Time to Sow

When life looms large and my efforts are not enough, you whisper it quiet:

Make yourself small.

Make yourself as a seed, curled in the dark earth, invisible but for the Father’s eye.

Make yourself sown, hurled by another’s hand and abandoned to the death of this dry husk.

Make yourself soft, able to receive the water of your germination.

When life looms large, make yourself small.

From this hiddenness, something radicle emerges.

From this burial, life will swell and root, a life that is stronger than the push of the world, as strong in this small place as any of the forces of nature. Here is the secret of the kingdom of heaven, the mystery of the cross, and the origin of being.

Do you feel it? Futility? Emptiness? The rattle of lifeless limbs? Then lean in close, leave all this striving, place yourself there between finger and thumb.

You whisper:

It is time to sow.

~lg

afternoon prayer :: 1

The prayer of the leaky cistern

By this time, O Lord, my leaks are showing and patches coming unglued. I bring my battered cistern, and lay it down beside your spring. Here is a source that never runs dry, never leaks out, never needs patching. Here is a source everlasting, everflowing, everquenching. Here is life, not to bucket away, but to draw near and drink deep. Here, your mercies are new again. Here, I am renewed.

Amen.

~lg

morning prayer :: 2

O Lord of open ears,

When I wake up with no voice of my own, I turn to the voices that you breathed into long ago.
I enter into their prayers and join my heart with theirs, till their words become my strength, my song, my own, and I am carried into your presence.

"Let the morning bring me word of your unfailing love,

for I have put my trust in you.

Show me the way I should go,

for to you I lift up my soul.

Rescue me from my enemies, O LORD,

for I hide myself in you.

Teach me to do your will,

for you are my God;

may your good Spirit 

lead me on level ground." 

(Psalm 143:8-10)

Amen.

~lg

Morning Prayer :: The morning after five years

This morning, a newly minted five year old snuggles in for a cuddle on the front porch swing, while the first green of spring bursts out on the trees. "The same old world, but new."* And every breath she takes against my body, every glint of light upon the river, every birdsong carol, all are morning prayers rising from the fresh dawn to the Father of creation.

Here is perfection, often glimpsed yet rarely grasped, and it lives and breathes in my arms.
Here is beauty so pure, and who am I to behold it, and how can a windswept hill make me want to cry for joy and longing?
Here is wonder in the warmth of a freckled face, and the curious nature of seeds, and this one child that I have woken to each morning for five years.

Here is life, life more abundantly.

It is right to give our thanks and praise!

* From Come and See: A Christmas Story by Monica Mayper

~lg

Reading list thus far

I realized the other day I hadn't yet written down any of the books I've read this year. I thought back to my bedside stacks, and this is what I came up with.

Farewell to the East End (Jennifer Worth)

The Geography of Nowhere (James Howard Kunstler)

Longbourn (Jo Baker)

Little House in the Big Woods (Laura Ingalls Wilder) - Read aloud with Arden

Pilgrim’s Inn (Elizabeth Goudge)

The Bird in the Tree (Elizabeth Goudge)

The Heart of the Family (Elizabeth Goudge)

On Hope (Josef Pieper)

The Gospel of the Kingdom (George Eldon Ladd)

Timeless Simplicity: Creative Living in a Consumer Society (John Lane) 

It's been a long, stormy winter, which has been a definite benefit for the book list! Things may slow down as spring picks up. 

On the "To Read" list for the rest of the year:

Emma (Jane Austen)

Till We Have Faces (C.S. Lewis) - it's been a few years since I've read this one

Revelation (Joseph Mangina) - a few chapters left

More Elizabeth Goudge

~lg 

~lg

Fools of Spring

May Day, and the bells ring out in distant Oxford, and the grass grows green on the sunny side of the house, and the blackbirds make a racket in the bracken, and we are shouting the same glad song for winter’s death with each stomp of our rubber boots.

Spring turns us all into yabbering fools, sprouting sincere, if unoriginal, poetry. And why not? Spring awakens our childlikeness. No one has ever said of a child’s first stab at a cat or the sun or their father, “Not bad, but I think it’s been done before.”

We are children, delighting in life and trying to get at its very essence, and all we have are shadow words next to its glory. Yet that should not, must not, stop us, for part of the glory we share is this urge of reproduction, the desire to create, and in creating to somehow comprehend our own origins in the freshness deep down.

Spring is not notable for its originality, but for its origin. God makes the spring come to Oxford and our island alike, this I tell my son. Woven into the patterns of the earth, spun up in its turning, spring is the recurring invitation to become the child we were born to be. 

~lg

Oceans Deep: The Call to Love

The wildest call is always to love.

The most dangerous waters He calls us to walk on are these: love your neighbour as yourself, and love your enemy. 

But who among us can walk on water? Who can carry this burden? A heart can break under the weight. The fear will sink us. We have not what we need to follow this strange and narrow path.

But when there is doubt we fix our eyes on the one who has gone before us over these waves. And not only over, but into, beneath, right down to the depths of the ocean of hate and sin and death, and everything that threatens to swallow us whole. He took love to the outer limits, and seemed to succumb . . .

But perfect love cannot be overcome.

He overcame by the power of pure love, pulling our soggy mess out of the sea and breathing new life into collapsed lungs.

He breathes His love into us, and fear evaporates.
He breathes His love into us, and hatred dissipates.
He breathes His love into us, His Spirit of life, and we are filled with a buoyancy that lets us take the first steps.

The call to love is no walk in the park, no pleasure sail on the pond.

It's a walk on the wild, past the point of no return, where our only hope is to follow Him.


~lg

Intercessions: God of tears and dust

O God, most gracious and compassionate, you hold our frailty in your hands. Man of sorrows, acquainted with grief, you know our weaknesses. You gather us in your arms, tenderly wash the mingled tears and dust, and fold us in your keeping. You weep with us. You weep for the whole weary world, swollen with the sting of death.

O God, most gracious and compassionate, you take our burdens in your hands. You hold the things we cannot carry, and carry them away this night.


~lg

Kingdom Field Notes: Mother Junco's Secret

Little mother junco knows a secret. The tilt of her head outside the kitchen window tells me so. She knows the place where heaven and earth meet, somewhere in the branches of a great tree. There she will build her nest, and lay her treasures to rest.

She has found a seed. The one that falls into the earth and dies. And it will be her kingdom.

She has a dark eye for the small things, little mother junco.

And how she will sing on the day of new birth, when the pale blue egg breaks open like a morning sky to welcome the sun!

Until then, she laughs at the snow, her faith the evidence of things unseen, and her secret keeps her warm.


~lg

A great change

The sap is flowing! The geese are returning! The world is shifting and a great change is about to come.

Now the dead will be shown for what they are. In the winter, all the branches look the same. But spring reveals the hidden reality.

All those who abide in the vine have sap in their veins. 

They will swell with buds and stretch to the sun.
They will not break when the tempest comes, nor wither in the heat.
They will bleed sweet water should the pruning knife wound.
The life is in the blood, and they are rooted and established in the heart of the universe.

They will not fear the change. They will clap their hands and wave their palms when the monarch of spring arrives, and their green laurels will be his crown. Their fruit will be his triumph, and when the grapes are trod they will cast their boughs before him as the wine is poured out for all the earth to drink.



~lg

evening prayer :: 1

From the Book of Common Prayer, "Evening Prayer To Be Used in Families"

For Freedom From Worry.

O LORD, who hast pity for all our weakness: Put away from us worry and every anxious fear, that, having ended the labours of the day as in thy sight, and committing our tasks, ourselves, and all we love into thy keeping, we may, now that night cometh, receive as from thee thy priceless gift of sleep; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. 


~lg

morning prayer :: 1

God of warming spring, turn your face toward our open windows. We welcome your light and the brisk air of season’s turning. Melt the chill of winter’s drifts and the things that lie buried within. Shake us from slumber and wake us to life. Fill us with the joy of chickadees, the hope of sap rising, the flooding love of water rushing down and down. Whisper the vernal secrets of your kingdom come, and give us ears to hear.

~lg 

A Pattern of Prayer: Finding a Groove

I'm trying to get into a groove here, with a rhythm, a pattern, a way to move through the day with prayer. 

{I am not a monk with hours of quiet contemplation, but a modern mom, held to the pace of a two and four year old and a hundred year old house in the country. I do not live by the chiming of a clock, though we have a flexible schedule that is the backbone of most days. Feeding the family, that is the reality around which the day revolves. And if I'm not careful, I can miss my own meal in all the preparation and serving and cleanup. I can miss my own meal. There is no end to the work, no bells to signal completion, no ticking off one box without adding three more, and it all can keep me running, running on hungry, and running down to empty.

I need to eat. Pause and break the bread of life, share this sweet communion. There is a time to wake, a time to work, a time to play, a time to rest. There is a time to eat.}

And so I imagine how I will translate the tradition of "hours" of prayer into my own moments of prayer, a movement of prayer, or rather of movement of self through the fabric of prayer.

This is the sketch in my head, rather like a line graph, with rise and fall and lots of scribbling, still in revision.

These are the moments I am learning to move into prayer:

1. Morning - A Gathering Prayer

"O lord, let my soul rise up to meet you as the day rises to meet the sun."*

Here is the gathering, the offering of the strands of my life, held out to be woven with God's own hands.
The reaffirmation to "Love the Lord my God with all my heart and with all my soul and with all my mind and with all my strength."
To begin the day in the light of His countenance.
To begin the day with the bread of His Word.

Before work, this worship.
Before my plans, His purpose.
Before movement, this deep breath.
Before feeding others, this filling up.

I gather manna fresh for this day, and pray, "Give us this day our daily bread." (Matt. 6:11)


2. Mid-morning - An Embracing Prayer

"Love thy neighbour as thyself." (Matt. 22:39)

Here I sit with the ones God has given me to love, sit with our morning snack and children's Bible, eating together.
Now is the time to spread our arms wide and embrace the needs around us, and carry our burdens to the Lord.
We pray for our neighbour and for ways to love them.
We spread our prayers into the world that they may go ahead wherever God may lead us.
We pray together, for others.
Here is compassion and intercession, and the faith of children.

"Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven." (Matt. 6:10)


3. Noon - A Rising Prayer

It is right to give our thanks and praise.

Here at the height of the day, the height of the clock, I lift my eyes up, turn my thoughts toward heaven, and raise my thanksgiving.

Hands are busy, tummies are hungry, but my heart turns thankful.
I name the blessings, great and small, treasures of this very day.
In the middle of it all, there is always something to be thankful for.

This motion lifts the mundane into a living marvel and makes room for joy.

"From the rising of the sun to the place where it sets,
the name of the LORD is to be praised." (Psalm 113:3)


4. Mid-afternoon - A Centering (Abiding) Prayer

"No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine." (John 15:4)

Here, by chance, I catch my breath and a cup of coffee at the same time. The day is in full swing, but we have built time for rest into it, and rather than find ways to amuse myself, I try to find ways to abide in Him.

I stop. Remember. Rest my soul. Rejuvenate.
Calm the chaos and center into the deeper reality behind these fleeting hours.
I reach down, root myself.
Make a knot. 

"She is like a tree firmly planted by streams of water,
Which yields its fruit in season
And its leaf does not wither;
And in whatever she does, she prospers." (Psalm 1:3)

I take root that I may bear fruit.

"Establish thou the work of our hands." (Psalm 90:17)


5. Supper Meal - A Celebratory Prayer

"One generation shall praise Your works to another,
And shall declare Your mighty acts." (Psalm 145:4)

All together now, we give thanks.
We speak blessing.
(We practice table manners.)
We rejoice.
We recount.
We feast.


6.  Evening - A Prayer of Release

Now, night falls, and it is time to lay aside the day.
Release its worries, problems, and work.
Release my grip on the things I cannot control.
Release my spirit to rest in His presence.
I unravel the things that threaten to choke, examine my living of this day and confess my sins.

Lord, have mercy, Christ have mercy.

I entrust my soul to His tender care and unceasing watch.
I entrust my body to the sleep He gives His beloved.

"When you lie down, you will not be afraid.
When you lie down, your sleep will be sweet." (Prov. 3:24)

~~~

I am a child learning to dance, learning to move in a new way. I am forming these often faltering steps - habits - that soon I hope will catch on to the rhythm and carry me along. More than that, I am reaching out in faith and finding a Father who is more than eager to move toward me.



* From Common Prayer: A Liturgy for Ordinary Radicals. Shane Clairborne, Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove, Enuma Okoro. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2010. 


~lg

A Habit of Prayer

As I work out what it means to become this person of prayer, I am drawn to holy people through the ages who marked their days and nights with regular “hours” of prayer. They trained desire into a discipline by putting on a habit of prayer.

A habit. It is what the nuns wear to mark themselves as those devoted to God. It is an outward sign of an inward state. And habits, the patterns of living we either fall into or form for ourselves, these too are outward forces which have the power to direct what flows within.

In my longing for a life of prayer, I need more than desire. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. It needs to be trained. It needs a path to follow. This river needs banks so my good intentions don’t disperse and dissipate to other ends. Habits create channels for the spirit to follow, without having the burden of decision, that initial inertia, to overcome each time. Habits can take affections and transform them into effective energy. A habit is not a burden, but a gift that grace makes into a blessing.

Perhaps, like my sisters, I can put on a habit of prayer at particular times of the day, a pattern that repeats itself with the sun’s rising and setting. Perhaps I can live by a different sort of clock, a different sort of time. Perhaps I can clothe myself with a second nature that, by force of habit, stays put no matter what the day brings.

It’s not the tyranny of ritual, but the freedom of rhythm. It’s the worship of God through and with time. I have been given a finite number of hours and moments, and perhaps by ordering them firstly through prayer, the rest will find their fitting place. Time management through prayer? I’m willing to give it a try.

~lg

The heart of the universe

Another winter day and the world turns slowly toward spring, a sleeping beauty wakening to her long awaited lover. And morning by morning I wake to my own two grinning suns and the warmth that is their love.

And I can't help thinking, that at the heart of the universe, love is the most powerful reality there is.

Where does this come from?

We with the soul breath of life in our lungs, we long for it, grieve its loss, relish its nearness, suffer for its grasp, suffocate without it.
There is no substitute for love.

Where does this come from?

This world can be a confounded mess, and yet in these troubles and terrors there is one thing that breaks through the darkness, and every child knows this secret
- it is love.

Love overcomes and outlasts even death.
This, we with beating human hearts, know.
And if we know it not in experience, yet we long for it as a lost homeland.

Where does this come from?

Woven somehow into our nature,
marked somehow with a primordial kiss,
drawn by an invisible thread,
fingers tracing letters in the air. . .

God is Love.

And if it does not come from God, then from where?

Not from survival of the fittest, or the onward, merciless march of history.

But sacrifice of the fittest.
There evil stopped dead in its tracks,
where heaven and earth's history met in a blaze of glory.

Not letters in the air, or words in the sky of an abstract heaven,
but The Word
Made Flesh,
one Man
Who
Loved
Us
to
Death.

A love strong enough, pure enough, the original and best.
Outrageous, overwhelming, overcoming love.

And we saw this love and our hearts leapt within and the whole universe made sense in that instant we looked at the cross.

This is the shape of everything, right the way down.

Somehow the birds know it, in their joyful dive toward the earth,
and the river knows it, racing down and down to the freedom of the sea,
and the earth groans for what it has seen beneath the surface,
and the trees fling the late afternoon sun into patterns on the floor,
and my eyes, dazzled, might have seen a face in the play of light and shadow,
the image of the invisible burned into my mind's eye,
the shape of a man,
the shape of a cross,
the shape of love.

I blink, and the world goes on spinning,
and this reality spins inside me,
with its own gravity sending me delightfully off balance,
as only love can do.


~lg