metamorphosis (2)

At the pottery studio, I prefer the wheel.

But there are other ways to shape the clay.  By a bank of windows looking out onto the parking lot, there is a slab roller (picture an old wringer-washer with just one roller bar on a table) for making flat sheets of clay for tiles or handbuilt items.  Just outside the studio, affixed to the wall at the edge of the showroom, is an extruder (imagine a sort of giant pasta- or playdough!- machine) for squishing out clay tubes of various shapes - smooth cylinders, long square boxes, star-shaped hollows, and more.  It looks kind of magical, really:  ball of clay in the top, pull down, tidy shape emerges at the bottom.

I never stopped to think about how the process affects the clay.

On the wheel, the clay is centered, bathed with water, and firmly but gently, slowly - often in three (or more) pulls - coaxed by fingers into a final shape.

Much different from being quickly forced from one shape to another by the strength of unyielding metal.

I'm thinking about the clay, now, feeling the forces of change on my heart.

"O Israel, can I not do to you as this potter has done to his clay? 

As the clay is in the potter's hand, so are you in my hand.

Jeremiah 18:6

Am I - will I be - malleable?

Months ago, a woman I trust told me that God is getting ready to shake up my friendships.  She didn't know that some of my friends were then planning moves, both into and out of my life, physically and emotionally.

Sometimes it feels like betrayal, this change, and sometimes like grace.  Sometimes both.  But always, there is pain.  More the extruder than the wheel, is this process.

I've never been a fan of change - at least not change initiated by another.  It's unsettling to me, like someone else pushing my rocking chair into motion, or a child swinging the hammock I'm resting on.

Maybe the liquidating stage of the chrysalis is over, now, and the formation of the butterfly is beginning ... I hope.  I hope there will be something to show for the squeezing of my heart.

No, not hope.  I trust.

"Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen."

Hebrews 11:1

So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, 
since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

2 Corinthians 4:18

weary & worn

{courtesy of Tenth Avenue North}

I’m tired, I’m worn;
My heart is heavy
From the work it takes
To keep on breathing.
I’ve made mistakes,
I’ve let my hope fail;
My soul feels crushed
By the weight of this world.

And I know that you can give me rest,
So I cry out with all that I have left:

Let me see redemption win!
Let me know the struggle ends;That you can mend a heart
That’s frail and torn!
I wanna know a song can rise
From the ashes of a broken life,
And all that’s dead inside can be reborn ...
Cause I’m worn ...

I know I need to lift my eyes up -
But I'm too weak;
Life just won’t let up.

And I know that you can give me rest,
So I cry out with all that I have left:

Let me see redemption win!
Let me know the struggle ends;That you can mend a heart
That’s frail and torn!
I wanna know a song can rise
From the ashes of a broken life,
And all that’s dead inside can be reborn ...
Cause I’m worn ...

My prayers are wearing thin ...
(Yeah, I’m worn)
Even before the day begins ...
(Yeah, I’m worn)
I’ve lost my will to fight ...
(I’m worn)
So, heaven come and flood my eyes!!

Let me see redemption win!
Let me know the struggle ends;That you can mend a heart
That’s frail and torn!
I wanna know a song can rise
From the ashes of a broken life,
And all that’s dead inside can be reborn ...
Cause all that’s dead inside will be reborn!

Though I’m worn,
Yeah I’m worn ...

metamorphosis

I am staring again at the chrysalis.

So dry.  So lifeless it hangs there.

No movement for days, weeks.  The first slick green fades, browns, withers a bit.  To all appearances:  dead.

You don't know, you just can't tell, until one morning, the blackest of them - the one we were sure wouldn't hatch anything but a wasp, if that - cracks open to show off velvety wings, brilliant with color, and a perfect black swallowtail flies away.

You just don't know, until that morning.

It all looks dead, hopeless, until that morning.

"...we are nothing, have nothing, can do nothing but sin." writes John Newton.

"And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns."  Philippians 1:6

Sometimes the work is being continued silently, in hidden ways and in hidden places.  Sometimes it all looks dead and lifeless.  And only He knows ...

...until the day when Christ Jesus returns ...   

... that's a long time to wait.

"Therefore lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees,"  Hebrews 12:12

"Moses' arms soon became so tired he could no longer hold them up. So Aaron and Hur found a stone for him to sit on. Then they stood on each side of Moses, holding up his hands. So his hands held steady until sunset."  Exodus 17:12

quiet waters

The Lord is my Shepherd:  I shall not want.

[Good morning, Lord.  I trust you with all my needs for this day ... ]

He makes me lie down in green pastures;

[ ... thank you for this rest on the floor for a few minutes while the children play outside, and my Farmer watches the needy one ... ]

he leads me beside quiet waters;

[ ... and for the quiet kitchen while I wash the dishes ... ]

he restores my soul;

[ ... it refreshes me to talk to you as I do my work today ... ]

he guides me in paths of righteousness for His Name's sake.

[ ... This course is changing my life, Lord.  Thank you for leading me to it, and changing me through it ... ]

Even though I walk through valleys of deepest darkness, I will fear no evil -

[ ... yesterday was tough, Lord.  Thank you for being faithful even when I was not ... ]

Your rod and Your staff are a comfort to me.

[ ... I didn't really like it when You showed me my sin yesterday, but it's a comfort to me that you love me enough to train me, and I will thank you for your discipline as a proof of your love; I hope I've been trained by it  ... "God disciplines us for our good, that we may share in his holiness.  No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful.  Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it." - Hebrews 12:10-11 ... ]

You prepare a table before me, in the very midst of my enemies!

[ ... Thank you for teaching me to "feast" on You, Lord.  When I look for it, I am seeing that you do prepare a feast for me - even in the thick of my daily responsibilities - even when they crowd so thickly about me that they look like "enemies"! ... ]

You anoint my head with oil.

[ ... You care for me, meeting even my smallest needs lavishly.  Thank you for the lavender sugar scrub that my friend made for me; I feel so pampered when I use it, and the oil in it is helping with my dry hands! ... ]

My cup overflows; surely goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life,

[ ... I know I haven't done anything to deserve your love.  But I'm glad that you are Love, and that you faithfully stay with me, showering me with your goodness, showing me mercy every day ... ]

and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

[ ... I can't wait for heaven, Lord, but I'm so glad that you dwell with me even now ...  "As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you.  Now remain in my love."  -Jesus, in John 15:9 ... "Anyone who loves me will obey my teaching.  My Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them." -Jesus, in John 14:23  ...  "And surely I am with you always, even unto the end of the age."  -Jesus, in Matthew 28:20 ... ]

                                                      Psalm 23

fuel up

Ever feel kind of empty this time of year?

I don't mean your stomach - if your house is like most, there are plenty of cookies around to take care of that.

I mean your soul.

It's Christmas:   "Joy to the world, peace on earth, goodwill toward men" and all that.  But if reading that leaves you feeling more hungry than happy, if it brings a bitter retort to your lips about
               family feuds
                        and low checkbook balances
                                 and ungrateful children
                                           and harried servicepeople
                                                    and other impediments to peace, joy, and love ....

.....then lay down your credit card and your grievances and hear this:


"Come,  all you who are thirsty, come to the waters;
                and you who have no money,
                                              come, buy and eat!
                       Come, buy wine and milk without money and without cost.


"Why spend money on what is not bread,
                             and your labor on what does not satisfy?


"Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good,
                             and your soul will delight in the richest of fare.
                                 Give ear and come to me;
                                      hear me, that your soul may live. ..."

Isaiah 55:1-3, 6

"whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst."  

John 4:14

"Come to me, 

all you who are weary and burdened, 

and I will give you rest.  

Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, 

for I am gentle and humble in heart, 

and you will find rest for your souls.  

For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."  

Matthew 11:28-30

git 'er done

I did it - that terribly little thing - and now I'm free!

                                                               [and so, perhaps, is a child]

fleshing out faith

I've always been a pragmatist.  An optimistic realist, I'd say.  Love the lofty, absolutely, but if it doesn't work, out it goes.

I would say I believed in prayer, believed in a healing God, a God who hears and loves to answer.  When I prayed and got an immediate answer, I was thrilled.  My faith, I thought, was bolstered and increased.

When I prayed and nothing happened, I'd chalk it up to some mistake I'd made in praying or in hearing God, and forget about it.

Rarely did I persevere in prayer.  Somehow I figured that if God wanted to grant my request, he'd do it right then. ...  I wonder how many answers I've missed seeing because I'd lost sight of the prayer I prayed?



Then the other day I got a shock.

I read in Hebrews chapter 11 about people who believed God and clung to faith even though they never saw fulfillment of the promises they were given.  I've read it before, of course, but it never really struck me:  they died, believing without seeing.  A whole lifetime of faith, passed down to children:  "What our God has said, He will surely do."

Nothing happened, but "nothing" didn't shake them.


They believed anyway.


Suddenly my faith looks tiny.  Microscopic.  Nonexistent?

I rejoice in stories of God's faithful provision for others, but when he asks me  to step out in faith and do something that makes me vulnerable and completely dependent on him .... I hesitate.  "Did I really hear you, God?  But that doesn't make sense.  What if ....?"

Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding.  In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will direct your path.  Proverbs 3:5-6

 I want to pray for boldness, courage, an increase of faith ... but I hear him ask me to trust him with what I have, now.  Trust him through my fear - obey without comprehension.

It's no more than what I ask of my own children.  And I, the far-from-perfect parent, frustrate myself with wondering why they disobey, why they hesitate, why they don't trust.

Oh, humanity!  Oh, the patient mercy of our God!

He is perfect.  He is loving.  He is trustworthy.  His plans for me are not to harm me, but to prosper me, to give me a future and a hope  (Jeremiah 29:11).

If I can't trust God, who can I trust?  

And if I trust no one but myself .... my record does not recommend itself, frankly.  Do I really want to forge my own way?  Depend on my own frailty for sustenance?  And if I don't trust him, why should he uphold me?

I am at an impasse.  Will I listen to fear?  


Or to love?


[and oh, if you only knew the tiny thing he asks of me ... !]

borrowed words, Part Five

Love these various thoughts on the creative process, reflection, and our interwoven-ness with each other.  That last reminds me of Deitrich Bonhoeffer's Life Together, which I need to re-read.  

I remember being impressed by his assertion that when the Bible refers to the Church as a body, united, it is not making reference to a goal, or an ideal, but to a present reality.  We affect one another, like it or not.  When you are injured, I bleed, for we are one, deny it though we may.  Our fight for independence from each other reminds me of the truism about unforgiveness:  it is like drinking poison and waiting for the other guy to die.  

I need you.  You need me.  There is no way around it.

The error of youth is to believe that intelligence is a substitute for experience, while the error of age is to believe that experience is a substitute for intelligence.  ~Slyman Bryson

The days are just packed. ~Bill Watterson (Calvin & Hobbes)

Please God, I will live my years with my face to the light, meeting the blows of fate with a joke, the contempt of men with a smile, the plague and mystery of the Unknown in my own heart and in the universe with cheerful faith, and death the best I can when I come to it.   ~Dr. Frank Crane

No artist has any other aim than to show his soul by his work.   ~Dr. Frank Crane

For the use of reason is to justify the obscure desires that move our conduct, impulses, passions, prejudices and follies, and also our fears. ~Joseph Conrad, Victory, 1914

The young man learned to reflect, which is a destructive process, a reckoning of the cost. It is not the clearsighted who lead the world. ~Joseph Conrad, Victory, 1914

I feel a most keen sense of self-laudation in that I am doing something the world is willing to pay for. ~Dr. Frank Crane

I wonder if it is written just which souls, of all the millions, shall touch ours? And each one whose personality impinges upon ours, even in the least, leaves some particles of flavor of himself upon us, and we upon him. ~Dr. Frank Crane

The Lord certainly shows His low opinion of money by the kind of folks He gives it to.   ~Dr. Frank Crane

Pessimism is the fine name for cowardice, vulgarity, self-pity, and failure. ~Dr. Frank Crane

The author lays his compelling mind upon the lives of thousands when he has written by the light of his own soul-burning. ~Dr. Frank Crane

It is sweet to mingle tears with tears; griefs, where they wound in solitude, wound more deeply. ~Seneca

cheerfully struggling on

I was encouraged today to let go the strange pleasure of self-pity, and reminded that we are all struggling - valiantly, it is hoped - to learn to love well, and to sing praise in the midst of trouble.

excerpted from A Long Obedience in the Same Direction by Eugene H. Peterson

"There are no easy tasks in the Christian way; there are only tasks which can be done faithfully or erratically, with joy or resentment.  And there is no room for any of us, pastors or grocers, accountants or engineers, typists or gardeners, physicians or teamsters, to speak in tones of self-pity of the terrible burdens of our work.

        .....

"There is nothing I am less good at than love.  I am far better in competition than in love.  I am far better at responding to my instincts and ambitions to get ahead and make my mark than I am at figuring out how to love another.  I am schooled and trained in acquisitive skills, in getting my own way.  And yet, I decide, every day, to set aside what I can do best and attempt what I do very clumsily - open myself to the frustrations and failures of loving, daring to believe that failing in love is better than succeeding in pride.

       .....

"I live on the edge of defeat all the time.  I have never done any one of those things to my (or anyone else's) satisfaction.  I live in the dragon's maw and at the flood's edge.

      .....

"....  Christians are not fatigued outcasts who carry righteousness as a burden in a world where the wicked flourish; Christians are people who sing "Blessed be the Lord, who has not given us as prey to their teeth!"  [Psalm 124]"

feet of clay

Just like that.

I've lived in four different states and three different countries.  I've attended two different colleges, been employed in twelve different workplaces, volunteered with two different mission groups, and studied the languages and cultures of three different nationalities.

I guess I thought all that exposure to diversity meant I was immune to prejudice.

But the other day, a buried prejudice found me out.  I didn't like the discovery, and I don't like telling you about it.  Even less do I like the fact that it was there to discover.  But there it was, anyway.

We live in "the country."  Not just among the cornfields, although that's true, too, but along a sort of cultural boundary-line not unlike the proverbial railroad track.  [in fact, the line is real - it's a school district division that involves definite stereotypes on both sides].  Drive ten minutes in one direction and you've got your pick of high-end named subdivisions with SUVs and manicured landscapes.  Drive ten minutes in the other direction and you'll find trailer parks, overgrown arborvitae, and pickup trucks.  Whole cultures, twenty minutes apart.

I never noticed how I had compartmentalized the two worlds.  You know: "yuppies" & "rednecks" (or -oh, shame!- that other phrase, "white trash", which we'd never say, but sometimes think, maybe.)

When the house down the street from us was up for rent, a man with two children moved in.  We took cookies and daffodils and introduced ourselves .... and kind of, well, labelled them.  As belonging to the world without the classy address.  As being different from us.  [intentional irony here:  being their neighbors, we obviously don't have a classy address, either]

I made assumptions about their lifestyle, which I thought I could tell by looking, and as if that weren't bad enough, I made assumptions about their values.  (remember that old mnemonic about "assume" making an "ass" out of "u" and "me"?)

This week I found out I was wrong.  They used to attend a local church of our denomination.  Since moving, they'd thought of visiting where we attend, but just hadn't made it yet.

Gulp.

Appearances are just that:  the way things appear to be.  Not reality.  I thought I had them pegged:  no common ground there.  That we found denominational common ground is not the point, but it serves to remind me that there would have been something, had I taken the time to look for it.

Humbled (humiliated is more like it), I want to double back and make up for lost time.

There is always common ground.  In all of us, under all the layers, beats a heart loved and given life by the same God who made us all, in His image.

".......................................I am a [person]. Hath
not a [person] eyes? hath not a [person] hands, organs,
dimensions, senses, affections, passions? fed with
the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject
to the same diseases, healed by the same means,
warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer, as
[any other person] is? If you prick us, do we not bleed?
if you tickle us, do we not laugh? if you poison
us, do we not die?.........................................."

[apologies to Shakespeare, Merchant of Venice, Act III, Scene I]