Musical Moments

For an amazing treat go to the link and watch Jake Shimabukuro play his Weeping Ukelele. (I got one for Joel for Christmas.)
I think this guy could probably make a tin can sound melodic.

subversive

`They commonly enter seminary motivated by a commitment to God and a desire to serve their Lord in some form of ministry, and find that they are being either distracted or deflected from that intention at every turn. They find themselves immersed in Chalcedonian controversies, they find themselves staying up late at night memorising Greek paradigms, they wake in the morning, rubbing their eyes, puzzled over hairsplitting distinctions between homoousios and homoiousios. This is not what they had bargained on.... Seminaries were regarded as the graveyard of spirituality. Seminaries were where men and women lost their faith.' -Eugene Peterson

Churches can be a graveyard as well.
No matter what we study: Greek or tech sheets

Keep seeking Keep knocking(up from the grave He arose)

Christian faith, by definition
Cannot die
The death has already been done

Shared Thought

Thy Grace is Sufficient

We're all trying to live it and figure it out it seems. Our faith that we claim is never stagnant.
Steve Norris quotes Peggy Noonan here:

"My mother, too, associated Catholicism with unhappy things, though she was not clear as to why. They married in 1947, my father just home from the war, and one belief they seemed to hold in common was that organized religion was for the old-fashioned, for hypocrites and creeps who would hit you on the head for wearing the wrong shoes.

They wanted to be modern, They wanted to leave their not-adequately lit apartments behind and enter the American sunlight. And while the church held little for them, other areas of life, which might even be called competing areas, seem more alluring."

Every Generation.
Even the Greatest Generation
Moved On
and Left behind the community
that seemed to offer them nothing.
And someone let them go
Some people didn't fight for them and
woo them
and love them through it.

Or maybe they just wanted out.
and they told themselves they were
misunderstood
When it may be that
They didn't seek to understand

Still Soliton

So, four months later, I am still wondering about Soliton.
Soliton, a gathering of seeking believers in Ventura last year, still much to my dismay is having it's ripple effect upon me. I am asking all the same questions as the rest of the group, but not at all liking the continuous loose end. Here is my first impression, written the day I got home, freshly nudged to Blog:

....I found something so new and beautiful at Soliton, but I am terrified by it thin and fragile frame.
To others, the frame may be bold and compelling. But I took in all that my ears and heart could hear and I am left shaken. I was not aware of the accountabilty to scripture. A new theology, but in reference to what? The ideas that were explored were out of my framework. My black and white unpopular unPC framework. Not all, but enough that I am having a hard time trusting. How can I take in the ideas and not the Soul Individuals that freely create them? This is touching on my co-dependancy. I want to take care of them. I am grieving over the gap I fear.
I am asked to make relationship with precious hurting urban people, to not turn from them.
I am losing courage. People are hard to hang with! I am writing my own song of lament. Micheal Card has written of this.
Psalm 119 touches on this. I want people to be heard and accepted and loved, but as Jesus would.
Now even who He is has come into question.
Blessed is the man who does not fall away on account of me. Matthew 11:6

So today, I know as much as then.
Soliton gleamed such promise for me, and gave me a warning. Show me what you got from it.
I must have a huge blind spot...
Show me Christ and I can see you clearly.
Show me what He sees and I will trust it.
Lay your answer down deep in this Man and I will follow you.
Lay your mystery down deep in this Man and I will live there.

Who'll Make the Team?

At the risk of turning this into a Knitting Blog (please don't run away), I'd like to announce my semi-final selections for this years Knitting Olympics:

Ribbed Center Cable or
All-Over Right Twist (sounds like a ski-jumper's manuever)

Yarn Harlot is logging up to 700 responses to date. Next thing you know, Matt and Katie will be calling for an interview.
I'm going for the Gold!

Knitting Olympian

I'm in training to take a blogger's challenge. I'm sure you'll be cheering me along with the downhill racers and bob-sleds. I'll be following the Yarn Harlot and lots of other knitters in a challenge of strength and stamina and we'll still get to eat what we want and avoid the cold snow from getting in our boots.
I'll be doing a classic Aran in Lambspride Oatmeal. 'Twill be lovely and just the thing for our trip to NYC for my B-day. Oh what a good idea!
Check out the Official of the Games @ the link......

worshiping

Tomorrow, I begin again to offer what I have, what's been given me and what I can't keep.
But why does it always have to run this path of anxiety?
The shortness of breath reminds me that I do not supply the air.
The images freeze-framed remind me I do not supply the vision.
The memory at a loss makes me rely on another Word.
Only one note in a long melody.

Grieving

Prayers and condolances. I pray where others cannot.
(Gene J. Puskar/AP Photo)

All Our Hands are Dirty

With my son, daughter and friend I saw Syriana last night. It was not as violent as I expected it to be, but it's hopeless images left a mark on me. Every character in this movie has their humanity all over them.
I knew it would be political, presenting a side of the story with the usual villains; corrupt government, greedy corporates, naive up-and-coming youths with their idealism.
Did any one else see the inference in the corporate names?
CONnex and KILLen.
Is it a coincidence that there is something in a name, converging to make a power that murders through deception?
But what was new and welcome to my sense is how this movie puts all our world players in the same desperate world. All the various motives and lies that hold up our world structure make all of us involved and important. It does matter how I react. It does matter how it is all connected. The story seems to demand a reaction that will offer more hope than a suicide bomber or a displaced, desperate government worker.
How can I make a difference? Instead of hardening my heart to the need, I must continue to allow the injustice to effect me, even going against the political tide of my community that turns our face from the collective greed in SUVs and thoughtless consumption. When will I begin to fast from that which does have it's roots in the poverty of others?
We are beholding to the Kings of the Earth. And in this movie about the Oil, the Middle East and American Greed, we apparently have many kings. Who is mine?
Who is willing to die in a way that brings life? Yes, the west and all it's philosophy does fail the destitute, and the forms of religion that continue to bring oppression. Good men everywhere know that we must continue to fight for justice. How will I emulate my King? Does His Kingdom reach from me across the world which I can now view from my laptop?
If I found myself in a small room with those my life could effect, would I disclose myself and offer the Good News of His Kingdom?

1/1/06

Light against Dark;
the reason I sleep
Love over death;
the hope in my prayer
Silence against the clamor;
the walls around my Kingdom
His breathing;
why I speak