'It's tidings of comfort and joy"

It is not scientific doubt, not atheism, not pantheism, not agnosticism, that in our day and in this land is likely to quench the light of the gospel. It is a proud, sensuous, selfish, luxurious, church-going, hollow-hearted prosperity.

- Frederic D. Huntington, Forum magazine, 1890, as quoted in Crazy Love.

Prosperity hardens the heart.

- William Wilberforce

A satisfied soul loathes the honeycomb,

But to a hungry soul, every bitter thing is sweet.

-Proverbs 27:7

Because I have such a sweet tooth and tend toward an addictive behavior with regards to sugary treats, I can readily relate to a feeling of overdoing it.

It's like a chocolate hangover, if you will.

It's this feeling of not wanting to see another sweet thing for 100 years, because your stomach is so cross at you for taking in too much, it has a terrible stale, sick feeling. Part of you wishes you could puke and get rid of it, just to bring an end to the gross feeling of excess. The only thing in the world that sounds good at this point is lettuce or water or maybe black tea. Something clean, clear, clarifying, and thin, to counter all the thick, rich, creamy excess.

I've had so much of a good thing, that is has become unpalatable and distasteful.

The thing that I loved became repulsive to me.

I believe we as westerners are sick on comfort in this same pattern. In so much as is in our power, we so strive to, and by and large have successfully polished, perfected and crafted our lives to serve the god of our choice, our comfort.

In years past when I was less in-tune to my body, I remember feeling the need to counter too much sugar with too much salt. For example, craving chips after a bowl of ice cream. It was unsuccessful, of course, as a solution, and only created a self-perpetuating cycle. One kept leading to the other and my poor body was an innocent victim of my mouth and my folly!

I find that it is the same with comfort. We so satiate ourselves on comfort and ease, that we keep having to push the envelope toward edginess and ugliness to bring back some feeling of reality or balance since our lives are too sickeningly sweet and ultra-clean.

Everything seems to reflect this pattern of unbalanced excess swaying from one gluttonous pendulum swing to another. We are manifesting it in all our expressions of life.

Genres of music have developed that are mostly fuzz and static and chaos, grinding, war-like grunting grating screaming. Visual art depicts mess, more chaos and aggressive black scribbles. Simple beauty when depicted in art now, is seen as unpalatably cheesey and even mocked by many published art writers and critics. Hobbies have developed to include jumping out of planes or off of bridges tied to an elastic, trying one's luck with wild and/or poisonous animals and many other daredevil adventures of which I don't even know. Here's a quick google top 10 list of some of the edgy danger some call fun.

The entertainment industry is certainly doing all it can muster to push the outermost limits of sensationalism. Sex can't simply be sex anymore - it must be twisted to involve and include almost anything you can think of and many you never would have, including pain and suffering.

I realize the last sentence is not a new development- there have been sexual abuses as long as there have been societies of people. I would argue, however, the prevalence, general acceptance and degree of perversion has increased in recent times.

The degree and frequency of violence in all entertainment media is well known. I just received a notice from Anna's school regarding a certain popular video game, to raise awareness. The description that was shocking to me, reads as follows:

This is a first-person shooter in which players control a U.S soldier who

works for the C.I.A. and participates in both well-known and secret events

during the Cold War (including assassinations and interrogations

involving torture). Players use a wide variety of weapons such as pistols,

rifles, machine guns, and explosives to kill/injure enemies.

Combat can generate pools of blood and dismembered limbs. Players can

use enemy bodies as human shields and execute them at close range.

In one sequence, broken glass is placed in the mouth of a man while

he is repeatedly punched, causing blood to spill from his mouth.

(Descriptive and graphic language plays a large role in the game.)

We're bored with anything less.

Did that sound good to you? Sounds like the opposite of true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent or praiseworthy - what Philippians 4:8 commends to us as what should fill our minds and thought life.

(The game was Call of Duty: Black Ops, by the way.)

I see where idea of a God of comfort becomes undesirable when you don't know real suffering nor have suffered any lack. We have a growing appetite for the ugly and twisted. Have you seen the movie 300? I've only seen glimpses, but to me, it was such a dark glorification of freakish perversion, pain, and power, through violence and fornication. Don't go see it just to find out, if you haven't. No really, please don't. Remember Philippians 4:8!

I had the happy opportunity to see a few clips from a documentary film that showed some of the underground church in China, as well as rural ministries in Africa. The kinds of things they face day to day, year after year are things we in the West as a whole have never encountered outside of digital media. There was real suffering. Not a delay in a pleasure (Shoot! My wireless connection is SO slow! Och! What is their PROBLEM!??).

I mean actual suffering. The kind where you suffer.

Not the kind where you are inconvenienced.

Many had seen family members massacred in front of them, been victims of brutality themselves, lived in fear of imprisonment, and much more.

So much of the West is numb to this reality, in part because of the glorification and use of misery as entertainment.

An offer of comfort and joy to those in those real-life situation would be the most relieving, refreshing and life-giving salvation to them. They can see more tangibly the meaning and value of the Gospel. It absolutely has no less value to the affluent Westerner! We just can't see it or feel it. Nor do we particularly want it.

We're good, thanks.

Nothing could be further from the Truth.

We are not good.

We have od'ed ourselves so grossly on counterfeit pleasures that we have cultivated addictions to them; our appetites have been corrupted to favor them, turned toward them. It happens in the physical as well as emotional and spiritual. 9 out of 10 people reading this probably have physical appetites out of sync because of abuses and gluttony. When you eat too much sugar, you are initially sickened by it. (that might have happened when you were too young to remember it) But then it creates the appetite for more... and more and more. You seek that pleasure experience repeatedly, and don't self-control it. You will find eventually that you are eating it out of habit even more than pleasure, if you pay close enough attention, but you can't seem to stop. You've created a habit to perpetuate the excess. The same could be said of excessive quantities, salt or any excess. It creates imbalance that is self-perpetuating.

When a ball bearing in a car becomes damaged, it can no longer spin in its perfect groove. The bearing will eventually seize up from the damage and uneven wear. The misaligned groove that the imbalance creates just keeps getting deeper and bigger. The initial damage kept perpetuating itself.

Like I said, folks, I was there. I so so so get it.

It can change. I'm still working on it, but I have come a long way.

What are we going to do about it?

God save us from our gluttony of comfort and our riches.

Jesus provides the only true salvation.

The broken and contrite heart He will not deny.

Come, Everyone who thirsts,

Come to the waters;
And you who have no money,
Come, buy and eat.
Yes, come, buy, without money and without price.
Why do you spend money for what is not bread,
And your wages for what does not satisfy?
Listen carefully to Me, and eat what is good,
And let your soul delight itself in abundance.
Incline your ear, and come to Me.
Hear, and your soul shall live;

from Isaiah 55:1-3

Disconnected

---Added in 2013 - This is the most painfully boring post, but I feel guilty outright deleting it. I recommend skipping it. Just saying. ---

Today, these are just thoughts that don't come to any real conclusions.

Just so you don't get your hopes up or anything. : )

------------

The most basic human interaction consists of 2 humans, within some proximity to each other, attempting to communicate verbally or with body language.

That is the closest connection. There is no middle man, tools or implements. Person to person; it is direct. If all of our senses are in tact, there are 4 mediums of information acquisition from the other- we can hear you, see you, maybe smell you, touch you. All of these are unique and provide information and shades of meaning that the others simply can't express in the same way. So there are different levels to which this interaction can deepen and transmit the greatest understanding. All of the senses are communicating something: remove any of them and that is one less aspect through which you are able to connect or commune.

Let's say that the first stage in introducing separation in communication and using a tool to connect people, chronologically, came with writing a letter, and having a third party deliver it. I then have in my hand something that was physically in my friend's hand at one point, and their words are expressed in their own distinct personal stamp and style of handwriting. I can see a visual, 1st hand expression of their personality, but not themselves.

There is a loss of 3 out of 4 mediums I would argue.

Then came telephones. I can't see you but I can hear your actual voice, though transmitted electrically (or however). I hear its inflections as you express and respond to me, and I can read a fair amount of your emotion and meaning from that. I lose sight, smell, and touch, and rely solely on hearing, but at least the voice is one of the most telling expressers.

Maybe losing 2.5 out of 4, having words themselves with the added bonus of vocal inflection.

Enter the internet. Via email, I see your words, but they are in impersonal neutral type, not in your handwriting, so I see the capital R that the computer produces, not YOU. Neither do I hear your vocal inflections. I do not see you, hear you, smell or touch you. Look at how far removed it is from the original. It is like a 3rd generation tape: one that was taped off of another that was taped off another, that was taped off of the original. The quality decreases with each step away from the original. I have very very little to go on, to actually effectively communicate with you. In place of all 4 senses, I must project in my imagination what I presume your tone to be, and the mood and intention behind these typed words before me. Quite a bit if left to conjecture, I would say! Miscommunication is rampant in this world. Everyone reading this surely has had instances in texting or email of your tone being misunderstood in what you said, or misunderstanding the other. In many cases it has been the source of high drama in relationships!

Lovely!

Isn't it wonderful the progress we've made? (excuse my sarcasm)

This is like, 3.5 out of 4 gone.

Now everyone else but me has cell phones and I'm using Skype. I can see and hear my mom on our Skype calls, but it is still very much like talking to a robot, as it is this digitally manufactured image of her and her voice. Also, since the signals are flying all over the PLANET and/or outer space, we often have a sketchy connection. I periodically can't hear her or see her or other various troubles.

Technically this should only be a solid 2 out of 4 loss (smell and touch), but combining connection difficulties and the artificiality of it all, I can only give it a weak 2 at best.

I talk to my dad on his cell phone (me on my LANDLINE - and I had to set down my WALKMAN to answer the PHONE. I know, I am such a dinosaur. Are any of you young'ins googling walkman now?) . Obviously we have conversations, but it is always much quieter than a landline call as the signal is weaker. The connection is removed yet another degree. It isn't from cord to cord across the continent, it is flying through the air harum scarum.

I've talked about this before too.

There is a great lack of quality connection and community in the world today, while quantity proliferates and overwhelms. I believe everyone is aching from it. Everyone seems to be complaining about it and the void it creates in our psyche. We frantically strive to fill it with other distractions, and saccharin substitutes for true connection, our fill-ins usually in the form of a digital reproduction of the original, the actual thing you wanted in the first place but choose not to, or can't have for whatever million potential reasons. Social networking sites like facebook attempt to fill the space of real relationships and people text instead of talk, and live imaginary lives online or in video games instead of in reality with other humans. Addictions to these outlets are as common as houseflies these days. There's got to be a reason for that! It's trying to fill some legitimate, real need we have.

So why don't we just go to the source? I have so many questions and theories about the larger impact of these changes. I think are a great many that we won't see until it's too late. Hindsight will be, as it always is, the perfect vision interpreter of what happened right under our noses, unbeknownst to us. I do fear that the further we get away from the original, the harder it is to go back. It won't be automatic and easy, cause it won't be the norm, we won't be accustomed to it, so it will have awkwardness added to further dissuade us.

Someone else is raising many of the same questions and concerns, I later come to find.

There's way more than enough blather on that topic for today. Thanks for listening!

As always, I love feedback! Comments?

funny/cool/thought provoking response options are only one click away just below here...

tempting tempting... clicky clicky!

Sustainability: Suffering

This has become quite a buzzword of late, in discussion of environmentalism, economics, you name it.

In my ongoing endeavor to quantify my emotions and perceived "needs" I was mulling over the idea of sustainability as it relates to suffering.

We've all heard stories of people lifting a car off of a trapped person, or other miraculous and normally impossible feats when emergency need arose. They were able to endure, survive and accomplish something normally impossible - but not for a prolonged period of time. They had to lift it and get the job done in a serious hurry, cause they certainly weren't carrying it around like that while they shop for groceries or try on several pairs of shoes.

But of course we all endure any number of stresses on a daily basis, for years and years. Some of those may make themselves mainstays for the majority of your life.

So different stresses have varying levels of sustainability.

Some are, some simply aren't.

And different people have different levels of strength.

So how do we determine what is sustainable for us?

Some things, like carrying cars, we are physically unable to do for a long time, so clearly it is unsustainable. Other things we may be able do for a long time and still survive, but it would be unhealthy to do them: smoking, doing drugs and eating junk food for physical examples. Many people do one or all of these for years without dying. But that doesn't mean that they are good to do and cultivate in your life.

What about emotional stresses like abusive relationships, energy draining jobs, unhealthy social boundaries, loneliness, etc?

Most of these have a fairly subjective assessment of stress level and are not conveniently quantifiable so as to render the answers clear. Most of the time we decide what we consider sustainable for ourselves and build our own arbitrary boundaries to enforce those decisions. The apparently random times that one person says "I can't ____" and the next person presses through the unthinkable can be befuddling.

Myself and another mom friend of mine (who has also been dealing with health issues) have regularly come to a place of Redefining Can't. It's become a buzz-phrase for us.

9.75 times out of 10, oh yes you can, like it or not!

When you say, "I need a break," from a task, stress, situation, person, you are deciding that boundary. Maybe you could take a lot more. Maybe you think you can't. Usually you can, but should you? I have no idea. Often it seems that break can be life saving. Sometimes pressing through is invaluable for building character. Sometimes pressing through only hurts yourself and others involved. Oh for a clear outline to know when to say when!

I have seen this in other's lives, where a situation in their life that was unsustainable (in the "I can't bear this" sense, not the I-will-die-without-water sense), eventually exploded quite messily, after they had toughed it out for longer than most would expect. In the end, they acted very uncharacteristically to satisfy these felt needs that they had denied for too long, apparently.

I want to avoid this, but I also don't want to be indulgent while using this 'fear' for an excuse.

I want to have healthy sustainable boundaries, that are willing and happily ready to be sacrificial when it is appropriate and right, and doesn't make a martyr of one's self unnecessarily.

God, give light to my path, and give me a good strong fence within to play and live!

Life Lessons at the Beach

We went as a family today to the beach. I love to collect beach glass, and you can see a glimpse of my collection in the background, filling the base for my bamboo. In my hand is what I found just today.

While others swim, tan, dig, or build, I'm on a treasure hunt for beach glass.

When we arrived at the beach, we searched and settled on our spot, put down our things, and began the beachy festivities. Children ran for the water and began constructing sandcastles. I roamed. Far and wide I scanned, back and forth, digging, perusing, searching, collecting. I didn't even begin to look around where we laid our things. I immediately left to walk and look elsewhere. I found some, but not much, and they were pretty small. I came across one or 2 larger ones, but disappointing in general.

But then to my surprise, when we came back to our base to dry off, dress, and prepare to leave, I found one... and another... and another... and another! Such an amazing concentration, and of greater size than others I had found all day elsewhere while I worked hard at looking.

Then as we walked to the car, 3 more were effortlessly at my feet as I was simply making my way, leaving the beach.

Life lessons. There were abundant treasures to be had right in my own nest. The things I was seeking were not far away - they were right beneath me. I needn't stray nor strain, but take the steps I would naturally take, without worry, and explore and not dismiss what already surrounded me. A little Taoism, a little Ecclesiastes, the theme remains.

Contentment. Finding, seeing, embracing the beauty in what you've been given and what and whom surrounds you; not breeding contempt in familiarity, but loving the common, the simple, the imperfect.

You might be surprised at what you find.

I was.

You Are What You Eat, part 2

I'm really not doing great at keeping continuity in a series, since part 1 of YAWYE was way back here in April'09, and not even well-written. But hey. I'm under no contractual obligations here. That's the beauty part.

SO. This is what I want to say to the world today.

Let's say you are going to build yourself a house to live in. All I give you for building materials is pudding cups; the little plastic individual serving ones covered in a little sealed foil.

So you build a house out of them, somehow. Then someone drives by as they inevitably will and the gust of wind knocks down a wall, de-stabilizing the roof and collapsing the entire structure. You rebuild, cause you have confidence in your method as I assured you these were reliable and safe. Surely it is a fluke that it didn't work last time. It rains. You are soaking wet and freezing cold as pudding cups afforded you no protection and were nothing even close to water-tight.

And on and on the story would go.

When you eat, you are giving your body the cellular tools with which to build itself. Eat garbage, and you give your body no option but to construct itself - your very organs, nerves, muscles, bones, brain, hair, eyes - out of garbage. The cells cannot be as strong, resilient or effective against the storms of life (bacterial, viral, genetic, toxic, etc.) as they could have been, built out of better ingredients.

Every cell in your body has a limited lifespan and, when it dies, will be replaced. Based on this process and rate of cellular replacement, you will have what more or less amounts to an entirely new body, bones included, over the course of 10 years (cells other than bones take approx. 7 years).

Why do we not regenerate to be newer and nicer over time then? Mistreatment, conscious or not, accelerates degeneration, and weaker, damaged cells constitute the replacements. Any and all mistreatment of our body contributes to the damage and oxidation, including smoking, drinking, environmental pollutants and toxins, dietary toxins, dehydration, insufficient sleep or sleep of compromised quality, emotional and physical stress, insufficient nutrition, insufficient exercise and oxygenation and certainly more.

Building stronger cells, I argue, is like building your house out of stone or brick. A strong wind of virus is less likely to level your house. A rain of nerve malfunction can be kept at bay. A landslide of cell mutation may be resisted, overcome and corrected.

A house of pudding cups is powerless against such onslaughts.

Degeneration will happen whether you like it or not, whether you live perfectly or not. We are mortal. But we can help or hurt matters tremendously. May I plead with you to build yourself out of worthy materials! Those french fries or hot dogs will be with you longer than you thought, and not only on your belly! They may be supplying the materials for the liver your body is currently working on, or brain, or heart! Those of us with children, may we take seriously the influence we have in establishing eating habits, and supplying the fuel and building blocks of our children's bodies.

Know that I preach to myself as well, lest this sound accusatory.

I say this for your blessing, not your cursing!

Be well, and do the good you know to do. Today.

Transparency

The introduction of blogging, facebook, myspace, twitter, etc. to my world presented me with a challenge. Everyone I know - family, neighbours, church friends, grade school friends, high school friends, university friends, musician friends, in-laws - from every subset of my life, were all converging in one location. There was a bit of an identity traffic jam, with maybe a few fender benders, and some unanticipated social juggling. I found I had to decide who I am, and it had to be through and through, the same to everybody. This may make it sound as if I lived the life of a total hypocrite prior, presenting different Jenni's to everyone. In a way I did. Mind you, it's not like I went out clubbing and smoking up with one group and leading prayer groups with another. My morals didn't change from one group to another, but language certainly did (no ghetto accents with in-laws, for example, or Christianese with fiddle cohorts) and the content of conversation differed vastly.

But when my blog could be potentially read by any of the above, and when facebook status updates are read by all of the above, it brought a level of transparency I hadn't ever had among my subsets. If I am excited about God, and had an awesome prayer or worship session and am busting with enthusiasm about it that overflows into a blog or status, I would formerly have chosen a smaller friend group of Christians with which to talk about it.

But now, everybody sees it.

I may have reserved my discussion on amaranth or hydrogenated oils for the few health nuts I know, instead of opening it to a broader audience.

The fiddle people, who may have vaguely known I was not Hindu, now see, 'whoa, she's really into this God thing', and possibly even 'she really likes to go eat pancakes' *. The church people are now hearing random references to Arthur Muise, about whom they haven't a clue. (A great fiddle player, by the way.)

So I had to make some decisions. What do I believe in? What am I prepared to represent?

Am I willing to own it in front of anyone?

Am I willing to be scandalous to one group while identifying with another?

There were lots of people I didn't hide my faith from, but I didn't advertise it either.

Now it's ALL out there! No secrets! I had lots of trepidation at first.

I struggled with, "What can I say that is neutral enough for every audience?"

And then I gave up. There is very little editing these days.

The whole Jenni : the Bride of Christ, the fiddle player, the MS patient, the mommy, the Irish speaker, quinoa & amaranth-eater, is all open to the public.

I have been deleted from some people's friend lists for being too Jesus freaky. That's fine. I believe there are even verses of blessing that might apply to that.

But for this development, for the acquisition of a more fearless approach to life, that doesn't change me to suit the viewer (only in so much as is actually appropriate and culturally considerate maintaining kindness in interaction), that is more real about who I am, what I believe, where I stand in the universe and on eternal matters of the soul:

For this, Internet, and often-sketchy social-networking sites, I thank you.

*"go eat pancakes" is a reference to the common misunderstanding of my reference to something called IHOP- more commonly known as the International House of Pancakes, but when I say it, is referring to the International House of Prayer.

I'm not that into pancakes, for the record.

The Generation Gap widens

I am feeling age creeping in. It is a little weird sometimes.

The generation gap is widening.

I say and do things I associate with my parents and even grandparents, with frequency.

At Christmas this past year, I found myself with an uncharacteristic desire for cheesey holiday clothing and/or jewelry. What's happening to me???

I am mostly unaware of, and even fearful of many new technologies. I don't know how to use them, nor do I often even understand their purpose. We have had an ipod for a couple years. I've never used it. I don't know how to turn it on.

Did I just say that?

I do own a jump drive now, however, and have used it... once...

I am getting more moles and freckles. What is up with that?

My makeup has much more of a purpose now. Concealer has become a near and dear friend.

I am concerned about my bedtime, and consider 9pm a perfectly reasonable and sensible bedtime, and 5am a common time to start the day, not end it.

I don't understand a goodly portion of what the young people are saying these days. The slang is beyond me. I have given up on it. After approx 3 wildly failed attempts that ended in public shaming, (in particular, one time when I described myself as a SAHM, which I understood to mean stay-at-home-mom, but I was shocked when I was informed that Urban Dictionary by the way, ahem, says that means sexy and hot Mama. This was not what I was going for in my public self-description.) I am resigning myself to datedness and old faithfuls, like 'you go girl' and the simple and universal adjective, "Cool!" in place of other confusing misnomer synonyms like sick, gross, wicked, bad etc. Is diseased the next description of something really desirable and attractive? How about loathesome? malicious? painful? heinous? odious?

"Wow! Where did you get those shoes?!?! They are nauseating!"

Would that give a new twist to that little catch phrase about "throwing up a little in my mouth just now"? Would that then be a good thing? Something was SO amazingly nauseating, you actually threw up in your mouth a little. I'm happy for you.

Super. Sounds like we're on a good road here, folks. Definitely want to keep on it! See where it takes us!

Not me, however. But you go right on ahead. However, if I give you gifts that you don't like, I really can't be blamed, because the last time you saw it and said you didn't like it, I misunderstood that you DID in fact like it.

This reminds me of a Scripture passage, however. Isaiah 5:20 says, "Woe to those who call evil good and good evil..." I think of that verse every time I hear these opposite-day adjectives.

I don't have a sweet clue what music is trendy anymore. Most of my favorite musicians are no longer living. And I don't mean Kurt Cobain. Much more obscure usually, many never did a professional recording.

When I go to the store with the humorous idea to buy clothing, I hold items up in the air with a confused, furrowed brow, unsure of even how they are to be applied to my body, let alone how to coordinate them with other things. It looks like a drape of fabric to me that I would have as much luck with as a sari. What happened to holes for your head and arms that were pretty self-evident and needed no explanation? While I love the creativity and variety, I miss understanding what I'm looking at sometimes.

Other clothing and styles that I wore in grade school are back in again. I've been around long enough to see the cycle.

*sigh* I need a young person to adopt me and give me little masterclasses to keep me at least partially in the loop. My five-year-old and mother-in-law are failing.

Another sign of true aging: I don't care that I'm out of the loop! Be gone, Oh Loop! I'm more and more ok with nerdiness.

Slave or Free Man

We all serve somebody. Larry Norman says so. I think he's right.

Just today Chris and I were talking about parenting in this light.

When you have kids, you sign up for slavery, as a radio commentator put it. Now, I would never trade this or go back. But as he heard in a radio show this morning, men are slaves to work to fund the lives and provision of their families; women are slaves to the family and home. They are on a pager 24/7, never off-duty, never on vacation - your time is no longer your own. You are always on the clock.

I heard a preacher say that a fundamental essence of our nature is our hatred of being told what to do. Five year-olds do not have the monopoly on this reaction; it is common to mankind. We have our own will, our own ideas and plans, and we want to do what we want to do, how we want to do it. When another will crosses that, we bristle. We don't like it. When our schedules and to-do lists are made for us, when the content of our life and time expenditure is decided for us, we don't like it.

This is one type of slavery, if you will.

Here is another:
It seems the vast vast majority of humanity are slaves to vanity, myself included, as my head hangs low with shame. Vanity in many forms, but all vanity in the end. By Vanity I simultaneously include and infer love of self and futility. I find the one leads to the other rather naturally.
The felt need to impress another human with our own coolness, superiority, or acquisitions and the lack of desire to please God, and more so the lack of fear of God, result in such a wealth of evils and waste. Years and years of millions of lives that amount to a landfill of time.

Maybe I should hold my tongue and not write when I'm this tired? Am I too bold? Meh.

We make ourselves slaves to money, to pride, to people-pleasing.
There is a slavery of service one could submit themselves to that holds monumental virtue, but it doesn't see the droves queuing up at the Lifestyle Line that the others do.
Why? My oh my, we are wickedly evil.

Parenting is a service of this virtuous variety, but it shouldn't end there. May this merely be for me a springboard and training ground to become a true self-pouring servant of God and his kingdom, embracing the least and being a blessing to true need and true lack.

Imagine now, if truly, you didn't care what was thought of you:
if someone thought you were attractive
if someone thought you were smart
if someone thought you had a nice house
if someone thought you were talented
if someone thought you were strong

It would be very freeing.

I heard once, and loved it ever since:


A man is free not when he lacks nothing,
but when he needs nothing.

Drive'er Herbie!

Anna got the culture ball rolling today with her question,

"Mommy, do you know what an orchestra is?"

Wow. Yes Dear, I sure do.

So I introduced my girls to Beethoven's 5th, as conducted by Herbert van Karajan.

Thank God for Youtube. I would so love for them to actually experience a live orchestra, but the nearest symphony I know of is at least 3 hours, and a hundred dollars away. Hasn't happened in my 11 years in Canada and likely won't anytime soon*. At least this way, thanks to the univerality of the internet, they got to wow at the size of a double bass, see that many fiddles (as Anna called them) all in unison, puffy-cheeked tuba players, etc.

What a different world that once was mine. Pit, chamber, ragtime, and baroque orchestras, string quartets, fancy dresses at potentially pretentious but exceptionally beautiful performances; airports, shuttles, subways, green rooms, rigorous practice and exhausting rehearsals, sweaty chin-rests, commondering conductors' batons, auditions, late nights.

It is interesting how the seasons in our lives come and go. I can look back to that season as if it were glamorous, and in its way it was, and I didn't know how good I had it. But there are things about my current season, that are certainly enviable, though certainly not glamorous. All of them collectively will amount to a lifetime of diverse and treasured memories.

After watching Karajan's Beethoven, she added, "I want to be a conductor someday!"
Their interpretive dances were priceless as well.

Without my prompting, my girls truly seem to prefer and engage with classical music to other styles. So much for 'inaccessible"!! If a 2 yr old has sufficient attention span for and can engage in it, why can't an adult?

Here is a semi-relevant picture of my high school orchestra with a guest conductor, David Barg. Takes me back. :) I'm sitting principle 2nd violin. At least 4 of the players in this photo are still actively involved in music, 3 of them full time. (I'm the part-timer). 2 or 3 of 4 have their MA in Music: one is teaching and playing full time in symphony and chamber groups; another is performing all over, and has recently been SOLO at Carnegie Hall, thank you very much; another is busy around Boston and greater New England area with various fusion groups and small ensembles. I perform in annual summer concert series, as well as ceilidhs here and there throughout the year, and have weekly piano and fiddle students. At the time, I'm sure our instructors had to wonder if any of their efforts would stick as I wonder with my students. At least for some of us, more than they could have known.

*may I clarify to my American friends/readers that not all of Canada lives in the cultural wilderness as here described. It is a geographical issue, not a reflection of national interest or lack thereof. Canada has its equal share of the world's top artists in every field, indeed, and makes a valuable contribution to global creativity and expression.

How could we

The Word became flesh and dwelt among us. 

The finger of God, which once directed the blazing stars to their place on the universe's stage, like the director of a great cosmic play, descended to write in the sand in Israel, to hold a child's hand, to bleed crimson drops of His own holy Blood on rough hewn wood, to bear the treachery and hellish punishment of every man, woman and child, in every place, of every generation. 

Because He loved us, even though we spat upon Him, physically at the time, and with our sinful rebellion to this day. 

Phenomenal. What magnitude of undeserved love.

Oo oo, I know, let's celebrate with a fashion show! I bet my kids have cuter dresses and hair than your kids, and then we'll eat sugar! Yes! Sugary bunnies! That's it! This is a perfectly appropriate commemoration of the most weighty moment in the history of mankind! 

I'm really not feeling that disjointed logic there, lately. If you know me, you know I have loved egg hunts in a big way from toddler hood til like 2 weeks ago. Then as I felt this sobriety this year, and again, watched the commercial mayhem blowing around me like a whirlwind, I was taken aback. What are we doing???

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I am heavy tonight, with the weight of contemplation, and sense of responsibility. I have been thinking about war tonight, discussing it, and am pressed by the price that has been paid for the lives that we have: by Christ for spiritual freedom, and by countless soldiers through the ages for my current social and political freedom. 

I can do with my life what I will. I have powerful, impacting choices before me every single day I awake to a new sunrise. What will I do with my choices today?

The tremendous cost at which that time and freedom came impresses upon me to make the most of the opportunity that all of life is!

To squander those in so many vanities and frivolities is to spit upon the dead. 

My own words find me guilty.

Seize the day. Live fully and with courage. Impact. Believe. Love. 

Act with love, decide in love, speak with love. 

A New Leaf

I didn't plan it this way, but contemporaneous with this turning to a new decade seems to be the opening of a new era for me.

I am simplifying and pursuing purity in ways and at levels I haven't before.

A purging of possessions is part of this. As I reflect on materialism, and attempt to pull up at least a couple of my madly entangled, profoundly and shamefully deep roots out of the world and its stuff, one thought was this: in looking at people who seem to 'have it all together,' I considered their disattachment to stuff.

Maybe, they have fewer things to keep together. That would make the task much more do-able, non? I could have it all together, if that only meant a couple things.

My mom would corroborate this line a thousand times over if you asked her: stuff takes time. What I mean by that, is that possessions require time from you. If I didn't own this computer, I certainly wouldn't be blogging right now. Every item that needs dusting, putting away and/or cleaning after it is used, organizing - takes your time, and it mightn't sound like much, but I promise you, it adds up remarkably.

I know a lady whose husband was quite the pack rat, and she lamented to me that after 20 yrs of marriage, she felt she had lost an entire phase of her life to shoveling stuff. That is how she spent the last 20 yrs, with nothing to show for it. Move the junk, try to organize it (which she found impossible as it was simply too much), give it away, throw it away, whatever could possibly be done so as not to live in utter chaos.

I don't want this life. Now, I am not saying that my house is so junked up, but the principle applies on many levels. I often find my mind is racing, in a thousand undetermined directions, too much to pray and meditate on the Lord as I would like. I have described it as 5 radio stations going at the same time, none of which are properly in tune. I hate it. I don't want that lack of mental clarity and inability to find the stillness.

I want to pare down, distill the truly valuable in life, how I truly want to spend my time, (not how it gets spent by default or without thought to its passage), and live deliberately, thoughtfully, with beauty and value.

So, I am trying to thin down possessions, bad habits, bad food, all the while believing that less is, and will be, more. More contentment, more health, more peace, more time, more happy.

time ran out

For those who are following this story about an Irish priest, I have what I find to be a very sad and depressing update.

I wrote him this huge letter, like 4 pages long, in Irish, thanking him and encouraging him, updating him on my life and how his gift impacted me. I had pictures made up for him, a recent family one and one from back then to help him remember me.

As I was searching online for his address or how to find his address, I found not an address, but
a death and burial notice. *sigh*

I missed the boat big time on that one, and feel like the hugest heel around. I missed him, simply because I didn't get around to it in time. I get a sick stomach every time I think about it.

So the message today is: just like those often cheesey forwards that tell you to tell your family you love them etc, I'm saying don't procrastinate! If you have a loose end to tie up, get after it. Don't leave 'em hanging.

You really never know how much time you have.

If I were an artist...

I would paint a picture of how I feel right now.

I would use a lot of bright colours.

I am invigorated.

I just got home from a trip to Halifax, and though I could give all kinds of stats to try and quantify and validate why this was big and wonderful for me, I really don't care to, as I weary of feeling like I have to find excuse for my feelings. So in this post, they will just be as they are, unqualified.

I so loved it.

There was one image that kinda sums up the trip for me. We did a lot of walking, in beautiful Cape Cod style neighbourhoods. Through one there was a bridge running over a stream , with a series of small waterfalls on one side. At one point, because of the arrangement of boulders etc., there was a 3 ft square ish pool of water that only seemed to swirl in itself. It wasn't plugged in to the flowing fresh current of the stream over the falls. Water would run/trickle over into it, but then was kinda stuck there. It would swirl around in circles, not going anywhere, at least not at any pace more than a gradual drain, with foam on it and looking kinda murky. The rest of the water rushing over the falls was clear as glass. It looked bright and alive and on the move. It looked like it was full of diamonds.

I can really identify with that little pool of water.

I feel like I got to run in the clear water for a couple days.

Refreshing.

I got to see beautiful things, and spend time with wonderful people, especially a friend I dearly miss. I feel more impetus for life, and for being better able to embrace it.

This was the view from my hotel room. Purrty. ☺ Beauty does a body good.

flushing diamonds with dung

Many posts are simmering. I will complain in this one about how youth is wasted on the young.

I have been SOO discouraged from encounters with teens lately. One was complaining about how school is useless and boring, how it is so ridiculous that they are learning about World War II. "It's over," she argued with annoyed indignance. "It's done, it's in the past. It isn't happening now, so why would we need to learn it? " *rolls eyes*

I was so blown away I was speechless to even argue with her. Why? Goodness sakes, where do I begin? There are so many reasons. The utter disrespect and cluelessness as to the pain and suffering of so many people, and the people who put themselves in the line of fire for someone else so she could be leading this comfortable affluent life. The self-absorbed world of these teens, while I will likely get comments saying, oh they all are that way, you were too, or whatever, is making me nuts. Ya, Girl, you're right. Who needs education. Pffh.

I talked to another guy who recently became active, we shall say, with his girlfriend, and was kinda proud of it. His cocky demeanor nearly made me vomit. HE was not spared the earful of my first individual. He was willingly oblivious to emotional and spiritual impact on either of them or any potential physical repercussions. Throwing away precious gifts of purity. A completely topsy turvy value system to my perspective. No no, this short term physical thing is TOTALLY worth potential parenthood, disease, emotional disability and spiritual corruption! Sure, why not! Sounds great. Who needs God, who needs health or wholeness.

Then there is the plethora of little people (who am I to talk, I know :P) I see on Facebook, people I know in our community here, who play with sin. Walk the tightrope, dabble in this or that, and then come and play church. I am not even sure if they know what they are doing. I feel certain they don't understand severity or implications of their actions. SO much is bound up inside me when I see this. I am successfully containing all manner of screams, running over and shaking them and falling on the floor with tears, begging them to heed wisdom. That's what I'm doing on the inside.

I've also had more MS activity lately, which very effectively drives the point home to me of the tremendous value of the strength and energy (and TIME) in youth. That it is cluelessly taken for granted and wasted on video games and flirting with sin is just bringing me to the edge of psychosis.

O Blogger, Where Are Thou?

I am back.
One thing that kept me away lately was having my phone line yanked from my house by a passing tractor trailer. Crazy eh? Now we are back on the grid, connected to the interweb. Yeehaw!

Does anyone else find patterns in their life to be self perpetuating?
For example: When I am doing well, I seem to just get better. I am on the ball: the house is sparkling, I bake and cook up a flurry of culinary varieties, I speak Irish like I'm smart or something, read to my girls so they will be smart or something, exercise, juice, take time outdoors - and all with a big smile. I feel confident because I'm accomplishing all this stuff, and things are going great. With this confidence and good energy, I can just keep accomplishing more!

Then these times happen when I'm not doing well. My brain seems to be on slow motion, I can't manage to think of Irish, and start to feel stupid. I am exhausted, so I don't clean or cook, so the house gets messy and we don't get nutritious food prepared. The mess then gets overwhelming, so I eat 'comfort food' [read: chocolate], I don't spend any time in the sun, can't find the strength/gumption to juice or clean, and my response to the under-achieving ends up perpetuating the exhaustion, stress and discouragement.

What happens to break these cycles I'm not sure, but they seem to spontaneously turn around. One day you are Mrs. Over-Achiever-Cleaver, the next, you feel you are barely hanging on.

Weird.
Just life, I guess. Life, and hormonal fluctuations, likely.

----------------------

I have been really preoccupied by world issues lately: hunger, poverty, disease, injustice. One evening in particular, Niamh had been playing on the floor happily, but then the fun ran out, as it does, and she started crying. It took me a minute to get to her, but as soon as I was there to talk to her, she was smiling again. Just wanted someone to talk to her and engage her.

Then it just struck me, the countless orphans in the world, and all they are doing without. They aren't any person's #1 priority, there isn't anyone that they know will always come for them, or for whom there is that feeling of security and familiarity. Most are probably in the care of some nurse, state employee or volunteer, many of whom are great I'm sure, but it is just not the same as the one Mommy or Daddy all the time, who loves you like nobody else. I just thought how very fortunate my girls are to have both parents, in the same home, who adore them. It is just so sad to think of the baby out there just like Niamh, who doesn't have a mommy to come smile at her when that might be all she needs, to know you are there.

There now, aren't you glad I came back so I could depress you? Better luck next time maybe.

the shame and the glory

I have realized a couple things about myself that I wasn't excited to learn, but hey.

Let me start here:
A number of years ago when I first heard of this thing, I shook my head and pursed my lips in self-righteous condescension. I likely spewed a bunch of mockery about anyone who would participate in such an institution of criminal vanity, oppressing and corrupting the helpless young.

But now I know, that if I was affluent, I would have a real struggle with over-spending on Baby Gap. Yes, Baby Gap. *sigh* I just HAD to visit that website, didn't I. Dummy. Curiousity killed the cat, and awakened some extra materialism in Jenni. Nice.

Also, I watched "The Devil Wears Prada" a couple weeks ago, and it made me realize that in fact, I really love fashion. I had just forgotten. With full knowledge of the fickle, vain, transient, superficial nature of it, I still enjoy it a lot. Again, if affluent, I would likely increase my clothes budget from, virtually nothing, replacing the occasional holey item, to actually trying to be shnazzy.

Now for the glory portion.
Last week my Great Aunt Edna died. I'm fine, although not being able to be involved in family stuff stinks royally. But the story of her passing is just so cool to me that I had to share it.

For 3 days she had been curled up on her side, not opening her eyes at all for the 3 days, but still talking a little bit. Then on the 3rd day, with her daughter Sherry holding her hand, she was praying a while. She asked Sherry to sing Amazing Grace to her. (Hello?!?! GUT wrenching request!)
Halfway through the song Edna said, "What?"
to which Sherry replied, "What what?"
Edna: "Did you call my name?"
Sherry: "No, Mom, I was singing. I didn't say anything."
Then Edna turned up energetically, opened her eyes wide, and Sherry says they were the biggest brightest, clearest, most beautiful eyes she has seen in her. She reached up her hand, and then she was gone.

Wow.

It seems pretty clear she was greeted by a friendly entity. Awesome. I'm not worried about where she went, nor who she is with now! Cool eh? I thought so.

Christian Life

I am overwhelmed with these questions.

I haven't been able to sum any of this up nicely yet, but there is something I am stumbling over, and that is making me crazy right now.
Here goes:

So there was John the Baptist. He lived in the wilderness, ate locusts and honey, and wore burlappy type sacks for clothes. Jesus said of him in Matthew 11:11, "among those born of women there has not risen one greater than John the Baptist."

Jesus himself was a big scandalous trouble maker among church leaders, and upset the status quo for most everybody He encountered - for the good, of course!

I am wondering to what degree our lives as Christians are compromised and fruitless because of our being man-pleasers instead of God-pleasers, and HOW our lives should change. Most people thought JB (John the Baptist for now) was a psycho, I'm sure. He just wasn't normal, let's face it.
If he were here today, he wouldn't be at the movies, he wouldn't play video games, etc. (sorry for another shot at movies... I'm just not thinking of more creative examples), he wouldn't live in a fancy house, or wear brand name clothes.

I imagine these 2 types of western Christians. They have to be western, cause I don't know how things work elsewhere in the world, socially, and I'm trying to figure out how to live here.

Christian #1 is a fairly normal guy on the surface. Yes, he loves God very much, is very devout, knows his Bible, whatever. But he doesn't freak people out with his intensity. He is a Christian while still being accessible to the larger population, and nobody thinks he is a psycho. At face value, his life isn't that different from your general upstanding citizen. Because he is accessible, he has more chances to talk to more people about God who don't instantly disregard him.

Then there is Christian #2 who DOES freak people out. He has so given his life to God's affairs that he stands out from society at large. He doesn't take more than he needs, he is not afraid to wear nerdy clothes and live in a home that isn't trendy or big or drive a little older, again, nerdy car. (a socialist for Christian reasons :P ) He chose this humble lifestyle in order to be able to give more to the truly poor and needy. He spends more time with church than most people deem 'balanced'. He spends more time praying and reading the Bible than most people deem 'balanced'. He knows little of pop culture because he doesn't bother with it, maybe sees it as a distraction from God. People think he is an insular, out-of-touch weirdo.

Which life has more impact? Or can we know or say? Which life is more pleasing to God?

I have been struggling with this for a while, but it came to more of a head when I heard criticism of people I know who have given their lives to prayer, fasting, and community service, I don't see how that is so much more different than Mother Theresa, whom I didn't hear ANYone of ANY faith criticizing. Everyone except the hedonists, who might have called her a sucker missing out on transient physical pleasures, or said, oh, isn't she noble, living a selfless life in the service of others.
I'm not saying every intercessory missionary should be up for sainthood.
I'm merely trying to figure out where the balance is in being accessible, living IN the world and not being OF the world, 'coming out and being seperate' while still having an impact, while still being true to the calling and the life that Christ led, if we are indeed following Him as we claim.

I don't think everyone should live in the desert or have to eat locusts, or even Kraft dinner 10 nights a week. I think that thrift store finds are perfectly acceptable replacement for sackcloth.
But I wonder how much we are rendering our Christian lives powerless and fruitless by our choices.
Today I spent $90 on maternity clothes from Old Navy. More than I've spent on clothes in years. Mind you, I still managed to get 7 items: a bargain by general retail standards. And I don't feel guilty about my purchase. BUT ultimately, I know the reason for spending that was vanity and pleasing man instead of God. It doesn't do anything for God if I'm stylish. I could have covered my body for a lot less with some less than stylish selections from the thrift store down the road. But my vanity wanted to still be "cute and cool" during my period of inflation. We make choices like this all the time.

How much more humble could/should our lifestyle be in order to be more selfless and giving?
How afraid are we of being weird or even material for a mental ward? Is this valid? How concerned should we be with being off-putting? JB was not concerned with being off-putting. He was OUT there, literally! Is it an excuse and copout to try to make your life more moderate so people don't think you are a freak and can relate to you? I really, really don't know.

I've always loved II Corinthians 5:13 : If we are beside ourselves, it is for God; or if we are of sounds mind, it is for you.

Basically, I'm keeping my cool here so as not to freak you out. But really, if it were just me and God, I'm not gonna look normal, so I'm playing it down and containing it for your sake.

Back to point-

People I know that live as Intercessory Missionaries (somewhat akin to a modern-day, Protestant monk life, if it was an order that was active in community and social justice as well as prayer) are called a cult or mentally unstable now by some because of how much time they spend praying etc. and because, likely, a lot of them are rather intense individuals, not afraid to walk up to strangers and say things like, "God told me [fill in the blank] to tell you", to be more overt and visible in their Christianity.

I ranted a bit about this when I started the blog.

Can both Christian #1 and #2 be called "sold out" Christians, that have let go of their attachment to the world and are truly living FOR God?
What is the Church supposed to look like? Where is the true obedience in all that, where is godly living? Where is the church that changes the world by being devoted to and subjected to God? What does that look like? What WILL that look like?

I dunno. and it's making me nuts.
please... any feedback? Even email me if comments are too impersonal or visible, or brief a format. I would love to hear from you!