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"By grace you are saved, through faith, and that not of yourself, it is the gift of God."

Well, that's me put in my place. What's needed is trust, not competence, grace not discipline, gift and definitely not personal achievement. Of course as a long time Christian I know all this; as a veteran disciple I know all about following and the daily obedience of taking up the cross; like a long term prisoner I'm now a trusty, one of the experienced followers, a seen most of it before disciple, a been there done that and learned the lessons kind of person. Saved by grace, yes, absolutely.

But if I'm honest, my recongition of, dependence on, trust in, gratitude for, astonishment and embarrassment at, this scandalously patient, uncompromisingly generous, disturbingly subversive, endlessly mysterious grace which is the gift of God, and the self donation of Eternal Love in Christ, is so far beyond my capacities of thought and emotion, that it's sometimes easier just to get on with life and try to be faithful, and accept my limitations, failures and mistakes as the way it is and has to be.Grace is just too complicated, or maybe too simple.

There is a Pelagian instinct that wants to carry my share of the burdens, and perhaps a residual pride not that far removed from Peter who promised to follow, never to deny or forsake, and whose best intentions tripped him up as he stumbled and fell on the tragic path that led to the High Priest's courtyard. Trust is such a difficult disposition; an expensive risk to take; a reckless commitment with no guarantees; a surrendering of control from hands used to steering ourselves. So that even the act of trust, the emotional and mental readiness to say yes to the call of Jesus, feels like an effort, something we must do, a piece of hard work on which our all depends.

And that's when Paul's words come with their liberating power and we hear the clink and clatter of falling chains. By grace….through faith….not of yourself….the gift of God. I doubt if we ever reach a stage when those words lose their power to contradict our pride, heal our anxious performance oriented devotions, renew with a different energy our frantic, or complacent walking in the footsteps of Jesus. And you know, that's as it should be. For the gift of God is the gift of God himself, promised presence, sufficient grace, love incognito, the goodness and mercy that follows us, with patience and hopefulness, bearing us up when otherwise we would fall.

Denise Levertov, in a short poem, expresses the reality of a life thus borne up, and her words are a call to the risk of trust, and perhaps to the trusting of risk.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Avowal, Denise Levertov.

As swimmers dare
to lie face to the sky
and water bears them,
as hawks rest upon air
and air sustains them,
so would I learn to attain
freefall, and float
into Creator Spirit’s deep embrace,
knowing no effort earns
that all-surrounding grace.

Today I had my eyes tested for new glasses. I only need them for driving, and middle to further distance. My eyes still read very small print unaided, but don't ask me to watch tennis from the far side of the room. The technical and technological know how brought to bear on my eyeballs was impressive and just a bit scary. I hate the puff-ball test, this hand held machine spitting in your eye! The space invader peripheral scope test is either fun or frustration, and now there's a deep 3d scan to see beneath all the layers and to the very core of the eye, though that costs a bit.

Then there's the choice of frames – my Dolce Gabana frames finally broke at the bridge giving me two designer monocles! After trying on this and that, I settled on a pair that I think fits the shape of my face, and doesn't clash with my grey hair and grey green eyes. And a free pair of sunspecs forbye as weel! When I get them I'll post a photo for those who want to comment on the effortless air of intellectual nous :))

Amongst the great gifts of life, our eyes. Much of what we do for work, pleasure, learning and sharing comes from our visual capacity. I'm not surprised that in John's Gospel several words are used to describe different ways of seeing; to glimpse or gaze; to see superficially or to see and understand; to stare with wonder or glance carelessly; to see beneath the surface or beyond the horizon. No wonder when it comes to understanding, or imagining we see with our mind's eye. We get it. Or as John would say we apprehend it, then we comprehend it. 

Amongst the gifts I've enjoyed most in recent years is my wee sony camera, with its digital eye. More and more I now look at what I see, and see what I look at. No surprise that one of my favourite writers, Thomas Merton, as early as the 50's and 60's was seeing more deeply into the world through the lens of a camera. What that Trappist brother would now make of a digital camera that can take 500 photos at the cost a charcging the battery, and the freedom to discard, edit, crop, reproduce, print from  a home computer – I don't know. I guess merton would be suspicious, even antagonistic to such technological ease and the excesses it spawns; and then too, I think he would find ways to discipline and redeem such facility to serve the deeper levels of human responsiveness to the world – wonder, compassion, praise and awareness. The photos above were taken on the way to Montrose last Sunday – colour is one of God's recurring surprises – give us this day our daily dose of colour… The Red Campion is one of my favourite meadow plants – you can see why.

                    "He bringeth the winds out of his treasuries…." Psalm 135.7

When my heart is low Mozart nearly always lifts it; when my body is tired two things always help, chocolate and exercise; when my mind is complacent and bored looking at some of my favourite paintings rekindles imagination and vision; when my emotions are jaded or tense, either cooking or tapestry help to nourish them or weave them into new patterns of wholeness. And if all of these fail I read theology! Not just any theology, chosen theologians, a medicine cabinet for the soul, a store of prescriptions which have proved effective in the past.On the bottom shelf within easy reach is P T Forsyth.

I was looking for something else and rediscovered this address by Forsyth, given over a hundred years ago. It's titled "The Place of Spiritual Experience in the Making of Theology". The last section touches into some things I feel deeply and approve strongly – the place of serious, continuous theological and biblical study in the equipping of preachers. Update the language, remove terms of gender exclusion, and I can read this and think – Yes, the point is still relevant, a century later.  

AN
EDUCATED MINISTRY
But I must leave many points alone in order to touch on two in particular
as I close. If experience is an insufficient basis for either Gospel
or theology,
if the base must be some-thing more objective, then, in the first
place, we may be more convinced than ever of the absolute necessity for
the Church
of
an educated ministry. If the burden of our preaching be our experience
any fluent and facile religionist may claim his place in the ministry.
But if our
burden be an objective gospel, which descends on our experience
both to kindle and to correct it, then we need that those set apart to be
bearers of the Gospel
should undergo the discipline of mastering their master, and becoming
at home in the nature and history of that which can never be given
by any experience,
but is given to it.

And
in the second place the preachers so educated should withdraw much of their
attention not only from their own experience, but
from the books,
booklets,
and prints that contain but the experience of others; and they
should bestow themselves upon the serious and resolute study of the Bible
in the best and
fullest light as the standing creator of Christian experience.
They should guard against the fantastic treatment of the Bible which so
easily besets
the preacher, and they so should devote themselves to the historical,
and not to
the historical alone, but to its objective spiritual message,
equally valid for every age and experience. The Bible is not our standard
simply but our
source. It is not there to prove doctrine, but to create the
faith
that produces doctrine. The trophies of a true minister of the
Gospel are
not only the precious
souls he has saved, but they should include his interleaved Greek
Testament packed with notes.

It
is not the Bible we preach; but what we have to preach is to be found nowhere
but in the Bible. And it is hid in that
field, which
must be
bought at much
cost and dug with much toil. Do not let us preach our experience,
but a Christ and a Gospel familiar to our experience. We
preach our experience
best when
people infer it.

Christianity
is nothing if it do not end in experience. But it is also nothing if it only
begin there. Experience is
its medium
and
its product,
but it is
neither its base nor its limit. It is its form, but not
its matter. And the experience even of an objective Gospel will
fade and
die if it remain
mere
impression and sensibility. It must wake our judgment and
compel our obedience. And whatever will do that will change the note
of popular
religion as well
as regenerate unpopular theology. Nothing but some such
change can give us the power to sway to God's will the new democracy.

 

 

 

 

 

 

"Vocation is where our deep gladness meets the world's deep need." Frederick Buechner

"For all that has been Thank You. For all that is to come – Yes!" Dag Hammarskjold

Not much I want to add to that as a summing up of what life can be about. Radio 4 Thought for the Day this morning quoted Buechner's bon mot. A telling corrective in a barcode and pin number culture.

I was down leading worship and preaching at Montrose today. One of the joys of those journeys, apart from the people, is the journey. I drive from Westhill to Stonehaven through Maryculter, and past Netherley. Over the past year like everyone else I've become accustomed to the appearance of windfarms and the occasional

 

solitary windmill, towering over farm and fields. Now I see them and resent them less. They are inevitably intrustive, giant geometric structures with their own engineering aesthetic, but clashing with the different geometry of anatomy and topography. I'm aware of the pluses and minuses, the clashing interests of green sustainable energy and the massive carbon footprint created every time one of these colossus sized machines is manufactured and bolted into concrete buried in the ground on top of hills and moors. In a country with so much beautiful scenery and naturally formed landscape, much of it unspoilt, it will walys be possible to object, to complain and to resent the intrustion of machinery that forever alters skylines. Mind you they are also far less intrusive than pylons criss crossing the country.

It's hard not to notice the Windfarms. But on the journey, paying attention, there are other things to notice.

Like the whitethroat sitting on a fence beside and acre of nettles south of Inverbervie.

Like the intensely lemon yellow fields stretching to the shoreline with oilseed rape in full flower, and against an azure sea reflecting a sunlit sky.

And speaking of colour, like the pink meadow flower (name to be confirmed and photo to follow!) clashing magnificently with the blazing yellow fields.

Like the police speed trap cleverly sitting off the road and quite well camouflaged with said yello fields behind them. I use my cruise control in speed limits!

Like the ostriches in their pen at Maryculter, long necks, long legs, evil eyes and pickaxe bills, looking at passing cars and dreaming of the race between souped up speed and the real thing.

Like the spire of St Cyrus Church, seen from miles away, reminding me of many a walk along St Cyruse cliffs and beaches. And slopes emblazoned with another shade of yellow, gorse this time.

And at the end of that journey, time spent with folk who work together at being a community of Jesus, sharing bread and wine, and finding in their worship and prayers, nourishment for roots and fruit.

 

Readers of Living Wittily will have noticed my absence for the past week. One of the words I struggle to give priority to is prioritise!  That means most times I try to do everything in my diary and on my conscience, as well as meeting expectations, my own and other people's. That same perfectionist impracticality fuels a sense of responsibility for fulfilling promises, meeting deadlines, standing by commitments and therefore often living life with more energy than wisdom. Or so it seems now and again.

This week I prioritised. Few things concentrate the mind more than the unlooked for advent of serious illness amongst those we care for most. So that's where energy, time, and all my focus has been. Thankfully we are now in a much better place and life goes on. But that very fact, "life goes on", is itself the reason for gratitude, humility and reflection.

Gratitude because life is a precious and unique blessing of the Living God. Our deepest emotions and experiences come to us through those in whose lives we live and move and have our being.

Humility because life is not ours to control, manage or dispose at will; we are human and have each our gift of years and days.

Reflection because when it comes to happiness, fulfilment, meaning, being a gift to the world and the world being gift to us, with life we realise comes responsibility, opportunity, choice, the miracle of existence and that most human of perspectives, hope.

This blog is about Living Wittily, serving God with mind and heart. Amongst the things this means is working out in the flux and frustration, the costs and consequences, the anxieties and aggravations, the loves and laughters, the gladness and the grief, the prayers and the promises, the give and the take of our daily lives, what it means to live with wise humility before the God who is sovereign in mercy and vulnerable in love.

The photo below was taken by Sheila while on a walk last year – the tranquil beauty and delicate colour of the grass – if God so clothes the grass…..how much more….

Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow….. I will fear no evil.