Obscurity's Falsehood: Delving into a bit of Theology for Thursday

"On the topic of obscurity and a life mostly unnoticed: most of the physical universe is almost completely obscure to us. Or for a different audience. Perhaps that is the point."

So said my beloved Uncle as he considered what I attempted in verse on the question.

And this gives cause for praise, for worship, for jubilance. Most of the life of every person is lived in relative obscurity. Most of the life of one's own mind is only partly known to him, less known to others, not at all known to most. We are obscure to our own selves.

It is curious why we want to be known, even be famous. Something about it is ingrained but I cannot trace it out to the root. We just do think - some more than others, no doubt -- that being known is good and being known on a grand scale is all the better. And because that is a fixed good, to be obscure is a fixed bad.

And yet obscurity is the lot of most persons in all of time.

This innate desire to be known is partly solved in small communities. A mother is the most important thing in the infants' world. That's fame, but the sampling size is rather small. Depth over breadth? To be sure, but most mothers still feel obscure.

But my Uncle's comment suggested something else, something like this: if we live for God in all we do we have an audience of the grandest possible scale. Nothing is obscure if done for God, for He sees all, knows the motive, loves the person for their own sake, joins in the song of glad creation that was the original genesis of every action and word.

A happy corollary is the reminder of nearly infinite bits of nature never seen by human eye. Sea-life at 20,000 feet expresses the sheer delight of their Creator and He is the only One who will ever see them. Obscure? Not at all. God Almighty delights in them.

Everyone throughout time, with extremely rare exceptions, has toiled in obscurity, their work unnoticed by all except those closest. Even if their work benefited a great many people, most never knew nor cared.

But my Uncle's point is that nothing is obscure because everything is seen by God and He is the greatest possible audience. We could put it this way, echoing Jesus. 

    You have two options:

• Live for this world and you get this world's reward. You will be scarcely known, all your work will be done for the here and now, and you will die.
• Live for God and you will get His reward. He will know you, all you do will be done for Him, and you will live for all eternity.

I think this is the key problem with what we call "worldliness." It is a basic orientation to this present world as our comprehensive value system. And when oriented solely to this world we get only what this world can offer. But when we invest our life with God and for His pleasure, we get all that He is. A dying world vs. an eternal God: the contrast presents a simple choice.

God offers more. I pray for the grace to walk His way and someday enter His eternal Rest.

What Makes Words Matter? [100WW]

This should be one hundred words worth reading, not just writer's diversion. Words should both stir and evoke thought. We prefer stir over thought and call it escape, like a thriller. There is thrill in thought, too, and good writers draw it out. The best writers do this with native skill but surely it's also learned. Wendell Berry's essays thrill with excellence. A book of concepts conveyed by a master, like Polanyi's Personal Knowledge, brings thrill along the spectrum: precision, deep understanding, accessibility, meaning. A novel like Brothers Karamazov mixes thrill with thinking such that you get both or nothing.

"Don't refer to yourself!" The Psalmist ignored the memo. Should we? [10"Tu]

I have loved inductive Bible study since it was ingrained in me via so many assignments in Seminary. And then I had the privilege of trying to teach it. It starts – and ends, one could say – with observation. As Dr. Oswalt used to say, "You can't really know what is there until you know what is there." Huh?! It is true. We readily jump to conclusions without due observation, which I am likely going to do in a moment.

I only have 10 minutes – less now. But I want to look at my Psalm for today, 116. What rises to the surface?

• Lots of first person. About 35 1^st person pronouns (2-3 are understood). This is over 10 percent of the words. So much for avoiding reference to oneself!

Well, time's a wasting as it often was as I punched out assignments before class. So I will take this one observation of continuing use of 1^st person.

• It is repeated. 

• It is pointed toward God: “Truly I am Thy servant.”

• It plainly reveals the self: “I said in my haste.”

• It makes promises: “I will pay my vows.”

The person is involved in relationship. I think we knew this. There is an “I”, a “me.” When we approach God it is ok to be personal. Very personal.

Perhaps keep it to oneself? David didn't. I'm gonna try to follow his example.

Thy Will be Done

To write an essay is to push a rope. To bring someone else along on the ride is another tier entire. But the pushing the rope can be easy enough. You say something – anything – and you see what else comes to mind.

Musing on such a matter brings to mind the question of ideas, specifically, “Where do they come from?” Or perhaps proper grammar will better serve the query: “From whence do ideas come?”

One of my best friends once challenged me with a similar question about desire. “Where do we get our desires?” he asked. I did not know how to answer. He suggested if God is Sovereign then all our desires come from God. He directs every detail of our lives and does so, in part, by moving us into His will by way of our desires. I did not, nor do I now, have a very good answer, for this is in the very heart of free will vs. Sovereignty.

Perhaps an example will help – help me at least. Of a sudden I am tired of writing. Why don't I quit? Because I would like to finish though no one says I must. Why do I want to quit? Because I lack inspiration, because I am writing with little point, because I feel weary and there are easier things that beckon. Our motivations are all over the map but they are usually self-serving. Does God really cause all we do down to the very nitty gritty?​ I have never thought so because I imagined I had free will, that I could choose to disobey or obey and such choosing gave my actions true agency and thus true accountability.

So surely this same applies to ideas, for they are very close to desires, free will, and the will of God. As is my wont I will side-step this a bit and go to a truth I have found helpful. I have learned to pray “Thy will be done” and to believe He is working it out in spite of me and, yes, sometimes by way of me. This answers the problem in measure because I am asking for God's will, I am leaning on Him, and I believe He in turn is giving me the ideas and desires that will accomplish His will. And His will is always good. Nothing better!

This keeps personal agency and real personal choice intact while bringing the 'agency' of God into the picture in a real, tangible, relational way. He doesn't force but he persuades and uses a compendium of circumstances at His disposal to bring about the Good.

As Solzhenitsyn said, “He will see that all the ways of Goodness are not stopped.”

Where do ideas and desires come from? From within, from our innate self-serving bent, from our training, from a variety of motivations we can scarcely anticipate, understand, or control. And from God.

But especially from God when we pray as Jesus taught us: “May Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” I'm learning to pray this all the time, and I commend it to you as well.

Neither politics, nor religion...

"Neither politics, nor religion," goes the line,

should you discuss else decorum and some such

you violate and good sense you afront.

"What else would one talk about?" one mutters, glancing

to be sure none within hearing take offense

nor none could possibly think it too blunt.

"Politics is poor man's church," someone fairly said,

knowing not nor caring what offense some take

when to one gender one refers for ease.

"Poverty of soul is what we mean," then we say,

and steal for solace to our well-worn comfort

where self is all that matters, if you please.

Land and Life and Longing: 1

 Living in Alaska gives cause for frequent flights to see family. We fly more in one average year than any five year period when we lived in the lower 48. I am grateful for the marvel of modern air travel. The musing below arose as I flew over some of the beloved hinterlands of my childhood.

I watch the land below, 6 miles below. I wonder at the miracle that puts me so high above the land with strangers in a long tin can, motors that push a steel tub with wings for thousands of miles through the sky. I look out the window and see roads and towns and wind-swept snow, terrain and trees in some midwestern state. There is yearning I can feel and know but I do not know why. The meaning of the land is its own thing – it does not need to be worked by people. The very is-ness of it makes it a thing and a thing is good, says God, and I think I would agree even if He had not said it. Of course I could not agree if I myself were not a thing and had resonance, as we say, with the other things since we are both made by the same Someone. And however we were made, whoever did it should have a capitalized name at the very least, and should be taken seriously.

Those who think we came to be through process could of course be right about what they call evolution, though I do not think so. But they can't be right about the beginning because how did this is-ness come to be? Can something come from nothing? What was there before the big bang, and how did it get there?

So I see the huge lake below me and imagine it may well be that big lake near Pierre, South Dakota, except I cannot make out the highways that are supposed to be near it. I remember visiting that lake with my dear wife and two beloved boys nearly 15 years ago now when the boys were 13 and nearly 9. Such sweet days, happy beyond wonder though we did not know it then. It seems I was always too busy, mind occupied, loving and working and caring and talking, but too much going on inside, unable to know and be in all the other-worldy is-ness that comes from the land, and things, and people.

By things, of course, I do not mean widgets – trinkets and toys and all. And yet, all things have meaning because they too have a creator and they get meaning from that, not least because it is the reason they exist. So I see the vast February snow plains below me and I think I know why it gives me longing. The mass of land is more than one can ever see when on it, much like that Tolstoy story where we are reminded all a man needs is enough land in which to be buried. But the aggregate, much like the aggregate of stars, reminds my soul of what is. This world is. It has a maker, and its meaning is real because He is real and personal and there. Whence else the yearning? Random feeling, a hiccup of consciousness? So now we are really in deep, for whence consciousness? Some science folk imagine they will explain it materially. Good luck with that. It is beyond the material, just as thinking is more than brain and mind more than matter.

I see the contour of the land and wonder why I want to write of it. I think I know. It speaks, a quiet voice. Much of it has never known human touch, vegetation and weather for days and centuries unending, a delight of wonder, self-preserving, re-creating, beauty of its own, life and death through seasons, wonder worthy of the best pen and simplest thought. Wonder enough to pain the soul.

Maybe we are not meant to see it in such aggregate, for no generation ever for millennia saw any thing this vast except – well, except for the sky which of course is vast beyond anything we can see here.

So why does the sight of plains and gullies for hundreds of miles bring such awe and a yearning beyond grasp? What of it? What must the heaven's mean? Nothing? Does their vastness and apparent emptiness and darkness speak nothing? What can it mean? I know not. I only believe that something created both me and it, and the fact our land can be trod by we bipeds gives it a special trueness.

I see the roads carve, straight and curved, houses now and then, a town here. Likely South Dakota, or southern North Dakota, farmlands of Iowa coming soon, too far north for my beloved Kansas. We have managed the earth and it in turn manages us. We were meant to receive it and care for it, know it and love it for the life it makes possible, worship the One who made it for what else could one do with such a Being. Made any worlds lately? Me neither. I'm glad for the one I've been given and if those brilliant brothers of mine gave us a machine that means I see vast pieces of land all at once, then I can't but learn from it, wonder if it is good, accept it all the same, be broken by the yearning, seek the good that must be in and behind it all, for this cannot come from evil. Awe is all I have, and pain for the longing.

And now I see the app that tells me where we are and I know we are over Nebraska by the Iowa border. I see sections of land bordered by roads stretching for miles on end. I see at least one homestead on each section, sometimes two. It is not obvious they are farms because most are not developed that I can tell. Easy to assume they were once homes for families who worked the land but I know that is not the case now as it was 80 years ago.

I remember the farm of my boyhood. Grandpa's farm, 80 acres with 2 ponds plus a watering hole. A long stone fence on the west edge, small alfalfa field on the NE corner. Old barn, a few cattle, chickens, beloved home and beloved people. He worked in town as a carpenter to make a living and did the chores when the boys needed to study, though of course they did their share. The other farm I knew was the Pucket farm near Ulysses, Kansas. Dale Pucket and his brother owned it together and in later years one son farmed it with Dale and now it is running down. In the day it had a nice home, good large barn, much livestock in cattle, pigs, sheep, a loving and diligent master with sons, a dutiful wife who cared for all with love and discipline.

My first job was there, helping to cut sheep and pigs. Cutting meant castration and it was quite a thing for a 12 – 13 year-old boy. I remember my very first day helping set fence posts. They were good to give me work and Danny, the eldest son, was trying to get me on track with God and with life. I am forever thankful. I would ride the bus after school and they would drop me off, then Mom would come get me or Danny take me home, about 8 miles I suppose.

to be continued – or not

[Natural] Theology Thursday takes a look at Tinker Creek's Pilgrim

I am reading Pilgrim at Tinker Creek for the first time. If this is new to you, as it was to me until about 10 years ago, it is a sort of natural theology written by Annie Dillard and published in 1974. The next year it won the Pulitzer Prize for general non-fiction and has been a celebrated title ever since.

Dillard is considered a modern-day Thoreau. I first ran across her when reading the late Eugene Peterson of The Message fame. His sharing of Dillard's work evoked wonder, and I've been interested since then.

The pique increased when I learned Annie had written the book in the very neighborhood where we lived for 5 years. The Tinker Creek of which she writes ran along our back property line. We mowed many yards for neighbors whose property bordered the creek and I passed her ex-husband's house many times, unknowing.

So you may imagine my interest when in the first chapter she describes the location of her house in relation to the Creek. I pulled up a map to take a look and discovered she apparently lived across the creek from where we used to mow. I could see the island of which she spoke and saw a nearby home where I once trimmed trees for an elderly couple after a storm. The house where Annie's first husband lived at his death last year is in a spot which would not align itself with her description so I assume 50 years ago they lived a few houses away. Of course, directions can be strange, but that's the best reckoning I can make of it.

But it doesn't matter a whole lot. The creek is there, as is the island. I am finding her account to be a very good read, the work of a young, hard-working writer with a great deal of gift. I look forward to reading it over the next couple of weeks.

Takeaway from today? She has a good grasp of various allusions in literature and elsewhere and uses them well. I especially like one Einstein line: “nature conceals her mystery by means of her essential grandeur, not by her cunning.” This reminds me of a comment on beauty I heard earlier today to the effect we recognize beauty unawares and its power shapes us and sways us to love the good. The grandeur of nature participates in the mystery, is the mystery and it draws us in, unwitting.

I hope to write perhaps a two-part essay about the book on the occasion of the 50^th anniversary of its publishing, March 13. We'll see how it goes. I may share a few reflections here.

A winter view of Tinker Creek.

The Price of Victory

[100WW]

Moses was a man of stellar training, of manual labor, of long waiting. He lead his people from bondage to freedom...and straight into the desert, a place he knew well. Deliverance is only step one. There is more to follow before the prize. Always more. “Beware cheaply-gained victories.” Before the promised land came the desert with its delays and disasters and dilemmas. In time they saw the promised land, learned it required a fight, and most of them chickened out. And “out” they were. Those who dared to believe and persevere gained the prize. Those who lacked faith never entered.

One Wonders [TMT]

"One wonders" is a suitable way to begin any musing I reckon. Certainly it is an apt title. And as 10 Minute Tuesday is designed for free writing, wondering and wandering are a perfect fit.

I wonder often because life is full of wonder! Of course I used the word in two senses there, or at least as a verb and as a noun. But in free writing you are not supposed to stop and think too much, which is a welcome requirement to this genetic over-thinker. It is often best to just say it, as I recently read of some noted author. Of course the critic who respectfully quoted him also said he suffered for that habit.

This brings to mind C. S. Lewis and G. K. Chesterton. Chesterton influenced Lewis toward his conversion. Lewis admired GKC but also said his writing style needed help here and there. I think I read him saying something to the effect Lewis felt if Chesterton had submitted to some refining he would have a much wider readership. I can imagine that to be the case.

I'm told Chesterton would prepare for a given project until he thought he was ready, then lay his material aside and begin dictating to his secretary. I would assume many of the hundreds of essays he wrote were dictated with little forethought and perhaps less editing. For awhile he was writing weekly for both major London papers and while he was always good enough for the press, no one writes a masterpiece every time.

Among his triumphs was his bio of Aquinas. A prominent Thomist scholar, Etienne Gilson, said of Chesterton's work it had no parallel and he himself could never have written so well of Aquinas. Of course he was known for various historical errors in his biographical work. But he was no historian nor scholar. Rather, he wrote for understanding and insight -- to help the average person gain a grasp of the value of a life and work. The details mattered, but not enough for his purpose.

A Friend Losing His Way

A friend is loosing his way. What can I do for one whose broken past revisits, embracing in his own life that which he despised in younger days, dreaming he can really make it right, bearing the weight of parent’s sin, picking it up again? What can I do?

Can reason help? It is barren, and so seems prayer. Slippery slopes are theory; but when one is sliding, nearly out of reach — what to do?

Does God care? He is the Father of the great parable, receiving the broken child with longing and gladness. But must my friend eat the rind again, knowing double its bitterness, creating anew that which pained him so much at the hand of others?

Must the 'shade of God's hand,' the driving beat of His loving pursuit, find him tasting more the dust of death?

As said Oswald Chambers, sometimes God has to ruin us in order to save us.

Must my friend be ruined? I do not want it; my heart breaks for it. Enough with brokenness — let my friend live and be whole!

I pray to the One who pulled me from the pit. I ask Him to do the same for my friend. May he rest, at long last, in the Love that will not let him go.

Making Good from Evil

The prayer of Solzhentisyn, reflecting on his many years in the gulag for political crimes:

Bless you prison, bless you for being in my life. For there, lying upon the rotting prison straw, I came to realize that the object of life is not prosperity as we are made to believe, but the maturity of the human soul.

Alexander Solzhenitsyn as a
young man in prison.

Darkened Glass No More

“Toiled in obscurity,” we say,
The gifted soul with voice beyond herself
Consigned to never known.

Or some such.

“The joys come later on,” we say,
Never knowing all we say, and yet all
at once too little, too much.

We know not.

“Our God sees everything,” we say.
Obscurity is an unmeaning fraud,
Masquerades as great loss.

Life libel.

“The work is all the thing,” we say
Meaning love, for what else fills all things and
makes them ever last?

Love is all.

“The toil, the joy is God,” we'll say
When faith and hope absolve the darkened glass
And love makes real, time gone.

A Hint of Sabbath on Friday

With Sabbath we discover what the rest of the days are for

Fridays are for fun, we barely know,
for time runs on, no punctuation, less meaning;
like water in a pitcher running out, same and going,
never stopping, no rhythm, no rhyme.
Stopping on a Friday is good, just for the stopping.
But why?

The departed Frenchmen remade time, or thought to;
as if commodity to be shaped, amorphous weeks, no nature.
Of course, "Why weeks?" one asked, with normal daring 
of human adventure. "What's always been is none the better for that,
nor more true."

Or as the Aussie said, of note: "The tenacity of ideas speaks
nothing to their worthiness." Though with the noted Brit I say but nay, 
the epochal customs are "democracy of the dead," 
the spoken silence that governs our every thought and action.

We have no thoughts of our own nor can we re-make the world.
And time -- the very rhythm of life -- is at home in that world.
And so should we be, allowing a break, if only at home, if only in our soul,
if only once a week.

To think, the gift of Sabbath, if offered and received, makes one seventh of a life
for leisure, for knowing what matters most, for play, for family, for a break.
With Sabbath we discover what the rest of the days are for, 
and we know time does not run on forever, nor does it own us.
Rather, on Sabbath, we learn to own it; and that is the best gift of all.

[Frenchmen: in their revolution they tried to reconstruct the week; 

Aussie: Tim Minchin's song, White Wine in the Sun (paraphrased);

Brit: the inimitable GKC]

Jacob: Knowing and Being Known

I have found the story of Jacob so very meaningful, layers of discovery and help and inspiration. I thought I would share this musing fortheloveofit.

Years ago I received a small gift book entitled “Find Yourself, Give Yourself.” I am sure it had solid grounding in Scripture and experience, helping folks be at peace with who God made them to be and offering that person to others in the economy of life. Well and good and right, as far as it goes which, in truth, may be far enough. But it came to mind today as I reflected on the path of life and the oft-heard expression, “I need to find myself.” Nothing is more true to the human experience I suppose. The trials of life are nothing if not a revealing of the person, and they reveal something else about us: we do not want to be revealed.

This is normal privacy, to be sure. Who wants their secret sins to be known, their strivings and failings, their fumbled endeavors? Though common to the human lot, they are shameful and hard to reckon with. Studying one's self easily descends into painful subjectivity: no mooring, no point of reference, no grounding. Truth is, the only way we gain any traction in “finding ourselves” is with God, and He is the One doing the finding.

This bears out in all of our stories but perhaps none better than the gift we receive in the biblical stories, especially that of Jacob. One tends to think Bible characters are perfect, cast in marble. And so we sometimes contort the story to fit some ideal. But in contrast to the the ideal, we get reality, and this makes the Old Testament so right and good and necessary. There is no sugar- coating. God reveals who we are in ways plain and bracing.

Jacob was a mess, caught in a mess, and he lived out the mess. Who plays favorites with their kids? Who concocts schemes to fool her husband with the favored child? Who connives to steal the most important gift in the family? We see this messed up home as it is: uncovered, uncensored, real. God reveals it to the world, for our learning, for our help, for our possible peace, for our own walk in life and effort to come to grips with who we are.

Not all homes are this way, thanks be to God. Many are beautiful and solid, the messes dealt with in purity and godliness that is real and touched everywhere by the self-giving God of grace and truth. And yet none can escape the necessary revealing that comes when we walk with God, and there is a mess to be reckoned with in all of our lives.

All this Jacob discovered as he ran from his troubles. At Bethel he had a dream, God revealing, drawing close, drawing Jacob closer. For his part Jacob simply was, very little filter. That is grace when it happens, and Jacob needed that grace. In the presence of God he was embarrassingly unaware of his hubris: “Well, Lord” he said, in my summary paraphrase of the scene in Genesis 28, “I am glad for your offer of blessing and so if you will keep your side of the bargain, I will keep mine.”
Jacob the deceiver makes a promise to God and one wonders if the heavens crashed with a cosmic laugh. Jacob was getting way more than he bargained for. He didn't really know himself, but God knew him and the game was on. Jacob thought he was on his own adventure, glad God joined in for the ride. But it was God's ride, and His purposes would prevail.

Jacob's story is rich in reality. Falling in love, bargaining for a wife and a life, receiving life's comeuppance as deception takes its revenge, bargaining again, working harder than he ever intended, running when it was finally right, wed into a concocted family of eye-crossing difficulty: two wives, two mistresses, many children. The family mess had compounded and Jacob's world was filled to the brim with it.

Looming in the background, of course, is his aggrieved brother, Esau, the one twice cheated by twin brother and mother. Some suggest even his father was in on it, knowing something was amiss but playing along anyway. This reveals the tragedy that tinges all of life, often spilling out in devastating ways. But Another was in the background, larger than all. God's promise to Abraham meant He would never stop His pursuit, always hold His part of the bargain, do whatever required to reveal, walk with, redeem.

And so we see Jacob coming to the reckoning, the pivotal point, the famous wrestling match at Peniel. God was discovering him, showing who he was, giving him a new name, a new promise, a new character. This is the path of God. Our eyes are opened, even in the wrestling match, and there is a blazing presence, a spoken word, a touch that both wounds and heals. “I will not let you go until you bless me.” I think God loved Jacob's determination, was in fact drawing it out, making it holy when in the past it had been all self-serving. It's as if God were saying, “I see how determined you are and I see we are never going to finish by daylight. I will end this – I will heal you, change you, give you a limp, give you a new name.”

The next day Jacob knew he was known by God and he went in that peace. He went from reluctant leader and background conniver to one who laid his life out for his family no matter the cost. He walked into a miracle of grace when Esau forgave all and dared to love the one who had so hurt him. In time Jacob became the father of the redeemer of the known world when his son Joseph saved Egypt and the surrounding nations from famine. And he is known today as a patriarch, a father of the faithful, a life in which God showed what can be done with a life born in a mess.
I believe the story of Jacob is our own. God reveals us to ourselves when we can handle it, through pain and real life, in ways we often cannot imagine are the hand of God. But he does it all the same, relentless in his love and redeeming work. And in time we know all we have to offer is we ourselves and that is, after all, all He asks. As Annie Dillard put it, “Jesus washed their very feet and toes and in so doing said, 'It is alright after all to be human.'”

In God's way and time He makes us what He wants us to be. Grace in a moment making possible? Indeed, surely that is right. Grace over time, revealing, shaping, molding, bringing many sons and daughters to glory (Hebrews 2:10)? Yes! In that very text the example of our Lord is given as one who Himself was shaped through suffering. 

"Find yourself?" Maybe, but never on the path or with the result we might think. It is God who knows us, works with us, cares more than we ever comprehend. Today, again, let go, love Him for the wrestling, know He knows you, feel his wounding and healing touch, and rise to walk with Him in the re-making of your life.

No Boundaries, Chorus Style [100wordwednesday]

"There are no boundaries, no limits, to what God can do, through me and through you; if we'll just ask Him and believe that He is able to do -- and it's according to the power that's working in you."

Is this beloved chorus true? If so, how does it play out? “Greater things than I do, ye shall do,” Jesus said. The power “working in us” would be faith, the confidence that God is able. This confidence is well-placed. What does God want for me? “As your faith, so be it unto you.”

This is the crux. Steady on.

Alaska Light, and Lack Of [10minutetuesday]

The Alaska darkness is a life-shaping thing. It comes with fall, and finds a heavy place by the winter solstice, right before Christmas. At that point, Prudhoe Bay has not seen the sun above horizon for four weeks. Here in North Pole even the shortest day sees the sun for about three hours. But it is low on the horizon and never rises above about 8 degrees. Low.

By contrast the summer sun is high and almost never goes away. In early May I can walk outside at 1 AM and something like dim twilight will greet me. By the summer solstice, June 21st, the sun dips below the horizon for only about three hours. It never seems dark and we will not see true darkness again until mid-August.

So it is more true to say we are shaped by the light or lack of. Winter brings slowness, welcomed after the long summer days. And summer brings activity that never stops, also welcome after being shut in for so long by snow and cold and dark.

Wisdom would call us to welcome the shaping of nature's ways, rather than chafe.

Low sun on a winter day in AK.

Faith over Fear

When I cry unto thee, then shall mine enemies turn back: 
this I know; for God is for me. (Psalm 56:9 )

This verse exhibits such confidence. “This I know, for God is for me.”

Does the statement make it true? Is faith the agent that makes real? What evidence does he have for the claim?

This last question gets us on track. David makes these claims based on his experience with God. He has seen God deliver Him and He has learned God is faithful and good. He has seen God respond to his cry for help, and he has seen that God is supportive of his efforts. That is why he makes the claim. It is not mere hope that God will come through. Rather, it is recognition God has come through before and will do so again.

Yet, there is still the unknown. It is certainly possible God will not intervene the way David claims, or in the same time frame. Yet, David is confident. This confidence gives basis for action. Further, it lays an expectation on God. Does God respond to this kind of thing?

There is evidence He does, but I think the lesson is more basic. David dares to declare that God is with Him and he acts accordingly. If it winds up being presumption he is willing to take the fall. But he acts with confidence.

This confidence gave him basis for action. And it rested on faith in God. Faith is present in any action where certainty is not at play. Which is almost anything we do.

What I believe about God and how I am willing to act in light of His character enables a level of healthy confidence, and gives basis for faith over fear. And this is the way God wants us to live.

“Fear not! I am with thee. Be not dismayed, I am thy God!”

Poor Poems

I had posted a poem here. It was poor so I tossed it.

Poems are better read and heard than written and read. Or, more likely, some can be received in print and the meaning is clear. Others, not so much. 

Such was the poem I tossed.

Who dares to be a poet? Probably half the people that ever lived have tried their hand at it. A few were exceptional. A great many were quite good. And the rest of us fill out the spectrum.

I don't know what can be said of it. Certainly poems attempt to craft meaning in artful ways. That is, a poet shapes what matters in a way worthy of it.

I think it was Peter Kreeft who said a poet must be shaped before he can shape words and life and meaning. Quoting some classical rendering (I believe) he spoke of poets who suffer in ways that shape their mouth such that when they speak the music is like none other. It eludes reason's feint and captures the heart.

It seems to me, though, the effect is most for the poet: in shaping life into syllables the poet discovers more of himself than he can possibly convey. And if the poetry is worthy, the listener knows he is looking into a mystery of knowing that the poet himself can barely grasp. In poetry there are hints and clues though it is not enough to call them that.

Poetry tells the truth and you receive it without knowing. Like music and other art forms, poems render resistance helpless. A worthy poem helps the reader find where he is, where he belongs, what really matters.

I'd like to write good poetry. I've managed some that was, perhaps, average plus. And then I read published folk and wonder what I am saying. Yet, the simple truth of life that "faith seeks understanding" rises here. We write to help ourselves know and to make sense of what we dare to know. Poetry helps the journey, reveals the beauty, wonder, mystery. Keeps us grounded.

Even poor poetry will do that. But that doesn't mean I am going to let you read it!

Rumination on a Misunderstanding

Last year I all-but-unavoidably overheard the following conversation in a restaurant. It is paraphrased – I wasn't that rude. And I have made up the names. I had no idea who these people were and wasn't about to ask, though I was deeply touched. Here's my best memory of the conversation:

“Amy has been a good friend for over 20 years. Now she seems distant.” Monica's voice was thoughtful and concerned, almost tired. At a glance she looked to be late 30's, perhaps a Mom, and busy with life. She seemed not to care if anyone overheard. I was eating alone and listening was hard to avoid.

Her friend, whom I will call Dawn, replied: “Well, you ignored her when you were in town last fall.”

“Ignored her?!” Dawn looked up as Monica reacted. “I told her I had no free time and felt really bad about it!”

“Well, she called after you left and we chatted,” Dawn replied. “I told her you had visited Valdez with Vallery. She was silent and seemed hurt. I think she really needed to see you.”

“What do you mean I went to Valdez?! I did no such thing!” I glanced between bites and could see Monica had gone from thoughtful to slightly angry.

Dawn continued, “Well, you left the house early one day and said you'd have to spend the night at Valdez with Vallery. I thought nothing of it because we both had so much going on.”

Monica's voiced was pained and sharp. “Valdez?! I went to Vallery's to finish that tax project she was buried with! No way did I have time to go to Valdez!”

Dawn was silent before replying. “Sounds like I made a bad mistake. I must have heard “Vallery” and thought “Valdez” and then joined the two in my mind, thinking no further. I didn't mean to.” It seemed there were some tears and more silence. I didn't dare look.

“I think you need to make a phone call.” Monica was angry. I wondered how this would play out.

To my happy surprise Dawn replied quietly. “You are right. I made a passing comment and didn't even know it was wrong. Amy thinks you enjoyed Valdez but had no time to visit her. The simplest misunderstanding damaged a friendship.”

I pretended not to hear but knew this was a sacred moment, the kind that heals and makes whole if we let it.

Dawn's sincere regret softened Monica's reply. “Thank you, friend. I wondered if something was wrong but did not know what to do. Maybe we should go see her together.”

I continued eating with head down but treasured the truth in my heart. How often an unintentionally errant word can divide. It is for us to be both slow to speak, and slow to indignation when we suffer a perceived affront. Misunderstandings abound, the result of human frailties we all share in abundance. And when we find ourselves at fault, we need the grace of wisdom and action to bring healing and truth.

Monica and Dawn found the way through honest discussion and a desire to heal. I pray the lesson is not lost on this eaves-dropping friend.

[The above is a true account -- with apt fictionalizing -- of a near-miss with a friend. It describes what might have been, but was happily avoided.] 

Theology Thursday: Don't Miss this Short Poem

As we know Christ we come to a place where we trip over joy and never again look back, our heart and life forever His. 

Tripping Over Joy                                                                     
(Daniel Ladinsky Hafiz)

What is the difference between your experience
of existence and that of a saint?

The saint knows that the spiritual path
is a sublime chess game with God
and that the Beloved has just made such a fantastic move
that the saint is now continually tripping over joy
and bursting out in laughter and saying, “I Surrender!”

Whereas, my dear, I’m afraid you still think
You have a thousand serious moves.

- - - - - -

I will always love this poem. The wonder of finding God's provision all-encompassing compels a dance of glad surrender. What joy to find in some measure our very will and person and imagined effort subsumed in the great I Am. All we imagined we were is owed to Him, easily surrendered because provided and re-purchased by this Great Lover of our souls. 

As Francis Thompson has it "All which thy child’s mistake fancies as lost, I have stored for thee at home: rise, clasp My hand, and come!" We never gain more than when we lose everything for Christ.

The theology here has to do, I suppose, with monergism vs. synergism: the effort to understand the scope and weight of God's role in our salvation. This poem leans to monergism, but I do not think it means God flattens our will or our free participation. Rather it shows God as the master persuader, drawing us to Himself in ways irresistible.

Why do not all come to Him? Many reasons but I will offer only one I stumbled upon today, attributed to C. S Lewis: "An atheist does not look for God for the same reason a thief does not look for policemen." We all find ways to avoid God, this is true, for our God is a consuming fire. Yet, when our heart opens but a little, when we dare to lean in, we find in time -- in time -- our resistance is overcome and we succumb to the very life of God, whom to know is life eternal.

In sum, I love this poem because it reminds me what I desperately need to remember: "Nothing in my hands I bring, simply to Thy cross I cling." Christ is our Sabbath rest: in Him we are freed from reliance on our own effort. As we know Him we come to a place where we trip over joy and never again look back, our heart and life forever His.

Always Longing (100 Words Going Somewhere)

We want to define ourselves by the new, the clever, the attention-grabbing. Or perhaps I only speak for myself. That's embarrassing. And if it's true we want extra, different, more interesting. Why do we shy away from that realization? No doubt because we are reticent, but for reasons. I think we are reticent because the lack is too painful, the hope too sad.

But we still want the new, the wonder, the more. I think this is the longing of life. Somehow we know we are made, and made for more. Hence the endless search which only God can satisfy.

On Writing (again)

[ten minute tuesday]

I set the timer for 600 seconds and begin. Why such a thing? Why ask why?

This writing endeavor of the last month has been good on the whole. It does bring the question, "Why write?" Somewhere along the way I heard a bit of advice attributed to Mark Twain. "What is the best advice you have for an aspiring author?" the great man was supposedly asked.

"If you want to be a good writer, I have three simple words of advice," came the reply. "Write, write, and write."

This does not answer why  a person should write. I think the answers to that question are many. Fundamentally one will have a sense of calling, an inner drive to do it, to put words on paper, to express thoughts clearly. Second, I think one yearns for clarity. And while this is surely much the same as calling, it goes to the desire to learn the craft well because one wants to be read. And this goes to a third reason -- writers write in hopes of saying meaningful things so well that readers will read, thus rewarding their efforts. 

In sum I might say writers write because they feel an urge to do so, they love ideas and stories and want to express them well, and they want to be read.

As to the advice of Twain, I think volume, pursued diligently and thoughtfully for some years, will inevitably make one a better writer. No guarantees of great success on all metrics, but certainly better. And that's a worthy goal.

Meandering, for Real

Mondays are supposed to be for meander, and the first word that comes to mind when I hear "meander" is "river." Specifically, "Yukon River."

It is quite funny, I reckon, that I would say Yukon. I grew up in Kansas, over 3,000 miles from this iconic river of the North. The first river I remember is the Cimarron, a sometimes dry river bed -- completely dry near where we lived in Ulysses. The second is the Kansas River which runs near Manhattan, in North Central Kansas. We would cross the river often while visiting my Grandparents who lived on a farm a few miles from the river and the city. When he was a boy my Grandpa lived in a community so defined by that river it gained the name "Hunter's Island" though it was not actually an island. He told me of waking in the night during flood conditions and hearing huge sections of river bank plunging into the surging waters. And then there was the Republican River outside Clay Center where I lived as a High School boy. On this river I even once rafted with friends.

But compared to the mighty Yukon these were mere waterways, drainages, or memories thereof in the case of the Cimarron. I remember seeing markers for the Cimarron as a boy but it is likely I was seeing the North Fork of said river and I believe it was indeed completely dry. The Cimarron itself is all but 700 miles long. The Kansas and Republican together come to about 600 miles. The Yukon? Two thousand miles all by itself, and that doesn't include the length in Canada!

From it's entry to the state near Eagle to it's Bering Sea delta neat Alaknuk, the Yukon meanders, adding about 1300 miles of meander compared to a straight line distance from point to point. I've seen a great deal of switchback meander in Alaskan waterways, but the Yukon is so large it makes its own way without extreme meandering for hundreds of miles. Even then, 1300 miles extra is alot of movement!

And so I meander, observing passing thoughts while sitting among the ones that pertain, and I remember that my late, beloved Uncle George once floated canoe down the Yukon. I thought of him as I first observed the river from a school building in Nulato nearly 10 years ago. My guess is he took an air taxi to Eagle or perhaps Ft. Yukon and then floated/paddled his inflatable craft a few hundred miles down stream. What must he have seen? The huge night sky for sure, with scarce visible stars due to the midnight sun. He was alone with only mosquitoes, the current, and various wildlife for company. I'm told he had bear protection around his tent at night, but I forget the nature of it. I'll never get a first hand report as he has been gone for 17 years.

As I think of that trip and what it meant I wonder what life means and how we discover such meaning. Some say we create meaning. The canoe, the aloneness, the wildlife, the wonder and wander: it has no meaning of its own. Uncle George liked it: therefore, it meant something to him. 

What is the problem here? I wish I knew. It seems the issue is something like this: we are desperate for meaning. To say otherwise via various artifices is, I think, a way of avoiding the desperation. But if we ourselves determine meaning then meaning is hopelessly atomized. Divide the number of ears on the planet by 2 and you now have the total number of possible sets of meaning, each unique. But wait. Next you must add to that number the total number of people who ever lived before today.

This will not do and likely no serious philosopher argues for it. I believe meaning comes from something fixed outside of us. This is necessary if only because meaning that is self-generated, in addition to above objection, is unavoidably subjective. It will not bear the weight of our need. It produces values that, to quote Thane Ury, succumb to "self-referential incoherence." 

I believe true meaning is found only in a Creator God, and Augustine hints as much in his famous line: "God has made us for Himself and we never rest until we rest in Him."

That's my Monday Meander. I hope it gave you something meaningful to consider!

Learn to Listen, or Never Learn

How willing, unwitting, I stumble and fall
Into the sweet feels, the easy knowing:
“'Tis not true for me, can't be true for thee.”

Resigned, embarrassed smile, genuine friendly care.

Forgive me, if you will, so I can learn:
“What's true for thee can teach me (even me!).”
But I must listen, swallow the answer that cries to be heard. 

Alas, the human plight. 

"You Didn't 'Like' My Post!"

"Moral pronouncements are divisive by their very nature. Facebook makes such pronouncements oh so easy."

"You didn't like my post!"

I groaned when I read the comment. A friend had declared moral umbrage on some matter of public interest. His opinion was strong. For my part, I could see where he was coming from but wasn't interested in the appearance of grand-standing. It can seem -- Lord, forgive me -- like "praying in public." We all remember the admonition of Christ early in the Sermon on the Mount. He told the Pharisees their public prayers were displays of righteousness to impress the crowds. Alas, this sin crouches at every door, and especially at every social media login. Certainly mine.

But the fact I couldn't "like" my friend's offended posture caused him to be offended at me. I wondered how he knew I had even seen the post. In any case, he wanted to know why I didn't "like" the post.

There are some reasons, which I will try to express. I didn't press "like" because:

1. I didn't "like" it. Social media is a web of reciprocity layered over real life. It can stifle love and honesty and forbearance. Since when in real life do we insist on others liking what we say or think or do? Well, I suppose this does happen when someone doesn't like the baked good we brought or obviously doesn't share our opinion. But should we shun them for it, reduce their status to "unwashed" because they can't see the unbridled excellence of our cookies or our theory?
2. I didn't want to press "like" for how it might contradict my true feelings. I mean, I wanted to like it even though I didn't fully agree. But I didn't want to press "like" under duress, feeling I must offer caveat or some such. For who on earth has time for the endless rabbit hole of discussion necessary to achieve civil understanding in these kinds of social media disagreements? They never -- well, almost never -- are helpful. At least not for the overly-opinionated yours truly. And the more contentious and delicate, the less likely any light will shine. If you can't fully agree, stay away! [Ugh! What an unhealthy reality this is in so-called discourse, but that's a broader, related discussion.]
3. Compounding these problems, various esteemed friends enthusiastically commented on the post. I like my friends. I enjoy knowing them and hearing their thoughts. It does not make the friendship better for me to bely my true feelings just because a friend likes something I can't really "like."

I suppose it all comes down to an effort to be honest with self and others. And it points to the ditch most of us step in from time to time. Certainly I have. If someone doesn't care for what we think or do or say we are free to assume what that may mean, and we may be correct. But we have to let it go. If we get offended, the friendship suffers a blow. Knowing when or if to try to talk it through is another matter. 

So what did I do? Well, since this is a mental exercise and the question didn't actually happen, I wrote about the possibility.

Do you sometimes wonder why a friend didn't "like" you. I think most of us learn to navigate this with maturity. But friendship falls victim if we are not vigilant. Moral pronouncements are divisive by their very nature. Facebook makes such pronouncements oh so easy. I am making such a sort of pronouncement in this very commentary. How do I avoid the "praying in public" I suggested above, the open declaration of my own umbrage because I can do it so easily and readily? 

I do not know the answer. But I am going to love my friend and not take umbrage at him for holding an opinion I can't fully agree with. There's a start and it calls for heart-changing prayer. Without genuine love which only God makes possible, I'll never give him permission to hold opinions I find offensive. And I'll always worry why he can't "like" what I think.

More

Poetry more than a poem,
Artistry more than a form;
Senses that make good sense sane,
This is my wife, Lana Jane.

In celebrating my wife's birthday I remembered a Methodist minister who, as a soon-to-be groom, met the Matriarch Grandmother for the first time at a family gathering. A staunch lifetime Baptist, the grandmother greeted the young man thus: "I always prayed my granddaughter would marry a minister, but I never dreamed he would be a Methodist!"

In perfect time the young man replied, "That just goes to show God always gives us more than we ask for!" The lovely lady nearly fell over laughing and the family bonds were sealed!

More. 

God is more and gives more. It is we who are stingy, grasping, wary to give freely for fear we won't have enough.

When God gave me Jane I often wondered what the attending angels had to say. "They were no doubt distressed," I think with a smile. I laugh to see the very real mix of love and tension between the sexes; the man who can't seem to quit all his beastly ways and the woman who dares to believe he will, yet not all. 

God gave me more than I knew to ask for. And he gave me more than I knew how to receive. And in it all is the gift that keeps on giving. 

There is so much here, a long treatise. If the beauty of Helen could launch a thousand ships, the wonder of knowing Jane could launch a thousand words, times 1,000. And this is no over-speak, for the beauty of creation revealed within marriage is more than we will ever fully comprehend.

God gave me more when He gave me Jane and the joy of knowing that is the becoming of a glimmer of all God had in mind when He made the world.

God always gives more.

Happy Birthday, Jane!