7 years!

Well, it all started 7 years ago today, with a post about why I should not have a blog. Happy 7th Birthday, Wasser.blogspot.com!

A Transfer

Jesus didn’t have to die despite God’s love; he had to die because of God’s love. And it had to be this way because all life-changing love is substitutionary sacrifice.
Think about it. If you love a person whose life is all put together and has no major needs, it costs you nothing. It’s delightful. There are probably four or five people like that where you live. You ought to find them and become their friend. But if you ever try to love somebody who has needs, someone who is in trouble or who is persecuted or emotionally wounded, it’s going to cost you. You can’t love them without taking a hit yourself. A transfer of some kind is required, so that somehow their troubles, their problems, transfer to you.

— Tim KellerKing's Cross(New York, NY: Dutton, 2011), 141-142

Choice and Choosing

Though he has not moved, he has turned. I must go now. If I am going to go, it is time.  On the verge of his journey, he is thinking about choice and chance, about the disappearance of chance into choice, though the choice be as blind as chance. That he is who he is and no one else is the result of a long choosing, chosen and chosen again. He thinks of the long dance of men and women behind him, most of whom he never knew, some he knew, two he yet knows, who, choosing one another  chose him. He thinks of the choices, too, by which he chose himself as he now is. How many choices, how much chance, how much error, how much hope have made that place and people that, in turn, made him? He does not know. He knows that some who might have left chose to stay, and that some who did leave chose to return, and he is one of them. Those choices have formed in time and place the pattern of a membership that chose him, yet left him free until he should choose it, which he did once, and now has done again.
From Remembering, by Wendell Berry.

Ann Voskamp & 7 years

This made prayer from Ann Voskamp made me smile. By the way, 11/16/05 was my 7 year Inasmuch anniversary. Goodness! I won't say time flies. This blog has chronicled the ups and downs (more often the emotional venting downs) of seven years (a quarter of my life!) The new beginnings. The passing of dear ones. And I hope it will continue to, for as long as it should. 

Oh God, thank you for 7 years of expression. I do pray every keystroke would be for your glory, not mine. And thank you for Ann and other wonderful bloggers out there, what a gift. Soli Deo Gloria. 

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A Prayer for Bloggers

I am no longer my own blogger, but Yours.

Refine me with each post how You will, rank me how You will.

Put me to service, put me to suffering.

Let me be a follower — instead of seeking followers
Let me post for You —  or be put aside for You,

Lifted high, only for You, or brought low, all for You.

Do with me and each post whatever You will, because You alone know best.

Let me not strive but submit
Let me not compete but care
Let me not desire hits but holiness

Let my blog be full of You, and let it be empty of me.
Let me crave all things of You, let me care nothing of this world.
Let my words be focus only on the greatest of audiences: You.
And You are enough.

May I write not for subscribers… but only for Your smile.
May my daily affirmation be in the surety of my atonement not the size of my audience.
May my identity be in the innumerable graces of Christ, never, God forbid, the numbers of my comments.
May the only words that matter in my life not be the ones I write on a screen — but the ones I live with my skin.

I freely and heartily yield every sentence, every title, every post, every comment… or no comments… all to Your pleasure and perfect will.

My only fame is that I bear your name
My only glory is the gift of Your Grace
My only readership, Your eyes that seek to and fro to find
Make this so. Lord…

Yawhew, you alone are my God, not Google
Jesus, you alone are my Savior, not sitemeters
And Holy Spirit, you alone are my Comforter, not comments

So be it, today, yesterday, and every post to come.

O glorious and blessed God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit,
thou art mine, and I am thine.

This is my prayer I have made on earth, over thie keyboard…
let it be ratified in heaven.

In Jesus’ Name…. Amen.

By Ann Voskamp

Stones

Tears for the mourning,
Two departed in one week is more than I can hold.

This grief, it comes and goes.

Like walking on old paved stones
brick laid a century ago
fired in a kiln, then
a kneeling workman sized and placed in the ground
now in this afternoon light,
I gaze, snap, and pass over, leaves collecting in the seams. I feel the weight of history. Then I move on.
They are moving now, too,
their feet are treading a paved way,
in a city I've only read about,
where the streets are paved with far better stones,
their eyes see with a far better light.

Sister Ruth, brother Jack.
When they met Him, did they run? Laugh and bow?
No over-shoulder-looking-regret
in this new city, no.
Only a Sun to look upon, only a King's arms into run.

I hold onto the hope that they are home.

Sadie, by Joanna Newsom

Sadie, white coat, you carry me home
And bury this bone and take this pine coneBury this bone to gnaw on it later
Gnawing on the telephone

Until then, we pray and suspend

The notion that these lives do never end

And all day long we talk about mercy
Lead me to water, Lord, I sure am thirsty
Down in the ditch where I nearly served you
Up in the clouds where he almost heard you

And all that we built and all that we breathed
And all that we spilt, or pulled up like weeds
Is piled up in back and it burns irrevocably
And we spoke up in turns 'til the silence crept over me

And bless you, and I deeply do
No longer resolute, oh and I call to you
But the water go so cold
And you do lose what you don't hold

This is an old song, these are old blues
And this is not my tune, but it's mine to use
And the seabirds where the fear once grew
Will flock with a fury and they will bury what'd come for you

And down where I darn with the milk-eyed mender
You and I, and a love so tender
Stretched on a hoop where I stitched this adage:
"Bless our house and its heart so savage"

And all that I want, and all that I need
And all that I've got is scattered like seed
And all that I knew is moving away from me
And all that I know is blowing like tumbleweed

And the mealy worms in the brine will burn
In a salty pyre among the fauns and ferns
And the love we hold, and the love we spurn
Will never grow cold, only taciturn
And I'll tell you tomorrow
Sadie, go on home now
And bless those who've sickened below
And bless us who have chosen so

And all that I've got and all that I need
I tie in a knot and I lay at your feet
And I have not forgot, but a silence crept over me
So dig up your bone, exhume your pine cone, my Sadie"

Poverty

A material definition of poverty harms both the materially poor and non-poor. -Steve Corbett & Brian Fikkert

Poverty
sinks in between the cement cracks and weeps
into soil compacted
every particle; saturated
with broken relationships
to earth
to fellow human
to self
to God.

Nothing stills the gaping lack
until the blood spilled
right through the cracks
overtook the thoughts
with light
shone in: mending
every broken relationship: pending
reconciliation with their Creator


with earth
with fellow human
with self
with God.



Righting every wrong
Adjusting every song
so every lung praises
every breath raises
 the Name of Jesus
from every people.

Simple? No.
But status quo will only show
cycles of pride and destruction
Only One Hope- not in a dollar nor a heavy yoke
Only One Hope- in turning and forgiving
Admitting my own poverty is the seed that can break the cement lies
Son-rays grow and fertilized in the blood of truth

joy in restoration
in earth
in fellow human
in self
in God.

Into Thy Light

Out of my bondage, sorrow and night,
Jesus, I come; Jesus I come.Into Thy freedom, gladness and light,
Jesus, I come to Thee.
Out of my sickness into Thy health,
Out of my wanting and into Thy wealth,
Out of my sin and into Thyself,
Jesus, I come to Thee.
-William Sleeper 

I drove into the light after such a day where I wept,
it seemed, at every turn;
half a tank of gas to be anointed with a balm of peace.
694 was never so sweet, except this moment.
His light, which shone in setting sun
echoed in the words he sang to me.
------------------------------------------
A day of grief, heaviness
sorrows rose and trouble rolled
taking on another's burdens
(as my burdens were taken too)
and truly burdened,
weeping,
interceding,
without words
and with words, claiming Jesus' Peace
and Light
against the Evil Power.

I do not say this lightly,
but I see a miracle
in her rising.
I see a hopeless daughter, tossed by anxiety
weakened by darkness
burdened by sin.
I asked if I could pray.
"No, I think I have to get off the phone."
Okay, I'm praying for you. Text me in an hour.

In that stone cold sentence, I knew no power in myself to save.
I prayed.
I cried.
Then others joined, and prayed. (Which was beautiful in and of itself, Thank You Father).

And, an answer.
She said "I am feeling a bit better. Are you up to driving?"
YES. Yes. yes.
In an hour's time.
A weeping breakdown later,
after kneeling in a gravel parking lot,
as songs drifted from the stone arched window,
a broken soul crying for a broken soul
a merciful, gracious, unspeakable kind Creator
unleashing Power.
--------------
A day where goodbyes pressed in,
sweet and bitter.
One expectant and departing; may you Call her there.
One dear family sent for the Name; Amen.
-----------------
A day where I saw a Lion and a Root,
a Fountain and a Well,
in a room of Saints who sang to tell
each other and themselves:
of this hope
of this Name
of this Living Breathing Life
Who Shines like the Sun
Who cuts like a Knife.

Reading Lolita...Favorite Quotes

I finally conquered Reading Lolita in Tehran this summer. It was fun to read a novel full of rich sights and smells- Persian tea and Pistachios- as well as a writer who so loves to read. You experienced life with her, the tortuous decision to leave her home, how she survived the war, how she lives now. You saw James and Austen through new eyes- through her eyes. Here are some of my favorite quotes. 

P. 317 ch 19
There is a term in Persian, “the patient stone,” which is often used in times of anxiety and turbulence. Supposedly, a person pours out all his troubles and woes into the stone. It will listen and absorb his pains and secrets, and this way he will be cured. Sometimes the stone can no longer endure its burden and then it bursts. My magician was not my “patient stone,” although he never told his own story- he claimed people were not interested in that. Yet he spent sleepless nights listening to and absorbing others’ troubles and woes, and to me his advice was that I should leave: leave and write my own story and teach my own class.

P. 325 last para
Other people’s sorrows and joys have a way of reminding us of our own; we partly empathize the with them because we as ourselves: what about me? What does that say about my life, my pains, my anguish? For us, Nassrin’s departure entailed a genuine concern for her, and anxieties and hopes for her new life. We also, for the moment at least, were shocked by the pain of missing her, of envision the class without her. But in the end we finally turned back towards ourselves, remembering our won hopes and anxieties in light of her decision to leave. 

P. 5, 4^th para
There was one more: Nassrin. She is not in the photographs-she didn’t make it to the end. Yet my tale would be incomplete without those who could not or did not remain with us. Their absences persist, like an acute pain that seems to have no physical source. This is Tehran for me: its absences were more real than its presences.

P. 135, para 4
As for the book, she had nothing more to say in its defense. The novel was its own defense. Perhaps we had a few things to learn from it, from Mr. Fitzgerald. She had not learned from reading it that adultery was good or that we should all become shysters. Did people all go on strike or head west after reading Steinbeck? Did they all go whaling after reading Melville? Are people not a little more complex than that? And are revolutionaries devoid of personal feelings and emotions? Do they never fall in love, or enjoy beauty? This is an amazing book, she said quietly. It teaches you to value your dreams but to be wary of them also, to look for integrity in unusual places. Anyway, she enjoyed reading it, and that counts too, can’t you see?

P. 145, 4^th para
Until then home had been amorphous and elusive: it presented itself in tantalizing glimpses, with the impersonal familiarity of old family photographs. But all of these feelings belong to the past. Home was constantly changing before my eyes. I had a feeling that day that I was losing something, that I was mourning a death that had not yet occurred. I felt as if all things personal were being crushed like small wildflowers to make way for a more ornate garden, where everything would be tame and organized. I had never felt this sense of loss when it was a student in the states. IN tall those years, my yearning was tied to the certainty that home was mine for the having, that I could go back anytime I washed. It was not until I reached home that I realized the true meaning of exile. As I walked those dearly beloved, dearly remembered streets, I felt I was squashing the memories that lay underfoot.

P. 219, para 3
The other quotation from James on the pink index card records his reachiton to the death of Rupert Brooke, the beautiful young English poet who died of blood poisoning during the war. “I confess that I have no philosophy, nor piety, nor patience, no art of reflection,” he wrote, “no theory of compensation to meet things so hideous, so cruel, and so mad, they are just unspeakably horrible and irremediable to me and I stare at them with angry and almost blighted eyes.”

Grief and Ground

Cold and hopeless now
Bones in the ground
Bones in the ground

He no longer feels the sweat on his brow
Bones in the ground
Bones in the ground

In the soil he loved when he lived and breathed
Bones in the ground
Bones in the ground
            ---
He is gone, and I grieve.
Just having known him, I was touched.
I sit cross-legged on the living room carpet and

We utter prayers
to a God we say we know.

Do they pray, too? Saying "he is at rest now. he is at peace."
With all assurances in their minds
of their god's universal offering of eternal life.


Did he repent and call on your Son
Only Savior, the beautiful sun?
Oh Lord, my heart grieves for Bud and family.
I pray for your power to be revealed in this passing.
Your eternal life-giving, dead raising power,
born of your suffering.
So unlike our suffering.
So freely chosen.
Oh Lord, may your Name be exalted through me and through this I pray.
In Jesus' name.


Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. (Philippians 2:5-11 ESV)

This. Is. Not. Okay.

I stumbled upon an ironical article on Relevant (9 Quick Ways to Get Depressed). Quite amusing, I chuckled. Until I got to number 6.

"Become a Cynic: Start to believe the following things: people don’t change, life generally sucks and avoiding pain is more important than risking love." -Nicole Uncie

Wait, that sounds a little close to home. 

That sounds a little...like me. 

I never would have put myself in this category. I'm a sanguine optimist! I have a rosy-colored view of the past. I forgive and forget. I have hope in God. Until now, I guess. I look around...

People I love are sick. And suffering. 

People I know are dying.  In hospice. Suffering.

People I respected and cared for are gone. Eternally. Suffering.

It's external, and it's internal.

I am broken. I am hurtful to others: impatient and stubborn and harsh. I think the worst. I judge. I compare. The list goes on. 

And it does, really, suck. And it's not okay. And I can't fix it. 

But I can cry out tonight. Lord, do what only You can do.
-------------------------------------------

I don't want to ride on somebody else's passion
I don't want to find that I am just dry bones
I want to burn with unquenchable fire
deep down inside, see it coming alive 

Help me find my own flame
Help me find my own fire
I want the real thing
I want Your burning Desire

In my heart tonight, do what only you can do
In my heart tonight, do what only you can do

Why wait for tomorrow, when I can have you today?
When I can have the change....

Change me by Your beauty God
Change me by Your beauty God

Help me find my own flame.

-Will Reagan and United Pursuit Band

 

First love

God will look to every soul like its first love because He is its first love.
-C.S. Lewis

Great Relisher

What I know of spirit is astir
in the world.
The god I have always expected
to appear at the wood's edge, beckoning,
I have always expected to be
a great relisher of this world, its good
grown immortal in his mind.

-Wendell Berry, The Mad Farmer Poems

This path of love

Love,
made on the kitchen table
across with eyes, fountains to
empty pitchers,
lies and jars of pennies.
Such is the family heritage.

I admit, I am one
capable and culpable,
I give up and in
and go.

This pursuit of happiness
in the Driftless region
of agnostic hypocrites
such a harmonious cacophony.
It's electric.

Now I wait for a penman
from the Red Cedar River,

I wait for the Man
of God to enter
again
into this Tapestry
and complete the loose ends fraying
and batten down the hatches blowing
and rescue mind from Satan's plaguing
and until then,
counting it all joy;

He is singing, strumming, loving
over us, over us.

Honestly, my soul.

I heard on the radio that one of the reasons we need to sit and be still and read the Bible is because there are so many voices distracting us, it can be hard to hear what is going on in your soul above the din.
That made sense to me. They gave the example of David, who spoke to his soul "why are you down cast?" He knew his soul was downcast. To know that, you need to listen. I have been trying to listen, and I'm not sure. Are you in a confused state, O Soul? Or are you locked shut by a combination I have forgotten? Or are you quietly speaking, and my hearing has gone dull?

I do know about my thought-life-- and that I have been listening to my thoughts rather than speaking to them... Finding that (once again) listening leads to drifting...and unbelief....such a viscous cycle. So I will pray.  I will pray honestly (I don't desire you God., as I should...I desire marriage and sex and esteem from friends and success at work and comfort much more than you right now). And I will ask for help (to know my soul, and most of all, to know and treasure Jesus much more.)

Some encouragements via blogs and email....


John Piper writes
"I use the acrostic I. O. U. S as I come to the Bible.

I. Incline my hear to your testimonies. Psalm 119:36 (Since my heart is inclined to sleep and to work and to lots of things other than the Bible.)
O. Open my eyes to see wonders in your word. Psalm 119:18 (Since my heart is so often dull and blind to the wonders of the word.)
U. Unite my heart to fear your name. Psalm 86:11 (Since my heart is often divided and distracted in many directions)
S. Satisfy me with your steadfast love. Psalm  90:14 (Since my heart is so tempted to be satisfied in other things."

Dan Porch writes
"Two very strong messages need to rest in our hearts and minds as we walk through this week.  The one is the reality that lustful living leads to unbelief … so fight it! We read from Hebrews 3 around the breakfast table this morning and heard this reminder … you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.  The enemy of our soul is so very crafty.  We begin to long for and lust after the offerings of this world without even realizing it.  And before we know it, we are walking in unbelief.  And an unbelieving heart leads us away from the living God.  It is a spiral downwards.  And so we need to encourage one another in the second strong message given to us on Sunday morning!

We fight lustful living in a delightful and amazing way.  We fight unbelief with worship … not drudgery or duty … but delight!  We remember Paul’s prayer for the Colossian church, and we enter into it … joyfully giving thanks to the Father who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light.  We worship the Father and are strengthened in our belief … our faith … our confidence that the greatest treasure is not found by sharing in what this world offers, but our greatest treasure is found by sharing in and walking with Christ in this life and the next." 

May God grant me the combination to know my soul, for the purposes of knowing and honoring Him. To worship Him and joyfully fight. Oh Lord, have mercy.

Passion & Need

Vocation is where our greatest passion meets the world’s greatest need.
Frederick Buechner

His eye is on the sparrow

Psalm 40:1-5 Tree of Life

I've been absent from the pen (err, keyboard) and writing and thinking about things on this blog. However I must say it's refreshing to feel the weight of burdens lifting. Next week I'll say goodbye to being a graduate student for good when I defend! It's been such a journey to even consider going to school- and what to study- and where! And to apply, and be accepted, then to make it through it...I haven't pondered it that much because God opened up an incredible job! My unemployment was short and sweet, and I've been pushing to finish up this last step. I'm seeking and praying for His grace next week...and even tomorrow... knowing "his eye is on the sparrow and I know He watches me...I can sing because I'm happy, I sing because I'm freeeeee...His eye is on the sparrow and I know He watches me!" (the old spiritual, sung by Abigail Wasburn, play count 45 in Itunes)

Science would be impossible

"Science would be impossible without the truth of the Christian worldview" -Justin Holcomb, from the Resurgence on "Why Science Needs the Christian Worldview".  It's a short, clear article that makes 9 arguments of how nature and our human experience point to God. Without from the world's functioning as a rational, uniform and 'fit together' sort of place, studying nature in a systematic way (a.k.a. science) would have been pointless. 

In fact the presupposition that we live in a designed place and can study it because it is consistent (not random) occurred because of a Christian worldview of a Creator designing all that we see (and don't see). Think of our friends Mr. Newton, Mr. Da Vinci, Mr. Galileo- though their thinking got them in trouble in their day, it also came from this worldview. 

Today science assumes nature has a rational order but takes God out of the picture and, in some cases, mocks those who believe in God or an intelligent designer. These 9 reasons encourage my timid, fearful self who can feel insecure about being a Christian in science. I hope they challenge someone who would be opposed to a Christian worldview and start a discussion, too.

But for you

Conditional

Fearing

the Son
Promises of the

Sun Rising 

in Goodness

Perfection

Rightness

Healing

Helping

FREE

Joy

Leaping

Dancing

Fearless

Fullness

Skipping

Singing

Overflowing

Child-like

at last.

Joining in with the whales and stars

Poems and thoughts from Louie Giglio, 9/22/2011 @ The DesiringGod National Conference

"This world is messed up at an amazing magnitude." -LG

Crying.
Sing a new hallelujah.
Reach across the table.
Reach across the ocean.
Reach to my neighbor.
Can I, when I don't know what to say?
When she has hurt me so much?
When I have done this?
May your blood drop into the hard soil of her heart,
soak in,
break up the clods,
so roots can sink in,
yes, so
gospel roots can sink in and
grow.
and flourish.
Tears that sing of his faithfulness.
Tears that sting of brokenness.

-------------------------------------------------------------------
Worship happens wherever God is.

The ripple effect of Grace.

We are not all here at our leisure
But under the mandate of the grace of God.

The Universe's primary function is to 
give 
praise to
God. 
-----------------------------------------------------------------------


"Wrecked, and not put back together in a simple form or fashion." -LG


Whoa is me, I am lost.
Wrecked, deep. Done.

Wrecked by sinful condition
Searing grace of God
To hear the question
"who shall we send?"
"Send me."

Light steps
miles- coming quietly
never still and shining
brilliant, wading deep in the
song of glory to the one who sees

Who reaches down                       this city
Unconditionally                             this day
Who breathes                               this family
Sets in place                                 this body
People for this time.

the community

“A thing is right only when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability and beauty of the community; and the community includes the soil, water, fauna and flora, as well as the people.”  - Aldo Leopold, A Sand County Almanac, 1949 (Via Friends of the Mississippi River, pic from National Wildlife Foundation).


Oh, Aldo. Sometimes he just hits the spot. I've got the broad community of soil, water, fauna and flora on my mind as I just returned from a refreshing weekend with new friends; folks who are passionate about Jesus and restoring creation. It was a privilege to spend the weekend in Northern Michigan at Au Sable (and to be a member of the Grad Fellows program this year) and to get into deep conversations about research, outreach, physics, networks, and of course, porcupine poo. Hurray for snow- hikes and cross country and a night of broom ball under the nicest pole barn I've ever been in! I'm brimming with thanks to our Creator, who designed us for rich fellowship like this! I feel reinvigorated to fight for the things that preserve communities, as Aldo says, and I'm thankful to know other fighters-- to be reminded I am not alone. Praise to the one who made this wondrous world and cares deeply about all of its inhabitants.