criminal, that he was a far better risk to be pardoned than the thousands of real criminals who had already been freed by the king’s pardon? Instead, all these powerful men seemed to have made their minds up about John.

But for so long Elizabeth had been sure that the king’s pardon would be the means of John’s release, she would not give up now. Somehow these judges must be convinced that John was innocent and belonged at home with his family.

The next day was another day of public hearings and Elizabeth was again in line at the courthouse, clutching another of John’s petitions. When it was her turn, she saw with relief that kindly Judge Hale was on the bench.

"And what can I do for you, young lady," he asked, not showing any sign that he recognized her from the days before.

She stepped forward with her petition, but before she had a chance to say anything, another official, a sly man, took the paper from her.

"This is John Bunyan’s wife," he explained to the judge. "He is a high spirited fellow who’s been convicted by the court. Don’t even consider freeing him."

Judge Hale gave her a regretful smile and dismissed her with a wave of his hand.

On her way out of the courthouse, the high sheriff stopped her. "How did it go?" he asked.

"An official took my petition,"she told him. "He said John was a condemned man so I never even got to say a word to the judge. But they are wrong. They tricked him into an indictment. He’s done no crime."

"There, there," the sheriff said in a kind voice, patting her on the shoulder. Elizabeth heard the sympathy in his tone and her eyes fill with tears. She hurried away before she shamed herself by weeping in front of them all.

The next few days Elizabeth busied herself at home. House duties had been neglected the last few days, the garden was ripening fast and there was much to do. But as busy as she was, she couldn’t stamp out the fearful thoughts of facing another winter without John. As the days wore on, and she knew the court sessions were drawing to a close, her prayers grew ever more desperate. Oh God, let John speak, she prayed, or send someone powerful and persuasive plead his case.

The last day of the assizes dawned and Elizabeth was at home attending to the children’s breakfast when there was a knock at the door. It was a young man, a court page, who handed her a message:

"A hearing has been arranged for thee before the judges in Swan Chamber this afternoon one hour after noon. Bring John’s petition. His Majesty’s High Sheriff of Bedford."

The remainder of the morning was a blur of activity – getting ready, making arrangements for the children, stopping by the prison to tell John. She forgot all about eating and when at last she was called in to the courtroom to face the crowd of judges, justices and gentry, she couldn’t tell whether it was hunger or nervousness that made her tremble.

She spotted Judge Hale and stepped over to where he sat. "My Lord," she said shyly, "I make bold to come once again to your Lordship, to know what may be done with my husband."

Judge Hale looked at her with kindness and recognition. But his voice was resigned. "Woman, I told the before, I could do thee no good; because they have taken for a conviction what thy husband said at the sessions. Unless there be something done to undo that, I can do thee no good."

Elizabeth felt her indignation rise. "My Lord, he is kept unlawfully in prison. They clapped him in there before there was any proclamation against the meetings. The indictment is false too. He never admitted his guilt and he did not confess."

One of the justices, who had been listening intently, broke in, "My Lord, he was lawfully convicted."

His assertion made Elizabeth furious. "It is false!" she exclaimed. "For when they said, do you confess the indictment, he said only that he’d been at several meetings where there was preaching and prayer and that God’s presence was there."

There was a moment of silence. The whole room was electrified at her bold response. Then another angry, and familiar voice boomed out. "What! Do you think we can do whatever we want?" Judge Twisdon’s face was red with anger. "Your husband is a peace breaker and is convicted by the law!"

But Elizabeth would not let Judge Twisdon have the last word. "My Lord," she said, looking straight into the angry man’s eyes, "he was not lawfully convicted.!"

"What?" It was Judge Twisdon again. "Will your husband leave preaching? If he will do so, then send for him."

"He dares not leave preaching as long as he can speak."

Twisdon threw back his head in disgust. "See here, what should we talk any more about such a fellow? He is a breaker of the peace."

"He desires to live peaceably," Elizabeth insisted, "and follow his calling to support his family. Moreover my Lord, I have four small children that cannot help themselves and one of them is blind. We have nothing to live on but the charity of good people."

But Judge Twisdon scoffed. "You make a show of your poverty."

"Why don’t you let him speak for himself," Elizabeth pleaded. "He preaches nothing but the Word of God."

"He? Preach the Word of God?" Judge Twisdon looked so angry, Elizabeth thought he might strike her. "His doctrine is the doctrine of the devil." Looking over toward Judge Hale he bellowed, "Send her away!"

"I am sorry, but I can’t do thee any good." Judge Hale took his cue from Twisdon. "Bring the statute book. Here, I’ll show you the three things thou canst do."

But a great despair swept over Elizabeth, caught in her throat and flooded her eyes with tears. She had failed. She strode from the room, trying to muffle her sobs.

Elizabeth didn’t visit John until the next day. "I have failed thee," she blurted as he came to meet her in the common room.

"No," said John, comforting her. "That is not what I heard. Those that were there said thou wast magnificent, that thou spokest like a different person, with passion and persuasion."

Elizabeth looked into his eyes through tears. "But I failed to convince them to release thee, Why would God give us this hope and then leave us with only failure?" She began to sob.

John took a handkerchief from his sleeve. "There, there my dear," he said as he wiped her eyes, "they’ve said no more about banishment or the gallows. We thought this was God’s way, but we cannot know His plans."

"But how will we survive the winter?" Elizabeth asked.

"I have news on that front," John said with renewed vigor. "I have met a man in here who knows how to make long tagged laces for boots. He will teach me. We can sell them to the hawkers. And who knows but God may provide another opportunity to appear before the courts. If He does," John went on, with a twinkle in his eye, "I will have no one speak for me but my shy wife."

A reluctant smile crept over Elizabeth’s face. Her performance in the courthouse yesterday had surprised no one more than herself. Surely the God who had heard her prayers and had given her the boldness of a different person would continue to hear her prayers through the coming winter, and spring and summer...

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John Bunyan was released from prison eleven years later, in September of 1672 but was jailed again for six months in 1675. During his time in prison he wrote many books, one of which was Pilgrim’s Progress. This fanciful allegory was an instant success when it was first published in 1678. By 1688 eleven English and five Dutch editions of the book had been printed. Today it has been translated into over 200 languages and dialects and is one of the most popular books ever written.

After his release from prison, John Bunyan continued working as a popular itinerant preacher and pastor. He died in 1688 at the age of 60. Elizabeth died about five years later.

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Some John Bunyan resources:

John Bunyan Museum - Bedford England.

John Bunyan Online

Acacia John Bunyan Online Library

Powerful Defender - Elizabeth Bunyan (Part 3)

• Read Part 1
• Read Part 2

Part 3

All the while Elizabeth made the preparations to go to London, her emotions swung between fear and excitement. What if she couldn’t think of what to say, or worse, said the wrong thing and made a total botch of it? On the other hand, this possible release for John just when things looked the worst, was a miracle. Surely God was in it.

Jack Bludgett accompanied her to London. The trip was long and tiring but after a good night’s sleep, she felt refreshed and optimistic. As their carriage maneuvered the crowded London streets, Elizabeth looked with amazement at the huge buildings and the swarms of people. She felt in her bag again for John’s laboriously composed and copied petition.

It wasn’t clear where they had to go. They tried one place, and were told to go to another. At that place, they were given directions to do their business in the House of Lords.

When they finally got there and Elizabeth entered the building with its echoing hallways, alive with uniformed officials and impersonal efficiency, she was awed. They were given directions to a hallway outside one of the chambers and told to wait their turn. She calmed her pounding heart by reminding herself how wonderful it would be to have John home again.

Finally a page opened the door and called, "Elizabeth Bunyan." She got up and followed him through massive doors, into a vast, high-ceilinged room. At one end sat a row of men wearing heavy white wigs. Beside them were other men, busy writing or looking at papers.

"Lord Barkwood, Elizabeth Bunyan,"the page said as they stopped before one of the wigged men.

He gave her a little nod, and she curtsied.

"And what is it thy matter?" he asked.

"I have this petition for my husband John Bunyan," she said, handing him John’s papers. "We have heard that many criminals are being released in honor of the king’s coronation. My husband wishes to apply for release."

He took the petition and looked through the pages, then back at her. "I must confer with my colleagues," he said. "Come back tomorrow morning for my answer. "

The next morning, after a long and restless night Elizabeth was back in the same room. She felt growing apprehension as she awaited the Lord Barkwood’s answer. It wasn’t long in coming. "We have discussed your husband’s petition," Lord Barkwood began. "We cannot release him."

Elizabeth’s head swam. John would not be coming home. But Lord Barkwood was saying more.

"We’ve committed such cases to the local judges. If you want to pursue this further, present his case at the midsummer assizes in Bedford.

All the way home she wondered, how would she break the news to John, and how would he react? However, when she did tell him, he was unabashed. "We’ll prepare our case for the next assizes in August then," he told her.

Immediately he got to work, revising and laboriously writing out several copies of his petition. "God is in this," he said, whenever she expressed concern. "Perhaps they’ll allow me to speak for myself."

Continued...