Hebrews

on the edge of the ocean
i swam in the sea
cold salty water
washed over me
i started to hope (again)
that i could be free

remember

Have just come back from our Remembrance Day assembly. It was really beautifully done, and good to see all of the kids in our school standing quietly and respectfully (despite heat and discomfort). I would have to say that this has been the first time I have seen the whole school body brought together in unity and respect for something, teachers and students, and with hardly any coersion at all.


As the last post played and we entered our minute's silence I thought about the different world that seems to have existed at the time of WWI. A world where young men and women would offer themselves to fight because someone required it of them. A world where the tragedy of millions of lives lost could happen.

Our modern world has grown out of that. Individuals would not be willing to fight and die in those massive numbers nowadays. And that is a good thing isn't it? Our society wouldn't be caught dead on a killing field at the hands of the authorities? No way.

And then the minute's silence ended and the reveille began. And as my heart quickened, I remembered another thing our society has 'grown out of'-

the hope of ressurrection.

from little things

I am thinking about this song right now. My Year Ten History class have been listening to it as a way of remembering the names and story of the Wave Hill protest and it's making me remember some other stories. Like Jesus' ones about the mustard seed and the yeast. From little things big things grow.

It's the way the world works and it's direct evidence that goodness is much bigger and quieter than noisy, ineffectual evil and destruction. And yet my mind insists on defaulting back to the assumption that I need to see or do this or that RIGHT NOW, witness immediate effects, and if I don't then I'm doing something wrong.

Two minutes ago I saw evidence of that big, quiet goodness residing in and working away through a Year Ten boy whom I have despaired over many times this year. What does it mean God? Are you bigger (and quieter) than the sadness and waste I'm confronted with in these teenagers' lives? Are you still present and working away? Can goodness work away right next to evil?

And am I so lucky, have I become so used to a glut of goodness in the people around me that I am unable to see it quietly working in my kids?

It makes me want to stop. And breathe. And rest in the small acts (very small) towards goodness that I am able to do.

And you can take those small acts, watered with the kind of despair that chooses to trust something bigger than itself anyway. And if we wait...

HARRY POTTER SEVEN!

My Year 10 girls just informed me that I need to buy a ticket from them to see Harry Potter SEVEN (a) on 17 November to raise money for their prom. ONE TICKET???? I INTEND TO BUY FIVE!!!!!

the game

It feels like a game I cannot win. I’m not very good at strategy you see. And I seem to make the wrong move by instinct. Is it fear that causes me to fumble?

But if it’s true that the music playing at the core of my soul could be part of a larger symphony, what I really need to learn is to relax; to trust; to live in the river I am being carried by: to play, to float and not to worry too much about the destination.

lilith a

'Life was rather dull for a while; but a comforter was given me, and the name of my comforter is Hope.'

trouble

i’m walking a tightrope

the ground not far below

holding my  father's hand

lightly

(I know I’m unco

but it isn’t far to go

and I know

it wont hurt too bad if I fall)

THEN

swiftly, abruptly

the ground falls

away forthwith

and

in the course of a moment

I’m out…

over a cliff!

grip tighter

heart falter

pale-face, whiter

headspace alter

feet swing
from side to side

wobbling,

trembling,

The arc is WIDE

(almost forget I’m holding His hand)

brain

SHOUTING, BLEATING

(insert deafening roar)

WHAT THE FUCK DID I GET ON THIS THING FOR?

…

He's holding my hand

and
I’m in high trouble....

Sure as hope
(and if i'm smart)

I will not let go!

heart with heart, love with love, being with being...

Hester, in George MacDonald's Weighed and Wanting, sits beside the bed of a cold, hungry, sick woman and yearns to help her. This is what the old Scotsman says...

She had yet to learn that the love of God is so deep he can be satisfied with nothing less than getting as near as it is possible for the Father to draw night to his creatures - and that is into absolute contact of heart with heart, love with love, being with being. And as that must be wrought out from the deepest inside, divine law working itself up through our natue into our consciousness and will, and claiming us as divine, who can tell by what slow certainties of approach God is drawing nigh to the most suffering of his creatures?

God Help Me to live with this kind of faith, hope, love...