worship – Aspirational Adventures

With all that is happening politically in our world many of the first posts of the year started with “World on Fire” and then large chunks of California have either been burned away or are being burned; for which reasons are being given to do with climate change but also that the undergrowth is growing faster, not being cleared and so fire fighters couldn’t get through to deal with the fires. Those fire breaks had gone.

Then yesterday I was at church and we were talking about the Baptism of Jesus and sung songs with lines like “let your fire come”, “set your church on fire”, “set our hearts on fire”.

What do we mean by these words? Do we really want that all consuming out of control fire that has raged through Los Angeles recently? Do we really want that in our streets, in our homes, in our churches?

Having heard stories from a friend who lost her house in a massive fire Ventura, California in November, which we didn’t hear about because the media was caught up in the US elections, seeing a fire race over the hills towards a home you have designed and built yourself, have untold memories as well as possessions inside and you just stand there in the clothes you have on, it is a horrid experience, and one I would not want to face. So I do wonder if that is why when we sing these songs about God sending fire we have a mental picture in our heads of something contained and safe.

Like it says in the Chronicles of Narnia when Susan asks if Aslan is safe, Mr Beaver says

“Safe? Who said anything about safe? ‘Course he isn’t safe. But he’s good.”

I wonder when we sing these songs about God’s fire coming if we really want a safe fire like the candles we burn or the fires we have in our grates at home where they give out warmth but are contained. I don’t think we really want a wild raging fire sweeping where it chooses to destroying things we hold dear in its path.

I think we are really singing songs asking God to send a calm, cleansing, controlled fire that will get rid of the bits we don’t like but we’ll be able to keep an eye on where it is going and what it is doing.

But as Mr Beaver says God isn’t safe. Good but not safe. Do we pray to a safe God rather than a Good God? Do we even believe God is good all the time?

Are we willing to let go of what we think is important and let God have free range to cleanse and destroy and change what we hold dear in our lives? Are we willing to look for a Good God?

As I sat there in that lovely Victorian building singing a song I’ve sung in many other places I know I didn’t really want something I couldn’t control raging through the routines of church, the routines of my life, the norms as I see them. Oh yes I would like to choose what gets burnt away because I think I know best, but I am suspecting my “knows best” is different to other peoples “knows best”.

So I think we need to be careful with our metaphors, careful with what we wish for, careful with what we pray. What we need to do is spend some time alone with God getting to that point of really being able to pray “Your Will Be Done” because that is a real letting go and takes us to a place of really being able to say “Ok God I trust you. Have your way in our land”. And believing, as my friend in Ventura still does, that God is a good God no matter what.

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.