I realised the other day, after reading a book about walking mindfully, that this is what I do most mornings. Yes it is a mix of pondering the day a head, chatting with other dog walkers, etc but also I am aware of God, nature, the Universe. And the words from Rich Mullins The Color Green always come into my head. I think it just says the amazingness of God and the complexity of the colour green. The above pictures of of various beautiful places in and around where I live and to me it is always the amazingness of the different greens. And God made all of them. Then it opens up to me how different we all are and how amazingly we are all made and how diverse. But also how if we show our true depth of God colours without our traumas, hurts, fears and needing to protect ourselves, how beautifully we would all look together, like the different colours green.
I decided google the song so I could listen to it again – as I seem to be listening to music again after a period of silence whilst I worked, played, etc. Listening to the song took me back to my early days of following Jesus – starting in 1992 and onwards. I had always been into music and used to organise venues for up and coming bands in my area so once I got into Jesus and God someone pointed me towards contemporary Christian music and Cross Rhythms.
Amazing how one song could lead to so many memories. I wonder if you are as old as me and if you know this song. If so I wonder where it takes you as you listen. What other songs do this for you?
Rich Mullins was an amazing influence in my Christian life. He challenged ideas that my small town, small charismatic church were teaching me. He was evangelistic, converted to Catholicism, worked with Native Americans, but then also was killed in a car accident because he wasn’t wearing a seat belt.
From him and many others that I came across via Cross Rhythms and others in the contemporary Christian circles I have also been challenging the things I am taught not just from the church pulpit, but within the books I read – both those that identify as Christian and those that don’t, the music I listen to, the conversations I hear around me, and even this relatively new concept of deconstruction one’s Christian faith. I’m not sure I’ve ever had one set in stone to deconstruct thanks to those like Rich Mullins, Cross Rhythms, Greenbelt and others. And that makes me so glad.
too. I don’t do the “watching music” normally – in fact I don’t often listen to music. In the car maybe but not just to sit down and listen to. I have to be doing something else. But someone from one of the writing groups that I run suggested we watch her. I have not been able to get her out of my head since. Then, as things generally do, I met with a friend for coffee and she was talking about similar things to the things Kate was singing about. Last night when I watched I also took notes of the things that had stood out to me the night before. The title of this blog is one of the lines and it is the line that fits in most with what my friend and I were talking about – “what we going to do to wake up?”
recompense, humility and most importantly to realise that we are connected and to live with unconditional love for each other.
what caused those young men to drive a van into people they didn’t know and then go on a killing rampage, what causes the person in the town next to me to want to stab his wife, what causes builders to put cheap inflammable materials into a building and authority figures to turn a blind eye, what causes suicides, murders, the need to buy sweatshop made clothes, to drink, etc etc.
there, stopped blaming them and started seeing how we can LOVE UNCONDITIONALLY. Perhaps we can only do that when we realise we are all connected, all loved and all have something to contribute?
Matthew 25 tells a parable of the Wise and Foolish Virgins. In the tale all ten of them are waiting for the bridegroom to turn up. It seems that this bridegroom doesn’t come at the time expected. In fact he is very late. Five of them had come without anything extra just in case and others had come with more oil just in case. When he did finally arrive the ones who had only got enough oil had run out but the others had enough left, though were reluctant to share. What struck me today was that all ten had come prepared but some were more prepared than others.
and see my daughter. Even though it was great fun it was still a very long day. Then on the Sunday I went to help out on Gwrych Castle open day, which again was enormous fun but tiring. Then in the week I had a meeting, a workshop every evening and every day, and a couple of other things going on. A very full diary. This weekend thankfully it has been calm and quiet, and last night husband was away and I had no guests staying. I am almost recovering. When I was in my 20s and 30s I could have breezed through this, but now it has taken a whole week to recover and I still feel a bit exhausted. I had enough but nothing left over.
churches I’ve been to there has been much preached on making sure you always have that extra oil. Yes I totally understand that, but I need to know what I now need to cut out so that I have oil left over.
asked to do. All valid reasons.
know what I think? I think he would have been on both sides. Yes both sides. Both sides are hurting and in pain – ok the refugees and those with green cards, etc stuck in airports have a noticeable need but the side behind the wall also have a need.
the news about the fences and walls being built across Europe to stop the refugees entering the UK. Yes this includes those fences that have now been torn down in Calais.
blessings from God.
Aspirational Adventures 