Tag: God

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endurance hope

Suffering is good for us

Beauty of a dead tree. Isle of Wight. August 2024. Photographed by myself

… suffering produces endurance,  and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, …

Romans 5:3-4

Yet in the world we live in we take pills, whether prescribed or self-medicated, whether alcohol or drugs, whether taken in moderation or to excess, or buying stuff, watching TV, to elevate our suffering rather than acknowledging that we suffer.

I wrote a piece a while back about acknowledging grief rather than just trying to make it go away and really grief is a form of suffering, but there are loads of other things that cause us to suffer which lead to anxiety and depression, to various illnesses [Read The Body Keeps The Score and other books by Gabor Mate and others like him]

Who of us does not want to be able to endure, to be of a character people admire, to have hope that we can pass on? Yet too often we don’t want to go through the suffering to get there so we fill our lives with stuff, etc.

The Bible also says “Blessed are those who mourn” [Matthew 5:4] which means those who mourn are comforted by God, if they are willing to acknowledge their need. Suffering and pain teach us things, help us in getting closer to ourselves and to God/something beyond ourselves; help us acknowledge our true selves.

A wise person said “there is no hope without the acknowledgment of suffering” and “a denial of suffering is a denial of hope” and yet too often we try to deny our suffering behind so many things.

I was writing a short piece about an older couple I knew many years ago. They had been through a lot – she had lost a lung through TB and told she couldn’t have children, and also they were very involved in CND [the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament] and had been on the original CND marches Aldermaston back in 1958 when fear about the world being destroyed by nuclear war was high. Yet they chose to have children – one of which was my boyfriend for a couple of years – and chose to have hope and to be involved in the lives of others. They very much acknowledged their own suffering and the suffering and pain of the world yet were so full of hope people were drawn to them.

A leprosy doctor [can’t remember the article but do remember what was said] said that from what he see we treat pain as an illness rather than the symptom of the illness. So we treat the pain, the outwards signs, but we do not name and treat the actual problem.

If the above bible verse is true then won’t it happen that the more we treat suffering rather than acknowledge it, surely slowly but surely we will lose endurance, will not gain a depth of character others want to emulate, and so will lose sight of hope?

If we need suffering to have hope then let us be willing to be open about our suffering, name it for what it is, and so grow in endurance and character so we can be a hope to the world!

Categories
hard outer shell made good

And God said it was Very Good [Gen 1:31]

This dog totally believe he is good, where he is is good and life is just good, especially if I am with him. Photographed by myself at Newborough beach, Anglesey October 2024

Renly believes that wherever I am is good and that he is good and that life is good. Did you know God is omnipresent which means God is with us all the time? So surely we could then at least believe that we are good – very good.

So Genesis 1:31 says God made humankind and said humankind is good; very satisfactory, our best, pleasant, interesting, better than anything else we’ve made. [paraphrase]

Meaning of “Good” thank to https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/good

very satisfactory, pleasant, interesting, better, best

But do we believe it? Do we even get taught it in many of the churches we’ve been to? Too often we get taught that we are sinful, that unless we accept Jesus [whatever that might really means] we are condemned to eternal damnation, and need to repent.

I will go back to the whole idea that sin is just missing God’s mark, which we all do, but isn’t about not being made good.

Sometimes, I think, good can appear a bit of a weak word. A bit like nice. A word that is used more when things are not bad but not great, which is why I’ve added in the Cambridge Dictionary definition.

I think God looks at us and when they say good they mean more on the amazing side of ok than the “just got through” side. How about if we looked at that verse and realised that when God says good it means that we are pleasant, interesting, very satisfactory, the best for the Creator of The Universe to want to hang out with. And not just when God first made Adam and Eve but when God made each and every one of us!

But too often we get caught with the things we’ve done wrong, the hurts we’ve endured, the traumas we’ve picked up, the intergenerational stuff that hasn’t been cleared, and we look at ourselves through all this hard outer shell stuff and we forget that we were made good.

I also think it is this hard outer shell that can make us do horrid hurtful things to ourselves and to others.

I think the amazing thing about healing and learning to trust and hang out with God – whether this is through QEC, Sozo, Freedom in Christ, other trauma healing stuff from wherever, hanging out with friends who see through our hard shell and enjoy being with us, or even a phrase or sentence that slides into our hearts and chips away at that shell – is that we do see that shell for what it is; something that kept us safe from stuff that was going on around us but it is not us. And we will be safer without it.

So as we see the shell for what it is and even get to chip away at it we learn to see ourselves as was originally intended; without the “good/bad” judgements we and others place on us; without those epigenetic tags our ancestors and ourselves picked up; without the mistakes we have made. We start to see ourselves as good, very satisfactory, interesting, pleasant to be with, the best.

And I for one think that if the Creator of the Universe thinks I am good then who am I to argue????

Categories
content safe place

Contented Little Hermit Crab

From openverse – hermit crab

My QEC practitioner did a podcast for our group about being a contented little hermit, exploring how for most of us the more we QEC the more we enjoy being on our own. Yes we still like people. We still like to connect but it doesn’t rule our lives.

Anyway this got me thinking about shells.

How often as a quiet, maybe shy, maybe introverted, maybe a deep thinker, were you told how pleased everyone was when you “came out of your shell” as though being in your shell was a bad thing?

Why is it a bad thing? No one would tell this hermit crab or any other shellfish to “come out of its shell”. That’s is home, its safe place.

We had visitors this week and at times there were things that I found hard work in the conversations. I found that I am now in the habit of ANSing myself [calming my autonomic nervous system and staying in regulation and balance] rather than reacting. But I also realised that I was no longer biting my tongue so I didn’t say anything. I was going into my shell, my safe place.

Inside my safe place I could be quiet, let the conversation flow around me, not have any desire to react to what was being said. I had space to breathe, to really listen to what was not being said too – the energy, so that when I did respond it was, on the whole, light, breezy and safe.

So for anyone who is getting a hard time about not “coming out of their shell” often enough ignore those people. They are jealous that you have a safe place to be to view the world when they aren’t brave enough to slide inside their shell.

Our shells are our safe places, are places to catch breath, are place to connect with ourselves and with God, which is where we should be on a regular basis.

Go on! Be bold and connect with your inner contented little hermit crab.

https://giphy.com/embed/xUA7bh63SnoXTl66Na

via GIPHY

Categories
pets St Francis

4th October – St Francis Day and Blessing of Pets

[A random selection of my dog, a goat and other dogs. ]

Today is Francis of Assisi day. The saint who was supposed to put animals in high regard. It is also around this time that many churches have services that bless pets – where people can bring their pets to church and thank God for them. [There was one with the church I co-run the youth group at but I was too lazy to go!]

Our pets are amazing. Where would we be without that unconditional love? that greeting when we get home? the hugs just when we need them? the adoringness? Or as I write this the loud snoring of my little dog under my chair and the loud scratching of the cat who doesn’t want to be missed out!

Because of dog walking I have made so many friends since moving up here. I potter round the park and say hello to some I have known just on the park for years, some who have become closer friends that I go to coffee and lunch with. My dog has open the door to friendships.

Did you know that when Mozart’s father died he hardly grieved him because they didn’t get on well [I understand that from my own father’s death] but when his pet starling died he had a funeral and a wake for it? Again I totally understand that. He had lost a being that he could interact with, that was there for him, that he had built a bond with.

Someone once asked me if there would be animals in heaven and I had to say I couldn’t not imagine it being heaven without them. Why? Because I cannot imagine God would have had mankind create such an amazing bond with animals for them to not be in heaven.

My daughter once helped out with the Cats Protection League and the way those older women cared for those cats was amazing. If we could all care for our fellow humans in that same way then there would be no more wars, etc. Although I was listening to a podcast today about how the opposite of Love isn’t hate but fear. Fear then leads to Shame which leads to Control which cycles round to Fear again and so the circle tightens. So humankind is fearful of others humans and so seeks to control them by wars, etc. So maybe there is something else involved here that I might explore in another post!

Anyway I digress!

Today let’s celebrate the animals in our lives whether they are our pets, someone else’s pets or the wonderful birds, squirrels and others creatures in the wild. Thank you God for all creatures great and small.

Just as I wrote that last bit two Magpies just settled in the tree opposite and the man who was picking weeds from his lawn just stopped and lazed up at them. And as we all know from the rhyme “One for sorrow, Two for joy”. So I pass onwards to you the joy of those two magpies.

Categories
epigenetics sin

Sins Of The Fathers

‘The Lord is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, forgiving iniquity and transgression, but he will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, to the third and the fourth generation.’

Numbers 14:18

Until Friday I’ve struggled with this verse. How could God be forgiving and abounding in steadfast love yet still visit the sins of the fathers on their children? Friday, whilst doing some QEC with a small group around inter-generational trauma beliefs it dawned on me what it all meant.

Sins is always a word we get hung up on. Too often it is seen as “wrong things” we have done and then someone decides what is wrong and what isn’t. Like gossiping and even covering over misdemeanors is alright but fancying someone of the same sex or sleeping with someone you aren’t married to are “sins”.

Years ago I heard a sermon saying sin was just missing God’s mark and God’s mark is to put God in the centre of all things all the time. That’s how the apostle Paul can say “all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God” [Romans 3:23]. Since hearing that this has always been my way of looking at “sin” and I will read it that way, even pray the “Lords Prayer” that way –

Forgive me when I don’t make God’s mark and do as God would for myself, others and the world, as I forgive those who hurt me by not hitting God’s mark for me

[forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us]

So what are the sins of the fathers? I think it should read “sins of our ancestors”. These are those traumas that stay in families and become norms. But they are inherent traumas that effect our mind, body and also our DNA. This can be anything from the belief that “all my family die in their early 70s”, “all my family have arthritis/diabetes/are anxious/don’t do birthdays/add your own” to saying “this is what we’re like as a family”, “it is in my DNA/my make up” as if that is it.

Did you know that there have been studies around genetics and when mice [whose DNA is really similar to humans] experience traumas epigentics tags are added to their DNA which then get passed on to their babies and grandbabies. Do use this Wiki link to read more and use the references to go further Epigentics Ir is totally amazing and for someone like myself who’s been exploring and noticing this sort of thing for a while it makes so much sense.

So back to Numbers 14:18 whether we actually know our ancestors or not, just looking at our recent history shows the traumas that have been faced; The Great Depression, two World Wars, the Cold War, fear of nuclear attack, plus racial abuse or fear of being “over-run” by “others”, fear of lack, of not having “enough”, the education system of having to get good grades, hospital waiting lists, etc and we’ve all experienced untimely deaths and fears of untimely death. So take all those in the last 100+ years and that is a lot of shit that’s happened which, of course, has led to lots of trauma, real and imagined, which has led to one’s DNA adding these epigentic tags to keep us safe.

These, I believe, are the “sins of the fathers”. But, from doing QEC and other inner healing things I know I can get rid of these tags, can be free to be who I am intended to be.

And also forgive those in my past, whether I knew them or not, for accepting those traumas and not being healed from them, and forgive myself for passing those traumas on the my children.

Then I can truly live out the New Creation [2 Corinthians 5:17] God promised I’d be, but I do have to do a bit of work to get there!

Categories
Believe ego

Ego in the way

Rhos-on-sea beach gathering lugworms photographed by myself Sept 2024

How often were you told as a child not to get “too big for your boots”? And you knew what that meant. It meant you were being proud, boastful, stepping up a gear, and that was not approved of by the adult who was telling you to be “more humble”, when actually here humble meant to not say you were good at anything.

Someone I know is doing a very brave and loving thing [long story so won’t give details but just know she is being so amazing, so trusting in God and so humble] for her son. I was praying and saw her as this amazing Warrior Woman and told her so. Her response was that she needed to get her ego out of the way so she could believe that.

That got me thinking of how often we see ego as being “egoist” or too big for our boots, boastful, prideful, etc whereas I heard from her that her ego was herself thinking she wasn’t up to the job, that she wasn’t a warrior woman, even though The God who Created the Whole Universe had just told her so.

Too many of us have had too many times when we’ve been put down rather than lifted up and have passed that onwards to our children and others we know too.

I loved working with Americans when I was in YWAM because they were not afraid to say what they were good at or had done well at and would tell others when they thought they had done well. Very unlike us Brits can be. Brits can be very quick to put down ourselves and others, to root for the underdog unless they start to win.

So I say … let us kick into touch those sayings of not getting too big for our boots. As my friend says “get our egos out the way”. And pull on those great big kick-arse boots that are waiting for us to go out and change the world with.

And changing the world might not be solving world peace or climate change but it might just be a kind, encouraging word, or as my friend is doing just supporting her son in a big things, or as another friend did and just obeyed what she felt she’d heard in prayer, or any of those many things that come naturally to us.

Categories
prayer technique

Doing It Properly?

I’m sharing a photograph of my dog at the writing groups I run because one of the big things I keep saying to the group is “there is no right or wrong, just write” when they ask me how to do things “properly”. It is all about finding your own voice and getting your words out there.

At the Upper Room Friday we got on to chatting about prayer. And on thing was how do we do it properly, as in what is the “right” way to pray.

Here’s a quote from Richard Rohr which even though it is about contemplation I think it applies to prayer just as well

When we emphasize specific practices too much, contemplation can become a matter of technique and performance. We fall back into self-analysis: Am I doing the practice correctly? The revelation of God, who always wants to enter the material world as our image, cannot possibly depend upon people sitting silently on a prayer cushion twice a day. That would mean that 99.9% of people who have ever lived on this earth have not known God.

It is possible to get too caught up in the “how to” of prayer and miss the whole point of “why”.

Why do I pray? Well for me it is to chat to God, to build relationships – so as much listening as talking, as much sitting with as doing with. It is to ask God to help me through things, to change situations for friends, to ask God to get involved with the lives of those I know and love so they can feel that deep inner contentment even when life is shit. It is also the same reason I write – because it is what I have to do to know what I’m thinking.

Often my prayers are more like letters in my journal than talking. Often God then speaks through my pen and gives me answers or directions or reminders. Often the outcomes of these times of chatting or writing with God can lead to unexpected answers.

One of our Upper Room friends had an amazing unexpected answer. She had to get her car to be MOTed and needed a lift there so she phone her son because she knew he went that way first thing in the morning. He was a bit short with her and even though he agreed to it said he wouldn’t have time to hang out. In other circumstances she would have found someone else but she felt God say that this was the answer to her prayer about getting back from the garage, so her son picked her and her husband up from the garage early. Instead of speeding off down the dual carriageway the son had to get off at their junction. As he slowed on the slip road of the junction his tyre blew out, the car shuddered and he fought the wheel but was only going at 25mph so all was fine. If my friend hadn’t heeded God’s response to her prayer her son could have been going at 70mph when it happened and who knows what the circumstances would have been.

Now I don’t think my friend did any special prayer technique or if she did I don’t think she’ll always expected that the answer to her prayers; an disaster averted. So it was not the technique she was thinking of or even her son at that time. All she did when she prayed that time was to ask God how to sort a lift back from the garage and her son popped into her mind. Next time, even next time to the garage, it might be a totally different response.

So I don’t think there is a “right way” to pray. I think it helps if we say we’re sorry for trying to do things our own way and not God’s way and that we do so want our hearts to be open to hear God not ourselves. But I don’t think we have to. I think there are times God answers prayer just because God loves us – whether we admit to loving and trusting them totally or not. I think it helps if we do love and trust God but then I think that helps with peace in our hearts thing rather than whether God will answer or not.

So let’s stop worrying about technique whether in prayer, contemplation, meditation, writing, our friendships, our jobs and more and just get on and do!

Categories
prayer Trust God

LET GO and Let God!

I’ve been staying in County Durham, UK for a few days helping friends clear out their loft as they prepare to move. It also meant staying with my little dog’s bestest friend ever. These two dogs have loved each other since they were puppies. Even if they go over a year without seeing each other they greet each other like long lost friends and just want to hang out together. This does mean that they want to get up early to be together all day so for four mornings I was getting a gentle knock on the door by Djola asking if Renly could come out to play. Of course I indulged and we were walking at 6am most mornings.

Well one morning we were walking down the path when I could hear mooing. A load of bullocks/heifers/young cows had broken out of their field and were moodling about in the wood beneath the path. Some were starting to attempt the climb up from the woods to the path we were on. Anyway I prayed and asked God is they could sort out these cows so it was safe for us when we came back.

Half an hour later we’re on our return journey and 5 cows, one a very large black one, were on the path. So I prayed again! As I walked back towards the village the cows stayed in front of us. I was concerned because I was walking them towards the village and the road. But I also had two dogs with me, and because the footpath is right by my friend’s house I didn’t have leads for either dog!

So I’m praying but also doing what may of us often do when we pray, thinking through solutions that I could do. Interesting how we do that – say we are handing problems to the God who created the WHOLE Universe but then spend lots of headspace and energy trying to think what we could do. Not really handing it over, is it?

The cows are almost at the turning to the track behind my friend’s house when this man appears round the corner with his dog and phone to his ear. He starts to herd the cows back in my direction. I grab both dogs so none of the animals, cows or dogs, get spooked. The cows give us a wide berth and skitter back to where they came from.

The man says “I’ve just phoned the farmer” and we have a chat about cows and that they all seem to be out and he says they’ve probably broken down the fence again.

When we went out in the afternoon for a walk there was no sign of the cows. Problem fully sorted. That local man and his phone were the answers to my prayers.

Simple.

Hopefully that will help me learn to let go totally when I do pray, not hold on a wee bit and see what I can do, and allow God to find the answers as they know best.

Bullocks escaped

Prayer answered

God is amazing

Maybe not quite a haiku but it’ll do!

Categories
God Sun

The Sun

[I’m off on my travels again but leave you with some photos and a poem from Sunday morning on the Isle of Wight ]

The Sun

Greeted by an glowing orange ball upon the water

Greeted by my God saying “I love you.”

Followed by bright yellow ball of warmth on my walk

Followed by my God saying “I am well pleased with you.”

Now the sun is high in the sky as expected

Now God is fully risen in my day, taken for granted.

Remember the joy and warmth of the sun as I go through my day

Remember the joy and peace of God in every step I take.

Categories
honour thankful

True Thankfulness

The dog with my daughter and her boyfriend with me in his sights. For Renly this is truly something to be wonderfully thankful for. Photographed by myself August 2024

Another one for me to ponder from our Upper Room gathering.

We cover so much in these times on a Friday that I’m sure God makes the time stand still. So we moved on from freedom to Gratitude, which is a big thing in self-care circles. One of our number had been told she needed to do more self-care – which to be perfectly honest I feel is a bit of waste of time if you haven’t started on the healing of childhood traumas and ways of surviving that are buried deep in the subconscious. Self-care has the potential to become just another thing to please, to survive and often to feel a failure at.

So as Christians on that healing journey with God what does it mean to “give thanks in all situations”? [1 Thessalonians 5:18]

For one I don’t think it means to say thank you God for my shitty situation, for someone still being sick, for always having to step in to help my children/grandchildren/spouse/friends/my community/the world, for someone dying horribly, for not having enough money, for seeing those you love not coping, …. [fill in your own], etc, etc, etc.

I think God wants us to cling to God in the hardness of our lives and the times when things are sad, upsetting, down right awful, but I don’t think they want us to thank them for that situation. I don’t think they want us to be all pie-in-the-sky-God’s-in-control about it all.

But what came out of the discussion was to be able to acknowledge God in the situation, to talk to God in the situation, to know that you are not alone in all this but that the Creator of the Universe is right-by you holding you through all of it, to allow you to rant and rage and cry and doubt, but at all times keep talking to them. It is to say thank you that within all this mess the Creator of the Universe loves you unconditionally, and loves all those who are involved whether they are doing harmful hurtful things or victims of their circumstances or whatever.

So now when I wake I thank God that I’m awake and have another day before me to walk through. And when I go to sleep I thank God that I’ve made it through another day even if I’ve made mistakes, been hurt, hurt others, and found things tough or easy, fun or hard. I have had the gift of life that I have been able to walk through with my Creator. And that to me is more than enough to say Thank you for, even if things haven’t worked out as I’d have liked, even if people I love had still died, are still struggling, are distant, or whatever.

To me it is the honour of walking through another day with The Creator God by my side.