"O Brother Where Art Thou?"

The Interior Castle

The introduction to St. Teresa of Avila's The Interior Castle moved me to tears.

The Calling

written by Mirabai Starr

There is a secret place. A radient sanctuary. As real as your own kitchen. More real than that. Constructed of the purest elements. Overflowing with the ten thousand beautiful things. Worlds within worlds. Forest, rivers. Velvet coverlets thrown over featherbeds, fountains bubbling beneath a canopy of stars. Bountiful forests, universal libraries. A wine cellar offering an intoxication so sweet you will never be sober again. A clarity so complete you will never again forget.

This magnificent refuge is inside you. Enter. Shatter the darkness that shrouds the doorway. Step around the poisonous vipers that slither at your feet, attempting to throw you off your course. Be bold. Be humble. Put away the incense and forget the incatations they taught you. Ask no permission from the authorities. Slip away. Close your eyes and follow your breath to the still place that leads to the invisible path that leads you home.

Listen. Softly, the One you love is calling. Listen. At first, you will only hear traces of his voice. Love letters he drops for you in hiding places. In the sounds of your baby laughing, in your boyfriend telling you a dream, in a book about loving-kindness, in the sun dipping down below the horizon and a peacock’s tail of purple and orange clouds unfolding behind it, in the namelss sorrow that fills your heart when you wake in the night and remember that the world had gone to war and you are powerless to break up the fight. Let the idle chatter between friends drop down to what matters. Listen. Later his voice will come closer. A whisper you’re almost sure is meant for you fading in and out of the cacophony of thoughts, clearer in the silent space between them. Listen. His call is flute music, far away. Coming closer.

Be brave and walk through the country of your own wild heart. Be gentle and know that you know nothing. Be mindful and remember that every moment can be a prayer. Melting butter, scrambling eggs, lifting fork to mouth, praising God. Losing you temper and your dignity with someone you love, praising God. Balancing ecstasy with clear thinking, self-control with self-abandon. Be still. Listen. Keep walking.

What a spectacular kingdom you have entered! Befriending the guards and taming the lions at the gates. Sliding through a crack in the doorway on your prayer rug. Crossing the moat between this world and that, walking on water if you have to, because this is your rightful place. That is your Beloved reclining in the innermost chamber, waiting for you, offering wine from a bottle with your crest on the lable. Explore. Rest if you have to, but don’t go to sleep. Head straight for his arms.

And when you have dismissed the serpents of vanity and greed, conquered the lizards of self-importance, and lulled the monkey mind to sleep, your steps will be lighter. When you have given up everything to make a friend a cup of tea and tend her broken heart, stood up against the violation of innocent children and their fathers and mothers, made conscious choices to live simply and honor the earth, your steps will be lighter. When you have grown still on purpose while everything around you is asking for chaos, you will find the doors between every room of this interior castle thrown open, the path of home to your true love unobstructed after all.

No one else controls access to this perfect place. Give yourself you own unconditional permission to go there. Absolve yourself of missing the mark again and again. Believe in the incredible truth that the Beloved has chosen for his dwelling place the core of your own being because that is the single most beautiful place in all of creation. Waste no time. Enter the centre of your soul.

this is my home

A great article that was recommended by Gideon Strauss.

Hamilton's dead. Or is it?

snapshots

build

There is a legendary story of a rich man who visited a cathedral while it was being built and he saw a workman carving a tiny bird on the inside of the beam. He was puzzled and asked the man, "Why are you spending so much time carving that bird into a beam that will be covered by the roof? No one will ever see it."

And the workman replied, "Because he sees."

marshmellow

This seems like a type of torture technique for kids.

A Conversation with Eugene Peterson

In the new earth I hope to sit down with Eugene Peterson and spend a good amount of time just listening to him. I read an article titled 'A Conversation with Eugene Peterson' from Image this afternoon and was moved by his insights on embodying the gospel. I especially love that he has a deep appreciation for literature!

Also, Angela told me that Bono once asked Eugene Peterson to meet with him, but Peterson turned him down because he was writing. My fascination with him rose and now is overflowing into this blog.

Here is an excerpt from the conversation:

Image: What poets do you read and benefit from? What theologians?

EP: Auden has meant a lot to me. I learned more about prosody from Auden than anyone else. Some of his poems seem to me so probing of the human condition and the culture in which we live. He was very much aware of the nature of the culture, and had a clear sense of how the gospel and redemption work in it.

At one point in my life T.S. Eliot was the poet who was most important to me. The contrast between The Waste Land and Four Quartets sees to me such a stark illustration of what happens when a sharply attentive non-Christian mind becomes a sharply attentive Christian mind. As a pastor, it's easy to find out what's wrong with the world and condemn it and preach into it. It's a very different thing to look at that same world and pray it. That's what I wanted to do, and Eliot was primary in my learning how. I'll always be grateful to him for that.

The two writers who've most influenced the way I use language and the way I developed vocationally as a pastor are Teresa of Avila and John of the Cross. Theologically I was brought up on Calvin and Luther and later on Barth. They're all magnificant theologians, and not without imagination. They care about words, but I think of them as mountain climbers. They go to the heights. They see the whole thing. But five or ten years into being a pastor, I was introduced by a friend to Teresa of Avila and John of the Cross. They are theologians of a very different kind. I think of them as theologians of the valley, where people live. Tersa is a storyteller. Everything she wrote is storied. John is a poet. Much of his writing is explication of his poetry, but all of it is rooted in the poetry, which has its basis in the Song of Songs. I realized that as a pastor I need Teresa and John right alongside Luther and Calvin and Barth. My job is not just announcing the truth of God; it's getting people into the country where the truth is lived. Teresa and John do that magnificentyly. While Luther and Calvin and Barth are proclaiming the truth from the mountain, Teresa and John are down in the valley plowing the fields, sowing the seeds, pulling the weeds. That's what pastors do. That's also what poets and novelists do. I couldn't live without the mountain climbers, but I couldn't do my work without the farmers.

little city farm

Yesterday, a co-worker of mine told me about a place that caused my heart smile. Last week, she went with her Mom to a Bed and Breakfast in Kitchener called Little City Farm. This is a home in a city that has a hens in their yard, no tv, shelves and shelves of books, a vegetable garden, freshly baked bread, strawbale walls, green rooftops, a friendly dog, and cozy rooms, all run by a young couple with a small baby.

Did this cause me to start dreaming about the possibilities of incorporating this into my future aspirations? Maybe, just maybe it did.

Here is some excerpts from their website:

"Many environmental visionaries have inspired us, and we are practicing ways to reduce consumption and incorporate natural cycles into every day living. Rather than setting up a rural homestead, we are exploring a sustainable lifestyle in the city and we hope to share this with our guests."

"To us, urban homesteading means a conscious choice to live more simply and within our means, while supporting endeavors that promote community & sustainability, and increase the livability of our city."

"As urban homesteaders we are learning to produce quality homemade goods that are necessary to meet our everyday needs. We grow much of our own food, recycle our greywater through a pond system, bake in an outdoor cob oven, incorporate solar power, eat a vegetarian diet, use bicycles or a shared co-op vehicle for errands, use a passive-solar greenhouse to produce fresh greens all winter long, support local artisans, and buy from farmers who we know by name."

"In the past, we have lived and worked on a variety of organic & biodynamic farms across Canada, and have developed a passion for growing our own food and living a life that is light on the earth. We also enjoy the vibrant community & car-free options the city life offers, and yet dream of a slower, self-reliant rurally based existence."

"You are cultivating peace at Little City Farm..." - Charlie, North Carolina

The Singer

Lately, this an aspect of the gospel that I am learning to cling to and the Spirit is teaching me to trust.

The Sermon on the Mount, from Matthew 6,9 and Luke 12, as told in The Jesus Storybook Bible (a highly reccomended resource for young families and all Christians alike).

Wherever Jesus went, lots of people went too. They loved being near him. Old people. Young people. All kinds of people came to see Jesus. Sick people. Well people. Happy people. Sad people. And worried people. Lots of them. Worrying about lots of things.
What if we don't have enough food? Or clothes? Or suppose we run out of money? What if there isn't enough? And everything goes wrong? And we won't be all right? What then?
When Jesus saw all the people, his heart was filled with love for them. They were like a little flock of sheep that didn't have a shepherd to take care of them. So Jesus sat them all down and he talked to them.
The people sat quietly on the grassy mountainside and listened. From where they sat, they could see th blue lake glittering below them and little fishing boats coming in from a night's catch. The spring air was fresh and clear.

"See those birds over there?" Jesus said.
Everybody looked. Little sparrows were pecking at seeds along the stony path.
"Where do they get there food? Perhaps they have pantries all stocked up? Cabinets of food?"
Everyone laughed - who's ever seen a bird with a bag of groceries?
"No," Jesus said. "They don't need to worry about that. Because God knows what they need and he feeds them."

"And what about these wild flowers?"
Everyone looked. All around them flowers were growing. Anemones, daises, pure white lilies.
"Where do they get their lovely colours? Do they make them? Or do they go to work every day so they can buy them? Do they have closests full of clothes?"
Everyone laughed again - who's ever seen a flower putting on a dress?
"No," Jesus said. "They don't need to worry about that because God clothes them in royal robes of splendor! Not even a king is that well dressed!"


They had never met a king but at they gazed out over the lake, glittering and sparkling below them, the hillsides dressed in reds, purples, and golds, they felt a great burden lift from their hearts. They could not imagine anything more beautiful.
"Little flock," Jesus said, "You are more important than birds! More important than flowers! The birds and the lowers didn't sit and worry about things. And God doesn't want his children to worry either. God loves to look after the birds and the flowers. And he loves to look after you, too."

Jesus knew that God would always love and watch over the world he had made - everything in it - birds, flowers, trees, animals, everything! And, most of all, his children.
Even though people had forgotten, the birds and the flowers hadn't forgotten, they still knew their song. It was the song all of God's creation had sung to him from the very beginning. It was the song people's hearts were made to sing: "God made us. He loves us. He is very pleased with us."
It was why Jesus had come into the world: to sing them that wonderful song; to sing it not only with his voice, but to make it his whole life - so that God's children could remember it and join in and sing it, too.

Austen and BBC

This is my favourite recipe when it comes to film.

3 cups of Jane Austen
1 cup of BBC

Enjoy on a chilly evening, wrapped up in an
aphgan, with tea and good company.

One day, I hope to be able to glace over at one of my nearby shelves to realise that I happen to own all 6 of the BBC productions of Jane Austen's novels. That will be a good day.

O Canada

a resounding resevoir

This is one of the most beautiful depictions of worship that I have encountered. It is from a Ravi Zacharias talk entitled, "Why Don't I Feel My Faith."

"I say to you that music comes into your life and builds a resevoir so that in the moments where you are down and the moments where you are dark inside, a song, a hymn, or a chorus, or whatever it is, will come back to lighten your path and lessen your load. There is a Reader's Digest article that says that when we are alone we dance. I don't know if that's true, but I do know that when we are alone we sing. I will tell you what, the great hymns, the great songs that you sing in the car, sing alone at home, or listen to by way of record or a tape, when the church gives us that gift, it gives us the sentiments that can lift us in darker moments. I saw this demonstrated. My father-in-law suffered a heart attack and we were living in the fear of not knowing if he was going to make it. We were in church that morning, while he was at home resting, battling this through, really emotionally struggling, and I was sitting in the balcony with my wife and our children and downstairs was my mother-in-law sitting next to her friends. I watched her through the whole service and she had a very sad countanence the whole time. The preacher was done, the testimonies were done, everything was done. Then the closing hymn began and the tears could not longer be repressed. This was the hymn that was sung, and the tears just flowed. It put it all together for her.

Be still, my soul; the Lord is on your side;
Bear patiently the cross of grief or pain;
Leave to your God to order and provide;
In every change he faithful will remain.
Be still, my soul; your best, your heavenly Friend
Through thorny ways leads to a joyful end.

Be still, my soul; the hour is hastening on
When we shall be forever with the Lord,
When disappointment, grief, and fear are gone,
Sorrow forgot, love’s purest joys restored.
Be still, my soul; when change and tears are past,
All safe and blessed we shall meet at last.

I watched her cry and I thought that was good, it was therapeutic, everything had come together. The word of God to came to her. The language reminding herself of the truths, the language of friends seated around her, the language of obedience, a life that had served him over all these years, and now the language of the church as a song was ministering to her heart and lifted her above the dark lonliness and possible heartache around the corner."

feminism and food

This is an excerpt from the novel that I am currently reading, The Animal Vegetable Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver. It struck a chord so I am sharing it with you. Read and respond if you would like.

I understand that most US citizens don't have room in their lives to grow food or even see it growing. But I have trouble accepting the next step in our journey toward obligate symbiosis with the package meal and takeout. Cooking is a dying art in our culture. Why is a good question, and an uneasy one, because I find myself politically and socioeconomically entangled in the answer. I belong to a generation of women who took as our youthful rallying cry: Allow us a good education so we won't have to slave in the kitchen. We recoiled from the proposition that keeping a husband presentable and fed should be our highest intellectual aspiration. We fought for entry as equal partners into every quarter of the labor force. We went to school, sweated those exams, earned our professional stripes, and we beg therefore to be excused from manual labour. Or else our full time job is manual labor, we are carpenters or steelworkes, or we stand at a cash register all day. At the end of a shift we deserve to go home and put our feet up. Somehow, though, history came around and bit us in the backside: now most women have jobs and still find themselves largely in charge of the housework. Cooking at the end of a long day is a burden we could live without.

It's a reasonable position. But it got twisted into a pathological food culture. When my generation of women walked away from the kitchen we were escorted down that path by a profiteering industry that knew a tired, vunerable marketing taget when they saw it. "Hey, ladies," it said to us, "go ahead, get liberated. We'll take care of dinner." They threw open the door and we walked into a nutrtional crisis and genuinely toxic food supply. If you think toxic is an exaggeration, read the package directions for handling raw chicken from a CAFO. We came a long way, baby, into bad eating habits and collarterally impaired family dynamics. No matter what else we do or believe, food remains at the center of every culture. Ours now runs on empty calories.

When we traded homemaking for careers, we were implicity promised economic independance and worldly influence. But a devil of a bargain it has turned out to be in terms of daily life. We gave up the aroma of warm bread rising, the measured pace of nurturing routines, the creative task of molding our families' tastes and zest for life; we recieved in exchange the minivan and the Lunchable. (Or worse, convience-mart hot dogs and latchkey kids.) I consider it the great hoodwink of my generation (126-127).

amen.

Thank-you Lord for a Dad who demonstrates aspects of Your faithfullness and love.

international clothesline week

Do you remember as a kid seeing your mother hang the clothes on the clothesline and a few hours later helping her to take them down and smelling the freshness of each piece? Even in the winter you'd be pulling in frozen pieces of clothes that would stand on their own. Now most people ONLY use dryers ... lots of dryers!

Over 80% of our households have a clothes dryer drawing huge amounts of energy! If every household participated for even one day hanging their clothes to dry it would save us a huge amount of energy and a huge dollar savings. More importantly that translates into less charcoal pollutants and thus less health consequences associated with coal driven electricity. As a global community, if we could all hang our clothes to dry, it will mean healthier mentalities, healthier relationships and a healthier earth. And that's just one day; how about a week, a year, a lifetime?

sew darn frustrating

In a couple of days I will be taking the walk. No, it isn't down the isle, it's across the stage of graduation. 

If you ask me what I will wear, I would have responded with, "This glorious dress that I am making." 

Except tonight the bobbin broke and since my machine is made in the 1970's, I cannot replace the part, thus I can no longer go on. Am I upset? Slightly. 

how to eat maple seeds

1.   Harvest the seeds. They should be gathered when they're full but still green in the spring; run your hand

      down the branch to gather a bunch in your hands..  All maple seeds are good to eat, but some are more bitter than others (a good rule of thumb is: small and sweet, big and bitter). Later, when their shells are brown, they are a little more bitter, but still good.

2.   Hull the seeds. Peel off the outer skin (the "whirlygig" part). Cut the end with your thumbnail. Squeeze out the seed; it looks like a pea or bean.

3.   Rinse out the tannins. Taste a few seeds raw. If they are bitter, you'll need to boil them in water, dump out the water, and repeat until the bitterness is gone.

4.   Cook the seeds. If you boiled them already, just season with butter, salt, and pepper and enjoy. If they weren't boiled, here are a few more options:

o    Roasting - Place the seeds on a cookie sheet and sprinkle with salt. Bake in a 350 degree oven for 8 - 10 minutes.

    o   Drying - Put them in a dry, sunny spot or in a food dehydrator until they are crunchy. They can then be pounded or ground into a flour, if you want.     

          

imagine: dots in blue water

just listen.

http://www.npr.org/templates/dmg/dmg.php?prgCode=ME&showDate=06-Jan-2005&segNum=18&NPRMediaPref=WM

too far to face

If I go too far, call me on it, or if I don't go far enough (Matt), call me on it.

Last week Thursday was the last time I clicked on the Home page of Facebook, browsed other's photos, easdropped on conversations, and contemplated the next image I would use to convey myself to my community of friends. Has it only been a couple of days since I deactivated my account? It seems like much longer. Have you missed me? Have I missed you?

I would love to sit here and pronounce that I am experiencing freedom. Instead, I admit that I do miss you (or is it that I miss knowing what you are doing and saying, who you are interacting with and where). I actually have to talk to you - darn.

Facebook has gone too far. It has taken on the responsibility of upholding relationships.  

Please come back and let's interact in a similar, but simpler way. A creational way?

psalm 104

"This is mine", says the Lord.
"Take it, live it, sing it, and care for it."
"You are mine," says the Lord.
"Remember I am God."

I am Everything
The beginning, the end, the first, the last.
Yet, I am missing.
I fill the space, I breathe the wind, I speak the fire
And I sparked.

I am ever Dwelling,
In prescence and in spirit.
Yet, I roam.
I lay down, I build up, I set forward
And I placed.

I am ever With
Never without, never in need.
Yet, I desire.
I form you, I love you, I trust you
And I cried.

"This is mine," says the Lord.
"Take it, live it, sing it, and care for it."
"You are mine," says the Lord.
"Remember I am God."