Seven

David Taylor recently did a blog entry on 7 things that are beautiful and I was inspired. I had to follow suit. 7 beautiful things:

1. Mazzy Star and her Into Dust introduced to me by my friend Amy who is living in Guatemala and helping the people right now while they recover from a hurricane AND a volcanic eruption (Amy is beautiful too). I fall in love with my husband even more every time I hear Mazzy Star.





2. Ikiru, the movie directed by Akira Kurosawa. Kurosawa is quickly becoming a favorite director of mine. This film takes you through a man's last year of life; it is a powerful and intelligent film that desires to inspire its viewers to live and truly live, to Carpe Diem. "... make the most of what you have. It is later than you think." (Horace) Ikiru is beautiful.

Takashi Shimura in Ikiru

3. My friend Stephen McCants gave us a breadmaker for a wedding present. Thank you, Stephen! It has been such an incredible blessing for this gluten free lady. Neal was brave and and tried making the first loaf, initiating the bread machine with gluten free bread. The warm smell of yeast and gluten free goodness filled our home; it's been hard to stop since. It's so good with a little butter and honey! Homemade bread IS beautiful.




4. A few months ago my husband sent me a link to some images to inspire creativity. I was fascinated by the fact I was drawn to the photographs with umbrellas in them. Here's my favorite: (click here to see a larger view of it.)

Waiting for rain by Simona Cristureanu

5. And speaking of rain, last summer we saw a horrible drought last summer with temperatures remaining over 100 for over 80 days. This summer, there is rain (nothing like three years ago, but wonderful none the less).






6. A couple of years ago I actually submitted a poem to a contest that I didn't make the final. When I read the finalists and this woman's work, I fell in love with her wit and craft. Love this poem. I think it's beautiful:

Cartography by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer

I want to know your body as I know
these sandstone cliffs behind our house-take treks
for weeks along your spine, traverse your neck
with slow, exploratory eyes and go
for long excursions on your limbs with no
set plan for how I might get home, except
to know that you will lead me there. I'll step
so lightly, leave no evidence. And oh,
the maps I'll make, my love, will not be made
of paper but of tune. No rise of you
will be unknown to me, no inch unsung.
I know topographies change by the day—
that wind and water have their way. So true.
A good mapmaker's work is never done.


7. Okay, I know it's simple but fresh herbs are beautiful! N has an amazing green thumb bringing back to life my wedding fern that had almost completely perished. With fresh oregano and thyme and tarragon and basil and curly and flat leaf parsley at our fingertips, meals are so much more lively!

chains

i don't know of many who have not heard the quote from John 8 "Then you will know the truth and the truth will set you free." if you read the rest of the context around the verse you get a truer sense of the meaning of the verse. there's so much i would love to get into (ie. the section before this where Jesus writes in the sand); but there is much in question of who Christ is in the verses above and below. Jesus is being challenged by the children of Abraham. who are you? right before this verse Jesus says, "If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples." and then after, "I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin. Now a slave has no permanent place in the family, but a son belongs to it forever. So if the Son sets you free then you are free indeed."

the truth Jesus spoke was hard on the ears it fell to. it was difficult to stomach. many denied his claims; this was not the savior they were looking for. he was from a terrible town (does anything good come from Nineveh?); he was meek; he was a carpenter's son. they heard Jesus proclaim, "before Abraham was born, I am!" and they were angered. this was blasphemy to their ears, so they picked up stone to throw at him ( Jesus escaped before the stones were thrown.)

what truth are you denying? are you listening to what you want to hear, pleased by good words? are you embracing a sugar coated lie that looks like the truth because how hard the truth really is?

a favorite quote of mine is from Flannery O'Connor: "The truth does not change with our ability to stomach it." the truth is the truth is the truth. i listened recently to truth be twisted into a lie; originally it was truth and it was truth that was difficult to hear. now after being twisted, it was lighter and sweeter but no longer truth, no longer powerful, no longer potent. it was impotent and weak. it was a lie. it was death. and now, with truth denied, the chains were placed back on.

a dear friend once told me a hard truth i needed to hear... but i did not want to hear it. she told me my apologies were not apologies because i followed them up with the word "but". i was angry, upset. but God used her to convict me. she was right. i listened to this truth; and i tell you, it gave me life, exposed brokenness and pride in me that needed to be addressed, and it improved my relationships and changed me.

the life Jesus is speaking about is the truth of who HE is, a hard truth but it is truth.


"A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic - on the level with a man who says he is a poached egg - or he would be the devil of hell. You must take your choice. Either this was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us." C.S. Lewis Mere Christianity

waiting

wednesday my dear dear friend gave birth to a son. i sat at the office waiting to hear the signal and see the flags waving that it was time, he was almost here. it was a lesson in patience, i tell you, one i did not handle well. later, i held his tiny body and i celebrated the beauty of something so precious and amazing created by two people i love. i loved watching brie's face as she took in the complete miracle that was and is the bundle of wonder laying at her breast. that was worth the wait (though i am VERY aware the waiting was so so much more intense for her involving that thing they call labor (and for a very good reason)).

there are times when waiting is the best thing. the caterpillar and the butterfly. the seed planted. the babe in the womb. i remember watching my grandfather's incubator waiting while the eggs from his show chickens prepared to hatch. we couldn't wait to see a beak peak through the shell!

there are times when waiting is the hardest thing to do. waiting for change. waiting for an answer. i am currently waiting for a change in a situation of loved ones; and i desperately wanting to do something to change the situation for them. i was reading from Lamentaions the other day, remembering all that Jeremiah went through, all that God's chosen went through. it wasn't pretty! "Though I cry for help, he shuts out my prayer," continuing, "He is a bear lying in wait for me, a lion in hiding; he turned aside my steps and tore me to pieces; he has made me desolate; he bent his bow and set me as a target for his arrow."

Israel waited. when they couldn't wait anymore and acted in pride, when they did things their own way, they had to wait longer and endure more. Jeremiah continues, "my soul is bereft of peace; I have forgotten what happiness is; so I say, “My endurance has perished; so has my hope from the Lord.” Remember my affliction and my wanderings, the wormwood and the gall! My soul continually remembers it and is bowed down within me. But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.“The Lord is my portion,” says my soul, “therefore I will hope in him.” The Lord is good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him. It is good that one should wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord.

there is nothing i can do for my loved ones but pray and wait on the Lord. waiting is in no way a passive thing though it is viewed and feels as such; trusting Christ is completely active. it takes shutting down and quieting the voice and the desire to do things my way. it requires believing that God is who He says he is and will do what he says he will do. it means praying, without ceasing, even asking the the LORD to change me.



christopher elliot, welcome to the world. you are a joy and a blessing to those around you. i pray you are a man who loves and waits on the LORD.