Loving Jesus first and best

That moment when I became a Christian, taking up the faith I'd had as a child and making it my own as an adult, was more a case of bowing down before the throne of God rather than kneeling at the cross of Christ.  Which is not to say that Jesus was not important in the equation.  That was just how it was.  And that has shaped me as a Christian all these years.  My default position is before the throne of God.  I get God the Father more naturally than I get God the Son.  That's just how it is.  But at long last (God waits for us patiently) I see I have some growing to do. 

At times I long for heaven.  When I see people around me struggling, when I struggle myself and even when I just feel bone tired or stressed or worried, I long for that time when Jesus will come again and there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain.  What am I really longing for?  I am longing rest found in God.  That perfect rest.  But it's a selfish longing.

The other day I was reading Psalm 25.  David loves God.  He knows with all his heart, as he says in verse 10, that

All the ways of the Lord are loving and faithful for those who keep the demands of his covenant. 

Sure as he is of God's love and His promises, David makes many requests of God throughout this psalm.

Don't let me be put to shame.
Show me your ways, teach me, guide me.
Remember your mercy and love and remember not my sins.
Turn to me and be gracious.
Look upon me and take away my sins.
Guard my life and rescue me.

I read that psalm and I read those requests and I nod my head in agreement.  Yes Lord.  But why I am nodding in agreement with David?  I know in my heart that I want those things for selfish reasons.  Get all those things right and it's comfortable.  It's a selfish longing.

But directly after verse 10, and right bang smack in the very centre of the psalm I read this.

For the sake of your name O LORD, forgive my iniquity, though it is great.

Being forgiven is not about me. It's not about me feeling comfortable or being seen in a good light.  It's for His sake.  That verse shot out at me like the proverbial silver bullet.  It's for His sake.

I've read through Philippians quite a number of times this year - stage one of memorising it.  And going over those words again and again is already working upon my soul.  Paul says, famously,

I eagerly expect and hope that I will in no way be ashamed, but will have sufficient courage so that now as always Christ will be exalted in my body, whether by life or by death.  For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.  If I am to go on living in the body, this will mean fruitful labour for me.  Yet what shall I choose?  I do not know! I am torn between the two.  I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is better by far, but it is more necessary for you that I remain in the body.
Philippians 1:20-24

Paul longs for heaven.  Not to be comfortable.  Not to rest.  There's not an ounce of selfishness in his longings.  He longs to see Jesus.  And if it is not his time, then to live is Christ.

This year as I read the Bible, as I try to memorise Philippians, as I love and serve the people around me and as I think, read, pray and reflect I find I am asking God a new thing, many times a day.  Help me Lord to love Jesus first and best. 

It's not all about me.  It's not about me at all.  It's about loving Jesus first and best.

It's a wrap

School's back.   We've had another great summer although I must say I am very much liking how quiet it is here just at the moment.  Here are some of things we've done...

Celebrated Christmas wonderfully.  One of the best we've had, I think.

 

Enjoyed catching up with friends "home" for Christmas.  This included catching up with various missionary families home on deputation.  And in amongst the missionaries, farewelled a friend from church off for two years on missionary service.

 

Saw three movies with the boys.  Gone gone gone is the policy of one visit to the cinema each holiday.  And in between the kids' movies, I saw The Hobbit with my husband.

 

The boys had two weeks of swimming lessons.  That went well.

 

We went to the zoo.

 

 

I finished six books. There are still a couple on the go but will need to reign in the reading now against the commencement of normal life. 

 

At different times we caught the train into town and took in the museum, art gallery (kept our youngest amused by getting him to count how many paintings included animals and managed quite a good stroll through the galleries as a result) and the state library.

 

At the state library we enjoyed an exhibition of original art work from the illustrators of children's books - Alison Lester, Graeme Base, Moira Court, Kim Gamble and Terry Denton to name a few.  We were delighted to see our favourite page from Imagine by Alison Lester, a portrait of Tashi and a page from The Eleventh Hour on display - and the exhibition prompted a bit of use of the paint set in subsequent days.

This one is by Terry Denton

 

And every time we went into the city we also enjoyed the water maze.  This is too much fun and such a gift to the people of our city from the local council.

 

 

I turned 47.  And The Key to the Door turned 5.  I would have made mention of the blog's birthday, it being a bit of special one for blogs...

 

...but we were away on a wonderful week's holiday by the seaside. 
 

One seaside highlight was this 'aquapark" - so much inflatable fun. 

 

Too much screen time, not enough cleaning, the occasional afternoon nap, a few new recipes tried and tested and most recently, lots of new stationery labeled, bags packed and some slightly strange cookies (I wonder if they will notice that they were made with wholemeal flour) baked for lunchboxes and this morning, off they went, happy with their new teachers and looking forward to a new year ahead. 

 

And I will look forward to a new year ahead as well, once I've sat here in complete silence for just a little bit longer. 

Eternal life

...it is with awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics.  There are no ordinary people.  You have never talked to a mere mortal.  Nations, cultures, arts, civilisations - these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat.  But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub and exploit - immortal horrors or everlasting splendours.

CS Lewis, from his sermon "The Weight of Glory"

We talked about this in Bible study last year.  That it isn't just Christians who have eternal life.  Every human will live for all eternity.  The issue is where and how that eternity will be spent.  This is a sobering thought for all and helps me to think about how to best spend my days.

Two books about grief - and a third waiting in the wings

Over the last two or three years I have read and reflected on the subjects of suffering, death and grief quite a lot.  And it's been helpful.  But with all that energy, enthusiasm and optimism that comes with the beginning of a fresh new year I had thought that maybe this year I should shift my gaze to life and living.  You know, eating hot cross buns eight days into the year and other crazy stuff like that.  Yet, twenty days in and I had read two books on grief and been reminded of a third - Timothy Keller's Walking with God Through Pain and Suffering published last year - to acquire and read. 

The first two, predictably, were A Severe Mercy by Sheldon Vanauken and A Grief Observed by CS Lewis.  Both are beautifully written, personal accounts of grief following the deaths of their respective wives.  Without giving names to them, they write their way through what we know as the stages of grief - stages that don't pass in orderly fashion but that swirl around and around, being revisited time and time again - painfully, frustratingly and sometimes even comfortingly. 

These are wonderful books, but they're not books I'd give to someone in the raw stages of early grief.  As CS Lewis himself, a man of reading and writing and books and letters, said,

And no one ever told me about the laziness of grief.  Except at my job - where the machine seems to run on much as usual - I loathe the slightest effort.  Not only writing but even reading a letter is too much.

(A Grief Observed - Part One)

What I found especially helpful was reading about that time in grief that Vanauken calls "the second death" - and which CS Lewis described in his book in depth.  It's that moment in grief when it stops being so very raw.  When there aren't tears every day.  When maybe it's harder to bring a clear picture of the one lost so readily to mind or recall the exact tone of their voice.  It is the second death - and it feels all disloyal and like a betrayal.  And yet, it is getting through this step that leads to peace and acceptance.

Great books to read for their sheer beauty, to keep learning about grief and how to respond to it in a godly way and perhaps to share with someone who has reached that point of frustration in their grief and needs to give words to what is happening, see that it will pass - which is OK - and be assured that they will emerge from it all, albeit as a changed (hopefully stronger, richer) person from the one who stepped into the process.

The year of...

Every year the United Nations declares it to "the International Year of ___ (fill in the blank)."  A year to raise awareness and celebrate particular causes.

This year it's the International Year of Small Island Developing States and the International Year of Family Farming AND the International Year of Crystallography.

Since starting this blog, I've given each year a designation as well. 

2009 was the Year of Optimism and the Year of the Garden.
2010 was the Year of the Roast.
2011 was the Year of Five New Things.
2012 was the Year of Praying for my Friends.
And 2013...well, 2013 didn't get a name.  Maybe it was the Year of the Strawberry Meringue Stack.

Plans for 2014 are still forming and settling into place.  Some of the goals for the year include:-
1.  The Daily Bible Reading plan.
2.  Memorising the whole of Philippians.  (Yes!  You read it first here.)
3.  Learning how to use a slow cooker.  Once the weather cools down I will be calling for your best slow cooker recipes.  Get them ready.

And there's a handful of plans and ideas brewing, not yet Internet ready.  So there is to be no naming of the year as yet.  That will perhaps come later.

That said, twelve days into the year, I find I have five books other than the Bible on the go at the moment.  Two on the go is abnormal for me.  I'm not quite sure what's going on here.  Short concentration span?  And not two days after Deb's post on hot cross buns I found myself at a friend's house eating one.  With real butter.  It was delicious.  I'd barely dusted off the fruit mince pie crumbs.

So maybe it will be the Year of Outrageousness...in my own mild mannered way.  Time will tell.

Things I like # 1

# 1 - A trampoline spring tool

Back in the day when Kevin Rudd was handing out stimulus package money, we spent some of ours on a trampoline.  The frame and springs are originals but we have replaced the mat, spring protector and barrier net each a couple of times.  Yesterday I replaced the mat that had done us two excellent years' service.  When I ordered the new mat I took the liberty of ordering one of these too...

...a trampoline spring tool.  This handy little tool enabled me to put the new mat on in ten minutes without giving myself a hernia as opposed to the last time when it took more than half an hour and was, shall we say, a tad exhausting.  I may not have many more trampoline mats to replace in my lifetime as a mother of boys who are not so small anymore.  But even if I only use it one or two more times, it was a worthwhile purchase.  Don't change a trampoline mat without a trampoline spring tool.  You can borrow mine if you need one.

Bible reading for the year ahead

How did your Bible reading go in 2013? I know of five dear ones who have been having a tilt at using a reading plan to get through the Bible in a year this year and I have been praying for each of you.  Whether you made it to the end or not, my prayer now is that it has been a wonderful journey no matter how far you got and that you are spurred on to press on.

Probably you already have 2014 sorted, but if not...

If you started in on a plan but stumbled and fell, here are three wonderful options...

1. Start again.
2. Pick up from where you left off.  This has the advantage that you will not be tied to calendar dates and that might take the legalism out of the exercise if that is a danger for you.  And it gives you the space to slow down or speed up as time, need and want allows.
3. Choose a new plan and start afresh.

If you are looking for a new plan or a first time plan here is THE place to go.  My three favourites are...

The Daily Reading Bible Plan - which takes you through the Psalms and New Testament twice and the rest of the Old Testament once.  Three readings a day.

The Chronological Bible Reading Plan - affectionately known as the CBRP, which takes you through the Bible in Chronological order - three to four chapters a day.

Every Day in the Word - four short  readings that take you through the Psalms twice in the year and Proverbs, the rest of the Old Testament (from front to back) and the New Testament once.

Each of these takes me about ten to fifteen minutes per day if I don't stop to linger.

If taking on the whole Bible seems too much, then I would suggest using either the first or third plan and just reading the New Testament and maybe the Psalms readings each day.  The Daily Reading Plan will take you through those readings twice in the year.  Everyday in the Year will take you through the New Testament once and the Psalms twice.  This would be a great start to forming a life long, life giving habit.

Please let me know if you are going to use a reading plan.  I would love to pray for you. And please pray for me too.  Don't think for a minute that I have this all sown up.  I love reading the Bible. Yes, yes, yes.  But that doesn't mean it isn't a battle at times. 

Oh, and how did I go in2013?  I used the Every Day in the Word plan this year and kept pretty well on track until September or October, which is a bit of a record for me.  I spent the last part of the year falling behind and catching up again, finishing yesterday. 

This year I am back to the Daily Reading Bible Plan.  I have been encouraging (some would say nagging) friends at church to read along with me this year and I think a few are going to join in.  It will be great to spur one another on in this.  And next year (yes...I already know what I am doing in 2015, God willing) I hope to do the same plan but starting at the beginning of the year in the middle of the plan - at the beginning of the New Testament and Psalms and in the middle of the Old Testament - because it will be time again to give the poor old Prophets the fresh end of the year and my attention.  They were a little short changed this year...

Happy reading.  Happy New Year.

For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you. We continually ask God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all the wisdom and understanding that the Spirit gives, so that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience,  and giving joyful thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of his holy people in the kingdom of light. 
Colossians 1:9-12

Merry Christmas

Joy to the world, the Lord is come. 

Let earth receive her King.

 

Quietly getting ready

 

How silently, how silently
The wondrous gift is given.
So God imparts to human hearts
The blessings of His heaven.

Greetings in the digital age - the Christmas edition

The Christmas cards are done.  Late this year.  And that was after I had culled the list.  The overseas ones were sent ten days out from Christmas.  The interstate ones went out with a week to spare.  The ones in and out of my own city were dropped in the post box yesterday.  On the 22nd December.  With a muttered apology to the poor postal workers who have to sort and maybe even deliver my mail this close to Christmas.  I'm appalled at myself.

There was considerable inertia to get the Christmas mail done this year.  Deb found the same.  On her post I put it down the to the recent full moon.  But the real reason for me was West Wing.  I am at the business end of the boxed set.  It's been a big six or eight months. And one evening early in December I was so tired after a busy day that I couldn't think of Christmas mail so I put on an episode.  That may or may not have led to one or two episodes more.  That certainly led to a late night.  So that by the next night I was so tired from my late night that there was nothing for it but to collapse on the sofa and watch West Wing...

Nothing like the pressure of a deadline (and that awful episode where Arnold Vinick's hand is broken from too many hand shakes) to break a bad habit and get you moving.  And I do like to write the annual Christmas letter.  If nothing else, in the absence of keeping a journal, it serves as my own little reminder of our year.  I've kept every one I've written since that year I dared to cross to the dark side of the photocopied Christmas letter.  That would be 1995.

I've said (ad nauseum, some might say) that we don't write letters anymore because we have email.  But then we don't actually correspond by email either.  And email has been overtaken by the shorter, sharper and snappier Facebook...and possibly by other means electronic that I don't even know about. 

I reflected here about the change in how we tackle greetings in the digital age when someone has passed away.  And it would seem that in one short year lots has changed about how we send Christmas greetings too. 

Last year we received lots of Christmas cards and as for previous years, many photocopied Christmas letters that I would place in a special box on the coffee table to read and enjoy during quiet moments.  And last year there were quite a few letters that arrived electronically, most of which I printed out to put in the box as well.

This year we have received lots of cards.  Most of them are from people who live within a five kilometre radius of our home.  Most of them hand delivered.  We attend a church with people who delight in swapping cards with one another so the last couple of Sundays have been fun.  There were quite a few received from friends at the end of the school year as well.  Then a few cards have come in the mail.   But the letters.  As of today the count is two in post and two attached to emails. 

That said, Facebook is becoming a fun place to hang about, so please don't hear me complaining about a lack of Christmas mail.  It's beginning to feel a lot like Christmas in that electronic neck of the woods.  And I get it.  The inertia was enormous this year.  I find myself wondering if this year is it.  There will always be a collection of souls who will receive a card from us, for any number of reasons.  But I am wondering whether next year I go essentially electronic.  My letter writing self would consider this to be crossing over to the really dark bit of the dark side of Christmas greetings.  But things have moved along really quickly in the digital world this year - a lot of it good  - and I feel I am moving along with it.  I guess another year will tell.

Or maybe it really was just the full moon, after all.

Longing and waiting

I look one way and I see my kids counting down the days to Christmas.  The Advent calendar is a constant reminder.  There's daily excitement.  What will today's pocket hold?  But really, they long with eager anticipation for THE day.  The day when we celebrate the birth of Jesus.  Great joy.

I look the other way and I see my friend whose mum is dying.  I am anxious with every beep of my phone that heralds the next text message.  Will this be the one?  They long for her to be out of pain and to be at Home with Jesus.  And yet they long for a few more days.  It's so, so hard.  I watch from the sidelines and I long for the time when Jesus will come again and there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain.

I look back many years now and remember when my own dad was dying over Christmas.  I remember praying that he would live.  And then praying that he would die, to bring an end to his suffering.  And then as he lay there neither improving or declining, I remember praying that I would learn to wait in patience for God's perfect timing.  And perfect it was, as a few days before he went Home to be with Jesus he gave us the small but sure indication that this was indeed where he was heading.  God's perfect timing was perfect comfort.

I look one way, the other, then back and now forward.  It makes the shape of the cross.  Christ.  Christmas.  Longing with the excited anticipation of a child.  Longing with a heavy heart that is, even so, sustained by the sure hope of a new creation.  Learning to wait patiently and to trust that Jesus will come again in God's perfect timing, when all who love Him have been found.

Longing and waiting.  Advent.

Wait for the Lord, be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord.

Psalm 27:14

How's your Advent?

During the last week I have had an enormous amount of traffic to a post I wrote in 2009 - the one about how you can use the Jesus Storybook Bible as an Advent calendar.  Over 2000 visitors to that one post.  In a week.  (Hello visitors!)  That is quite a lot more than the usual ten dear ones (hello you guys) who drop by occasionally.

Anyway, in case you missed it...if you go HERE you will find all the hard work for getting the Jesus Storybook Bible up and running as an Advent calendar done and ready to print off for free.  It's probably too late for this year but go and print off a copy ready for another year - or to give away.  This is an amazing resource.

In other news, I have just about finished all the Christmas shopping I am going to do this year.  Good news.   However the Christmas letter writing muse seems to have upped and left the house.  And given it's 5th December...that's bad news. 

Summer update

Giving up: on monthly status reports.  I read a few of them all at once a while ago and you know, they are a bit repetitive.   So I'm having a go at the quarterly approach at the beginning of each new season instead.

Reading: the last month of my Bible reading plan for the year and also Come, Thou Long Expected Jesus edited by Nancy Guthrie.  I read Come, Thou Long Expected Jesus in 2010 and LOVED it.  I didn't read much of it in 2011 because I kept giving my copy away to someone, buying a new one and giving that one away and so on, all the way to Christmas.  I'm not sure what happened in 2012, but I didn't read it.  This year is the year.

Recently discovered:  that I like beetroot dip.  And carrot cake.  Not together though.

Eating: carrot cake.

Have had: the perfect diary to keep track of life for the last two years.

Panicked: when the place that sets up each November to sell calendars and diaries for the year ahead didn't have the perfect diary.  There was one there but it has an intolerable cover and intolerable pictures scattered through it.  Couldn't overlook the artwork for the sake of a perfect system.  It does after all have to be my constant companion for a whole year.

Went to: extraordinary lengths  to get a perfect diary for next year.  That is, after a quick a look around at a few shops, ordered one off the Internet.  What is the perfect diary, you ask?  It is an A5 diary with a week to the page on the left and a lined page on the right for notes and the weekly TO DO list.  Perfection.  And the one I chose is cornflower blue.  Very happy.

Bought: a new CD last month.  Third Day's Christmas Offerings.  I couldn't get enough of their rendition of O Holy Night last Christmas.  Loving it. 

Resources for Advent:  Besides the above mentioned...

For smalls, The Jesus Storybook Bible which acts like an Advent calendar.

For adults and for bigger kids who can manage a grown up version of the Bible, there are a great set of Jesse tree readings (bit like an Advent calendar in tree form) in the appendix of Disciplines of a Godly Family by Kent and Barbara Hughes.  I've seen a few versions of Jesse tree readings and some of them have REALLY LONG readings.  The Hughes' set is very short-concentration-span friendly.

How the Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr Seuss is a fun reminder against greed.  I borrow it from the library most years.  I've never got around to buying one.  Maybe that though is part of the message of the book.

If you are looking for an excellent Christmas tract, the Christmas WordWatch published by Matthias Media is the one for you.  Say the good people at Matthias Media,
"In this 'mini-dictionary', word guru Kel Richards puts us straight on the origin and meaning of some common Christmas words and traditions, and tells us things about Christmas we may never have known. As he does so, Kel cleverly communicates important Gospel truths in a gentle way." 
I'm giving a copy of this to each of my upper primary Scripture kids at the end of the school year.

Making a big effort: to be joyful.  Last year as the notes kept coming home from school with more and more things to do to mark the end of the year, I found myself rolling my eyes a bit.  I later remembered that a) I don't let my kids roll their eyes at me and b) I don't ever recall my parents rolling their eyes at all the things they had to take us to at the end of the year...or any other part of the year for that matter.  So practicing joy and enthusiasm...and it does have a flow on effect. We are all having a happier time of it this year. 

Inspired: by Deb's Christmas tree to finish this update with a Christmas tree quiz.  Please join in by answering in the comments section.

1. When do you put up your Christmas tree?
2.  Colour co-ordinated or mix-and-match?
3.  If you have kids, do you decorate the tree yourself, let the kids decorate it or let the kids decorate it and then fix it up when they go to bed?
4.  When do the presents go under the tree?  As they are wrapped/received or not until Christmas Eve?