Fierce Faith

We desire to be totally influenced by Jesus Christ and concerned with the personhood of others rather than with their talents or other gifts. John English Spiritual Freedom

Tonight is a difficult night in Korea and wish I were there, or she were here. The feelings of powerlessness are very real in me yet I am not in despair rather a desire for God's glory to be revealed. There are many tough lessons in life to be learned and fears to be confronted for me and I learned this week a saying from Richard Rohr that "Hope is fear's faith." I misheard it the first time and thought "Hope is fierce faith." But both are equally strong and insightful. In the face of the pain I feel she has, I have to, I must hope and find strength for her that "in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose." (Rm 8:28)

I've been reading John English for a month now and he wrote about the love relationship with God describing 3 modes of humility illustrated by the love relationship of marriage. The first is
illustrated by a commitment to the love relationship in being faithful. The second goes deeper being sensitive to situations of conflict which damage the relationship and seeking to make amends. Finally the third is that suffering with the spouse who is suffering. ..."the acid test of humility and sharing with one another will be found in suffering. ... In love's paradoxical view, a couple might even desire this situation if only to show their love by staying together in time of insults and disregard."

This is a tough time and perhaps I feel further away than I want to be, but I'm reminded of Bruce Cockburn's song Waiting for a Miracle. I'm really praying for the miracle.

You rub your palm
On the grimy pane
In the hope that you can see
You stand up proud
You pretend you're strong
In the hope that you can be
Like the ones who've cried
Like the ones who've died
Trying to set the angel in us free
While they're waiting for a miracle

Recycle and simplicity

I was reading an article on Lifehacker and one respondent claimed

A cd/dvd is considered a class 7 recyclable plastic. To manufacture a pound of plastic (30 CDs per pound), it requires 300 cubic feet of natural gas, 2 cups of crude oil and 24 gallons of water. It is estimated that AOL alone has distributed more than 2 billion CDs. That is the natural gas equivalent of heating 200,000 homes for 1 year. It is estimated that it will take over 1 million years for a CD to completely decompose in a landfill.

I'm so glad I no longer back my data up onto CD and DVD roms. But the issues remain about the nature of our garbage. The clutter I've been hanging onto is crazy, but perhaps the music industry's hanging onto CD's and the movie industries to DVD's is worse. I'm currently reading Henry David Thoreau's Walden. A very interesting book written in the first half of 19th century. It's a fascinating read not just because Thoreau is a Transcendentalist - a pre-industrialization proto- ecologist but because he challenges unbridled acquisition. In order to research and write, he built a little house by Walden Pond and farmed a few acres and claimed that "I found that ... it required only thirty or forty days in a year to support one." He grew his own food and built his own shelter and sold a little excess to cover his costs. He lived at Walden for 2 years 2 months and 2 days. The fascinating thing is I've been reading this on an iPod touch which has been gifted me by grace as a pass-me-on. It isn't, for me, a hand-me-down because it has raised me up. What if I had bought a book?

It occurs to me that it might possible to live your life more simply where technology is used especially where distribution is digital and virtual. Thoreau seems to be for me at the moment a 19th century hippie, jailed for refusing to pay his taxes in protest over the Mexican War. There is no doubt of his intellectual ability and insightfulness. (A graduate of Harvard.) I'm interested in where these thoughts go in the collision of ideas between Thoreau's and the distribution of digital media through the internet as possibly a lighter carbon footprint .

How does this relate to spirituality and faith? I believe we tend to simply accept cultural trends and marketing. We buy into an unbridled consumption model. if we do this it is extremely difficult not to end up with cluttered lives, physically, intellectually, emotionally, and spiritually. We need enough space to think and to think critically. I'm about to read yet another book about decluttering. I am amazed not that I reading another one but that I can find yet another one. This one published 2008!

ways of asserting

Caring for my Auntie Mary is a strain at times. At 93 she remains strongly independent but sadly not to the extent of looking after herself properly. She is not eating enough and yet wants to live alone. It's tough as she wants to assert her independence but I need to help her do it in the right way.

I am glad that we can have 1 hour a day assisted living with a support worker, but now I get phone calls from the different agencies when she is not home. Saturday I had 4 calls from 2 different agencies because she did not answer her phone or door. Finally she answered the phone when she came home 7.30pm from her mineral club show. She did not tell the agency or the helper as she found them a nuisance . God give me strength and wisdom as I have to convince her that independence means having these people in her life!

Dogs and Cats

Strange stuff the last few days. I learned that my good friend is looking after Penny a small friendly long-term. He took her on a canoe trip and had a great time with her. Dogs need us our attention and care about us. Penny was off her leash and yet came back because she knew who fed her and cared for her. I think Penny is good for him. He has to get up in the morning walk and feed and play and be loved by this little dog.

This morning I was late for service and was even later because as I locked my bike I saw a group of people looking upwards. There on the building opposite a 4 storey industrial place and on top of a 12 foot large brick chimney was a small white cat. How it got there I have no idea. But to be sure cats are very different animals to dogs in human relationships. Yes we worry about the cat but I don't think we can say a cat loves its owner or the one who cares for it in the same way as a dog.

This fits something I was reading in a book this week which is about small acts of generosity and their far reaching effects even on the one being generous. Henri Nouwen in an interview with Philip Yancey records being correct by Nouwen that he did not give up stuff to care for Adam at L'Arche. Nouwen gained and benefited from the relationship because in learning to love he learned how much he himself was loved by God.

In learning to love a little dog, learning to care for this animal we can learn that we are loved and cared for. I feel even in my relationship with others, and especially with Iris, in loving and caring for others I have learned what love is and more so the greater love of God.

getting back to it

Well yesterday I felt drawn to the Reference Library on my way home. Don't know why but I went in. I thought to see if The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society was available anyhow instead I picked up this book and read it between 11.45pm and 1.30am. Strangely challenging and relevant for where my life is at the moment.

Clutter Busting: Letting Go of What's Holding You Back by Brooks Palmer

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

What is this book doing on my ology shelf at Goodreads? Brooks Palmer, a professional clutter buster, is not an organizer. The issues are internal not external, more psychological, sociological, cultural etc. Most of it is not about organizing what you have accumulated rather getting rid of stuff both internally and externally.

People's homes are a map of their mind. The mind is a storehouse of memories and opinions and beliefs. ... Problems ensue. Things pile up unused. ... home had become a stagnant pool. ... When you toss things and readjust your living space, you readjust your state of mind

We need to clear our minds and our homes to find space and freedom. We need to find release from the stuff, which invariably has feelings attached to them and realize that this clutter locks us into the past. Believing that these feelings are in fact scarce we need to realize that through letting go we can have freedom to experience the abundance and riches of feelings in the present.

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Not a Mamil

I was wondering whether to buy a lycra cycling top as I have been loosing a bit of weight and cycling more. Today I managed my first steep hill in a year since my back injury. I didn't get off I didn't feel pain or strain anything. But I remembered the article I came across on the BBC news site, Rise of the Mamils (middle-aged men in lycra). Oops I thought and perhaps a cycling top is not the best idea. I'm not ready to join the Mamils yet! Maybe a few more pounds to go and I'll be the weight when I left school at eighteen.

As I get fitter and lighter I am feeling a lot more at ease. I took 6 boxes of theology books to the local bookstore just to clear and of course the public library system took 6 boxes of scifi. Today I cleared another 2 boxes of books and tomorrow I give away my bed.

A stressed week

The last few days have been stressful. My Auntie Mary wasn't home when she should have been but we weren't sure that she was out. When all the agencies (four of them) who are involved in her daily care call, I end up being the co-ordinator. I was trying to decide whether we needed the police or not. Thank God for helpful phone operators who referred me to a supervisor who was inspired to call the person giving her a ride to a doctor's appointment. Why a doctor's office doesn't have a human being to answer phones I have no idea. Anyway the panic was aleviated after 2 hours.

The same day my doctor emails me and tells me I have an adrenal incidentaloma. Actually I didn't see those words. All I saw in the email was a growth on my adrenal gland and a discussion whether in was benign or malignant. Well currently it is 6mm and therefore tiny and it needs to be monitored to see if it grows or not. There isn't a panic at the moment rather this is quite common and it will be a matter of wait and see. But I'm going to see the doctor next week.

This week I had my dental hgienist appointment. Mostly everything was OK except the problem molar was 9mm pocket. Actually 4 or 5 is normally bad! She took X-rays and was going to talk to the dentist. Well the same day as the other stuff she phones and advised me that the dentist was suggesting extraction! It's the last molar on the bottom right side, so I was worried. Nothing would left to chew on. Well we're going to wait and see if I can improve my hygiene and that it begins to heal! A real call for prayer because the expectation is that it will not.

Also this week is Iris' english exam results. She needed an average score of 6 and I got the call to say she got a 7. Our relief is unbelievable because all the other stuff of the week is pushed aside and we now know we can have a future together. With only 2 weeks of preparation I feel God's hand is with us.

Burning

Often we are preoccupied with the question "How can we be witnesses in the Name of Jesus? What are we supposed to say or do to make people accept the love that God offers them?" These questions are expressions more of our fear than of our love. Jesus shows us the way of being witnesses. He was so full of God's love, so connected with God's will, so burning with zeal for God's Kingdom, that he couldn't do other than witness. Henri Nouwen Bread for the Journey

Paul Richardson's book and his life is invigorating, inspiring and scary. The challenge of faith at the edge demands creativity, dreaming, and risk taking. All very logical and all demanding a step or maybe a jump into space. But we can have confidence. "Assimilate it [God's Word] into your life so that you can plunge into your days with unbounded freedom." May God give us this confidence and enable us to burn without being consumed. After all faith is nothing until it is exercised and sretched.

A personal challenge

A Certain Risk: Living Your Faith at the Edge by Paul Andrew Richardson

Of course getting our priorities right in life is important but Richardson moves everything to a new level. In fact you might say my understanding and more important my way of living is challenged in the edgiest way possible.

As the Spirit opens your eyes, what will he allow you to see? He will show you greater possibilities that you have ever dreamed before.(158) To be sure, many leaders have an important role as visionaries and communicators. Yet, as we come closer, we will always discover a band of people who have stepped out by faith in response to the dreams the Spirit has planted in their hearts.(38) The agony of faith ...is stepping out beyond the edge of human capabilities and trusting God's Spirit to lift us into his dreams.(113) Faith is the flash point between God's creativity and your participation in his creativity (100)

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Infobesity

We are so informed that we can’t be bothered. Catherine Collins British Dietetic Association

Brian just sent me a link to Tim Challies blog (here) and I found this great quote within a quote from John Naish's book Enough. We need and I think I need to learn his lesson of when enough is enough. Challies notes that Golden Labrador Retrievers are a dog that has a far bigger eyes than stomach and not a lot of sense. It will eat too much, throw up and then eat again. The dog will repeat this cycle.

... while we are given more information than ever about healthy eating, our consumption of fresh food has fallen. This is partly because we are too busy getting and spending to enjoy the simple pleasures of cooking.

One of the lessons coming at me from counseling and spiritual direction is that I know a lot but am lousy at actually practicing it or applying it in the real world. I know what I need to do but don't do it or use it or applying to wisdom. I consume information in large quantities but the issue is application. I hurt Iris yesterday because I had too much information to give rather than love and support. There is so much information out there but in fact it's more about learning lessons not consuming. It's more about digesting and not merely filling our stomachs. Otherwise we're (or at least I am) no better than a Golden Labrador Retriever.

Marketing wisdom or commonsense

I've just finished reading Why We Buy: The Science of Shopping. It looks at human behaviour and the retail environment and attempts analysis of how human chopping behaviour works and why. To this how the store environment can work with or work against this behaviour. They call this the conversion rate, from someone wandering into a store to someone leaving the store with a purchase.

My friend Firman and I were talking this week about this in terms of getting clients. You don't just wait for them to come to you. You have to get out there and talk and meeting and get infront of them. If you're looking for someone who might want to become a Christian, you want them to comein and stick around. We want a conversion rate as well yet we are passive.

In retail it seems to be well known that men will wander into a store, look for information in brochures or displays, collect and generally leave without consulting or talking to anyone. Women are the opposite looking for advice and to consult someone who knows something about what they're looking for.

I realized this has huge ramifications for churches how they welcome men and women. When it comes to welcome desks, information points, and welcome personnel there are enormous changes needed in how things are done, if done at all. Churches are generally dominated numerically by women. Why? My boss once asked whether it's because the words of the songs (read excessive emotionalism) or the relevance of the messages or the packaging/environment is wrong? We asked this on one of our staff training modules why university Christian groups tend to be monocultures, particularly no "jocks"? So what is the purpose of the church? to become monocultures because that is what is most successful or to become reflections of the Kingdom of God?

information overload or obesity

...the average American on an average day, who consumes 34 gigabytes and 100,000 words of information Roger Bohn How Much Information? 2009 Report on American Consumers

I started reading a blogger running a site called infovegan. I was challenged because he was thinking about the consumption of information like food and calories. Rather than having the weight oppressing us, we are consumers of information and can become obese. The solution is a balanced diet. Many of his ideas originate from some research at the University of California by Roger Bohn (here). I think infovegan deductions are based on the fact that around 41 percent of information time is watching TV (including DVDs, recorded TV and real-time watching). But he fails to acknowledge that a higher percentage of the total time is spent on computer games.

Still there some interesting helpful suggestions which I been thinking in response to my internet time and bytes consumed which is vastly larger than the average American of the research. Infovegan suggests realizing we are choosing to eat and then looking at what we're consuming.

"...if you find yourself agreeing or disagreeing with the information you’re consuming, ... You’re consuming too much opinion and not enough fact. ... consumption ought to be limited such that you maintain a clear mind and the ability to form your own opinions."

So what do I need to do? Well I'm trying to read more books and some fiction. I'm trying to understand how I look at the world and respond to it. I'm trying to simplify in the pursuit of simplicity so I can be freer and more spontaneous because there is enough space to be so. I need to lose some weight in the information diet and eat more healthily.

In my prayers Wednesday morning I read this. It hit me deeply because Iris and I were talking about this exact area of our lives only 10 hours earlier.

It is so easy to get caught up
with the trappings of wealth in this life.
Grant, O Lord, that I may be free
from greed and selfishness.
Remind me that the best things in life are free.
Love, laughter, caring and sharing.