Author: admin

Sometimes an idea for a tapestry takes a while to formulate. I wanted to do something with the Hebrew phrase “tikkun olam”, using the Hebrew script. But as I sometimes do, I complicated that plan by starting to think of what it might take to “repair the world”.

I remembered that powerful image at the start of the genesis creation story, of the Spirit of God brooding over the pre-creation chaos, followed by that lovingly long narrative of Creation when God said, and it was so, and it was good. That in turn took me to the closing couplet of ‘God’s Grandeur’, one of the poems I go back to without ever tiring of it, or feeling I’ve come all that close to understanding it.

Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
   World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.

So two ideas came together, a Hebrew script and the couplet of a Victorian poem. The title of the tapestry is “Ah! Bright Wings”, because the structure of the imagery is sustained by the encircling and brooding, brightly coloured and covering wings.

The Hebrew script commands the horizontal central ground, but surrounded by the wings of the Holy Ghost. But the tapestry tries to relate to much of the rich imagery throughout Hopkins’s poem. The dull coloured square and angular grey and brown stitches symbolise the industrial ugliness that accompanies manufacture on an industrial scale. The combustion and force needed to work raw material into steel, and the engineering that constructs machinery, and the waste that is the inevitable by-product: ‘all is seared with trade; bleared smeared with toil’. The natural world is threatened by human activity and ‘wears man’s smudge’ so that ‘the soil is bare now’. That narrow central panel symbolises the earth stripped and brown, and trampled by steel shod shoes.

The cross is constructed of blocked squares that contrast with the flow of colours in the wings, and its geometric, utilitarian engineering is surrounded by the blues and greens where live, ‘the dearest freshness deep down things’. Those six squares dominate and yet are surrounded by a thin defining thread of red that rises to the top of the Gothic arch where it splits in three directions. It’s only a hint, but intentionally a Trinitarian articulation of the cross. The cross holds together the green of Creation and the smudge of human industrial activity.

And of course the Hebrew script is in green, the colour of Creation. Green represents the defiance of life against death. The seasonal and recurring beauty of the land contrasts with the destructive forces of human possessiveness that is the economic presupposition of mass manufacture, cheap goods, the profit motive and the dominance of factory over field.

The Gothic arch is dissected by red thread, and on the west side the sun is setting and on the east the sun is rising: “And though the last lights of the black West went, Oh, morning at the brown brink eastward springs –‘

The wings frame the whole, and their colours move from red sacrifice, to green life force, to golden light, before tapering inwards through pink to the red that surrounds fields, factories and the rhythms of sunset and sunrise. The colours of the wings are warm as they enfold the heart of things.

Hopkins’ astonishing phrase ‘Ah! bright wings’, is in my view a powerfully hopeful cry that is as much a prayer as it is a touch of poetic brilliance. To repair the world, ‘tikkun olam’, requires nothing less than a replay of the Creation story, an act of eschatological nurture, possible only to the originating Creator and those first divine breaths that energised the spirit of God, brooding over the waters of chaos, intent on creating a world. 

The surrounding frame of triangles and a border in random muted colours, are held together by an unobtrusive thread of gold. That continuous loop of gold makes possible a ‘world charged with the grandeur of God.’ Like a power cable it carries energy, light and the power to renew and replenish.

Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
   World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.

Here is the full text of God's Grandeur, G M Hopkins.

By the time we were into last year’s first lock down on March 23, we were well into Lent and heading towards Easter. It didn’t stop some Christians complaining tongue in cheek “I never thought I would have to give up so much for Lent.” A year on the not so funny jokes continue. Someone announced on Facebook, “I’m giving up unnecessary travel and all indoor visits to other households.” At best these attempts at humour raise a tired smile. The truth is, the realities we are all living with have seriously reduced our readiness to smile, let alone laugh.

This has been a year of doing without, of lost freedoms, and we have become far too familiar with inner feelings of anxiety, loneliness, boredom and other emotional deprivations. These days when folk ask how we are getting on, at least part of the answer is that precise and peculiarly Scottish word, scunnered!

Quite a lot of the Psalms describe that feeling of being scunnered, when the Psalmist has had enough, but the hard stuff keeps coming. “Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me…my tears have been my food day and night.”

If you’re scunnered, read the Psalms, for two reasons. First, whatever it is you’re feeling and thinking, it’s there in the Psalms, and it is prayed to God. Second, the Book of Psalms is like a pharmacy for the soul, pointing us towards those restorative thoughts and practices that will help us move from where we are to a firmer foothold, a better place, a different standpoint to view the life we are living.

The great Reformer John Calvin recommended reading and praying the Psalms as a way of understanding our hearts and speaking to God about the best and worst that happens to us:  

 “There is not an emotion of which any one can be conscious that is not here represented as in a mirror. Or rather, the Holy Spirit has here drawn all the griefs, sorrows, fears, doubts, hopes, cares, perplexities, in short, all the distracting emotions with which the minds of men and women are wont to be agitated.”

When we read Psalm 42 carefully, which means prayerfully, this depressed and troubled Psalmist shows us how to be honest with God. He doesn’t feel guilty about being sick of the way life is, and he doesn’t try to say what he doesn’t feel. He says it like it is. Thirst, tears, downcast, waves and breakers have swept over him, he feels forgotten, mourns the life he used to enjoy, disturbed and upset – Calvin is right, all the negatives we can think of are right here in a prayer to God.

But that’s only half the story. And often when we are scunnered, it’s because we are only telling ourselves half the story. Here’s what else is in Psalm 42:

“These things I remember…how I used to go with the crowds…with shouts of joy and thanksgiving.” (v4) This has been a year like no other we have lived through, with all the losses we have each experienced. But God loves us no less. God is no less working his purposes towards our healing and wholeness and salvation. Alongside our complaints about how life is right now, take time to remember the blessings that, despite everything, have not been absent throughout this past year.

“Put your hope in God for you shall yet praise him…,” (v 5) Yes this has been a tough year. But, our hope for life and for eternity is in the eternal love and redeeming power of God, our Creator and Saviour. In under six weeks we will be celebrating Easter. “It’s Good Friday but Sunday is coming.” Hope is one of the most powerful antidotes to that loss of impetus and interest in life that comes from having to deal with more than we feel able to cope with. I love that defiant little word “yet” – “you shall yet praise him”. In the end, after all, when the world does its worst, there will yet be reason to praise. “Yet” is only one letter different from Yes. And the resurrection is God’s ultimate and final Yes! to life, yours and mine.

“By day the Lord commands his steadfast love, at night his prayer is with me – a prayer to the God of my life. ( v8) At a time of isolation, anxiety and exhaustion, our minds fed with 24/7 coverage of Covid, it is especially important to remember who is ultimately in charge. God commands his steadfast love by day, and at night his concern and compassion surround us. “God is my rock! That is true, rock solid true. No matter what we feel at any one time. God’s loving concern is steadfast, faithful, rock solid, and energised by loving purposes for you, and all that he has made.

Yes there’s a lot that can get us down. But remember God’s blessings as well as our troubles, hope in God because we will yet praise him together, and whatever happens, God commands his steadfast love and he is the God of your life,

God is sovereign , nothing else must be regarded as sovereign , including our ideas about God . As I have sometimes put it , the great advantage of believing in God is that you are then liberated from believing in a lot of other things that incessantly try to set themselves up as god — like nations , and governments , and ideologies , and dictators , and presidents , and ( yes ! ) religions , and churches , and priestly hierarchies , or even ( in democracies ) majority opinion!

(Waiting for Gospel, Douglas John Hall, p.37; A book of late essays by Hall)

His earlier book The Cross in Our Context remains one of the most challenging books on the Church at the end of Christendom having to relinquish a theology of Glory and return to a theology of the cross. It's one of the books I return to often, and value it more each time.

Photo of Westhill Community Church, on a dark late winter afternoon!

"Lord teach us to pray", said the disciples.  From the very start Christians have known that prayer requires disciplined effort, focused thought, and the sacrifice of time. But the disciples' request presupposes that prayer can be taught; not just prayers, but the how of prayer. Prayer as practice, or technique, or habit, or skill, suggests a functional or instrumental view of prayer. Prayer makes things happen, prayer works, prayer makes a difference. It's something we do.

Many a book on prayer takes this approach, and one of the best is Richard Wagner's Christian Prayer for Dummies. Seriously. The approach encourages practice, experiment and discipline, and outlines basic training in prayer, even a section on turbocharging our prayers. Prayer is a subject you learn about alongside Windows 10, Wood Turning, Wine Making or Existentialism – other books for Dummies. 

But then there are books that aren't so much about the practical how of praying, but the theological whys and wherefores. A theology of prayer begins to explore different types of prayer, considers the God to whom we pray, and ponders the problems and questions that always come up when we pray.

Julian of Norwich has a different approach again. She isn't so much teaching her Christian readers how to pray, as teaching them about the God to whom we pray. She is specially keen to pass on what has been revealed to her about how God hears our prayers, inspires our prayers, and certainly desires our prayers.

By doing this she is portraying a God who is accessible, not to be feared, holy but loving, a God who needs no persuading to hear and lovingly receive the cries of the human heart, whether praise or plea. In Julian's thought, prayer is not one way traffic from human to divine, it is a conduit of love through which divine love communicates with the human heart, inspiring and enabling the response of loving trust and grateful joy.

"He looks on us with love and wants to make us his partner in good deeds. And so he leads us to pray for what it is his pleasure to do. And he will reward us, and give us endless recompense for these prayers and our goodwill – which are his gifts to us…God showed such pleasure and such great delight, as if he were in our debt for every good deed that we do. And yet it is he who does them. And because we ask him eagerly to do things he loves to do, it is as if he said,: 'What could please me better than to ask me – eagerly, wisely and willingly – to do the very thing I am about to do? And so, by prayer, the soul is attuned to God." 

That last sentence, "And so, by prayer the soul is attuned to God." Julian's understanding of God being delighted in the very fact we pray is in startling contrast to any idea that prayer is a wrangling or pleading with a demanding God. She is redressing a theological balance here. God is not the stern task master demanding we exhaust ourselves labouring away at persuading God to hear and answer prayers. On the contrary, God initiates prayer, gives grace, energy and words to our prayers, and he "leads us to pray for what it is his pleasure to do." It isn't going too far to describe this as a spirituality of playfulness, prayer as a serious but non-competitive game. 

When all our praying is said and done, isn't what we really want just as Julian describes, the soul in those moments of praying "attuned to God." During these times of reflection in Lent, that is a profoundly simple goal in our praying, and itself a key definition of what prayer is, "the soul attuned to God."     

 

I'm reading several books over Lent. Some of them are slim but I hope making up in substance what is reduced in page count. Starting with this unambitious new volume by Sheila Upjohn, The Way of Julian oif Norwich. A Prayer Journey Through Lent.

Unambitious refers to my own choice of a book that feels like playing at home. I've been reading Julian's Revelations over the years since my first encounter in 1974 with a book that, like some of our most dependable friends, we come back to after not having seen each other for ages, and pick up as if our last encounter was yesterday. 

Sheila Upjohn is an undemanding writer. Which doesn't mean that she is in any way superficial. Already it is obvious she knows this text intimately, as you would expect from someone who translation of the Revelations is one of the most popular and accessible, without ever being trite or dumbing down the intimacy that lies at the heart of mystical theology. 

Already there is cause to pause, for thought: "It's a new thought that our prayers are stored up in heaven, and it's challenging, too, when you think how few of them there may be." Just read that again and do a quick calculation of how many prayers have been added to our prayer treasury in heaven this past week. Upjohn raises this intriguingly searching question in response to Julian's description of how gladly God receives and keeps safe each of our prayers.

Our Lord himself is the first to receive our prayer, as I see it. He takes it, full of thanks and joy, and he sends it up above and sets it in the treasury where it will never be lost. It is there before God and all his holy ones – continually heard, continually helping our needs. When we come to heaven, our prayers will be given to us as part of our delight – with endless, joyful thanks from God." (Chapter 41)

That is such a subversive description of the dynamics of prayer. Not us giving a prayer of thanks, but God giving thanks to us for our prayers. Really? Our prayers are kept in heaven and continually heard; time bound as we are we tends to think a prayer is spoken, thought or felt, and time moves on. But, says Julian, the prayer perdures, and retains its efficacy as the voice of God's child that continues to echo in praise, petition and intercession.

Upjohn is right, at least for me. This is a new way of thinking about prayer, especially for those of us often tempted to think of prayer as a functional discipline, or a conversation along contractual lines. Even allowing for the more devotional intimacy of pouring out our hearts to God in love, gratitude and worship, the idea that all those spoken words, stirred emotions and ideas given thought, are received by a glad God grateful for the gift they are, and that they are stored in heaven as God's treasure – that's an altogether different level of prayer dynamic. 

That is why Julian is such a provocative companion during Lent. She insists that joy, gratitude and love are not one way traffic, but a cycle of giver and receiver in which each enriches the other by gift exchange. Prayer is a commerce of love.  

First Snow

The snow
began here
this morning and all day
continued, its white
rhetoric everywhere
calling us back to why, how,
whence such beauty and what
the meaning; such
an oracular fever! flowing
past windows, an energy it seemed
would never ebb, never settle
less than lovely! and only now,
deep into night,
it has finally ended.
The silence
is immense,
and the heavens still hold
a million candles; nowhere
the familiar things:
stars, the moon,
the darkness we expect
and nightly turn from. Trees
flitters like castles
of ribbons, the broad fields
smolder with light, a passing
creekbed lies
heaped with shining hills; 
and though the questions
that have assailed us all day
remain — not a single
answer has been found —
walking out now
into the silence and the light
under the trees,
and through the fields,
feels like one.

Looking at, and looking through the ordinary, was one of Mary Oliver's gifts. This poem has a tone of breathless wonder, as the poet becomes caught up into one of nature's quietly transformative happenings. The sense of wonder is intensified by the presence of questions seeking answers, and later in the poem, answers seeking questions; but "not a single answer has been found", except it has, or so it feels. 

To read this poem through aloud, but quietly and slowly, is to begin to see and feel the miracle of snowfall. Climatologists can better describe the phenomenon in terms of science; but it is the poet who is best equipped to analyse and articulate the power of snowfall to interrogate the subjective impact of snow. The 'white rhetoric' of trillions of falling snowflakes evokes the longings, stirs questions we hadn't thought to ask, and provokes the imagination to see more than is merely visible.

Throughout the poem Oliver uses words that are uncomplicated and which are descriptive of inner responsive feelings as well as the visible phenomenon of snowfall and its pristine aftermath. "Whence such beauty and what the meaning." Oliver's poetry often acknowledges nature's mysteries, with hints at the metaphysical clues of loveliness, beauty, energy and silence. 

Once the precipitation has ended, "the silence / is immense, /and the heavens still hold / a million candles…" So the skies of heaven are cleared, and predictably awe inspiring, but the earth beneath is transformed into a magic landscape of beauty, possibility and and surprise. This poem is about quietly satisfied joy in a world where newness is not only possible but made visible in the light of a million candles. 

But it is that word "though" that is the poem's hinge that folds the earlier italicised questions to wards a kind of resolution. Not answers to the questions of the metaphysically speculative or aesthetically curious observer. But an answer more humanly resonant, that is felt rather than spoken, experienced rather than described, and that satisfies the human person's longing for wholeness and at-homeness in the world. The questions have assailed the mind and troubled the spirit; the answer is not in the earthquake of argument, or the wind of aggressive enquiry, or in the fire of logic energised by reason – but in the still small voice that can only be heard during a night walk in snowlight. Assailing questions remain with not a single answer found – but

walking out now
into the silence and the light
under the trees,
and through the fields,
feels like one.       

One further thought. Today I spent a couple of hours digging out our car, shovelling snow, clearing pavements, mine and our neighbours'. I have never resented that kind of work, least of all moving snow. There are so many compensations to snow. I have unqualified sympathy with Oliver's attempt at describing a natural spirituality of snowfall upon a landscape. Reading her poem this morning, looking out at a North East blizzard, I'm aware it isn't quite the same as snow gently falling in moonlight. But I guess we all know enough about the entrancing power of snow to sense that Oliver is expressing something of our own questions in search of an answer; and perhaps too pointing to an answer that sends us searching for the questions. Either way, this is a poem in which we overhear the gentle interrogation of the heart, by heart-stopping beauty. 

   

(Prayer written as the Benediction for our Sunday online service.)

Jesus, Light of the World, shine upon us, and within us.

  Shine the light of hope into our despondency;

    Shine the light of truth into our world, and into our minds;

      Shine the light of peace into places of division and conflict;

        Shine the light of new possibilities into our stuckness;

          Shine the light of joy and laughter into our boredom;

            Shine the light of faith and trust into our fears and anxiety;

              Shine the light of your presence into our loneliness;

                Jesus, Light of the World, shine upon us, and within us.

There’s a lot of sobering news around. I could make a list for you to read but you’re ahead of me. You know as well as I do that watching the news online, on TV, or in the papers is an exercise in discouragement and sadness.

The Psalmists, good poets that they were, had a good description for that kind of feeling: “My spirit grows faint within me, my heart within me is dismayed.” Those same Psalmists also knew the antidote for a crushed spirit, a heavy heart, and a mind trying hard to see beyond the world’s mess. “Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and grant me a willing spirit to sustain me.”

Right. That’s what we need, some joy and a spirit willing to get on with life whatever the limitations. One of the most frequently used words in the Psalms is gladness. So.When were you last glad? To help you pinpoint such an occasion here’s the dictionary definition: glad – feelings of pleasure, pleased and delighted, characterised by cheerfulness.

Okay Jim, when was the last time others could say you were ‘characterised by cheerfulness’; when were you last genuinely glad? “Oh, I think it wasn’t that long ago – when geese flew overhead, honking all the way to Loch Skene, when I ate a crème brûlée, when my friend Zoomed me from Alabama. But I admit it – gladness is scarcer than it used to be.” This past year it’s been hard to be characterised by cheerfulness!

The thing is, gladness can’t be manufactured out of thin air. None of us can just talk ourselves into feeling glad and cheerful. There has to be a reason for gladness just as there is usually a reason for sadness. And that’s where the Psalms can help us. The Psalmists are very clear about the causes of gladness and characteristic cheerfulness. As you would expect, it all comes back to what we think about God, how we see the world, what is happening in our own life story, as we live the life that is God’s gift every single day. Here are a few hints about where gladness comes from:

Psalm 31.7 “I will be glad and rejoice in your love, for you saw my affliction, and knew the anguish of my soul.” The one constant, dependable, unchangeable circumstance in our lives is the love of the God. We are not alone in this. Be glad about that.

Psalm 92.4 “You make me glad by your deeds, O Lord, I sing for joy at the work of your hands.” This is still a wonderful world, the Creator’s masterpiece gifted to us. The birds we feed, the technology we use, the glory of sunset. Be glad about beauty and the fruitfulness of God’s creation and human labour.

Psalm 97.1 “The Lord reigns, let the earth be glad.” At a time when even the best world leaders struggle with complex problems and life or death decisions, the Lord God reigns, and his purposes will be fulfilled. Don’t know about you, but when I watch the news all about political division, Covid 19, Brexit, the economy and recession, I’m glad “the Lord reigns”, and this is still a God-loved world.

Psalm 118.24 “This is the day that the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.” So there it is. You wake up, you’re still here, the gift of another day. Time is God’s gift, not to be wasted in morose wishing it could be otherwise, but to be enjoyed and lived gratefully, creatively, and yes, gladly.

Put all that together, as a recipe for gladness, especially when we don’t feel like it. We are glad God loves us and sees how hard life sometimes is; we are glad because all around us, if we look for it, is the beauty and fruitfulness of God’s creation; we are glad because, in a world as broken as ours, we affirm as a resurrection people who worship the God of Hope, the Lord reigns; we are glad because today, we are alive, this day is God’s gift, and God has work for us to do.

With all that in mind, here is one of my favourite prayers, which I often say at the start of the day:

May we accept this day at your hand, O Lord, as a gift to be treasured, a life to be enjoyed, a trust to be kept, and a hope to be fulfilled; and all for your glory. Amen

During these long days of restriction and loss, go looking for reasons to be glad – even if you don’t feel like it. God’s love to us in Jesus, God’s beautiful creation, God’s providence and reign over the earth, and each day when we wake up still with a life to live – “Let us rejoice and be glad, and give the glory unto Him. Hallelujah, for the Lord our God the Almighty reigns.”

Prayer written for our forthcoming online recorded service.

Theme is based on Romans 8.38-39

For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Prayer of Petition

Creator God, you looked on all that you made and said, “Very Good.”

Your love is creatively and purposefully invested in all that you have made.

The stars are numbered and named, and not one of them is missing;

yet you notice the sparrow that falls from exhaustion.

So Your mercy and love surrounds the vastness of our universe,

and holds as treasure, the inconsequential sparrow.

We thank you that your your love is faithful, careful and unfailing towards us,

and that nothing you have made is inconsequential to you.

 

God of Grace, mostly we know that nothing can separate us from your love.

But sometimes we do feel alone, afraid and uncertain.

Comfort our hearts and strengthen our minds with these words;

nothing in all creation can separate us from your love in Christ.

 

God of Hope, when life gets us down, and we’re left wondering what’s worthwhile any more,

restore our joy, rebuild our hope, renew our peace,

by instilling deep in our souls those inwardly far-reaching words –

nothing in all creation can separate us from your love in Christ.

 

God of the cross and the empty tomb,

help us to look on all that is broken in our world, in our country, in our own lives,

and then to lift up our eyes and see your forgiving and redeeming love on the cross;

then lift our eyes further to see our Risen Lord

who has overcome all that separates us from your love,

calling us into the new creation of life in Him,

where nothing in all creation can separate us from your love in Christ.

 

May God who is the ground of hope fill you with all joy and peace,

as you lead the life of faith

until by the power of the Holy Spirit you overflow with hope.

Amen

These have been difficult weeks here in the North East of Scotland. Like everyone else, we have lived with the public health restrictions, and Christmas and New Year have been diminished to the closest circle of friends and family, and even that has been severely selective.  For ourselves, walking outdoors has been one of the daily routines to help us stay healthy, physically and mentally.

That was fine until the snow, which melted and re-frosted overnight (I know re-frosted seems a made up word). It being the holiday period, and local authorities short of staff and money, neither roads nor pavements have been gritted since the ice and snow took hold. The result is it is near impossible to walk safely out of doors for any but those who have ice grips on their shoes.

Our house sits at the top of our street, on a fairly definite gradient, which has been like an Olympic ski jump slope, except with a surface like an Olympic skating rink. So the car isn't a safe option to get from impossible walking to cautious walking. Except for one day. The road was made passable by myself and a couple of others using the salt grit in the wee yellow bin at the top of the road. So we escaped for part of a day and had a walk in the woods. That's where the photo was taken.

During these long months of lock down, then restrictions eased, then tightened again into winter until we are in lock down again, I have found solace in the woods, with a camera, and she who is my lifelong walking companion. Together we take time to look, pay attention, think, pray and enjoy this day while waiting for better days. Looking out through the trees this hanging twig of pine caught the sunlight, which caught my eye. 

Haiku
The waters of life,
on a pine needle setting,
drop like diamonds.

I've often wondered about beauty. Is it always there waiting to be noticed, or does it become beautiful as we notice it, and appreciate the there-ness of that which calls into the depths of who we are? And does our ability to see something as beautiful depend on our own inner climate of emotion and disposition towards the world?

Would I have noticed this pine twig if I hadn't been so glad to get out and about again, hungry and thirsty for the smells, sounds, sights around, and the feel of mud paths, pine needle carpets, uneven ground requiring more than just putting one foot in front of the other? My answer? I don't know. 

What I do know is that there are now countless occasions when I have stopped and seen beyond that which is there. Taking a photograph is much, much more than trying to capture a moment that cannot be digitised anyway.

Taking a photograph is:

a way of disciplining the way we look on the world;

a moment of intentional appreciation;

an acknowledgement of our connectedness to that which is not us;

a knowing smile as we recognise the signature of the Creator;

a gentle defiance of a culture that thrives on noise, possession and the enthroned ego;

an aide memoire of an encounter that has nourished, provoked and summoned us;

an act of trust in the worthwhileness of the ordinary, the daily and the routine;

a form of prayer which merges the contemplative, the active and the imaginative.

And for myself, that last definition " a form of prayer", holds together and affirms all the others. My camera, and the worlds it opens to me, has become a means of grace, and a means of recognising grace when it stares me in the face. So many other emotions and inner climate changes come into play when that happens, when we recognise the grace "that brought me safe thus far." Gladness, gratitude, thoughtfulness, wistfulness, longing, alertness; and yes, at times intimations of sadness, reflective moments of regret, memories nudged awake, and a sense of the incompleteness that is inherent in human finitude.

Such inarticulate feelings and responses are perhaps the deeper parts of prayer, whether the "burden of a sigh" or "the motion of a hidden fire, that trembles in the breast." That has become so for me over quite a number of years now, but more keenly felt, and more spiritually necessary over these past pandemic blighted months. Deprived of regular worship, absent the shared fellowship of prayer, and distanced from the physical communion of saints, other ways of relating to God have grown and strengthened. They have had to. 

I still long for renewed and uncomplicated human encounters in the fellowship of all God's children. This most recent lock down postpones that even further. But eventually for each of us there will also be the important work of hanging on to what we have learned about ourselves, about God, and about this God-loved, and beautiful but broken world -through which grace still reaches out to us. The second photo was taken before I finished writing this post. It's the burn that runs through one of the forests we have come to love as a place of peace, companionship, interest, and yes, grace…

Thou flowing water, pure and clear, 
make music for thy God to hear,
alleluia, alleluia!