A - Z Challenge - K: Kettle

Hiya. 

How many times have I let my blog gather dust for a lengthy period of time and then announced a comeback that doesn't happen?  Several times I have declared that I'm back, announced that this time I'm here to stay, definitely, watch this space because great things will happen and... and... then, nothing. Fade back into oblivion until the next burst of enthusiasm. Or guilt. Or something.

Well, no more. Never let it be said that I am not a creature with the ability to learn. It might just take time.

So, yes, I am back, right now. 

Tomorrow? Who knows? 

The A-Z Challenge that I started has long finished, slept for a year and finished again, but I am choosing not to care. Not to focus on the yawning gaps, but just embrace the fact that I'm here now, not making any promises to anyone; not to God, not to my faithful reader, not to myself. 

I shall put the kettle on. As my teenage daughters might say, BRB.*

* Be Right Back. 😉

Confidence and perseverance

Hebrews 10:36-37

'So do not throw away your confidence; it will be richly rewarded. You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what he has promised.' 

Lord, this same passage has found me via four - no - five different routes over the past week. I'm starting to think you're trying to tell me something.

I catch on quick. 

I'm just not sure quite what to make of it, though.  I sometimes wish you'd be a bit more obvious about your messages. I worry that I'll miss it completely, or if I do catch the general drift, that I won't pick up on the proper significance of what you're telling me. I don't think I'm the sharpest tool in the box when it comes to nuance. I could do with the neon finger writing in the sky but that's not your style, is it?

So. What confidence am I throwing away?  The context of the verse is that Paul (assuming it was Paul who wrote the book of Hebrews - people seem to be squabbling over who the author might be - was it Paul?) is writing to the persecuted church and telling them to hang on to their faith even when it's hard, because in God's own time (in this life or the next?) there will be a great reward. When the race is run, as Paul said elsewhere, good things will happen, because you don't break your promises. I know that you don't.

So. I'm not considering abandoning my faith. What if 'confidence' means what I usually take it to mean and you're telling me not lose confidence? Don't be discouraged. This would be good, because I've been feeling discouraged lately. I'm sure you've noticed that I've been feeling a bit droopy recently.

Here's the thing. I wish your timing was the same as mine. I've had a few plans mapped out in the last few months and I thought you were on board. Or rather, ahem, I thought I was on board your Plan.  I thought we were of one mind. And yet, if we'd been singing from the same hymn sheet, ha ha, things would have happened by now. Or at least I thought they would. When things don't seem to be going the way I think they should I start to doubt that I understood you right in the first place, or whether I'm up to the job I think you have for me, or whether any of all this is worth bothering with in the first place. 

'So don't throw away your confidence...'  Are you telling me that it's all in hand?  Are you telling me to wait and see, sit tight, just keep on keeping on even though things aren't the way I thought they'd be?  

Alright. I trust you. I know that I can't get anywhere under my own strength. I know that even when from my perspective, opportunities are drying up and possibilities are diminishing, this is not necessarily how you're seeing things. Your timing is perfect and you never, ever, arrive late or mess things up. 

So if you're telling me to stick with the programme, that's fine with me. I'm down with that, as they say. I'll take every bit of encouragement you've got, because sometimes it's a hard thing to stay optimistic when this world is telling me that it'll never happen...who am I to imagine...?  

'You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what he has promised.'

This is a bit less confusing. Don't give up. Heard that before. There are times when those words energise and inspire me and times when they just depress me. Keep hoping. Keep plodding. Keep trying. Keep going. Even when I'd rather just take the line of least resistance and climb under the duvet. 

Persevere. 

Persist, carry on, continue, keep going, struggle on, hammer away, be persistent, be determined, see something through, keep at it, press on, be tenacious, stand one's ground, stand firm, hold on, go the distance, stay the course, soldier on, hang in there. Don't you love the thesaurus?

Antonym: give up.

So, don't give up. 

Don't give up when people don't understand and when they criticise and when they mock. When people think I should be doing other things and don't approve of what I do instead. When I focus on you and other people are jumping up and down and waving their arms in an attempt to distract me. When I do what you tell me to do even when it makes me unpopular. Keep going when I get it spectacularly wrong and come crashing down; keep going when I'm not sure what to do next. Keep asking for enough light for the next step. Always the next step. The next step is enough, though I so want to see the whole way to where we're going. 

Maybe it's better that I don't...

I need to trust where you're leading me, even if it's not where I thought we were going. Even when it's not where I wanted to go. It's a bit scary. Will you take another look at my plan?

Promises. Because you never break them. If you make a promise, you pay out. You don't change the goalposts and you don't welsh on the deal. If you promise, I can take it to the bank. 

I like the sound of receiving what you've promised me.  I hold in my heart some pretty specific promises (if I've understood them properly; can we talk this through sometime, please?) and I am so looking forward to the day when I get my promises.  Still a bit blurry about this world or the next, but I'm hoping for this.

So I am going to hold onto my confidence. My confidence, not in me, in what I can do, but in you. I am fully confident that you are God; that you are in control, that your timing is perfect, and that you never ever go back on a deal.

I'm going to keep going because you told me to. Because I want to follow you, and you're leading me somewhere. I'm going to trust that you know the way better than I do. I'm going to keep trying.

Thankyou. For being there. For a word of encouragement just when I need it. And for making sure that I didn't miss it by sending it five times.

You do know me, don't you?

In search of a punchline

So, another year is nearly over.

Do the years go by in the blink of an eye for you, Lord? Being outside time, what does it look like to you? Do you see us rushing about like ants? Always unaware of how much time we have left. Still searching, hurrying, trying to fit in all the things we want to fit in before some unknown deadline...

What a year it's been. I don't know whether to do a review of the year, or to look forward expectantly to the next one, or just have a bit of a ramble about New Year's Eves past and present - I guess I'll end up doing all of them, being a fairly introspective, slightly obsessive sort of person, but one thing has become clear to me over the course of this turbulent year and I wanted to run it past you.

I feel as if at the end of the year there should be some sort of momentous conclusion, some punchline, but there isn't, is there? It just sort of goes on.

The way that time is broken up into years is only our construct, isn't it? For you, regarding us, your creations, the span of time that matters is our lifetime; and that's only because you know how long that is. We don't. I don't honestly know if this coming year will be my last on earth or whether I'll still be here wittering away in another three or four decades. Perish the thought, hey?

At the beginning of this year I told you very earnestly that I had a sense that it was going to be a significant year. You smiled indulgently. Most of the way through the year I was still thinking that there was a point to it - a lesson to learn, or something to do, something to understand.  Although I think that I was partly right in thinking that, because there have been a myriad of lessons and ideas to absorb this year - what has dawned on me is that there is no end to the ride until you decide that It's Over.

Just as today ends and tomorrow begins whether there are fireworks and Big Ben strikes or not, the journey doesn't end because the year does.

Yes, we mark out our time with dates, festivals, hinges in a year so that we can stop momentarily, maybe; so that we can pause and get our breath back. Maybe that's it. Maybe we need to build in some things to look forward to. Maybe we need to reflect.

New Year is all about reflecting, it seems to me. It always makes me look back on a year and look forward to the new one. This time last year I was full of excitement and anticipation. I 'knew' that something was afoot - I sensed that you had something in store for me but naively I thought that it was something to do with 2011 and vaguely I thought that the something would be complete by the end of the year.  Now, on 31 December, I can honestly say that I did know that something was afoot. I was right. Something was. You have a plan for me, and this year not only have I had the penny-dropping moment when I realised that it was so, but I have begun to take a couple of little tiny baby steps towards it, with your help. That might not sound like much of an achievement for a whole twelve-month period but, God, you know how momentous it's been for me!

So, yes, I am going to look back on my year and try to distil what I've learned from it. I'll do that because, as someone pointed out to me recently, I am a 'completer/finisher' or something like that and I am obsessed with details and I like things wrapped up. It has to be done properly. I will also look ahead to a completely new, as yet pristine year ahead and try to determine what of this year I want to take with me and what I'd like to leave behind in the smoke and debris of 2011.

What I want most to do, though, is learn how to pause more regularly. To stop and watch and listen and learn to hear you. To reflect on a daily basis (is that too ambitious?) - anyway, more often then just once a year.

Ha.

I feel all smiley. Just thinking about the potential and the hope and the promise of going forward with you holding my hand and showing me where to go. This year has been hard but it's been wonderful and I want to go a bit further, please. You know what I'm capable of. Show me, so that I know too. Is that alright?

I want to praise you, Lord. For the snow and the blossom and for Easter and the sunshine and the seaside and the falling leaves and the Christmas story. For your constancy and ingenuity and beauty and mercy. I could go on and on.

Thankyou for the company we've had this evening. For fun and laughter and small children staying up beyond their bedtimes having had too much sugar. Thankyou for friendship and love and for the wonderful people you've arranged around me that teach me, inspire me, support me and care for me. It's a gift of such generosity and these people are so, so precious to me. Thankyou for my husband and a glass of champagne and a comfy sofa. I might not make it till midnight tonight but I will go to bed happy.

Thankyou for this year, Lord God. Thankyou that I survived it, that those I love are still around me and in pretty good health, and that you have never left my side; that you never, ever will. Thankyou for looking after me, for listening to me, for humouring me, for playing with me, for answering me, for loving me. For all the blessings that you've so generously given me. For all the glimpses and the revelations and the questions and the wonders.

Thankyou, my Father.

Here's to starting all over again, a bit further on, in a different place.

Cheers.

Standing on your promises

Well, Lord, I'm here gazing at the church tower from out of my bedroom window once again; repeat performance of whatever bug made me ill last week. 

It's not much fun. I am becoming a connoisseur of indigestion remedies. At the moment I am swaying in favour of fruit flavour ones as the mint ones have a bit of an unpalatable aftertaste. The best are cherry, I think, followed by orange. The lemon ones seem to have more calories than the others, believe it or not. I've read the information leaflet and the back of the packet. 

Ah, calcium carbonate. Do your thing with my dicky tummy, would you?

Yesterday I was driving somewhere and I put on my worship CD.  Because Katy is now at school, and the school is only walking distance away I find I'm driving less, and though this is good from a petrol cost/environmental point of view sadly it does mean that I listen less to my worship CDs. But yesterday it was on and a song jumped out at me.

It was Stuart Townend's 'Every Promise' and it made me think. 

From the breaking
of the dawn...

'From the breaking of the dawn to the setting of the sun,

I will stand on every promise of your word.

Words of power, strong to save, that will never pass away,

I will stand on every promise of your word.

For your covenant is sure,

And on this I am secure - 

I can stand on every promise of your word.'

The truth of this struck me. The Bible is full of promises and you keep your word. 

'...I'll faithfully do all that I solemnly promised.' 

Psalm 89:34 The Message

If you say that you'll do something, then you'll do it. 

Which means, for people like me who find living life a tiring, confusing, sometimes hazardous and nearly always a troublesome proposition, that we can count on you. That we can indeed find strength and safety and power by hanging onto your Word. Something to hold onto.

And I do need something to hold onto.

I worry. You know how I worry. I actually think that I'm better than I used to be, but I still have problems with anxiety. Sometimes I wake up in a morning and there's a moment when I can't quite place the anxious feeling and then whatever the particular day's troubles might be come crashing in. I give my worries to you and I take them back again. I've been trying to break the cycle for a while now and it's a 'two steps forward, one step back' sort of process. 

You tell me not to worry about things. Don't worry about what I will eat (how much money there is in the bank) or what I'll wear (what people think when they look at my clothes or the things I have). The Bible tells me that you know what I need. In your word, you promise:

'Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.'

Matthew 6, 33

I can stand on your promises. I must remember this when I have a panic about the mortgage, or the pension plan...

To the setting of the sun...

I sometimes feel as if I am the only person who has ever felt like I do. Quite often I cast about looking for someone to talk to and I feel desperate to find someone who understands so that I don't feel so lost. Sometimes I can be in a crowd of people in church and feel like the loneliest person in the world.  I have felt on occasion that I might be going mad because I am so emotionally mixed up and confused and I don't know how to express how I feel or what to do to feel better.


You know me and you are with me.

You made me. You know every thought that I have and you alone understand the way my mind works. The amazing thing is that you know all that and still, you love me.

'If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,
even there your hand will guide me;
even there your right hand will hold me fast.'

Psalm 139:8-10

There is nowhere I can go that you won't come with me. You will hold me fast. You will be there when no-one else is. You will never leave me.

'...and surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.'

Matthew 28:20

Lord Jesus Christ, you are with me. You said you will never leave me and you won't let me down.

'I will stand on every promise of your word.'

So often I know what I should do and I don't do it. I amaze myself that I can know what the right thing to do is, and then choose to do something else. There are things in my life that I know are wrong and I've brought them before you time and time again and made such promises that I won't do it again...and then I do it again. It sometimes feels as if it's too much to ask, to expect me to get it right all the time. Trying is such hard work and I blow it over and over again. Can it really be that you don't hold it against me? That somehow, even though I know that you died to save me, my constant failure to live up to my family name doesn't mark me out as a bit of a waste of space?

'If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.'

1 John 1:9

You keep on forgiving. You said you will, and you don't break promises. And it also says in the Bible that you don't keep a secret tally...

'Blessed is he whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man whose sin the Lord doesn't count against him...'

Psalm 32:1,2

This year has been a roller coaster of good things and bad things. Insights and dead ends. Exhilaration and disappointment. Hope and despair. Excitement and depression. I knew that you were taking me somewhere this year and I climbed on board enthusiastically and I suspect that I'll be ending the year feeling a little bit travel sick, a little bit bruised, a little bit wary. One thing that I do know, though, more than ever, is that you have a Plan for me and that you want the best for me.

"'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 29:10-12

I wish that you'd send me an email with your plan on it, Lord. Sometimes even though I know it's there I haven't a clue which way to go. I can't work it out. It'd be so much easier if there was a map. I know that you just want me to depend on you each step of the way. It's just not easy. I feel a bit as if I'm wandering about in the dark. I've set off somewhere because you held out your hand and asked me to come with you and now I'm out of my depth and I couldn't find my way back if I wanted to.

You said that you won't abandon me halfway there, though. You promised. If you start something, you finish it.

'...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

I am loved, I am forgiven, I am not alone, I am part of a plan and I am a work in progress.

It is enormously reassuring that in a world where the sand under our feet is endlessly shifting; where everyone inevitably lets each other down and nothing seems safe or reliable that you never change. You are certain when everything seems uncertain. You are eternal. You are my Rock.

I will stand on every promise of your word.

Amen.

Not one wet foot

Morning, God.

This morning's turned into a bit of a mess.  Realised that I should have paid my credit card and yet couldn't locate my online password; was on a small piece of paper stuck to the fridge with a magnet that Katy likes to play with and isn't any more. Realised that I need a new tax disc for the car imminently and then while making an online application for that realised that the MOT is out of date. One of the children has written on the dining room table, Katy's room is such a mess that I trod on something precious when I went in there in the dark this morning to wake her, and I have a headache.  

And it's raining.  

And my coffee went cold while I was taking my car to the garage and locating the small slip of paper that contained the magic numbers to pay my overdue bill. 

Sigh. 

I know, I've been reading the daily devotional that emphasises the need for Christians to be efficient and methodical with their finances. I know. Stop reminding me. Usually it all trundles along, sort of, but just occasionally it gets derailed. Deep down I'm an organised person. Deep down under layers of confusion and apathy, that is.

Karen Carpenter sang:

'Talking to myself and feeling old

Sometimes I'd like to quit

Nothing ever seems to fit

Rainy days and Mondays always get me down.'

I never knew Karen, but she was on my wavelength. 

I'm off for a new coffee, a paracetamol and a scrub at the dining room table.

*

(Did you know that a combination of toothpaste and hairspray removes marker pen from laminate surfaces? I suppose you did. The wonder of the internet, and the wonder of twenty-first century chemicals. Our dining table is restored to its former glory. And the bookshelf.)

Right. I'm going to start this day again. If I could I would do so by returning to bed and trying again in a few hours but in the absence of that option I am going to flick a switch in my head and pretend that the last hour hasn't happened and I am gliding along like a swan, with poise and elegance. Never mind if my legs are going like the clappers under the water.

I'm going to focus on something positive. 

Yesterday was a strange day, Father. I was so depressed to begin with. The gloom had descended again and I was feeling very low. If I hadn't been doing the intercession prayers at church there's no way I'd have gone; I trudged in feeling very negative and all it took was a friendly face to ask me how I was for my eyes to fill with tears. Completely inappropriate with minutes to go before the start of a service in which I'm taking part, but you helped me pull myself together and hold myself there. The prayers went ok, I think, but what really woke me up was the sermon. 

You spoke to me. I wasn't expecting it, or particularly in the mood for it, but you caught my attention. 

Joshua 3 and 4. The Israelites are crossing the River Jordan to take possession of the promised land.

Now, I've never really given much thought to crossing rivers. It's dead easy. There are bridges. Big bridges to drive over, railways, viaducts, footbridges, ferries... sometimes I don't even need to get out of my car. But the Israelites didn't have these luxuries and an immense rushing torrent of water maybe a mile across might well have looked like an insurmountable barrier. So that puts a different complexion on it.

Still, Joshua knew that you wanted them all on the other side of the river. And he told them what to do.

The priests carrying the Ark of the Covenant set their feet in the water of the river, which has overflowed its banks because it's in flood. It's a big, wide, fast river. Joshua has prophesied that you will stop the water from flowing so that they can cross. So they step into the water. I wonder if there was a

'You first.'
'No, after you.'
'No, I insist.'

sort of moment. But, Joshua said that you would take care of it. So they step in...

And you did. But you didn't stop the water right there, like the parting of the Red Sea - you stopped the water nineteen miles upstream. So, they stepped in, carrying this precious, heavy load, and they wouldn't have known immediately that they weren't going to be swept off their feet. They went in anyway. Surely the waters would have taken a while to subside as there must have been quite a lot of water in nineteen miles of Jordan, but they stood in the river and waited.

You didn't let them down. The waters subsided until there was dry ground. The priests holding the Ark of the Covenant stood there until every last one of the Israelites had passed by onto the other bank. That would have taken some time as there were getting on for three-quarters of a million of them, I'm told. They stood there, presumably in the mud, heavy burden on their shoulders, but standing firm.

So this was the basis of what Matt had to say.

1.  I have to trust that you will do what you've said you'll do.  The priests had to step into the water before the flood waters stopped. They had to commit themselves. Joshua said that you would hold back the flow and they trusted in you. They wouldn't have known that you'd honoured your side of the bargain for quite some time, but you had. You said you would.

So - all those times when I think, 'Where are you in this? I asked for your help and you're not helping me', it could be that you have built a dam nineteen miles upstream and I just haven't felt the effects of it yet. You may have done the work, but I am just not yet in a position to know.

2.  I have to stand firm. If I feel as if I'm standing in mud with the tide against me trying to carry a heavy burden, then I have to just keep upright and be strong because relief is coming. Perhaps you have given me a job to do and I'm wavering and uncertain that I can carry on doing it - I should stand firm. Maybe the priests were tired and aching and needing a rest but there were still a few thousand Israelites still to cross. They stood firm.

3.  Maybe I'm still on the river bank and I'm scared to put my toe in the water. Time to climb in. Time to step out in faith.

So here I am contemplating where I am in this scenario.  Maybe all three? I definitely feel as if I should be taking a step somewhere but I've long been asking you which direction.  Are you telling me that I should just step off the edge in some way? I've had so many questions about what you want me to do with my life and I've had ideas, some of which have just evaporated, some of which seem to be coming to nothing, and some of which (the most precious and fragile dreams I have) I have not even explored yet for fear of failing. In case they don't work. In case I make a fool of myself. In case I have to discard hopes that I've had for a long long time.

So maybe now's the time to put my foot in the water. And not in a dangly-what's-the-temperature-like-shall-I-shan't-I sort of way, but a wholehearted step-off-the-edge-into-the-torrent sort of way.

Whoa. Scary.

But you've said that whatever my own personal promised land, you'll get me there if I follow your lead. You've planned something for me and if I can only hear your voice, you'll guide me. So if you are with me, who can be against? If I hold onto you, you'll keep me upright until the waters abate. After all, you've made a dam upstream, if only I can wait for relief. If only I can trust that you'll do what you said you'll do.

Like they did.

And then at the same time as hesitating on the bank, I am stuck in the mud. At times lately I've felt as if the burden I'm carrying is far too heavy and I shouldn't have to carry it on my own. I've felt misunderstood, resentful, frustrated and angry at things that have happened and I've felt isolated and hurt. I've felt that the anxieties building up around me have grown to monstrous proportions and I'm no better equipped to cope than I've ever been. You told me on Sunday that I should stand firm. Sometimes movement is not required; I only need to stand firm and hold onto my precious burden, and fix my eyes on you rather than down at the mud. I'm playing to an audience of one. Stand firm until the job is done and then I can lift my feet out of the mud with a satisfying squelch and climb onto the bank. (Where, presumably, the priests had a bit of a break from carrying the Ark of the Covenant. Surely they sat down and put their feet up and had a snack while someone else took over then? The Bible is strangely quiet on these details.)

So here's the thing. I know that I'm vacillating a bit at the moment. I know that I've got some things wrong recently. I know that I'm filling my time with so many things that there is so little left for you. I know that I have so many unanswered questions and I'm constantly complaining that you don't speak to me when it's quite likely that you're there, just where you've always been but I just can't hear you over the background noise of my life.

I need to stop and listen.  And then I need to get on with it.

Give me strength, Lord, and courage. Help me to believe more than I do now that I can step into the current and not be swept off my feet. Help me to believe that upstream you have made a dam and even if it doesn't feel like it straight away, you have honoured the step I've taken. I just need to find the courage to climb down off the safety of this riverbank.

Even though this bank is the wrong side of the river, and I can see where I want to be, and you've promised to see me safely across, I am hesitating. I'm not sure. I keep making excuses. I'm scared of committing myself. What if it goes wrong? What if I can't do it? What will people think? What if...

'And there they stood; those priests carrying the Chest of the Covenant stood firmly planted on dry ground in the middle of the Jordan while all Israel crossed on dry ground. Finally the whole nation was across the Jordan, and not one wet foot.'

Joshua 3:17 The Message

I'd love to have seen that.

I wonder how this translates into what you want from me in my life. I wonder what my River Jordan is. I wonder what you want me to carry across. I wonder what you are doing upriver. Show me, Father, because I want to know. I want to climb in.