stressful times

As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, my God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God? My tears have been my food day and night, while people say to me all day long, “Where is your God?” Psalm 42

I covet prayer. I desire prayers said. Iris needs a covering of prayer as the situation at home comes to a very difficult point.

I'm so stressed that I left home leaving the front door open all afternoon Monday. I'm stretched caring deeply about a situation thousands of miles away. There I am the the cause or a key factor of so much pain. Here I'm stretched as Auntie Mary has the big C again and I'm called to make decisions about the future and her care. So where is my God?

All I can hold is simple hope. Why, my soul, are you downcast? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God.

Health and stress

Willingness implies a surrendering of one’s self-separateness, an entering into, an immersion in the deepest processes of life itself. It is a realization that one already is a part of some ultimate cosmic process and it is a commitment to participation in that process. In contrast, willfulness is the setting of oneself apart from the fundamental essence of life in an attempt to master, direct, control, or otherwise manipulate existence. More simply, willingness is saying yes to the mystery of being alive in each moment. Willfulness is saying no, or perhaps more commonly, ‘yes, but…’ Gerald May

The great stress researcher Hans Selye identified two type of stress good and bad. It was not on the external circumstances rather on our response. I've just finished Gerald May's The Dark Night of the Soul. It is a challenging book written both critically and personally. I could not help but remember that he was a cancer survivor and awaiting a heart transplant which never came. The importance of hope is something in the midst of stress can be trust with some reason or simply with no logical reason.

I'm in the midst of stress as Auntie Mary is back in hospital. I went to her place Sunday afternoon and there was no answer. I got a key to her place a few months ago for exactly this type of situation. Opening the door I had that fear of the unknown what was I going to find? The place was empty but odd! had she gone out? but without her cane or walker? Getting home I found a stack of phone message from all sorts of people and I rushed to Toronto East General to find her lying on a stretcher in the hallway. She's still in emergency 3 days later but at least in a room waiting for a bed upstairs. I'm glad she used her panic button to call for help but it was the third fall in 10 days. What was disturbing was her story of gypsies dancing nearby who woke her up and how beautiful the scene was. Fortunately the doctors think this is a by-product of an infection she is carrying. The stress is daily visiting and determining her future.

But Iris's father has just had a tumor removed from the bowel in a difficult operation. It seems to have gone well but more stress. The stress of not being together has made life difficult. The stress of my own wait for an appointment with an endocrinologist about a growth on one of my adrenal glands. This all adds up but the challenge is in how we respond to crisis and trouble and distress. I'm left with reflections again about the nature of hope as fierce faith in times of difficulty which is also fear's faith in these moment. Gerald May talks of a raw or naked hope in times of darkness when it is difficult to see anything clearly.

In the contemplative tradition the transition from meditation to contemplation is one from willfulness to willingness. This is an important movement as meditation is a personally active action where one applies the will to move oneself towards a state. Thus it is willful. But contemplation is personally passive action where one is willing and open without conditions and in fact freed of attachments to outcomes. Of course this is an ideal but only momentary at best. Yet when we pray in the Lord's Prayer Thy[your] will be done it is exactly this state we are desiring.

labels - help or hinder

I've nearly completed the sift, sort and dispose sequence in the my CD collection there are over 120 CD in the dispose. Just people I'm never really going to listen to yet in my keep boxes are close to 300 CDs, excluding the 100 or so still on shelves. I started trying to make up playlists so that I can categorize them for playing and reasons for playing. Trying work out what category to file some of my stuff is really difficult. I got scared when I found some of my stuff was described as shoegaze! Is that a musical style? I'm happier with the label of postrock but what does it really mean.

I have bands such as Sigur Rós, Labradford, Japancakes, Channel Light Vessel etc. They are a rock version (or postrock version) of Philip Glass a classical minimalist composer. The music is extremely repetitive with slight variation and modulations. It is these changes which create the interest as the patterns change and morph. Add to the fact the speeds are slower and there is a lot of reverb to create a huge ambiance, we are talking about a genre nesting between chill, minimalism and meditation.

The Bible talks about vain repetition in praying and perhaps this also applies to worship but the issue is this. Whether the nuanced changes and variations create something which rather than being vain is a gentle route lifting us to the ecstatic moment where everything disappears and God is God. The liturgical chants of the Orthodox churches and liturgical monasticism especially made popular in Taizé provides this. I remember a teenager saying once of her first Taizé worship experience, who needs drugs, when there is this experience.

But there is a dark side. Friday I was reading about the Danger Mouse/SparkleHorse project Dark Night of The Soul. I've been aware of Danger Mouse in looking at concepts of copyright in the remix culture and the "Grey Album" a remix of the Beatles White Album and the Jay-Z's Black Album. He is part of the better known Gnarls Barkley.

Well Dark Night was first delayed by legal wrangles but deeply marred by the suicides of co-creator Mark Linkous/Sparklehorse and contributor Vic Chesnutt. This recent album carries some heavy baggage which I hope to listen to soon. I wonder about whether a heavenward moment and a hellish moment are possible. Of course I think yes. In my sorting I had to decide whether to keep The Tear Garden's To Be An Angel Blind, The Crippled Soul Divide. I kept it because it is an authentic reflection of one side of human emotions, the darker side.

Darkness and a special voice of hope

I am rereading the Narnia stories as I do every 5-6 years. This passage is from CS Lewis' book The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. My friends named their daughter God's breath after a passage and at last I think I've found it.

The children and the ship are in a darkness surrounding an island and the darkness is driving them to despair. There's an albatross flying in a shaft of light surrounded by the darkness and it lands on the prow.

..."it called out in a strong sweet voice what seemed to be words though no one understood them. ... 'Courage, dear heart', and the voice, she felt sure was Aslan's, and with the voice a delicious smell breathed in her face."

Darkness can bring paralysis but if we look and look for that glimmer of light our will is strengthened to keep going and virues grown and hope comes and a call for courage. This is the movement from Good Friday to Easter Sunday.

... we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us. Hope in darkness calls courage. Romans 5:3-5

techno fast

An enormous danger to the Church is an unthinking Christianity that slips into society's patterns of living without investigating their validity. We should fear bandwagons that draw in participants who haven't really thought through the significance and meaning of a particular movement for their lives. Marva Dawn Truly The Community

Lent is a time for Christians to focus often giving up things. Fat Tuesday also pancake or Shrove Tuesday last week is a clearing of formerly luxury foods for the season of Lent. A few years ago I limited my tv viewing to one hour a day. Friends give up chocolate. This year in Italy catholics are urging switching off technology such as mp3 players and abstaining or reducing internet surfing or text messaging until Easter.

Of course the issue really isn't about denial but discipline and self-discipline. Reducing my tv viewing freed me up for reading more things. Since I now don't have a tv now, I've decided to ensure I do an hour of devotional reading a day in this season. Not Bible study nor prayer but devotional reading by trying to read good Christian literature. I avoid as much Christian fluff as possible. Marva Dawn asserts "How people think is the basis for who they become."

Makoto Fujimura asserts that "we carry the dust of Eden in our DNA. Now, as we face a world ... we need to understand that our imaginative capacities carry a responsibility to heal, every bit as much as they carry a responsibility to depict angst." I feel Lent is a time of simplicity getting rid of complexity in order to find God both in angst and healing. Recently I was reading about the Father General of the Jesuits, Pedro Arupe who after celebrating Mass in a slum in South America, was invited to a home by a big man. Arupe wasn't sure whether to go or not, but he went to a shack that was ready to collapse.

He had me sit down on a rickety old chair. From there I could see the sunset. The big man said to me, "Look sir, how beautiful it is!" We sat in silence for a few minutes. The sun disappeared. The man then said, " I don't know how to thank you for all you have done for us. I have nothing to give you, but I thought you would like to see this sunset. You liked it, didn't you? Good evening."

I missed the sunset but last night I looked at the moon and then at a very bright light in the sky. So bright it was difficult not to keep looking at it and wondering what it was. I know now it is Venus in the Western sky. Can we appreciate or wonder at the simple things when we have the distraction of other things? I'm not sure or not.

Faith and Fear

Monday morning I had an episode. I went to a reading class with my professor and suddenly there was this zigzag bright flashing line in my eyes blocking part my vision. I had to pause our discussion because I couldn't see properly. Over the years I have had floaters inside the eye and you learn to live with those things. Anyhow my professor was concerned and told me to see an opthalmologist and if they came back or I saw a veil of darkness to go to emergency immediately. Anyhow the lights went away and I couldn't detect any vision problems but I had a whole series of meetings etc.

Tuesday morning I had a day long meeting and called my old opthamologist and had real difficulties getting an appointment but telling the receptionist the symptoms and her talking to the doctor got me in Wednesday morning. But I didn't sleep at all well last night. My back was hurting as well because of the underlying tension, worry, and fear of what if my retina detaches or I have to go into emergency etc. Who will look after me if I do have vision problems or impaired sight? Internet research means that that ignorance is bliss is impossible because I now know the worse possible possibilities and outcomes.

Faith and Fear are sometime said to be effectively opposites but it seems to me not exact opposites. Fear and anxiety are similar but not the same but both sap energy and create all manner of effects in my body and psyche. I don't know whether I reach on he scale fear but I have been more anxious than I thought. It has taken 9 hours to calm down. Nine hours since the opthamologist told me that the thick gel inside the eye has shrunk and pulled away around the optic nerve but this is quite common.

To have Faith is to be blind, otherwise it is knowledge and therefore not faith. These couple of days have been stressful and anxious and a call to faith. My faith has been stretched.

A squeeze of the hand

"Jesus?" he whispered as his voice choked, "I feel so lost." A hand reached out and squeezed his, and didn't let go. "I know Mack. But it's not true. I am with you and I'm not lost. I'm sorry it feels that way, but hear me clearly. You are not lost." The Shack by William P Young

I've been reading The Shack and Mack, in Young's book, is met by God in a special way in the depth of a deep darkness and sadness. Also I have been listening to the pain of a number of people struggling recently. The future and not knowing create anxiety, anguish and pain for many; and the unknown brings fear and fear of failure and fear of falling and pain.

Mike Pilavachi writes about a challenge to him from Graham Cray, "Who told you that we were no longer in exile? Who said there are no laments to be sung to God? Are we really at home with all the pain, turmoil, killing, and hatred in the world? Is there nothing to lament before God about?" Again a collision of things, this morning I read William Blake's poem Ah! Sunflower and the trumpet blasts in Revelation and thought about the many godchildren I have and wrote this.

Sunflower, oh my soul!
restless in the search for the infinite
feeling loss and loneliness in the night

I feel lost
deep in my soul I cry for light
glimmer of hope, confusing desire for sight
for the received covering of white - I can't see

It feels that way
but hear me clearly
seeing is not always believing
trusting is more a squeeze of the hand in the darkness

Zimbabwe, a human tragedy

In a country with the terrible distinction of having the second highest proportion of orphans in the world — one in four children has lost one or both parents — the closing of schools and hospitals is hitting these most vulnerable children mercilessly. Celia W. Dugger New York Times

A few weeks on and cholera continues to spread and more human suffering. Cholera victims are expected to pass 60,000 and travel to neighbouring countries. Sadly the Information Minister Sikhanyiso Ndlovu called the cholera outbreak as a "genocidal onslaught on the people of Zimbabwe by the British". Meaningless words casting blame and no action.

Inflation officially hit 231 million percent in July, soldiers rioted because their wages were useless. Teachers have abandoned their jobs to find food. Hospitals are closed for lack of supplies etc. There isn't enough clean water to treat sick patients. Zimbabwe is being described as turning into a "failed state". "The situation is truly grim. One man and his cronies - Robert Mugabe - are holding this country hostage," Mr McGee US Ambasador.

What is a failed state? Well some criteria are as follows.

• a state whose central government is so weak or ineffective that it has little practical control over much of its territory,
• legitimate authority to make collective decisions has been eroded,
• reasonable public services can not be provided,
• widespread corruption and criminality,
• refugees and involuntary movement of populations,
• sharp economic decline,
• failed interaction with other states.

The Fund For Peace's Failed States Index is very interesting for 2008. Zimbabwe is third behind Somalia and Sudan. The Uk is 160th, USA 161st and Canada 167th.

It is interesting that much of repentance and Faith involves the admission of weakness, failure and need for strength and resource beyond self. This is the realm of faith. looking into transcendence. Here religious leaders say pray that Mugabe step down, Mbeki former South African Prime Minister asks to a power sharing and in the waiting more die. Is there any point when a nations sovereignty can be violated because that state has failed in it's care of its citizens. I don't know but how can I avoid meaningless words. Perhaps people like Bonhoeffer had a better idea?

Some happier news

Last Friday I wrote about my friend's daughter who was sick with dengue fever which took her father's godson's life. At last some good news that her blood platelet levels are what they should be and she has recovered and is going back to school. A frightening time if you are a parent.

Today I learned about the pain of Alzheimers, not for the person who has it but for the family. We talk about the sufferer as the patient but they have memory loss, cannot do things, lose language and lose all sense of place and time. But family has to live with the memories as they were, the things they did and said and know that the present time is nothing like the past. However even here there can be moments of grace a minute or two of recognition and memory.

Recently I started thinking again of M who died in February taking her own life. It's strange the depression and desolation has changed in my memory. It is almost a year since I met her for the first time on campus and she breezed into life at the college. She was not able to receive or accept the love and care offered by so many and although there is some heartache there is also a feeling of hope and new life, no paralysis but reaching for new life and new hope and new purpose. I remember her well and her memory drives me out there again.

Nothing spectacularly different

The missional life is not a life removed from the ordinary. The missional life is nothing special, it’s just embodying and giving expression to “gospel”, gospel centered on Jesus’ life lived in all the everyday contexts and circumstances we find yourselves in, and “yes” most especially in the mess and inadequacy of our own lives being lived in those places – the places of doubt, brokenness, failure, sickness, vulnerability, and powerlessness – in other words, in our simply being human! In our simply being alive and being about life as living persons, not as the “living dead”. This is the spiritual life. This is the missional way. This is the Jesus-way. Paul Fromont

As I catch up with some of my Google reader accounts I was caught by the obviousness of it all. I of course agree whole heartedly and yet at times I don't really live that way sufficiently. I try so hard to do the best possible and desire after the best. it's Ok when I'm working by myself but sometimes when I have to work with others that have radically different working patterns it can bring trouble bubbling up. I plan ahead and work hard at preparing comprehensively. Of course there is nothing wrong with rigor especially in things academic, but many people are procrastinators. Or at least my world seems to be full of procrastinators. The distance between being adequately prepared and last minute is vast for me and narrow for many.

This is one of my crosses to bear. I love to play music and when rehearsals are short and there is no time for fun, I struggle. For me something that doesn't carry intention whether spirit led or person led - ultimately it is ugly and not uplifting. This too is a cross to bear because I want to meet God and have fun, to enjoy being in the presence of God.

I worry. When events are planned I want to work on them for hours and months in advance. Others don't want to start thinking until much closer in time. I'm less scared of failure than in the past as grace has abounded and I realize the gifting that has been lavished on me. Also I recognize some of the best talks or messages I have given have been on the backs of envelopes or improvised! But many hours of listening, thinking, and especially just wondering contributed to those moments. This week I set aside something I have been planning actively for 2 months because it was stressing because others were not ready to move on the matter. I'm willing to live with the potential for failure or incompleteness in order to release the control and and worry. It is no longer mine. I will wait for the others to initiate praying that God will shape and guide them. I have decided tolive in the places of doubt, brokenness, failure, sickness, vulnerability, and powerlessness.

Aesthetic or anaesthetic?

I'm cleaning up going through piles of paper and reading some stuff which arrived a while back. One was a review of a December lecture by Jeremy Begbie called ‘Sentimentality in Christian Art & Worship: What’s Gone Wrong?' I love a collision of ideas having spent 3 late evenings talking with an extremely qualified church musician and former broadcast producer about the state of worship and musicianship. Anyhow Begbie hammers home a deep problem in current worship trends where music and words become bland, flat and meaningless, being reduced to the emotional. Sickly syrup rather than real honey sometimes with only a faint sweetness and other tastes and aromas. Have you ever wondered why so few contemporary worship songs are in minor keys or even use relative minors?

"Three characteristics of sentimentality Jeremy identified three characteristics of sentimentality. First, sentimentality misrepresents reality through evading or trivialising evil; it is selective in what it chooses to notice (“the world is a great place, really”), and projects innocence where there is no innocence (“he’s not so bad, really”). Second, sentimentality is emotionally self-indulgent; it encourages an emotional reaction to reality that is shallow or one-dimensional. Third, sentimentality fails to take appropriate costly action; the sentimentalist screens out darker dimensions, wants emotion without expense."

Visit my music blog and you'll see a similar reflection over a recent worship song. I really desire that worship music and words can cry with me! If you want to read more of the summary of Begbie's lecture go here. (be warned the pdf is 2.35 MB!)

in the skies

What emotions are stirred in you watching and listening?
Why is the moon associated with mental illness?


(I shot this feb 2oth on a cold bitter night)

On the shore

The tension I feel with a horrible balancing act of being tired and trying to get things done and provide myself with sufficient self-care is total craziness. But I have been saying no to somethings which is a small miracle!

There have been some good glimpses of encouragement in emails etc. I cried with an email from my god-daughter by adoption, it was so special and honest. Tonight I felt good to talk to my god-daughter-by-baptism's parents as I finalized the first phase of my vacation next month.

The best perhaps is the chance to play cello for Good Friday, which will be the greatest self-care project before I take a rest next month.

RIP

Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven Matt 5:3

We all have good and bad days and today was a bad news day. Somehow I went into college today when I wasn't intending to go in. Then I found out that Margaret had passed away a couple of weeks ago. She was an international student I knew from last year but she didn't return after Christmas. She was sad and depressed and struggled desperately for acceptance, which she could not feel even when it was offered. A beautiful young woman deeply disturbed, but even then I was aware of a gentleness and graciousness of spirit.

Going away to university or college can bring excitement and freedom but it can also bring disappointments, struggle, pain, even the need for acceptance. Ten hours later and I'm still stunned and really don't know what to feel. Relief that she is free or sadness she is gone. But I know Death touches us all in someway somehow all the time. But I also hate "get over it" talk because it cheapens the life that is gone. Forgetting and moving on dishonours the person and their importance to you. I think she had purity of heart within her for even then she was God's child.

Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God. Matt 5:8

feeling small

When you're weary, feeling small, When tears are in your eyes, I will dry them all; I'm on your side. when times get rough - And friends just can't be found, Like a bridge over troubled water I will lay me down. Like a bridge over troubled water I will lay me down. Simon & Garfunkel

Sometimes I feel very small. Very insignificant. Sometimes I wish I could simply disappear and not exist. Sometimes it is other people's words, sometimes it is situations and sometimes it is simply a vastness of reality. Not my reality but the immensity of it all.

Sometimes I just want to stay in my bed and hide. Sometimes the darkness of the night is better than the reality of dreams Sometimes it simply does not make sense, and I don't want to make sense of it. Sometimes I really don't want to think just feel. Sometimes I just want out of it all. I want to lose myself.

Sometimes I feel I'm not good enough. Sometimes I feel there is not enough. Sometimes I realize I am not enough.

In the moment of paralysis I must trust, I seek. In the moment of stillness, I hear the little words of encouragement. In the moment of consciousness, I find hope and a reason to go on.

Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. Luke 11:9

darkness, suffering, and dark night

I am beginning to wonder both from reading and experience whether suffering is a necessity for spiritual growth or just an accelerant. Suffering may be ill-health, life crisis, depression or mental illness, self-induced or externally applied.

This last week I have been very aware that our weakness, in my own weakness is really the only opportunity to experience the grace and strength, the power and mercy, the love and assurance that only God can give.

I was reminded again of that in watching the second night of the New Year Special for Nodame Cantabile. Her professor asks Nodame, Why do you play the piano? and Nodame can't answer. She experiences a dark time with streaming tears as she quests for meaning in it all. Initially she is reminded eventually that it is her love and desire to be married to Chiaki is why she is studying piano, but as she rises above that and gives a recital she rediscovers the joys of having others listen and also be inspiring. Her piano performance moves her friends to reach for greater things as well. It takes having things stripped away from us to realize what is important. For us, to lose all is only to find ourselves.

Music and spirituality have a lot in common. We need authentic lives to inspire other, only with knowledge of the darkness can we walk with those in darkness.

The Battle within Living

I just want to be living as I'm dying, Just like everybody here, Just want to know my little flicker of time is worthwhile, And I don't know where I'm driving to, But I know I'm getting old And there's a blessing in every moment every mile Vienna Teng - Homecoming (Walter's Song) youtube

I've been listening to some more Vienna Teng and in juxta position with Salvador Dali's image entitled Warrior mounted on an Elephant Overpowering a Cello. Life pierces me and the living continues to be a struggle but yet there is blessing in the moments. It is this that I bring to others in their struggles. Not cheap words , not quick fixes, no papering over pain. Yet I can still sit in the shadow of it all and I can still find a graced moment. Don't we long for more. This reminds me of a story from the Ecclesiastical History of the English People. The Venerable Bede records an account of an allegory told to a pagan king to explain the transitory nature of life:

The present life of man, O King, seems to be, in comparison with that time which is unknown to us, like the swift flight of a sparrow through the room wherein You sit at supper in winter, with your commanders and ministers, and a good fire in the midst, whilst the storms of rain and snow prevail abroad; the sparrow, I say, flying in at one door, and immediately out at another, whilst he is within, is safe from the wintry storm; but after a short space of fair weather, he immediately vanishes out of your sight, into the dark winter from which he had emerged. So this life of man appears for a short space, but of what went before, or what is to follow, we are entirely ignorant. If, therefore, this new doctrine contains something more certain, it seems justly to deserve to be followed.

Life can seem transitory and short lived, but at many moments interminably long. Nights without sleep endless. Nights alone...

Well the night eats up my body heat, And there's no sign of another, And I find myself slipping down into that black, But things are good I've got a lot of followers of my faith, I've got a whole congregation living in my head these days, And I'm preaching from the pulpit, To cries of "Amen brother", Closing my eyes to feel the warmth come back Vienna Teng - Homecoming (Walter's Song) lyrics

From the The Cloud of Unknowing which I read quite a few years ago,

My thoughts cannot comprehend Divinity, and so I prefer to abandon all I can know, choosing rather to love even that which I cannot know.

Let loving desire, gracious and devout, step bravely and joyfully beyond and reach out to pierce the darkness. Yes, beat upon that thick cloud of unknowing with the dart of your loving desire and do not cease come what may."

La ténèbre n'est point ténèbre devant Toi. La nuit comme le jour est lumière. Ps 139

Salvador Dali

Salvador Dali's The Temptation of St Anthony

Years ago I read The Life of Antony by Athanasius. A fascinating story of his struggles with himself and his desire to follow and be faithful to God. Antony/Anthony was the founder of Christian monasticism and asceticism

Dali reused a number of key themes from the history of art. The Temptation of St. Anthony is one used by some of the more fantasy-oriented Renaissance artists (e.g. Matthais Grunewald). In this version, the saint is walking through the desert when he is confronted with a number of temptations. The first a monstrous horse often a symbol of power or strength and them a number of elephants on stilt-like legs. There carry different temptations, including the golden cup of lust and perhaps symbols of greed. There are many Freudian interpretators out there but I find Athansius' biography more helpful. He was being tempted by "memories of his possessions, the guardianship of his sister, the bonds of kinship, love of money and of glory, the manifold pleasure of food, the relaxations of life , and finally, the rigor of virtue and how great the labor is that earns it...".

After two long conferences this month where my sleep patterns have been severely disrupted, I've just returned and slept 3.30pm Wednesday to 10.30 am Thursday. And last night I slept a further 10 hours. We all have our temptations to deal with and their desire to turn us from the path of virtue. They may not be the same but they come at us steadily and we struggle with each of them in turn.

On the road two - the return

I have returned home after a week away and suffering very deep tiredness. I have always found it difficult to sleep with strangers in the same room especially when there is snoring to deal with. This conference probably bit the deepest in a long while.

After my earlier posting a colleague commented on the very dark circles under my eyes and expressed worry. So much that I got worried myself. I still find the concept of sleep and rest difficult. and letting go is is a serious issue that I carry.

Strange because this is what I find I teach to many of my mentorees. You are not the saviour of the world! God is! Funny that we teach the lessons that we ourselves must learn or perhaps as a good musician friend once said to me. The best teachers of a musical instrument are those who struggle because they have to think about what they are doing while excellent performers often find it difficult to explain what is going on. Perhaps this is God's little joke with me...

I attend a conference on reaching the ipod generation and end up using it to block out the snoring so I can sleep!

Blackout - two kinds of darkness

The morning of the famous Northeast blackout of North America on August 14, 2003, I wrote this startling comment in my journal.
(I am right in the centre.)

"Prayer can be dangerous", says Robert Faricy, "when it is real, prayer pits against me all in the world that rejects Jesus."

Furthermore "until a person has developed a kind of sense for the action of God, it is difficult for him [or her] to make use of these signs [peace, love & joy] with any sureness. There is a complacency that may pass for peace, and there are false joys and wrong kinds of love that maybe mistaken for those of the Spirit."

That day was the largest blackout in North American history. It affected 10 million people one-third of the population of Canada, and one seventh of the US i.e. eight U.S. states.

There are two darknesses in the spiritual life, one is a darkness because of false light because the person has exercised prudence phronesis (see my earlier post) and confused that with discernment. The person is complacent in their relationship with God and do not seek to be familiar with God to know love and be loved. The other is that of faith, a true darkness. "The Holy Spirit leads me to a loving knowing, to a knowing through loving and being loved. This "knowing through love" can take the form of dark knowledge, a knowing in obscurity that seems a non-knowing, a blank. It will often be a groping in the dark, a knowledge in the darkness of faith...".

We can be like the house sparrow which was determined to carry on flying around inside my kitchen, trying to fly higher rather than fly towards the window and darkness. "Discernment differs from prudence. Both concern making decisions, but prudence judges the act itself, whether a given action or option is wise, prudent under the circumstances. Discernment judges the impulse to act, judges whether the idea to do this comes from God or from elsewhere." What seems darkness may in fact be where God is calling us because our faith will grow. Yet if we know we are loved by God and love God so then we trust God in the darkness.

We know that "We all possess knowledge." But knowledge puffs up while love builds up. Those who think they know something do not yet know as they ought to know. But whoever loves God is known by God. 1 Cor 8:1b-3