Posts tagged ‘religion’

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March 14, 2013

You, Eternal Tr…

You, Eternal Trinity, are my Creator, and I am the work of Your
hands, and I know through the new creation which You have given me in the blood of Your
Son, that You are enamored of the beauty of Your workmanship. Oh! Abyss, oh! Eternal
Godhead, oh! Sea Profound! what more could You give me than Yourself; You are the fire
which ever burns without being consumed; You consume in Your heat all the soul’s selflove;
You are the fire which takes away all cold; with Your light You do illuminate me so
that I may know all Your truth; You are that light above all light, which illuminates supernaturally the eye of my intellect, clarifying the light of faith so abundantly and so perfectly,
that I see that my soul is alive, and in this light receives You—the true light. By the Light of
faith I have acquired wisdom in the wisdom of the Word—Your only-begotten Son. In the
light of faith I am strong, constant, and persevering. In the light of faith I hope, suffer me
not to faint by the way. This light, without which I should still walk in darkness, teaches me
the road, and for this I said, Oh! Eternal Father, that You have illuminated me with the light
of holy faith. Of a truth this light is a sea, for the soul revels in You, Eternal Trinity, the Sea
Pacific. The water of the sea is not turbid, and causes no fear to the soul, for she knows the
truth; it is a deep which manifests sweet secrets, so that where the light of Your faith abounds,
the soul is certain of what she believes.
–Catharine of Siena from her Dialog (1347-1380)

Working through Catharin of Siena’s Dialog is an encouraging reminder to be passionate in our pursuit.

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February 21, 2013

Tell Me The Story That Will Heal My Soul

wheat

I have been teaching an in depth course on the spiritual interpretation of the Song of Solomon for the past few months which has kept me happily immersed in the beautiful language of love, but as this season is winding down I am taking a Spring Sabbatical to flesh out the new inner workings of The Spirit stirring in my heart.  This beautiful message of the Indwelling Life of Christ.  I have found myself vacillating from anger ( why didn’t anyone teach this to me sooner) to a beautiful sense of the eyes of God upon my frame and his wonderful timing of things in my life.

As I find this message coming out in the strangest of places and conversations, I know it is time to put pen to pad and chronicle this journey…and so we begin with story.  Beautiful wonderful story.  Thank you to Major Ian Thomas who has passed on to be with the Lord for listening that day in your college dorm room, and receiving this message for the Body of Christ.  Thank you to my mentors and friends who have journeyed with me and ahead of me declaring the “truth” and nothing less than the truth.

In a recent article from Clarissa Pinkola Estes she makes the following statement about culture and narcissism that I find relevant and worth pondering:

“Narcissism is not falling in love with oneself; it is falling for ‘the false self”… the one which has no real heart, a cardboard self that can only mimic tenderness and toughness, but has no winged soul.

Thus a culture diagnosed with narcissism is not in love with itself, as suggested by the reductive epithet, ‘me-ism.’ A narcissistic culture is in love with a false self, one that is not real, one that is perceived to have no real issues, no reliable gifts, no real harms and thereby, no real solutions.

But, there is ever hope. Prognosis for an ill culture? It depends… mostly on cultura cura, how smaller healthier cultures within the ill culture will expand outward to heal the larger society.
One of the first ways to destroy a culture and a people, is to destroy their stories. One of the first ways a culture that has become ill can be restored is by adding back the stories that are sustaining to its people.

I have heard this challenge in my spirit.  To scribe the story that will heal the soul, and free the spirit and point the heart to the resurrected reality of the Living Christ and Savior who died, rose, ascended and is coming again.  Our Christian culture has lost the story in the midst of the madness of crafting our own life, planning our destinies, patenting our image, and demanding adherence to disciplines that are dead outside of the reality of the spirit of God at work in our mortality.

So I ask you, have you ever heard a grain of wheat talking to itself?

To be continued….

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October 5, 2012

Corinthians Remix

A Musing From Corinthians…

If I can speak the eloquence of the ages

In tongues of angelic sound

But cannot hear the forlorn cry of the lonely heart

Desperate for a Word balm of kindness-

I am the worst noise of empty clash and gong

Tin, ear -ringing, cold, ego -pride fluster- in brass.

 If I can see the pathways of the depths of man

And hold the balance to the weight of every thought and intent

With calculating accuracy reduce actions to a set of predictable

Formulaic rhythms and reasons-

Bringing mountains to molehills-

But I cannot see hunger in front of me,

Withholding all crumbs from my table of insight,

As precious morsels from an enlightened existence-

I alone am the most pitiable, weak, and impoverished of souls.

 If I leave the world of men

To live upon the heights of ascent,

Deliver myself a sacrifice for the causes of greatest good

But do not live with my heart pierced by the wounds

Of the afflictions of those of earth-

And bear their life in my open, upraised hands-

To hold in love,

To receive in love,

 To give in love….

My own soul fire is but a dim flickering wick

 that profits the world-

Nothing.

© Christina Dammerman 2012

 

 

 

 

 

 

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June 18, 2012

Gardening Transition

As I was resting from the seemingly endless mound of boxes, bags and more boxes that needed sorted, put away, given away or delegated to the burn pile, I came across this article on the psychological effects of moving on a family.  Moving is frequently cited as one of the most stressful life events, after the death of a loved one, divorce or illness. According to Galen Tinder, senior consultant with relocation agency Ricklin-Echikson Associates, Inc., “selling a house, securing housing in the new location, packing and transporting family goods and the
endless tasks of ‘settling in,’” are all hard work, but perhaps the most stressful part of moving is the acceptance of permanent change.  “Nearly every aspect of common family life changes: daily routines, schools, community associations, friendships, even the physical landscape,” says Tinder. This disruption in everyday life can manifest itself in a range of reactions. “Shock, anger, anxiety, sadness, fear, confusion and disorientation” are a few of the common emotions felt by new movers, says William Bridges, Ph.D., an acclaimed expert
on transitional management and author of several books on the topic.  Add to these feelings the chaos of unpacking boxes-

In her book, Making the Big Move: How to Transform Relocation into a Creative Life Transition (New Harbinger Publications, 1999), Cathy Goodwin, Ph.D., explains how moving is a significant life transition that forces people to reconsider their identities. “Most people recognize that marriage, divorce, graduation and childbirth are significant life transitions … marked by ceremonies and rituals, such as weddings, funerals and graduations. Moving can be an equally significant life transition, but there are no ceremonies to mark its passage.”

“No ceremonies to mark its passage” h-m-m-, considering how I am believing my return home to be THE LAST TIME I WILL EVER DO THIS…pardon the all caps, I have come up with my own version of a transition ceremony that celebrates my efforts of the past twenty years to bring life to each place I have lived.  I will plant various shrubs, flowers, trees etc. to commemorate the  places I have lived, and the people who have been so much a part of my life.    As I have pondered the different landscapes  I have raised my children through, beautiful, scented memories come flooding back to me:  Yellow roses, pine trees, deep purple lilacs, red clover, weeping willows, shaking aspens, Italian prunes, strawberries, french tarragon, lavender and spearmint. The joy of gardening these places of transition has given me a delightful  expectation that was once only dread, and weariness.

God commanded memorials and markers to be erected in the transitory life of the Israelites.  Commemorations of the pain and hope of transition.  From one life, to another.  Each time they passed by they were to speak of them to their children’s children’s children…I hope I can do the same, as I fill my generations arms and hearts with the scent of beauty from chaos, hope from loss, and a sense of home for their wanderings.

 

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May 16, 2012

The Turning

 I can feel the Earth tossing aside the blankets of her cool Spring bed as she moves to embrace the heat of Summer.  The Spring has been extravagant in its offerings of rain, the life giving hope poured into aquifers, and hidden places.  Will this be a thirsty Summer?  Will there be a cry for rain?  In the Earth?  In me?  I watch how nature doesn’t strive with the turning.  Obedient, and present with the days.  There is a quiet acceptance and a joyous celebration in the morning songs. It is here I discover the syllabus for this season.  There is a trust that though we change, and the turnings come to our lives, there is One who does not change. There is one whose love is constant, whose supply is constant, whose compassion is constant, whose care is constant, who neither slumbers nor sleeps as He watches over the work of His hand.  One who never ceases speaking us into being, and because he is, we are. 

James 1:17  Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom can be no variation, neither shadow that is cast by turning.

So, I listen to the praise of sparrows, who can not fall without notice from their Maker, and join with the Psalmist of Israel and turn my face to the heat of a new season, while I trust as I sing:   “I will praise the name of God with a song, and magnify Him with Thanksgiving” Psalm 69:30

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May 3, 2012

My Restless Heart

“Thou hast made us for thyself, O Lord,
and our heart is restless until it finds its rest in thee.” ―St. Augustine

I have been pondering this reality for months.  We are made for our God. Not for any other endeavor but to worship the one who crafted us with his hands, his words, his breathe.  An object of His fascination and desire, we will stay in this state of discontent until our internal longings are satisfied with the beauty of His face. We have been torn from the purpose and meaning of our existence, and He is daily bringing us to a place of gazing, to discover our image.  To remind us of our reflection.  Often we catch a glimpse of our true selves in the kind face of strangers extending love to strangers, benevolent pauses as we consider one another in the hallways of life.  We hear our native tongue when healing syllables of life flow from lips that choose to bleed rather than hurl curses at the offender.  We are reminded for a moment that we belong “other” than this dysfunction of existence we tear our way through on any given day.  We belong to a kingdom ruled by a King of Righteousness who shall reign forever, and ever.  So, we comfort one another s restless hearts, as we gently lift chins to the horizon, and remind ourselves….we were made to gaze on beauty.

 

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May 1, 2012

Mud On The Eyes

 

Mud On The Eyes

Job 29:15  ” I was eyes to the blind, and feet to the lame”

Mar 8:23  And taking the blind man by the hand, He brought him out of the village; and after spitting on his eyes, and laying His hands upon him, He asked him, “Do you see anything?”

Several things about this story strike me.  First, the blind man was not asking for help, not like in the case of blind Bartemaeus who cried out loudly after Jesus.  It says his friends brought him. Then, Christ led him out of the city, not his friends, Christ.  The Lamb of God, the Light of the World, took this blind man by the hand and led him….

No one from the town witnessed this…is it that they had had so many miracles worked in their midst, they weren’t curious enough to follow them out of town to see what might happen?  Whatever their lack of witness became a judgment against them.  The Lord told him not to go back into that village and share the miracle. What have we missed because of our lack of wonder?   We are called to rejoice when God moves over our brothers and sister in ways that brings sight, health, love , peace etc. lest we find ourselves without our own visitation.

What was it like to be led by God in the flesh from blindness to sight?

John Stott in his book ” Basic Christianity” makes the statement that fear is the greatest enemy of truth.  Because fear paralyzes our search.  This is true. I know in my own life I have been afraid to  “look” at certain things for what I might see in myself, in the subject, in others.  Yet we are called to search, and when we do we will find.  God’s biggest complaint with mankind is that they didn’t seek after Him.  I am on a hunt for “the lie” at the base of my own apple tree.  I want to dispel the paralysis that has kept me from seeking the depths of the mystery.  I am ready to be undone.  To be unsettled by the inconvenience of a true Christian conviction.  Spit upon the mud, and let me see…have mercy on me Son of David.

Rev. 3:18  “anoint your eyes with eye salve that you might see.”

I too, want to feel the hand of the Master lead me from darkness into His glorious light.  I don’t want to be paralyzed by fear of seeing I would rather be blinded by the light.  The last point is the value of Godly friendship.  Friendship led this blind man to his encounter.  But notice, they couldn’t lead him into the light, only God could do that.  They just put his hand in The Master’s then got to rejoice at the miracle.  Like the parable of the friend needing the bread at midnight Luke 11.  We don’t have the bread, but we know someone who does, and we go to him and ask, and He provides.

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April 27, 2012

What Happens To Me When I Live?

The world is consumed with death.What happens to the body when we die, where do we go? What affects our placement in the after-life….but, I must ask , as Christians shouldn’t we be asking the “other” question?  What happens to me when I live?  Truly live.  Radically live.  Live the reality of the indwelling nature of Christ fully alive on the inside. What then?  What changes. What has to have new language because the old can not express this living of life?

I am going to be meandering here a bit I think.

What do you think?  What happens to us when we live?

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April 24, 2012

At The Sound Of Her Name-

We are surrounded by myriads of voices each demanding our immediate attention. Some within, most without. Some with sound, others consist of data, image, and fonts of various sizes and shapes all competing to communicate their version of truth with each tap of the finger upon the keypad. We are a culture that is proving more dysfunctional and anti-relational in the midst of the greatest advance in networking and social media structures designed to help us converse and “stay connected”.  We are multitasking ourselves into sickness as though there were seven of us instead of one.

Mary of Magdala knew about voices.  Raging accusations against light, goodness, holiness, health. She had seven ghoulish quarrels battling for dominance at any given moment of the day.  Each of them despising her frame, scorning her worth, terrorizing her soul with the reality-she let them in.  Seven, until the day she encountered the power of silence with just one word from The Christ.

Mat 8:16  And when even was come, they brought unto him many possessed with demons: and he cast out the spirits with a word, and healed all that were sick:

She went from the cacophony of blasphemy to the holy hush of new birth.   I wonder who had the vision to see her whole?  Who brought her to him?  Or, did she run like the demoniac from the Gatarrenes who at the very hope of the name of Jesus upon his shore,  fought the legion of darkness to fall at the feet of Christ?

Luk 8:1-2  And it came to pass soon afterwards, that he went about through cities and villages, preaching and bringing the good tidings of the kingdom of God, and with him the twelve, and certain women who had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities: Mary that was called Magdalene, from whom seven demons had gone out-

Seven. Gone. Silence. What did it feel like to hear the sound of her own voice again? To be whole in her intentions, motives, conversations? What was it like for the Creator of the Universe to say her name?

Mary!

Is it any wonder we find her here in Luke, attending to the needs of her Savior?  In the company of the one who opened her prison, and shone his light into darkness and declared:  “Let her be…”  Is it any wonder that angelic presences straight from the throne room of God could not persuade her from her mission of finding Him at the tomb, this one who was her world of peace, was missing.  Nothing but Him would satisfy no matter how glorious.  She had come to dedicate her life to mourning, to perhaps pray away the fear that without the presence of his name the voices would return. In her agony  she couldn’t see, she looked toward her savior and saw a  gardener- In a sense He was.  The Second Adam come to the garden of mankind’s heart, to tend and to till.  He came first to this garden.

Joh 20:16  Jesus saith unto her, Mary. She turned herself, and said unto him in Hebrew, Rabboni;

Her name, upon his lips.  That familiar sound of the Master setting her free. The one true voice in a myriad of noise.  Her name spoken with resurrected life.  It was he, and that is all that mattered.

Lord say my name.  Silence is the beginning of sound. Speak your truth through me, that resurrected life would be my portion.

Sharing this with Seedlings In Stone

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April 21, 2012

Change-A Vision of Love

-”you can’t really know something until you’ve seen it transformed by change. You must see it in all the angles of light and shadow provided for by time. You must see it in wind and in rain, under a blanket of snow, in the gentle light of spring, in the hazy heat of late summer, in the crisp cool of an autumn day. You must witness it in twilight and at sunrise, in thunderstorms and under the light of the moon and stars. Only then do you get a glimpse of the spirit lurking underneath. Only then do you begin to understand it.”-Andy Goldsworthy, artist as quoted by Danielle on her blog The Teacup Chronicles.

This quote has captivated my musing for several days now.  What a great observation of life.  I must ask the question if I  love with change in view?  Do I have the vision to see someone in a winter season, full of spring blossoms, and laden in the summer sun with fruit abundant?  Do I steady my heart gaze through long winter days of drought and dreary moments knowing that love conquers death?  Have I seen myself this way?  Do I believe in the faithfulness of my Maker, to shepherd me to new seasons?

Jer 29:11  For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the LORD, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.

Our Lord has an expectation of future and hope for his Beloved.  As his friends we must ask ourselves if  we  “see” those in our care?  Do we watch expectantly for the first blooms combing the branches of the heart with gentle hands waiting for the promise of spring, or are we quick with the pruning shears lopping off relationships we are sure are dead only to mourn the blossoming branch laying on the ground withering, and separated from our life? I desire to have this kind of vision that sees woody, leafless branches in the grey of winter and can smell the fragrance of fruit.

Oh Lord.  Help me to keep my pruning hook in the shed.  You are the Master Gardener, you decide the shape of my life, mine is to receive, and give the life you have given me.  Open my eyes Lord. I want to see you at work in the Earth of my feet, the Earth of my hands,  and the Earth of my heart.

 

Shared with Seedlings in Stone.

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