Tag: God

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Main Event ordinary

Defining My Year

Colwyn Bay 6th January 2024 photographed by myself

It is that season where we look back and look forward. A time when we talk about our best times over the last year and our worst times. A time when we talk about and make plans for the future.

I’ve been reading Josh Luke Smith’s thoughts which he has been sending out each day since 1st Jan. This verse struck me from the poem he shared

We must not define our lives by our worst days, and neither should we by our best; most of life is in the middle.

Joshua Luke Smith – This is the main event

This photograph I’ve shared is from a walk my husband, daughter, my dog and myself did yesterday. It was an ordinary walk along and ordinary beach. We talked about ordinary things then went to the pub. Ordinary

Neither of my children could make it up for Christmas. 2nd January was the first time my daughter was able to come and has managed to be with us for the whole week. But she’s tired after working all through December, over Christmas and over New Year in hospitality. She’s tired and needs a bit of family downtime. We’ve done a lot of sitting about and chatting. One afternoon her and the dog fell asleep on the couch whilst I was reading. We did one day where we went out to lunch so she could get a new coat. But it was all low key. All ordinary. It was life lived in the middle point between best and worst.

But as Josh says in all his writings for this year – and it is a phrase he uses often – it is the ordinary that is the “main event”. If we spend our time waiting for the amazing or even wallowing in the awful we will miss out on so much. God promises to be with us ALL the time.

Yes God promises to be with us when things get tough and life is awful and when we need to be enfolded in their loving arms. God promises to rejoice with us when things are amazing and shout with us. Though often in the great times, and even in the good times, we forget to acknowledge God. But God is with us ALWAYS.

With this in my head it is helping me realise to just acknowledge God in the washing up, in the deep cleaning the kitchen which I did this morning because husband and daughter have gone for hike in the sunshine that has miraculously appeared over North Wales. I have got good at remembering to praise God for the beauty in my local park but this whole thing of remembering that actually it is the life we live day in day which is our “main event“, which is our lives, is something to be grasped

I suppose it is what mindfulness is deep down, but often that has been turned into a “thing.” – eg “I am being mindful” or whatever. But this is just knowing that all my life, whether good, bad, indifferent, whether mindful or forgetful, all of this is my life. All of this is the main event of my life.

Dog enjoying the beach. For the dog each moment of every day is just what it is!

Categories
enough joy peace

You Don’t Need To Do It

My dog’s biggest decision/resolution for any day of the week is what toy shall he play with from his two new ones. And each decision is “new every morning”

On a Facebook group I’m part of my QEC practitioner suggested instead of feeling like we are being forced into New year resolutions – that most of us feel guilty about breaking by mid-January – why not QEC a vision of Peace, Joy and Plenty for 2024. This is working with that principle that what we believe will come to pass will come to pass. This isn’t a “pollyanna” “pie in the sky” way of thinking. This isn’t saying that we will be protected from bad things happening. But it is saying that we will ride through them with peace, with deep joy [not the silly giggles but something deep and fundamental] and that we will know we will have plenty/enough of whatever we need to see us through.

All this is what God says to us through the Bible – that “the joy of the Lord is our strength” [Nehemiah 8:10], “my peace I give to you” [John 14:27] and Matthew 6:25-34 which tells us not to worry about anything because God has it all for us. God has what we need in abundance. Though too often we do not see Christians living this out so find it hard to believe. But it is there!

But I realised as I was free writing around this that there is an order to have this happens. I felt that one couldn’t just dive into believing there is plenty/enough/an abundance because it is so hard to believe. It is why we have to QEC things and put in new beliefs so we can start on that journey.

  • But that QEC journey starts, I think, with us having peace with our past, with our upbringing, with our mistakes.
  • From this place comes deep joy that we are such amazing people, even if that has been lost in things that have been said to us as children.
  • Then once we are at this place of deep joy and gratitude, then we can believe we have plenty for what lies ahead each and every single day.

To succeed with this we need to be like those who go to Alcoholics Anonymous believe, that what we have this for each day and we rejoice in the dailiness of it and not have to stake it up for longer than today.

God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.
Living one day at a time;
Enjoying one moment at a time;
Accepting hardships as the pathway to peace;
…
Amen.

The Serenity Prayer

Note the “living one day at a time, enjoying one moment at at time” or as Lamentations 3:23 says God’s blessings are “new every morning” because “great is your faithfulness”

By not trying to put it in resolutions – that we aren’t doing at the moment anyway and so won’t stick to because there are reasons why we didn’t start now – but listening to our hearts and going day by day doing our best to live in peace, from which follows joy and gratitude, givings us the hope of living in plenty/enough then we can move in harmony with ourselves, with God, with The Universe, and with each other.

Categories
Cross Lighthouse

To Steer By

Looking towards the end of Ynys Llanddwyn, Newborough, Anglesey. Photographed by myself 26th December 2023

A friend was telling me how when people say to her that it is Jesus is just a crutch she responds with “too right because I can’t do life on my own” [paraphrase]. I found this an interesting response because too often I have heard, and also my response has been, to defend myself, to say that Jesus isn’t a crutch and that we, me and Jesus that is, are walking together equally yoked etc. So her response got lodged in my mind.

Then when we were out on our yearly Boxing day walk, this year accompanied by picnic, to Ynys Llanddwyn with half of the North Wales population, I was struck by the lighthouse and the cross being on the headland of the island. Yes I have seen them before but I don’t think I’ve walked along this path before and got the same view.

How often does that happen that when God wants to highlight something we are lead down a different path way? Often with some phrase or expression or bible verse hovering round our peripheral thought.

I was struck by how no one would mock a sailor who said they were guided by the lighthouse, that they relied on the lighthouse to keep them safe. Yet I wonder how often we are mock for saying we are guided by the cross, that we rely on the cross? Also how often I might keep quiet about being guided by the Cross but openly say how my SATNAV keeps me safe. Or how often we check the weather forecast trusting that but don’t check in with our hearts/the Universe/God to hear where we should be going.

Note to self – be willing to let others know what guides me, but also make sure that guide is the Cross first. Nothing wrong with being guided by lighthouses, SATNAVs or weather forecasts, or all those other things that we use to help us along the way. But make sure that first and foremost it is the Cross the guides and leads us.

And not to be embarrassed by that.

Categories
Looking well-being

Looking Up

My dog is always lifting his head up to me 🙂

Belated reflections on St Stephen’s Day, which was yesterday. 26th December. Interestingly it fits in with, what I felt was a bad BBC drama, Vigil. In one episode the main character has been captured by suspected Middle Eastern terrorists and the British soldiers come with their drones to rescue her. It is only when someone looks up that there can be a positive identification made by facial recognition software. Someone facing downwards, side-wards or anyway other than directly up cannot be recognised.

Now here’s the verse from the story of Stephen that struck me. Do read the whole story if you don’t know it.

54 When the members of the Sanhedrin heard this, they were furious and gnashed their teeth at him. 55 But Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, looked up to heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. 56 “Look,” he said, “I see heaven open and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God.”

Acts 7 54-56

Now I know God knows us all whether we look up at them or not [which actually those back viewing the drone footage knew everyone anyway] But with those viewing the drone footage they needed this full on head upwards facing the camera identification to either rescue or destroy.

After reading this passage about Stephen I wonder if God needs us to look up to be able to fully show us things. Interestingly if you walk with your head upright on your shoulders then your breathing and your digestion are improved. If your head is even down a little bit then this makes it harder for your body to digest or your lungs to work to their full capacity. But perhaps it is also easier to worship God if our heads our upwards.

I know heaven isn’t “up there” and hell “down there” but I do wonder if we look upwards as we go through life, whether walking, talking with friends, working, etc whether we connect with God more so.

I know that there is prostrating prayer, bowed down prayer, but how often do we encourage prayer with heads raised? Would Stephen have seen that amazing vision if he had bowed his head and accepted his lot?

I wonder if he lifted his head in defiance to the anger of the religious leaders. [For those who don’t know he then gets stoned to death] I don’t expect he did it to receive that vision. I do wonder, as I spend time with this story, if God blessed Stephen because he was bold enough to look upwards, to see the sun shining, to hear the birds singing, to graciously rather than fearfully accept his fate.

As 2023 ends and 2024 is coming I hope that I can lift my head more to God, to the wonder of my world, to the joy of being, and for the health of my body, and no longer allow the pessimism that can so easily engulf to drag my head downwards thus hindering my well-being.

Do you fancy giving it a go too???

Categories
christmas turkey

What is Christmas all about?

As this is Christmas Eve this gives me time to wish you all a Peaceful Christmas, a time of rest and reflection, and a sense of acceptance, whether you are on your own, with family, having to go through tough times or enjoying life.

I’m off to be part of my favourite service of the whole of Christmas. The Christingle service. I love the words. I love the symbolism. I love that it is a service for children without being cringy and overly child focused. For me it is staying the true meaning of Christmas

Check out what it all means from this post from The Children’s Society who started the whole thing.

But I also wanted to fill you in on a bit of a family joke about me and turkeys. One year we did a road trip to see my husband’s family. I thought I was going to eat turkey till I burst but each household we reached informed us they had done their turkey the day before hand. We even caught up with my son and his then girlfriend in a pub to be told that they didn’t do turkey between Christmas and New Year because people were fed up of. Not me!!

I was quoted as saying “Christmas isn’t Christmas without turkey” which from someone who had never written hard hitting Christmas plays about the true meaning of Christmas would have be amusing but from myself who has spoken on the true meaning of Jesus coming into the world this is hilarious. And of course the phrase has stuck.

Well this is now where God’s amazing sense of humor come in. This year at the Christingle I am part of a group performing Benjamin Zephaniah’s Talking Turkeys.

I am doing the first long verse and saying

Be nice to yu turkeys dis christmas
Cos’ turkeys just wanna hav fun
Turkeys are cool, turkeys are wicked
An every turkey has a Mum.
Be nice to yu turkeys dis christmas,
Don’t eat it, keep it alive,
It could be yu mate, an not on your plate
Say, Yo! Turkey I’m on your side.
I got lots of friends who are turkeys
An all of dem fear christmas time,
Dey wanna enjoy it, dey say humans destroyed it
An humans are out of dere mind,
Yeah, I got lots of friends who are turkeys
Dey all hav a right to a life,
Not to be caged up an genetically made up
By any farmer an his wife.

At the same time as having roasted my 10lb+ turkey that only myself and my husband are going to eat as both my children aren’t able to make it up for Christmas. A slight touch of irony there.

Whatever your “must have” at Christmas is do enjoy it no matter what amazingly fantastic poets have to say about it 🙂

Categories
positioning Trust God

Happy To Be Second

No matter what this looks like it is definitely my cat saying she comes first.

I was reading 24-7’s Lectio this morning. Josh Luke Smith is looking at John the Baptist especially John 1:6-8

There was a man sent from God whose name was John. He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all might believe. He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light.

Sometimes with known Bible passages we can switch off or tune into a familiar sermon about them but it was reading Josh’s comment ….

I’m a musician and I’ve been on many tours as ‘the support act’. People haven’t primarily bought tickets to see me, but to see the artist or band that’s headlining the show. My role on stage is to warm up the crowd and set up the headline act for success.

What struck me is how often many of us have wanted to be the headline act but that is not our job. But we get caught up in the shove and grind of pushing to the top. So we trample over others. We elbow our way through. Some do make it to the top whether they are meant to be there or not but because they can push harder, shove better, are louder.

As Josh goes on to to say

God wants me to be fully, creatively myself, without shame or passivity. There is no higher calling, or expression of who I am, than to point towards Christ

But I also think an equally high calling to to encourage others to get to where they are meant to be – whether that is leading a church, leading a group, being a great musician, writer, etc. And it is to say “look at them. Haven’t they done great” instead of feeling that quiet stab of jealousy and wanting to say “you should have known them when ….”

Am I willing to come second? I know I can be ok about point towards Jesus but am I happy about seeing someone in a similar field to myself doing well. Or what is often a biggie – seeing someone’s children “making it” [whatever that really means] when your own are bumbling along just being!

When I first had this amazing encounter with God and realised that, even though I was a mess in the world’s eyes, God thought I was awesome and loved me as I was, I was given a bookmark with “Be Still and KNOW I am God” Ps 46:10. Then when I was with YWAM Scotland one of those on my team drew me a picture of me lying with a cuppa watching the sun rise or set. But still I kept busy, kept elbowing, kept wanting to be more than God intended.

That picture from Mrs Kim on my study wall

After a turbulent year that I made more stressful by getting a part time job to fill a gap God has shown me that I am at my fullest for them when I am calm, resting, there for others.

Yes much as I would love to be a leader, run a ministry, work hard, my calling, my ‘fully creative self’ is being able to have time for others, to drink coffee with them, to listen to them, to be a safe space for them, to encourage them, as well as my writing. So 30+ years from that encounter with God in all their gentle acceptance I think I am finally coming to accept and realise that verse of being still and just knowing God. It follows on then with “and I will be exalted in the nations.”

God is going to be more exalted if I stop putting to be first, stopping pushing for the noticeable ‘ministry position’, that ‘accepted place in a church setting’. So hopefully I am going to enter 2024 being more still, more able to point towards Jesus, more able to be fully, creatively who I am, and just letting God rise into my nation, into those they have placed around me without me having to go looking.

So are you willing to come second?

Categories
Feminist Roles

What Does This Really Say?

This is a joke that does the rounds regularly at Christmas and we all have a bit of a laugh about it. But this year after reading books like Laura Bate’s Everyday Sexism and some about the ignored achievements by women by Sandi Toksvig I didn’t find it funny.

Why would women not have trusted the ancient prophecies? Why would they want to clean up? Why would they want to cook? Why be practical? The gifts the wisemen brought were prophetic and practical.

I find this whole “joke” puts both men and women down and puts them in a box that many of us for years have been trying to get out of. I find it even sadder when something like this is shared with a group of women who are not being fully who they could be because they are keeping house, looking after children and grandchildren, doing the “ought to” things that women feel they need to do, whilst their husbands and/or children get on and do the having a career, a purpose, a role in society.

To me this, and other things like it, say that a women’s true job it to the one who keeps things going by making sure things are clean and tidy and everyone is fed. Then if there is time she can then do what she wants.

What I really hope in the story of the Wisemen visiting Jesus is that there were prophetic women in the group that said “yes this is what the stars say and so this is where the new King of Judah should be” and were then willing to say they had made a mistake. I hope when they got to the stable with Jesus in it that they were so blown away by seeing God Incarnate that they didn’t give a sh*t about whether the stable was clean or dirty, whether Mary had had time to clear up, whether there was a good meal. I really hope they just feel flat on their faces and worship the King of Kings. I really do hope that, like the men in the group, the were blown away by what they saw and just wanted to praise and worship God.

So my hope this Christmas is that women stop trying to keep the house together, stop trying to make sure everyone is alright and well fed, stop worrying about what other people might think of their house if they enter it, stop trying to look like “good girls” and will fall at the feet of Jesus.

Also getting on to the last part – it isn’t up to the women or the men or anyone to bring peace on earth. God will do that if we stop trying and just worship them with everything we have.

Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’

Mark 12:30

And stop worrying about what people will think, about whether the house is clean, about whether there is food, about anything. Then you, then I, will be at peace and so then Peace can truly reign on earth. But it has to start with individual people who can then join to become a whole.

Categories
Bible children

Samuel

No connection to what I’m going to explore but he just looks so cute. Photographed by me November 2023

I’ve been trying to get down to some Bible study as I have been a bit lax on it recently. So I’m following 24/7 Prayer’s Lectio365 app and trying to hear something different. Sometimes it is hard when you are reading the same pieces you’ve read for over 30 years [and when I first met with God I read my Bible loads and loads, reading it through twice in both my first and second years of meeting Jesus plus teaching on things, etc, etc and reading to my children] It takes a bit of concerted effort not to just go “yeah yeah I know what that says”

This was what was on the app for Friday –

 The lamp of God had not yet gone out, and Samuel was lying down in the house of the Lord, where the ark of God was. 4 Then the Lord called Samuel.

Samuel answered, “Here I am.” 5 And he ran to Eli and said, “Here I am; you called me.”

But Eli said, “I did not call; go back and lie down.” So he went and lay down.

6 Again the Lord called, “Samuel!” And Samuel got up and went to Eli and said, “Here I am; you called me.”

“My son,” Eli said, “I did not call; go back and lie down.”

7 Now Samuel did not yet know the Lord: The word of the Lord had not yet been revealed to him.

1 Samuel 3:3-5

What jumped out at me was verse 7. We don’t know how many years Samuel has been serving in the temple. It is possible he was five when Hannah weaned him – yes people used to wean their children much later than most of us do in our fast paced modern world. And I suspect as she knew he was going to live in the temple she probably waited longer just so she knew he would be ok. He was a small child not a baby or a toddler. Like I say we don’t know how much later God decides to call Samuel personally but I suspect it wasn’t within his first year.

So there he has been serving in the temple with Eli doing his priestly stuff and yet Samuel “did not yet know the Lord. The word of the Lord had not yet been revealed to him.” Goodness me what had been going on? Why had Eli not got around to helping Samuel know the Lord and know “the word of the Lord”?

Yet, as always when one lets God speak, I wonder how often we as Christian parents and children’s workers and youth workers [of which I have been all three] read the stories to our children, do the fun children’s and youth activities, etc but don’t give those young people in our care time to really know who God is and let God’s word be revealed to them personally.

Yes we tell them about God, we get them to pray, but how often to we stop and ask God to speak with them? [Note not a condemnation piece but a questioning piece wondering why so many young people don’t follow God after having been immersed in church]

I think too often, like Eli, we think we know how God will speak because that’s how they have spoken with us so we tell those young people in our care “this is God“. Then when God turns up to them personally often we are not as wise as Eli and don’t say “oh my I think that’s God talking to you in your language.” Eli did miss that it was God first of all and dismissed Samuel. It was only the third time [and that is a story telling technique and it may have been more or less times] that it dawns on Eli to tell Samuel to listen to God.

I have had to some major forgiveness from times when I was first talking with God and wanting to share it with others and was told that could not possibly God because God didn’t speak like that. But I think I have also been guilty of speaking of some of the young people who’ve been in my care because God was speaking to them differently. Or have seen them mold what they have heard to fit in with what I would like or what the group would like.

Like I say this is not condemnation piece but something that first made me go “Oh Eli why did you not teach Samuel about God in all that time” to hearing God’s still small voice asking me if there have been times when I have been like that.

The Bible, I believe, is always personal to each one of us, but too often we don’t like to really listen to what God wants to say to me. I believe the Bible is living and is God’s way of talking to each of us, not in one of those big sermon type ways but with us sitting, reading, getting involved with it.

Though I do wonder if that is why we don’t like to do it. Better to have something that one can say “this is what this passage says” than “God has just used that to open my eyes to some place where I have missed God’s mark [sinned]“

Categories
christmas mindfulness

Advent! Preparing!

View from my window. December letting us know it has arrived by giving us our first real frost of the year. Taken by myself 1st Dec 2023

I am going to be honest – like I am most of the time on here – I struggle with all this Advent prep, all this talk of preparing for Christmas, all this having decorations out more than a week before Christmas, etc. So whilst I was walking I was pondering why do I feel like that.

Since doing more of this QEC stuff and the ANSing I have realised that for every thing that feels like a “gut reaction” there is generally something in me that causes it. Sometimes it can be from my past but sometimes it can be just from who I am or from the emerging me.

So some of the reason I struggle with this long lead up to things is that I am not very good at keeping something up for six weeks unless there is someone keeping an eye on me doing it, some sort of reward. So if I do a devotional book I get fed up after a while. With NaNoWriMo I managed until 23rd November, which is a record for me, but couldn’t make it to 30th. Fault in me? Or just how I am?

I am trying to live in the moment, be mindful, enjoy the now – to listen to that still small voice of God/The Universe/my heart – and not be rushing off to the next thing, which I think is what is bugging me about there being so so much chatter from Church, shops, media, and even some TV programs already having decorations up.

My daughter asked me yesterday if I’d got anywhere with Christmas present shopping because son and his wife had asked us what we wanted about 2 weeks ago! I had to say that I hadn’t given it much thought as there had been other things going on – preparing my husband to go off to America for 10 days work this week, my lodger leaving to go to her newly bought flat, thinking of when to visit my Mum before Christmas, getting used to not working, and just enjoying life in the slow lane.

For me with Christmas, when my children were little we used to wait till 1st December to start any form of Christmas talk. [Even now they are only allowed to talk about their birthdays a month before the event] So there were no home school Christmas activities till 1st or talk of presents or what we were going to do or anything. Decorations would go up around 19th December and it would be a thing we did together. Yes because I was on a very low income I used to have various savings schemes in the butchers, the supermarket, the toy shop, saving from January. But the event itself didn’t enter the fray till 1st December. Whereas this year I feel like from every angle, whether Christian or secular, I am being bombarded with Christmas – from giving to buying to thinking about how to spreading good cheer.

One of the big things about helping with one’s mental health is to live in the moment, to enjoy today for today, to be mindful of the now rather than worrying about tomorrow or yesterday. But what I feel with all this Christmas prep hype, whether good things or not, is that it is starting earlier and earlier and so we are living in the “oh my goodness it’s coming” state of mind rather than, like a good holiday, knowing it is around the corner but not making it a big thing until it gets closer.

As I saw on FB this morning, someone was saying how they are grateful every day and live in today so why should they be doing this end of year stuff. [Interestingly even this end of year stuff is coming earlier and earlier each year. At one time things like Sports Personality of the Year, film reviews for the year, music reviews of the year, etc would all happen in the week between Christmas and New Year or even in the first few days on the new year. ]

So I am not being a Scrooge and I do like Christmas but please, please, please can we start to have all the Christmas hype – whether from Church or elsewhere – nearer to the day rather than 6 or more weeks in advance?

Categories
autumn season

Autumn Tide

Photos from my walk this morning at Betws-y-Coed, a lovely town on the edge of Snowdonia, about 20 miles from my house. Dog and I were walking there at 8am watching the mist lift off the river. Was about 3 degrees with that lovely fresh autumnal/winter feel to it. Not quite a nip but almost. The sort of weather that makes dog walkers smile.

Today looked like it could be the first dry morning of the week so, even though I have quite a few other things to do today I thought I’d drive the 40 minutes to Betws-y-Coed, do the 40 mins walk around the golf course and see the two rivers meet, then go to the Alpine Cafe for breakfast and write some poetry. Renly likes both this walk and this cafe [there is a sausage involved so he gallops around the walk 🙂 ] I felt now that I had stopped working in the nursery/after school club, and Mum is doing ok for now, I thought I’d get back to at least once a week taking myself off to write poetry.

It is very much free writing from what I’ve seen and the photos I feel led to take so there is never a plan.

What came from today’s was all about autumn, understandably. But more about my autumn. Not that “oh I’m in the autumn of my life and the end and winter are coming“. Much more a “this is an autumn season where I need to shed my leaves”

I’ve just googled what goes on with leaves in the winter. [Here’s my take on it so all your biologists and amateur biologists hush!!] As light fades the tree sucks in as much goodness as it can from the leaves because they are no longer photosynthesizing and so they turn all those amazing colours.

So I’ve reached a place where I have been taking a lot of goodness from the projects and work stuff that I’ve been doing over the last few years but that means I need to be looking inside of my “tree-self” a bit more. I need to let those dead leaves go, let those projects and things fall.

But what I noticed as I pondered about walking in mulch and compost was that most of the leaves don’t fall that far from the tree so really the leaves are going full circle and being the compost to help the tree keep going.

I feel I have been fighting this process for a while. Trying to keep going under my own steam instead of letting go. I think I’ve been afraid that if I let everything go then there will be nothing. But in fact all that I’ve done will fall at the “base of my trunk” and so give me sustenance for whatever comes next.

Via QEC, God, and a book called Don’t Believe Everything You Think, I’m doing my best to give all my dreams to God/The Universe and let them bring them to fruition. I know there will be things I have to do but I must only do the things I feel deep in my heart and know to be from God/The Universe. It all comes without striving.

These trees don’t strive. They are just the best trees they can be. They don’t plan the seasons, the winds, the droughts, the floods. They just get on and do their thing.

The walk I did today is one I do every couple of months and today I noticed things I hadn’t seen before, but that was because there were very few leaves on the trees. I was looking through the bare branches and seeing the road, seeing houses, seeing sheep and things. If I am wise, as my leaves fall for this season, I can see other things and who knows what might come from my quietly just being, just really seeing and waiting?

Oh and I took this last photograph because the plant in the foreground has brown and green leaves and red berries too!