A Poet's Holy Muse

Spring alternately bristled and curtsied this week. 

Cutting, crisp winds with rain and intermittent low temps one moment, 

upstaged by bold rays of sun the next day, 

teasing our trees and budding bulbs to release their fragile blooms.

Amidst the indecisiveness of the outdoors I ventured into the library 

where fortune blessed me with an introduction to poet Jane Kenyon

by way of A Hundred White Daffodils, 

a collection of her essays, interviews, translations,  and poems.

Pleasantly, as rain flooded the back ponds, I discovered a new favored writer.

Jane Kenyon is a highly regarded contemporary poet whose work is greatly influenced by her Christian faith. 

She writes,

“It was my habit to speak to Him.

His goodness perfumed my life.

I loved the Lord,

he heard my cry,

and he loved me as His own.”

From “Woman, Why are You Weeping”, p.207

* * * 

And later in reading an interview with  Bill Moyers,

Jane claims: There are times when I feel I’m given poems.

Bill Moyers: How do we cultivate that in ourselves?

Jane Kenyon: We have to get quiet. We have to be still, and that’s harder and harder in this century.     ...

Moyers: How did you come to write “Let the Evening Come”? So many people say that is the favorite of your poems.

Kenyon: That poem was given to me.

Moyers: By?

Kenyon: The muse, the Holy Ghost... I felt I needed something redeeming. I went upstairs with the purpose of writing something redeeming...this just fell out.

* * * 

This happens, does it not? In just this way. 

In our creative experiences, as one writes, strums, or applies oils to canvas, sensing a hand in union with eye and the heart, 

the Creator present in our inner musing 

to guide our efforts to record His creation.

A Hundred White Daffodils illuminated these early brooding days of spring, 

these expectant and watchful days Lent.

“It’s not just more flowers I want, it’s more light,

more air for flowers, more sun for cheerfulness...

and a hundred white daffodils that grow after dusk 

against the unpainted boards  of an old barn.” 

From “The Phantom Pruner”, p.50

[Originally posted 2014]

Be Like Jesus

{For the past several months I have been working with a small group of folks at my church, defining what a Creative Writing Team might contribute to worship. In part we have been in conversation about beginning a blog designed to compliment each sermon series for the contemporary service. This post was first shared on that blog.}

~

“God decided from the outset

to shape the lives of those who love him 

along the same lines as the life of his Son.” 

Romans 8:29 MSG

God’s fervent intent, His deepest desire, is to make us into Jesus’ image; for us to be like Jesus. The concept may seem daunting. Here are some thoughts that point the way.

Lauren F. Winner, Duke Divinity School Assistant Professor reminds us, “Jesus specialized in asking people to steep themselves in the words of the scriptures and then to look around their ordinary Tuesdays to see what they could see about holiness and life with God.” In her book, Wearing God: Clothing, Laughter, Fire, and Other Overlooked Ways of Meeting God, Winner explores multiple Biblical metaphors that symbolically illustrate the nature of God. From such symbolism we gain insight to ways that we can be Christ-like. For instance, Colossians 3:12 NIV tells us, “Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience.” Put on Jesus’ nature each morning just as you put on your day’s attire. Wrap yourself in His character as you engage in those ordinary days that are every day of the week. Be like Jesus, for His interaction with the people was not just on the Sabbath and did not happen behind the pulpit of a sanctuary. His conversations with seekers occurred across the tables of a meal, down the street around the local well, on lake shores in the midst of workday chores, on the road during travel, in homes and on hillsides, as well as in the congested thoroughfares of city streets. To be like Jesus, to love people as God loves us, we must wear our faith into every venue that we frequent. 

To be like Jesus, Christians simply have to show up. Jesus showed up in the hard places of human life. He showed up when people were diseased and dying. He sought out the poor, the widow, the orphaned, the marginalized, and the felon. Jesus offered food when the crowd was hungry. He washed feet to express His love. As Shelly Miller describes, “... God often shows up in the messy, broken, ordinary, complicated of the mundane.” In the foot steps of Christ, with the love of Christ, we are given compassion and courage to show up, to be His ambassador of hope for people who are struggling.

“ He who believes in Me, the works that I do he will do also; 

and greater works than these he will do.”

John 14:12 NKJV

In the course of our efforts we’ll encounter people with deep questions regarding faith. It’s helpful to remember that Jesus repeatedly engaged in conversations with people who doubted His divine nature. But His followers knew Him to be approachable. Strangers knew Him as a teacher; ever patient, prepared to illustrate again, within the context of daily life, a new metaphor, a new story, of how God lovingly pursues His children and how faith can be nurtured. We can follow His example in the varied circumstances of our contemporary lives by being authentic about our own moments of doubt and our own committed journey to a stronger faith. Christian writer, Shannon Martin wrote, “...(Jesus) keeps showing up for us, often disguised as each other. He reveals himself, quite improbably, through humans who struggle ...”

Try it on, this garment of Christ. Perhaps a few alterations might be made, in keeping with the unique talents and spiritual gifts that God created in you, even though the composition of the cloth is His. Step into your ordinary days permeated with the variances of God’s people, wearing the heart and mind of Jesus.

~

Dear Lord Jesus,

You spent your life here on earth caring for others.

You reached out to the homeless and the hurting with compassion. 
You forgave those who insulted you and tried to destroy you. 
Seeking hearts found answers from you. 
Weary hearts found rest. You lifted up those who were beat down by life.

Your kind heart broke for the entire world.

May we follow your example and spend our lives reaching out to others. 
When we are tempted to turn away from people,

let us show your love instead. Amen.

Max Lucado

Sources:
Lauren F. Winner, Wearing God: Clothing, Laughter, Fire, and Other Overlooked Ways of Meeting God
Shelly Miller Blog - http://redemptionsbeauty.com/2016/06/27/what-if-the- spirit-descends-like-a-pigeon/
Shannon Martin - http://www.incourage.me/2016/07/the-purpose-of- church.html
Max Lucado, Live Loved: Experiencing God’s Presence in Everyday Life
Photography by Lisa Moreland

Story Reflects the Weave of a Striving Heart

I have not written. It escapes me. 

The notion rises near daily, then evaporates as a wisp. 

Sentences promise to line up. Topics ticker tape across the marquee of thoughts, but fade and spill into the mist of distractions. 

Immediacy calls out, speaks internally about life’s shortening thread and the reduced opportunities to tell stories. Relentless, Immediacy rises up to inspire the will to write. 

Decision Making counter argues. Decision Making tangles the story yarns; knots the family of origin lore with travel logs, splits threads between loss or redemption memoire, and balls up faith stories with frayed epistles of doubtful searching. 

Decision Making teams with the uninvited Nay Sayer to haggle internally over the value of recording any of it. Where would the stories find readers or purpose? One woman’s collection of tales, the Nay Sayer posits, among billions of her peers; why would that have value?

~

"The Only unique contribution that we will ever make in this world 

will be born of our own creativity." 

Brene Brown, Daring Greatly

~

Spirit rises. 

Spirit, the sacred and divine within all, rises. 

Spirit persistently urges – write.

Spirit devotedly whispers, every story matters.

Every story reflects the weave of a striving heart,

co-created by divine intent and human interpretation. 

Record personal history, recount disasters and discoveries

to herald the dearly attained saga of human transformation.

~

“The voice that spoke light into existence is the one we need to expel the darkness within and bring us to light, to life, and to love. Working on us like an instrument that is out of tune, God masterfully tightens and loosens the strings until notes resonate properly and reflect the most beautiful of sounds. We find our voice when we find His voice.” p. 60

The Artisan Soul: Crafting Your Life Into a Work of Art, 

Erwin Raphael McManus

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Readings Around the Web

Many mornings I begin with a steaming cup of green tea along side the laptop, scrolling through various favored sites that expand my devotional reading as well as inform and inspire my faith practices. I'll share these few. Perhaps your heart will be encouraged.

~

Christian poet Jane Kenyon  wrote beautiful poetry and essays on faith. A while back I wrote about her expressions of faith in her last book, A Hundred White Daffodils. It has recently been highlighted in this BrainPicking link. Kenyon is quoted, along with other writers, on the characteristics of pursuing a focus and routines that contribute creative living, specifically, a writing life. 


Jan Richardson wrote a fascinating book, A Sanctuary of Women, exploring the faith stories of selected Christian women including the earliest cloistered women of faith. She also writes an online Epiphany retreat for women each year. The retreat is a collection of short writings and engagingly beautiful art, designed to facilitate reflection and prayer. 


Jeanne Oliver is a multimedia artist who founded a website that offers online art workshops lead by several female artists. Each year the women also offer a free online faith workshop that is scripture based, video clips of women telling their faith story. This year's theme is LISTENING. Their stories cover the full range of a woman's experiences. Regardless if you are an artist or not, there is encouragement here. After you get to the site, click on Week One of the video's listed down the margin.

~

The days are cold. The hot mug warms my hands. People sharing their faith through words or art, warms my heart and kindles awareness of holy presence. Whether I hold a hardcover book or travel across the internet for words that inspire, God's hand is in it all. 



Linking with Weekend Whispers, Still Saturday, and Simple Tuesday.

Letters: Cherished Chronicles of Life

Letters were once thought to be precious and essential, even a gracious art form and a chronicle of history. Whole portions of a person’s day was devoted to composing letters following specific structures and social standards of the era; solicitous greetings, dutiful reports, careful revelations of opinion or sentiment, closing with respectful sincerity, highest regard, and the flourish of one’s name. For centuries, the world wide wrote letters.  

My parent’s were letter writers, cherished pages handwritten in unique, yet so familiar scripts. Ink fading. Thin paper in envelopes, both aging. Words received that are more valuable today than when they were initially retrieved from a mailbox so many years ago.

As our preschool grandsons began those earliest literacy routines of recognizing and writing their own names, I began to send them mail. As I had hoped, they soon anticipate mail delivery, asking if there was “any mail for me?”. I know their interest won’t last long. All manner of phones and tablets already have a place on their menu of communication tools and land mail will one day disappear from our lives. For now, they experience the pleasure of seeing their name on an envelope, breaking the seal to discover what news might be within, knowing this was lovingly prepared just for them.

Grateful today for…

~ parents who modeled literacy and valued the joy of story in every form.

~ long distance relationships nurtured by the tradition of letters.

~ the circumstances that provided literacy and education across our generations.

~ the bundles of ribbon tied letters, dated decades ago.

~ my nation’s provision of vast systems of communication.

~ the letters in the mail, for messages of greeting, news, and affection.

~ for Epistles signed, “Grace, mercy and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord.”

*   *   *   *

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Humbled and Honored ~ Sunshine Blog Award

Coffee cup in hand,
I was perusing my inbox this morning 
and happened upon to this comment 
from a reader of a recent post on my blog:

"Congratulations!
I have nominated you for the Sunshine Blogger Award! 
Please accept this award for the wonderful way your blog has blessed others."

Well how kind is that! 

After some further link hopping I learned from Peggy Hale that the Sunshine Blog Award originated to highlight blogs that:

"positively and creatively inspire others in the blogosphere." 

Such an honor to have my writing and photography included in that category!

I'm delighted that the original photos and thoughts of praise for divine blessings that are posted here at Reflections – Beside Still Waters has touched the heart a reader in a way that prompted her to confer such an honor and to share this recognition with me. 

As a Sunshine Blog Award recipient 

I'm asked to share some random bullet points about myself:

Love cool, moist air; think fall or northwest coast

Trees and water inspire me

Walking is my exercise of choice

Educator by temperament and calling 

Traveled extensively across America 

Extensive Reader {still prefer hard copy book-in-hands}

Prefer green tea, crave oatmeal cookies, love one pot meals

Passionate life long learner

Spiritual, devoted Christian

Painter in training

Weaver of words

~

Read here for thoughts on Hope,

here for Whispers of God's Grace,

or browse the side bar for topics of your choice.

~

I am inspired by and read several fellow bloggers including: 

Patricia Hunter, Shelly Miller, Emily Freeman, Ann Voskamp, Michelle DeRusha, and Sarah Markely.

Hillsides Blossom with Joy

The grasslands of the wilderness 

become a lush pasture,

And the hillsides blossom with joy.

Psalm 65: 12-13

"Stop and reflect on our own life. 

What seeds are you planting today, 

hoping for a glimpse of the kingdom of heaven?

Paul names the fruits of the Spirit as 

"love, joy, peace, kindness, 

generosity, faithfulness, 

gentleness, and self-control 

(Galatians 5: 22-23).

Are the seeds of these fruits being planted 

in your life and in the lives of those around you?"

Helen Cepero

Journaling As A Spiritual Practice ~ 

Encountering God Through Attentive Writing 

An Ever Vigilant Ear to One's Writing

Reluctantly I came to the end of reading Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg after months and months of slow perusing through her thoughts on the writing life and guidance for honing the craft. 

An Afterward in the closing pages offered the author’s thoughts, now more than 2 decades after the original publication of her part memoir, part writer’s handbook classic. 

I mentally stumbled over the challenge of hindsight in reviewing the writing of ones young adult soul that has been printed for millions of readers. Ponder the change in a human’s attitudes, tastes, and experience across that time frame and yet millions of readers keep that individual firmly in the mindset of her third decade. Little chance that a ‘do over’ would topple the sheer size of the author’s original impression. 

As for me, my 50 plus years read a 30 plus author knowing full well that she has added two and a half more decades to her life experience and surely has refined her professional and cultural wisdom. Good fortune would have it that Natalie Goldberg’s book was, is, and remains a collection of remarkable personal observations that new generations of writers continue to read even today.

Though there are many highlighted segments in my copy of the book and it remains in my on-going reading stack; a prominent take-away from the reading of this work is not in the text of the writer but in the historical longevity of the book.  

I counsel myself, 

to underline the need for 

an ever vigilant ear to one's writing before releasing it to a reading public. 

A vigilant ear beyond mechanics to the soul of the message.

An ear for the sincerity of my intent. 

An ear for the accuracy of what has been stated. 

An ear for examples that will weather the test of time.

An ear for the confidentiality of institutions and people.

An ear for consequences stemming from what has been written. 

An ear for responsibility extending far into time.

Because, though my writing is not published in the traditional manner for millions of readers; on-line writing releases these words of personal musings to the public, for all time.

Since you call on the Father...

Goodness the wrestling I’ve done; anxious mind work stretched across months. Only brave enough to share my heart-searching chatter with a precious faith-strong few who listen [yet again], who respond with God words that I know, and who point me back to knees-down prayer.

The wrestling is over this: to place faith writing on that World Wide Web, to open soul- private musing to unfamiliar others, to send words seeping from the deeper places of thought out onto screens unknown, to reveal God’s place in me.

Taken to the Book of Jeremiah during Sunday service, reading along, my eyes grow wide as words seem raised, bolded on the page;

“If you utter what is precious, and not what is worthless  you shall serve as my mouth.” Jeremiah 15:19

As this message works on my thoughts … a phrase from earlier in the morning surfaces to be strung together with it;

“Since you call on the Father…live your lives as strangers here…”  1Peter1:17

Seeking God’s word makes us strangers in the world. Writing words of faith in public places may fall on uninterested ears, may distance, alienate, and make us a stranger to some.

Yet faith and words, two gifts divinely bestowed are certain, assures Our Lord, to withstand the world’s discomfort. Though this mind wrestling likely will remain constant; “Since I call on the Father” I will endeavor “to utter what is precious” in hopes that it honors Him. I shall follow God as the Sunflower follows the sun.



The heart that has truly loved never forgets,

But as truly loves on to the close,

As the sunflower turns on her god when he sets

The same look which she turned when he rose!

~ Thomas Moore