A - Z Challenge - E: Ebenezer

All day today I've had a line from that beautiful song, 'Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing'* going through my head: 

Here I raise my Ebenezer
Here by Thy great help I've come

My Ebenezer. Nothing to do with Scrooge, other than that Scrooge was named after one of these, I guess, but an intriguing word indeed. 

Let me point you towards 1 Samuel 7:12.

Then Samuel took a stone and set it up between Mizpah and Shen. He named it Ebenezer, saying, “Thus far the Lord has helped us.”

A stone named Ebenezer. 

Samuel set it up to mark God's faithfulness so far on his journey. 'Lord, you have helped us get this far'. In the song, the same. The writer of the song is saying that in some way he is marking this point in his journey, and thanking God that it is because of His help that they have reached this point. 

As I said at the beginning of this little A-Z expedition, I am setting the bar low on my blog posts - a lot has happened since the days I used to be a prolific poster and I've had numerous false dawns where I've intended to get back into it and failed. So, nothing earth shattering happening here, if you happen to be reading. 

No profound conclusions or inspiring reflection. 

Just this: I wonder whether this blog post, eleven years since I started writing, is a kind of Ebenezer for me. 

I am still here, I am still following Jesus, I am still trying to communicate the wonder, awe and comfort that He gives to me. 

I could neither have begun this journey, continued to walk it, nor found the path again all the times I've wandered from it, without his help. 

A metaphor for life, indeed. 

The song goes on: 

And I hope by Thy good pleasure
Safely to arrive at home

Amen, Lord. 

And Just like Samuel, I am saying to anyone who is listening: If He's brought me safe this far, I think He'll bring me home.  

'Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing' by Robert Robinson, 1758. Words and music in the public domain. 

Collar up, chin down

Alright, God.

So there's a howling gale blowing outside. It's whistling around the corner of the house and the silver birch is bending, bending and whipping its bare branches back and forward.

The sun is shining for now but the sky is that purply black that says rain is on its way. And when it comes it'll be heavy. Combined with the wind, that means the rain will be horizontal right about the time I'm leaving to collect my girls from school. 

Oh joy.

Today is one of those days that an umbrella is no good whatsoever. They haven't invented a brolly that will deal with the high-wind-and-precipitation combo. Certainly not the handbag size miraculously opening out one like mine that wobbles about on a stick that's hard to hold and flips inside out at the drop of a hat. 

Great. 

There are days when all I can do is pull my collar up a bit higher, tuck my chin a bit lower and resign myself that I will be the woman with no hairstyle by the time I arrive at the playground. Even more so than usual, that is. Might even plug in a set of earphones and crank up the volume on a bit of something inspiring as I trudge along. 

I have days like this. Sometimes life feels like this on days where the sun shines, the air is still and the sky a peaceable blue. Sometimes it's a collar up/chin down day even then. 

I've been having a few of them lately. To the outside observer there's nothing particularly wrong; only the usual low-key day-to-day stuff like aches and pains, over-thinking and not enough sleep, a handful of children's problems ranging from mysterious repetitive throat clearing and rashes to playground friendship issues and then there's demise of my favourite pair of boots. Sigh. 

Still, nothing earth-shattering. All in a day's work. 

So that's not it. 

Something in my head says it's hard at the moment, that's what it is. I'm just collar up/chin down instead of chin up and defences down. I'm trudging rather than dancing. My hands are holding my coat close rather than swinging by my sides. 

So here it is. When the wind is whistling around my ears in a little while, this is what I'm hanging on to:

'Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? Yet not one of them is forgotten by God.' 

Luke 12:6

I am not forgotten. When life is grim and bleak and it all comes crashing down, you are there. 

When life is wonderful and exhilarating, you are there. 

And when life is humdrum and monotonous and I feel like a hamster on a wheel, there you are still. 

"'For I know the plans I have for you', declares the Lord, 'Plans to prosper you and not to harm you. Plans to give you hope and a future.'" 

Jeremiah 29:11

There is a Plan. Whether I sense it or not, whether I'm on board or not, whether I have the energy or not, there is a Plan which is best for me, which is what you want for my life.

'For great is your love, reaching to the heavens; your faithfulness reaches to the skies.' 

Psalm 57:10

I am loved. Even when I feel all alone and solitary, I am loved. When I feel unlovable, I am loved. When I bow my head because I don't want to meet anyone's eye, I am loved. When those skies are full of rain, my hair is plastered to my face and my nose is running, I am loved. When I'm the size of a house in my winter coat and jumpers and I know the diet must start before spring, I am loved. 

'I, the Lord, have called you in righteousness; I will take hold of your hand.' 

Isaiah 42:6

You think I'm great. Even when I'm more inclined to dwell on all that I'm not than all that I am, you see all that I could be. You think I'm worth working on. You will take hold of my hand and lead me. 

'...being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.' 

Philippians 1:6

You are at work. I have come a long way, following you. There is a way to go, but you have promised to carry on changing me into the person you want me to be.

'Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go.' 

Joshua 1:9

You will never leave me. When my hands are thrust in my pockets, and my head down against the wind and rain, eyes focused only on putting one foot in front of the other, you are there, right with me, waiting for me to lift my eyes to you. 

You are the God of all weathers. The God who calmed the storm, the God of the still, small voice. You are in the rain and the wind and the sunshine. The rainbow and the thunder. You walk with me on the school run as I bend into the gale and you smile when a small hand slips into mine and asks if there's any chance of nipping to the sweet shop. 

I'm walking with you, Lord. 

Collar up and chin down, maybe, but my heart is whole, for you're holding it in your hands. 

There's no safer place.




Picture used:
kr015118_034.JPG by Krosseel
From Morguefile.com withpermission

Pink cheeks and shifting shadows

So here's the verse for the day.

'Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.' (New International Version)
James 1:17

Every good gift is a gift from you, my God. 

Even on a day which started perishing cold because the boiler took a morning off, I am surrounded by presents from you.

Evidence of your love is everywhere. I miss so much more than I notice, I am sure, but today I have been aware of your presence.

• Waking a sleepy daughter this morning, only the top of her head visible from under the duvet. 'Mummy, you smell nice. You smell sweet, like flowers and ice cream.' 
• Ice crystals on the metal of the gate at the side of the house. 
• Foxes in the garden before school, playing in the snow, unafraid.
• The first miniature daffodil bud on a pot of bulbs given to me by a friend who knew that I needed a little piece of spring in my kitchen. 
• Small children bundled up in hats and scarves and mittens and ski-suits so puffy that they can't bend in the middle. Wellies so tiny that the feet inside can barely be walking.
• Pink cheeks and holding hands tightly on the icy pavements. 
• Another daughter, on the way to school, 'Mummy, when can we get the paddling pool out?' and we laughed. 
• Bright berries in a world of white.
• A fieldfare in the garden this morning for more than an hour eating his way hungrily through the rotten orange apples still on the trees. Beautiful bird. 

You give gifts for the sheer delight in giving; in seeing your children delighted. You shower us with blessings that we don't even notice. You leave us love-notes to remind and reassure us. 

Thankyou.

The Father of heavenly lights. 

The source of all light. The author of light. Creator of the sun and the stars. Origin of all that is good. Banisher of darkness. 

The dark is only the absence of light, and where you are, there can be no dark. no shadow. Black is an absence of colour, and you are the source of colour. 

You are the rainbow, the blue of the sky and the green in the chlorophyll. 

You are the red of the rose and the yellow of the corn, the purple of the thundercloud and the silver of the spray of the sea. 

You are the sunrise and the sunset, the eclipse and the full moon.

You are the blanket of snow making the mundane beautiful. 

Oh, God. 

You are present everywhere; you are the Presence of light and colour, where darkness is the absence. When you arrive, everything is illuminated, darkness is banished. Dark and light cannot co-exist, and you will always prevail.

You do not change like shifting shadows...

Shifting shadows. I'm sitting underneath a tree at the height of summer, grass thick and soft and lush. There's a feat of imagination. It's -4 degrees outside, snow is still lying thick on the windowsill, the roads are treacherous and I'm here wearing three jumpers and a throw around my shoulders, hunched over the steam from my coffee. 

Anyway, where was I? 

Ah yes. Under a tree on a hot day. In the shade, lying back looking at the deep blue of the sky through the green leaves, the sound of a gentle breeze stirring the branches. The light is dappled, shadows of the countless leaves dancing and flickering. Ever-changing. Nothing the same from one moment to the next. Shifting shadows, impossible to pin down and capture. 

Not like you. You are constant. You are steady. You are eternal. 

So much in life is like shifting shadows. So much that I think is secure is really just momentary light through leaves. 

• I lean on people and they are bound to let me down, because they are human too. 
• I lean on things, only to find them eroded, destroyed, unstable, stolen. 
• I find comfort in food, only to find that the reassurance I was looking for is too elusive and I am more damaged than ever. 
• I try to build myself up with roles that I play; committees I sit on, rotas, jobs - but then I miss a meeting because of illness and I find that nobody is indispensable after all. 
• I retreat under the bedclothes and go to sleep to escape my anxieties, but I wake up again, and they are unresolved. 

Nothing is safe, but you. Nothing constant, but you. Nothing eternal, unshifting, solid, reliable, dependable. Nothing heals, but you.

Older translations of the Bible say, '...there is no shadow of turning with thee.' (King James Version) 

I'm not sure why, but this makes me think of a huge ocean liner slowly changing course so that the sun behind it slowly casts a different shadow on the waves of the sea as the boat moves round. You don't change course. You know the way - the only way. There will be no re-plotting of co-ordinates and reversing of the propellors with you. 

Alternatively it could mean that there is no suggestion of turning; that there is not even an illusion of change. You never give the impression that you might. You are unshifting, constant.

You do not change. Everything else does - I just have to look in the mirror to see that everything changes. The whole of life is simply a montage of shifting shadows, but you are the Sun. The world might spin, slowly alternating who feels the warmth of the sun, but you shine without stopping. Where the sun shines, things that are frozen melt.

Teach me to depend on you, Lord Jesus, and not cast about for things down here to prop me up. Not to look for meaning or satisfaction from any other source than you. To fix my eyes on what is steady, not shifting.

When I try to balance I need to focus on something that doesn't move, something unwavering. That's you. When I try to steady myself by gazing at something that wobbles, I fall over.

Thankyou for the gifts. For the beauty and whimsy and humour and majesty. For the little things and the big things. For health and family and laughter and snowflakes. 

Great is thy faithfulness, O God my Father

There is no shadow of turning with Thee

Though changest not, Thy compassions they fail not

As Thou hast been, though forever shalt be.

Amen. 

Lyrics: Thomas Obediah Chisholm (1866 -1960)

Music: William Marion Runyan (1870 - 1957)

How's that for a couple of good middle names? 

Making a habit of it

Lord, they say it takes three weeks to make a habit. 

In other places, they say two weeks, or a month, but you get my drift. 

I am a creature of habit. I like routine, predictability, planning. If something comes at me from the side, unexpectedly, I fibrillate until I can get myself back into my groove. I think, I write lists, I plan. I timetable. I want to get it right. Perfectionism? Control Freakery?  

Possibly.

But anyway. I am meeting with you in the mornings. I've been talking about it for a long long time and flatly refused to make the effort on more than one occasion. I've felt convicted to set up a morning time with you and I've ignored the feeling. Me? Get up earlier? Yeah, right. 

But I have started setting the alarm a bit earlier - not much, but a bit - and pressing snooze a bit less. Last week when I needed to get up earlier for a school trip I set my alarm the corresponding bit earlier to include you too. 

I'd have missed all this

I don't want congratulations (though if you feel like smiling, I'd like that). 

I am enjoying it. I've noticed that my day goes better when I do this. I am nicer to the children (and since I am most definitely not a morning person, every little helps) and I feel more stable as I go into the day. Calmer. I can tell a definite difference when my morning check-in gets cancelled or eroded. 

This is a Good Thing. The penny has finally dropped. Thankyou, Lord. 

So I want to ask for your help, because despite my love of the routine, my track record at maintaining long-term plans is not very good. I've lost lots of weight three times in my life and three times has it found me again. I've started exercise regimes that include three hours of swimming a week, kept it up for a year - note way past the three-week-habit mark - and then stopped. In the past half-term I was cheerfully walking Elizabeth to school every morning, enjoying the chats, the scenery, the fresh air and the Good For Me feeling, and then suddenly the weather worsens, the routine changes, a meteorite hits and I am nipping her there in the car. 

I can't seem to make a new habit part of my life. I can keep it up for quite a while (alright, not the school-morning jog) but completely assimilating it seems beyond me. I don't want it to happen this time. I want this to be a keeper. 

So help me. I know that I need you in my head before anyone or anything has a chance to settle down in there. I know that the first thing to get into my mind in a morning sort of sets the scene. Not that anything's irreversible, but I know the value of the Word of the Lord in my head as opposed to a quick check on Facebook (risky; who knows what I might find) or (far worse) a check of the day's news headlines (chance of a positive start to the day after that? Nil.)

Make this a habit that lasts a lifetime. You know, early morning isn't always bad, and that's been a bit of a revelation to me. I've seen some sunrises that I'd have missed if I'd gone for the snooze button just one more time, let alone four more times. I've relished the quiet of the house before the explosive arrival of my daughters on more than one occasion and even with my sleep-bleary eyes I can smile a little smile that they are still asleep and I am awake. One day I might try and creep downstairs for a coffee to make my early morning snuggle with you just complete, but I risk waking them up and so that's just too much to hope for at the moment. 

But back the point. 

Wanted to thank you. For not giving up on me and for giving me the gift of a new discovery after all these years of thinking that I knew best. I don't, you know. 

You do. 

So I have my journal, and my little book of devotions, and when the wifi works I have some email thoughts for the day. Most mornings, however, I find that I write, 'Morning, Lord' and then I pause. I just like being with you. I run my day through my mind and ask that you come with me in the things that I have to do. I read your word and sometimes you read it to me. Sometimes I write loads, sometimes barely anything after, 'Morning, Lord' but you never let me down. 

You are always there waiting. 

And I'm always glad that I came. 

What a faithful God have I

Lord, I know you made this day like all the others, and here am I telling you that I'm not as keen on this  one as I am on some of your other masterpieces. 

This one is dark, dreary, wet and cold. Everyone is depressed. I've had text messages from people who are down in the mouth today and I'm not immediately coming up with encouraging, upbeat things to text back. 

I wanted to stay in bed today. I put the alarm on snooze three times. I could hear rain heavy on the roof and I could see that it was dark outside. The children were still asleep and I maintain after all these years of trying to get the children to sleep and stay asleep, to wake them in the morning is against nature. I was warm and comfy in my little duvet-nest. 

But no. Not to be.

Rainy day.

I've been reading about positive thinking, recently. Not the self-help mantra type positive thinking, but the need that I have to fill my mind with something positive first thing in a morning. It makes a difference. I used to check the news headlines on my phone app but came out of that more often than not worried and miserable about the state of the country and the world. I used to check my email - but that's an emotional lucky dip and more often than not my mind just started making 'To Do' lists before my eyes had even properly focused. I used to post on Facebook each morning but realised two things:  my first-thing-in-the-morning posts were never among the most positive and upbeat status reports and by writing them I just solidified my own grumpy feelings and was therefore hardly likely to encourage or uplift anyone else.

Now and again, on a particularly tired and disgruntled morning one of these posts still slips through the net, I have to confess. 

I don't want the tone of my day to be set before I even put a foot out of bed. I don't want to stand in the shower with my eyes still shut thinking about who's hurt who, who's in prison for violence or fraud, who's fighting about what. I don't want to brush my teeth gazing in the mirror at the person who just reinforced her negative outlook by posting it on social networking sites for everyone to comment about. 

'Today's going to be a bad day.'

I'm thinking that's probably a self-fulfilling prophecy.

'Please can I stay in bed?' 

Just the same. I don't want to engage with today, no matter what wonderful things you have planned for me. I don't trust you to bless me today. I'd rather stay here with my head under the covers and avoid today completely.

Hmm.

So I've been thinking about what I put in my head in those first few minutes as I'm waking up.  War and murder and crime and recession (BBC headlines)? No. Dissatisfaction and complaining and self pity (first-thing-in-the-morning Facebook status)?  Nope. Even if there is occasionally a sort of strange satisfaction in having a moan. 

I want you. 

First thing in a morning I want the tone of my day to be set by you. 

I want to stand in the shower with my eyes closed and your words in my head. I want to look in the mirror at a woman who has already had a chat with the Creator of the Universe (who happens to be her friend) even though the toast isn't even on for breakfast yet. I want to be a woman who responds to the children with a smile and an even tone of voice rather than a snarl and a shout when they crash through the bedroom door in the middle of some squabble or other; and I know - I know - that I am completely one hundred percent unable to be that woman unless I've met with you first thing. 

Today I didn't feel like waking up. I didn't want to get up. I didn't want to pull back the curtains and let in the faint and watery daylight. I didn't want to haul myself up to sitting and reach for my journal. You helped me, and I did. 

Ok, if I'm honest, I had a moan. A little one, as time was moving on, but I told you that I didn't like the look of this day too much, thank you and sorry about that. I also told you about something I had on my mind in the night and an ongoing thing that's been worrying me. There's a problem that I have that I thought was sorted out and now I'm no longer sure that it is. I told you about it. Again. 

Listen, God, I tried. I said: 

'This is the day that you have made. I will rejoice and be glad in it.'  I will. I-will-I-will-I-will. 

Psalm 118:24

I got in the shower and turned the water up hot. 

On the way to school, Elizabeth was a delight. She wants to own a sweetshop when she grows up and she was talking about which sweets she'd have, and what the shop would be called. There's going to be an ice cream stall outside, apparently. It's going to be lovely. She skipped in and out of puddles under her Winne-the-Pooh umbrella and she laughed and her little face was lit up as she dreamed about sweets and independence and ice cream and painted shop signs with her name on. The rainy walk to school wasn't bad at all. After I dropped Lizzie at the gates I put some music on and selected a random track from a random playlist. As I tucked the second earpiece in place I heard your voice. It was a little word from you. 

'What a faithful God have I; what a faithful God
What a faithful God have I; faithful in every way'

(What a Faithful God, Robert Critchley, 1989 Thankyou Music) 

You are faithful. You promise; you deliver. You say, 'I'll take care of it'; you do. The thing I thought was sorted is still sorted. You said you would sort it and you will. It's just that your timing is not like mine. It's in your hands. I keep taking it back from you and thinking that it's down to me, or to someone else, but no, it's in your hands. 

'Lord, I come before your throne of grace
I find rest in your presence, and fullness of joy...'

I did. I only had a few minutes but I came, just as I was, tired and reluctant, but you are endlessly patient and when I give you such a little, you give me back so much. Rest for my anxious heart and the joy of my little girl splashing in the puddles on a morning when there didn't seem to be much to be joyful about. 

I need to remember this. I need to make time to come before your throne of grace even when I have to drag myself there because the voices in my head are saying 'press snooze again. Go on, just one more time...' and 'you can't be bothered today, God won't mind...' No, the chances are that you won't mind. You don't hold it against me when I don't drop in for a few days. It's me that misses out. It's my day that is the worse for it. The days when I miss my five minutes with you are the days that I miss the splashes of silver in the muddy puddles and the pink-cheeked joy of the seven year old jumping in them. I miss the messages and the gifts that are just for me. It's me that doesn't hear the voice of my God, and I don't hear because I'm not listening.

'Lord of mercy you have heard my cryThrough the storm, you're the beaconMy song in the nightIn the shelter of your wings hear my heart's replySinging what a faithful God have I'

You heard me. You heard what I said and what I didn't say. You can hear my heart. 

You're right there when it's raining as you are when it's sunny. You're there as we slip into Autumn and  my heart is heavy because I hate the dark and the dank and the cold. This is the day you made; my job is to be glad in it. 

When I'm worried that I can't see what the future holds, you are the beacon. All is in darkness but you alone shine. You're all there is to see; I just need to keep my eyes fixed on you. 

When I wake in the night and I wonder what's going on, when I get anxious about losing control, being uncertain and fearful, you are my song. What a faithful God have I? He is faithful in every way. Don't doubt him. 

Ah, Lord. In the shelter of your wings. Yes, please. If I were tucked under your wings I would be warm and dry and safe. Held tight against your body I can feel your warmth and hear your heartbeat. Where you go, I go. I am protected - I am in the only safe place. I am loved. I am in the shelter of your wings.

And my heart does indeed sing to you, on this dark, dismal day, as I sit here with cold fingers and half a cold cup of coffee:

'What a faithful God have I; what a faithful God
What a faithful God have I; faithful in every way'.

Amen. Ain't that the truth. 

After your own heart

Hello, God.

I've found new way of looking at things. 

Well, it might not be new for you, for obvious reasons, and indeed it might not be new for people wiser than I, but I was reading something and this stood out. I carried on reading but my eye came back to this sentence.

'And real prayer isn't about changing God's mind but about finding God's heart - and letting His heart change my mind.'

Ann Voskamp, A Holy Experience (http://www.aholyexperience.com)

How often do I pray to try and get you to do something for me? How often do I somehow assume that you're reluctant to give me what I want; indeed more likely to be planning the polar opposite, and so somehow by begging and persuading, I might change your mind? 

Why do I think of you like that? I know you are patient and loving and generous and compassionate. Slow to anger and abounding in love and all that. I know that you are my Father who loves to give me good gifts. I know that because I know you. So why do I find myself talking to you this way?

Are you up there?

Prayer. I am not very good at it. 

I realise that my prayers are mostly arrow prayers. Mostly 'Lord, help so-and-so, will you?' Or even shorter still, ''HE-ELP!' when I'm in a corner or at the end of my tether, when Katy's having a tantrum or Lizzie's in a sulk and I can feel my temper mounting. 

I read of the great characters in Christian history from the Bible to modern times who wrestle in prayer for days and nights on the trot. St Paul tells us to pray continually.

I pray sporadically. I often fall asleep before I get to 'Amen'. I often drift off into my own thoughts and never come back. I often put it off all together and read a book instead. 

So praying until I know you so well that I find your heart? Praying myself in tune with you? Praying until your will becomes mine?  I'm miles away. 

I think I understand this concept, though. I can see that the more time I spend with you, the more you rub off on me. A bit like a childhood friend that I hung around with - after a while I adopted some of their mannerisms and turns of phrase. The things they liked I began to like and their views became mine. Only when I hang around a lot with you then I become a better person, not just a different one. 

It also makes me wonder why I always think you're going to ask me to do something that I don't want to do. Why I often think that if something means a lot to me, then you're likely to ask me to give it up. This makes no sense to me even as I do it. I know you for who you are. I know you've made me as I am for a reason and although I am still a work in progress you aren't going to alter the very me-ness of me, because you don't make mistakes. The essence of me is what you made it, quite deliberately, and so my deepest longings and hopes and dreams are God-given. Why would I assume that you set me up only to thwart me?

Forgive me, Father, for this view of you. Forgive me when I infect others with this way of thinking about you. I'm sorry that I sell you so short. 

You are my loving Father and you want what is best for me. The more I understand the way that you think, the more I will agree with your assessment of a situation. The more in tune we are, the more I will be asking for the things you want to give me. The more like you I am, the better. 

I do want to know your heart, God. I do want to be faithful in prayer. I know very well that prayer changes things, so why don't I do more of it?  I know that exercise makes me healthy, but I don't do much of that either, come to think of it. Laziness?  Don't like that idea much. Might be uncomfortably close to the truth.

Lord, I could finish here by promising to spend an hour a day on my knees. Or (as I have done, to my shame, many times before) by swearing that I intend to find a time daily or weekly where I will find a quiet ten minutes to read my Bible and spend time with you. I've said that I will and then I haven't. I'm still out there in the wilderness when it comes to finding this promised land. 

So what shall I say? Help me to make a step towards it. Give me an idea where I should start. How about that?  

'The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective.'

James 5:16

Baby steps. Prayer changes things. 

I want to be a woman after your own heart.

New every morning

Goodnight, God.

I'm so tired. So tired that I'm all mixed up. I can't think straight. 

Last night I wanted to get an early night because I was tired and by bedtime I'd developed a muscle spasm in the big muscles of my neck that I couldn't lie down. For hours I tried different constellations of pillows and painkillers and kept getting up to re-warm my wheaty so that I could sort of poke it in between my shoulder and my neck but the result was a terrible night. Coupled with a mini Katy-tantrum at about 5.50am I'm sure that you could tell that today wasn't going to be a great one. 

I started it with a scowl. A stiff neck and a scowl. 

I feel as if I haven't done too badly in the circumstances, but you might have different ideas. This morning Mum and I took the children to get their feet measured and buy new shoes and Elizabeth ended up with some trainers that I think are awful. She, of course, loves them. Glitter, different colours, shiny bits...ick. Sigh. They were the only ones that fit. I wanted to stamp, but I didn't. We had lunch in a cafe and they barely touched their meals. We came home and I wanted half an hour's peace before we went to a party for one of Katy's classmates' fifth birthday. I didn't get it. Spent two hours in a packed soft-play place bouncing between Katy who was involved in the party and a whiny Lizzie, who wasn't. Refereed on the way home as they picked on each other in a tired and crabby sort of way and then delivered them through bath time and a bed time with many false starts (well, false finishes, actually - I kept thinking they were settled and they weren't) and I haven't shouted. Have I? No, I haven't shouted. 

I didn't actually shout. I felt like it. Well, maybe internally, a bit of shrieking. For those amongst us that could see in my head, (that's you, then) I don't suppose I acquitted myself that well, but at least I didn't demolish either of my children by bellowing at them. The odd snap, maybe... And I did do a bit of an angry dance after taking Katy back to bed for the fourth time, but it was out of anyone's line of sight. Except yours. 

Ah well. I think that maybe I'll settle for that. 

A quote for the day on my iPhone this morning:

'Because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed,

for his compassions never fail.

They are new every morning;

great is your faithfulness.'

Lamentations 3:22-23

Oh, God, thank you for that. New every morning. They need to be, because I crumple them up and throw them aside so often. I am saved, but so often I fail to find any joy in it. I know that you love me and want only good for me, and yet I turn away because in my creature-wisdom I think I see things more clearly than you. I know that I am never alone, and yet I complain that I can't feel you. 

CS Lewis said:

'Relying on God has to begin all over again every day as if nothing had yet been done.'

Doesn't it just. I trust you. I do. Then I don't. Then I try to but I don't manage it. Then at a moment of Spirit-led prayer or worship it all comes together for a nanosecond and I get a glimpse of how life might look if I did, actually, completely, let you take my troubles from me - and then it evaporates into a sticky slick of anxieties clutched in my sweaty little palm. 

When it comes down to it, what can I do, though? 

Who can I rely on, if not you?  I can't rely on me because I constantly disappoint myself. I can't even keep up to my own standards, let alone anyone else's. I let myself down. Who else? Who will take care of Katy?  The doctors? Well, maybe, but they tried twice last year and her tumours are back. Tomorrow we'll take her to a new hospital to see a new consultant and, who knows, make plans for a new operation or try a new treatment. Perhaps it will solve the problem, I don't know, but I'm wary and I'm scared and every fibre of my being resists entrusting my precious daughter to a doctor or an anaesthetist who doesn't care for her as I do. 

But you do. You love Katy more than I do. Not sure about that, but I read it in the Bible and so it must be true. Father, I'm relying on you. I'm going to have to. I'm going to put out the light in a minute and lie down and I'm going to try to leave it all with you. Try and open my tightly clenched hands and let you take the worries from me: my anxiety about getting up at the crack of dawn and getting us all out of the house in time. My worry that there's a forecast of snow for tomorrow and we're travelling to another city for a 9am appointment. My concerns about finding the place, getting there on time, the cost of train tickets, tram tickets, getting wet and cold on the way, finding somewhere for lunch, getting back in time to prepare for visitors over Easter. 

All of which are satellite worries around the main one, which is all about what is wrong with my beautiful daughter and what can be done about it? Will it hurt her? Will she get better? Will she be frightened? 

How strong do I have to be?

'Because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed,

for his compassions never fail.

They are new every morning;

great is your faithfulness.'

Amen. Your compassions are new every morning.  I'm going to be needing tomorrow morning's, Lord. And if tonight is anything like most nights for the last three weeks my doubts and fears and panics start to creep back overnight so I'll need to rely on you all over again in the morning.

Don't let me be consumed, my God. I'm frightened for my little girl and I'm frightened for me. 

Right, I'm needing sleep. 

Come with us tomorrow. Give the doctor wisdom and compassion and gentleness, please. 

Let's get this thing over with, can we, this time?

A kind of magic

Afternoon, Lord.

Today has been a bit of a lukewarm sort of day. I have not been firing on all cylinders, because of something that happened last night.  Actually it wasn't last night, it was about 3 o'clock this morning. It was very weird and not something I'd like to happen that often, if you don't mind. 

About 2am I woke up and I wasn't surprised as round these parts we've been having gales and heavy rain and the noise of the weather outside was dramatic. The sort of night where you lie in bed and wonder what damage might be happening in the garden or if the roof tiles and chimney are stuck on properly. (Well, I don't suppose you do, but we mortals have these concerns).

So I was awake and I glanced at the clock only to find that it wasn't there. Well, it was still there but I couldn't see it because its digital display had gone. More groping about revealed no bedroom light, no lamps, no electricity. As I pondered this I noticed that I could hear music, and assumed that it was one of our neighbours who has a tendency to play his CDs too loudly. I have no idea why but I decided to go out onto the landing and it was then that I realised that the music wasn't coming from outside the house, but inside, somewhere. My first thought was that it was the children (how were they playing music with no electricity?) but as I walked past their bedrooms it was clear that the sound was coming from downstairs. 

Using the light from my phone to navigate (despite having a torch in the bedroom drawer) I went downstairs in the dark, trying lamps and light switches as I went. The music was coming from the kitchen, and it was loud. No wonder I could hear it upstairs. My iPod was playing. To be specific, it was playing Queen's 'It's a Kind of Magic' and it was playing it quite loudly. No other electricity was working, but the iPod, on it's dock, was playing away in the dark in a deserted kitchen and in a particularly spooky sort of way.

As you know, Lord, because you made me this way, adrenalin was coursing round my body at that point as I stood in my pyjamas in the dark in a house where everyone should have been asleep. 

Was this the work of a burglar who'd seen too many films and was luring me downstairs? Why would he play the iPod rather than nick it?  Why on earth would music be playing in the middle of the night? I tried the doors but they were locked. Windows closed. Valuables seemed where they belonged. Heart beating like crazy.

I whipped the iPod off it's stand and silenced it and then looked around. The digital display on the cooker and microwave were flashing, so the electricity had been off and come back on again. Further investigation in the cupboard under the stairs revealed that a switch in the fuse board had tripped. I flipped it back on and the second frightening moment was when the whole house leapt back into life. The computer beeped, the printer sort of revved up and did some exercises, the DVD player beeped and blinked, the phones all chippered and even the shower made some strange noises. Every room seemed to be beeping or flashing or whirring. I scurried back to bed. 

Not going back to sleep for a while after that. 

I might as well have downed a couple of espressos because I was so wide awake after that little adventure. I worked out that the electricity must have gone off for a while, and then come back with such a rush or a spike or something that it tripped the fuse for part of the house. The surge back on must have somehow switched on the iPod even though the iPod dock was still part of the house that was out of electricity.

'It's a kind of magic'. Ha! The ghostly voice of Freddie Mercury uninvited in my kitchen in the small hours was telling me it was magic. It might not have been magic, but it was certainly very odd. 

Electricity is a bit magical, when you think about it. My husband has a Masters degree in Electronics, among his many and varied qualifications, and so he understands it much better than I. I like to turn on the kettle and have it boil water for my coffee, or turn on the bedside light when I want to see what I'm doing, or switch on the music - when I want it to play, rarely at 2am - and I'm happy not really to grasp how and why it does what it does. He understood what had happened straight away when I told him. But to me, it was strange indeed. 

I am sure that there's a lesson to be learned here somewhere. Maybe about the unpredictability and power of electricity and a parallel with your good self? I accept that the lights come on when I flick a switch and grumble when they don't, without needing to know why or how. Maybe I should stop asking you for so many answers about what you do and don't do? We depend on you, even more than we do on the electricity.  You, like the lecky, are always there humming along in the background. Only occasionally do you intervene, and then, like electricity, you tend to get our full attention. 

However, if you ever stopped being or went offline for a while I suspect more would happen than a few flashing lights and beeping gadgets. I think we all might cease to exist. 

But maybe that's an analogy too far, is it? After all, many people manage quite well without electricity, and in the history of the world nobody has managed that well without you.

So, to summarise.

Thankyou for being there last night/this morning.

Thankyou for accompanying me downstairs when I'm not a great fan of the dark. 

Thankyou that my unsettling experience was really nothing; there was no actual danger even though my body took a while to accept that. 

Thankyou that you're always there to be called upon for help and moral support. For your faithfulness in life's little adventures.

Thankyou for the strange and complex things that happen in our bodies at times like this to enable us to do things even when we're afraid. 

So that was how me and you came to have a little chat at 3am. Or actually a number of little chats between 2am and 4.30am. It was a good job we did, to be honest, because at 7am when the alarm went off I was so tired I was pretty much beyond all coherent conversation. 

An early night tonight, I think. 

A pause in preparations

God, This is not going to have a Christmas theme. 

It's a pause in the endless stream of festive preparations because I've just had a thought.  

It's on the subject of worry, and not worrying, and things being out of my control. As you know, this is s subject very close to my heart. 

The other day we had some friends coming to visit and I wanted everything to be perfect as we hadn't seen them for a long time. I had a lengthy list of things to do that had to be fitted into the usual tight programme of things that need doing and as the date of the visit got closer it became apparent that the house was not going to be particularly tidy, or particularly well-dusted for that matter. I got tired and dispirited as my perfectionist nature kicked in with a vengeance, and then I got to the point where I thought, 'Oh bother it.' (or words to that effect) and decided that I wasn't going to worry about details any more. If the house wasn't immaculate (and whose is, with two small children and an under-developed sense of house-pride?) then it didn't matter all that much. 

Hard to dust, these decs.

As it turned out, it didn't matter all that much. Of course, as they left the conversation subject matter in the car down the motorway might have been about nothing else but the dust on the DVD player or the smudges of soap in the downstairs cloakroom sink after Katy went on a squirting-spree, but as far as I know, it wasn't.  And we've spoken to them since so I know that no-one contracted any sort of dire bug or infectious complaint as a result of an unsterile environment. 

It was just nice to see them. And they us, I assume. 

This is a silly example. But the thing is - there are times when I find that I can shelve an anxiety. I sort of give up on it. It times out. 

Going away, for instance. It's just occurred to me that sometimes when I go on holiday, or after a deadline has passed and I realise I can't change things, I stop worrying about them.  I remember more than once being on a plane or a ship going somewhere on holiday and talking about an anxious situation at home and because I was going to be miles away and couldn't get back easily or quickly I concluded that there was no point in worrying because I was incapable of remedying the situation. 

And I didn't worry.

Of course, as you probably remember, that situation (like so many) was one that I never did have any control over; my feeling that I did was an illusion, no matter what country I was in. I never could have done anything about it so to relinquish a control I never had was just common sense. Just a shame I didn't do it earlier. 

It might sound stupid for this to be a revelation to me but it's just occurred to me how wonderful it would be if I could do this all the time, without the need for airline or cruise tickets or indeed reaching the end of my tether. How much more efficient and emotional energy-saving if I could skip to the end bit.

There are so many situations in my life that are out of my control; but it doesn't stop me from spending ages worrying about them and turning them over in my mind and discussing them with friends and yet - and yet - when I eventually, finally, at long last reach the conclusion that there's nothing I can do, I can leave them alone. In fact, you are the only one who has control; the only one who CAN do something, and so I should leave them with you in the first place.

I can't help it, so leave it with the one who can help it. How come I can do this when I'm miles away but not when I'm right here? How come I can get a decent sense of perspective about trivia like the necessity for a perfectly spotless house when I'm stressed and tired and end-of-tetherish and not save myself the worry? 

Remember in May this year when I'd just been referred to the breast clinic with a worrying breast lump?  I thought I had cancer.  I was so sure that I couldn't possibly enjoy the planned weekend at the seaside for my Mum's 80th birthday - but I did. With your help, certainly, but an impossible situation was made possible. I thought with anxiety like that hanging over me there was no way I could relax and skim stones and laugh and play and celebrate but I did. On the way back as I drove closer to home and appointments and Katy's surgery and everything I felt things closing in on me, but for a few days you helped me push them away. It was nothing short of a miracle.  (Music in the waves)

In fact I think that's what it was. You took the weight of it from me. 

You are faithful indeed. You understand my little quirks and you know how I think. I am quite sure that you want me to worry less and enjoy life more. It's been on my mind all year and I want to get to grips with it a little more. 

So, help me. When there's nothing I can do, help me do nothing - including worry. That's a new year resolution and a half. 

An audience of one

Are you listening, Lord? 

Are you watching? 

Are you there, right there, as I sit in front of my computer with my fingers on the keys?  Because I've started this and I don't know what I'll say next. 

It's something about who I am and why I am that I want to get off my chest today; it's a bit vague and I'm hoping it'll take shape as I talk because quite often if I waited until my ideas and questions had form I'd wait forever and I'd be sitting here intending to talk to you but never starting because I wasn't quite sure what I wanted to say. 

So here I am. Are you? 

You've said you are, and so you must be. 

Waiting. Watching. Listening. Waiting with a smile, encouraging. Expectant, because you know what I'm going to say before I do.

'Before a word is on my tongue, you, O Lord, you know it completely.'

Psalm 139:4

I spend my life trying to please people. I'm not sure why, but I worry an awful lot about what people think. Always have. To some extent I'm better than I used to be, but I'm still preoccupied by people's opinion of me too much of the time. 

I'm the sort of person who stops in the supermarket to exchange a spontaneous few words with an acquaintance and then plays the conversation back in my mind over and over wishing that I'd said something else, or not said anything; considering and fretting over what the other person thought, what impression they must have of me. After such an inconsequential exchange I am quite sure that the other person is thinking of nothing but the frozen food or their shopping list but I can go over it and over it. You'll know that it's not unusual for me to make a phone call and then put down the phone afterwards and stand where I am chewing a finger, deep in thought, and I'm rehashing it in my mind. Usually there's something I'd have done differently.

So you'll know what a minefield of potential gaffes the average day is for me. And it's not only what I say - it's how I look (what do people think?) and decisions I make (do people approve?) and how I act (how do people see me?). 

I know what it is that I want people to see when they look at me; I know what I would have people think, most of the time; it's just that I always fall short of my own idea of what I should be, and so I'm convinced that I fall short in other people's assessment of me as well. I'm constantly assessing and regretting and wincing at my perceived mistakes. Sometimes I'm crippled by it. Immobile. I assume that the thing people notice is the bit I'd hide if I could. I assume that other people are always assessing too and yet I know this isn't true. Most people are much more peaceful and accepting than I give them credit for. But then again...maybe they're not...

You see how I tie myself up in knots? 

Somebody said something to me the other day that has thrown all this into relief. 

I am playing to an audience of one. 

Of One. 

It doesn't matter what other people think. The only opinion that matters is yours,  Lord God. 

Of course, I have programming that needs to be undone I think; I seem to have become wired to assess and worry and this has given rise to self consciousness and diffidence and indecision. I almost never have confidence in my own decision making; if I decide something and immediately someone questions me I am invariably shaken. I wonder if I was right after all, should I perhaps have thought differently... and the process cycles once again. 

Why am I like this? I don't know. That's a whole other Thing. Maybe one day I'll luxuriate in someone's deconstruction and come out understanding myself in a whole new way; or maybe one day I'll just learn to let go of it and be transformed into a whole new person. Maybe I can climb the mountain to a higher level where the air is different and I can be freer. Who knows, but you? 

But I had a little breakthrough.

An audience of one. 

Recently I've had to make several decisions involving different people with different expectations of me. Each time I've been in the position where I couldn't please everyone. Each time I've agonised about it and worried about it and the truth is that there is only one opinion that really matters. I still have some tricky decisions coming up and I need to be sure that I am doing what pleases you. Not pleasing other people so that they will have a high opinion of me. Not pleasing other people so that I can gain a sense of self-worth because they depend on me. Not doing something so that I look good/busy/godly/committed/needed/competent/efficient/any other adjective I can insert to prop up my frail ego. What other people think is of dramatically lower importance than what you think.

'Am I now trying to win the approval of men, or of God? Or am I trying to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a servant of God.'

Galatians 1:10

An audience of one. 

Lord, that's easier said than done. I often feel obliged to do things - I find saying no very hard. I worry that people will be disappointed or disapproving. But I find that when I take on something for the wrong reasons it becomes stressful and oppressive and overwhelming; indeed I've just extricated myself very painfully from one commitment that has been nothing but anxiety from day one and I am still not sure why I said I'd do it in the first place, other than that people expected me to. Not good enough. 

It all comes down to being close to you. Walking close enough to hear your voice. Holding on tight enough so that I feel your presence. Stopping long enough to look and see the real picture. If I don't do that then I dash past knocking things flying and getting it wrong and having to go back and pick up the broken pieces. 

So I have lots of claims on my time. Since Katy has started school I have more time and I don't know where it's going. I'm busier than ever and the only, only thing I'm sure of is that you are waiting for me to dedicate some of that time to you. There are worthy things out there; enjoyable and less so, things that are productive and undoubtedly need doing - but I need to stop, wait and discern which of those things are for me because you want me to do them, and you have equipped me for them, and which I would do only because someone else wants me to do them. 

What do people think of me?

What do you think of me?

An audience of one.

I want you to approve of me. I want you to be pleased with me. I want to be less concerned with the opinion of others. I don't mean that I want to be careless of it - but not desperate for it. I just want to learn how to walk with confidence in the steps you have carved for me, secure in the knowledge that I am doing all I can to be your servant, and my significance comes from that. Not from the ideas that another person has of me. Of course I want to be thought of highly, and I should, because I carry the family name and I should look after it.  I mustn't pursue others' approval at all costs. 

'Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as though you were working for the Lord and not for his people. Remember that the Lord will give you as a reward what he has kept for his people. For Christ is the real Master you serve.'

Colossians 3:23,24

Amen. Help me to remember that, Lord. I keep forgetting. My need to get things right has sort of gone askew and I need to ask myself who is marking the scoresheet? Who says if it's right or not? Every person in my life thinks that I'm someone different; only you know me, all the sides of me. You know me inside out. Every strength, weakness, hope, dream, fear, insecurity and foible. Many people would not love me so much if they knew what you know.  People would reassess their opinion of me dramatically if they knew all that.

But you love me anyway. More than that - you delight in me. 

You accept me because you made me and the angels celebrate when I get something right that pleases you. With everyone around me I have to play a part - even with people that I love who love me. Only with you can I lay my whole being down and be assured of perfect love however badly I get it wrong. However many times I have to ask your forgiveness. Why would I close my eyes and walk past that wonder in pursuit of another human being's flawed opinion that isn't based on all the facts? 

You are my Father and I am your child and I want to light up your face with pleasure because your opinion of me is the one that matters. I want to remember at those moments when I could go one way or another that you are my real Master. I serve the God of the Universe. Please give me wisdom and discernment and integrity. And courage.

I am playing to an audience of one. 

One hundred: It's all for you

I don't know if you're counting, Lord God, but this is my hundredth post. You've listened to me whinge and whine and grumble and sing and dance and laugh a hundred times as I've been sitting at my computer. For me it's flown by - maybe now you'll tell me that it feels like the two hundredth! 

Still.

I thought I'd take this opportunity to give it back to you again. This has been my emotional outlet, a sounding board, a platform for getting things off my chest and a way of exploring what I really think, and what you really think. That perhaps should have been the other way round, but you know what I mean. But I suspect that it's changed into something else and I just want to check that it's ok, or get back on the right track. I love this blog. I love that I so often start out feeling one way, and end up feeling something completely different. So often I've started out angry and hurt and worried and finished up more peaceful, and that's entirely because of you. Sometimes you speak to me through what I write - sometimes I'm quite sure I don't give you a chance. I write and run.

On the first of January I said that I wanted you to sit with me as I did this, and I want to thank you that you have never left my side. I want to thank you that you're here now. I'm writing this waiting for dinner to cook and I know that you are here; you can smell the garlic and you can hear the pans bubbling and you can taste the wine. I know that you have your hand on my shoulder and that you care what I say. I know that it's only because of you that I am able to do this; indeed anything.

If at any point I have started to think that it's me that writes this, I give it back to you, Lord. I know that what I do I do through you, who gives me strength. I know that I have no inspiration, no way of understanding even the little things, no way of working things out unless your Holy Spirit shows me how. I know that I would have no faith to lean on or talk about or investigate if you had not given me this most precious of gifts. I know that I would not be able to express myself and share my ideas and worries and wonderings if you didn't enable me to do it.

I want to give you the glory, Lord. I don't want to be the one who writes the blog, I want to be the one who points to you and says, 'He does it.'  It's all for you, Lord Jesus. It's all for you.

Lord, forgive me for my vanity and my selfishness and my pride. Let me reflect your light and beauty so that people see me and see you. Let my words be your words. Guide me and teach me so that I can sit here and notice, and understand, and reflect, and worship. Give me wisdom so that I can write wise things. Give me perception so that I can notice. Give me discernment so I can tell the difference between your voice and the voice of my own ego. Give me faithfulness to write what is true. And again, give me wisdom so that I can recognise truth when I see it.

I'm asking you to show me the way forward, Lord. Show me if you want me to do something different or if this pleases you as I'm stumbling along. Show me when I get too self-conscious or too inward-looking. Show me when I'm going on too much. Give me the words, Lord.

I want to do what you want me to do.

So I'm off to see if there's another glass of wine in the bottle, Lord. I'm going to raise a glass to you, my Lord and my God and my Friend. And then I'm going to press 'publish' for the hundredth time.

Here's to you, Lord Jesus Christ. Thankyou for so much. May my little offering be pleasing to you.

Amen.