Hospitality and Floods

 

This is another place marker post. 

I've been taking a class at the Davenant Institute studying The Chronicles of Narnia. I took it in part to push me along with the Hospitality and Lament project, but also because the professor, Dr. Jason Leporjavi, used Narnia Code by Michael Ward. Narnia Code is the popular version of Planet Narnia, and I have long wanted to discuss it with others. I'm writing this post as a marker for ideas that solidified or arose from the class that I will explore further in later posts.

1) While reading Ward's Planet Narnia around 2010, I expected to see a connection between Jupiter and his role as defender of the practice of hospitality. In Ward's work, I did not find a reference to Jupiter and hospitality. You see a similar role in Ancient Greek society based on Zeus as a defender/punisher/rewarder of hospitality or xenia. This was the cause of the whole Trojan War. Xenia was the practice of hospitality that includes responsibilities of both host and guest in the practice. More on that later. 

2) Sometime in the past, I made a connection between Ovid's poem Baucis and Philemon and the Dimbles in That Hideous Strength. Common to both was an older childless couple who practiced hospitality in its most life-giving form. Offering food, shelter, and fellowship in their poverty and childlessness. I had not connected until I recently re-read both was the common destruction by flood of those the leaders and their town for the leaders' corruption of, dismissal of, and lack of hospitality. Flood is an archetype of the destruction of wantonly corrupt societies going back to the oldest stories in antiquity, including the Jewish/Christian story. I also connected during my re-reading between the couple becoming oak trees at their death and Hermes, who, along with Jupiter, visited Baucis and Philemon. My other connection was to see that the Beavers in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe could be based on Baucis and Philemon. Both are childless, poor, and gracious in hospitality. I see here three couples who, in their poverty and childlessness, did not become bitter for childlessness and poverty are real sorrows. Instead, their woes became the ground where humility and hospitality flourished.  

3)When writing a paper for the Narnia class on the role of myth in Lewis's writing and thought, I began to see that Eustace in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader became a different boy because myth worked in him; not because as his mother thought from the influence of the Pevensie children. By participatory knowledge, he learned to look along the sunbeam when he traveled on the Dawn Treader instead of looking at the world. This will all make sense when I edit the paper for posting here.

The next post will be on the foundation of hospitality and lament, God as Good. 

Working Together

When I began making the connection between the practices of hospitality and lament and discussing it with others, I quickly realized that I needed to explain those words. Often the word “hospitality” conjured images of a table set with pristine linens, fine china, silver, and candles. Beautiful as that can be, it was a limited image and far from the images I hoped to encourage. Similarly, "lament" recalled images of an unbridled display of grief. I didn’t want either set of images to hinder others who wished to learn more about these practices. I found that some definitions and illustrations were either too terse, lengthy, or vague to be helpful. As providence would have it, Alan Jacobs came to my aid.  Some of his most recent blog posts were extremely helpful not only in providing apt descriptions for these practices but in spurring a meaningful connection between hospitality and lament. 

Jacobs is working on a series titled Invitation and Repair. In one of his recent posts in this series he discusses the use of similes saying, "Maybe that’s what humanistic thought is essentially: a search for new similes, new ways of perceiving the familiar — better to appreciate it when it deserves appreciation and better to change it when it requires changing.“ This was what I was looking for, similes for hospitality and lament. Words flexible enough to give me new ways to explain the practices and allow others new ways to envision and embody those practices. In his next post, I found those similes and meaningful connections between hospitality and lament. 

In his post titled, not giving up, Jacobs explained, "One way to describe the Invitation and Repair project is to say that it’s for people who haven’t given up." He goes on to give examples of various institutions and how they have given up their good purpose. Those good purposes, he says, require the hard, patient work of those who do not give up. This idea is easily connected to both hospitality and lament. Those who practice hospitality and lament commit to hard, patient work, knowing there will be temptations to give up.  Both practices require physical, emotional, and spiritual stamina which are often tested due to the frequency and intensity of the work. 

Jacobs goes on to say in doing the work of inviting and repairing, "we manifest hope: we look towards a future of cooperative endeavor — cooperative discovery, cooperative healing."* There was the connection I had been looking for between hospitality and lament, hope. The two practices work in a cooperative endeavor to manifest hope. When hope is initiated and supported within hospitality, then the practice of lament can work within and toward hope and healing. If the hard, patient works of lament and hospitality don’t collaborate, and if hospitality and lament surrender to the temptation to give up, hope and healing are forfeited. Hospitality and lament must work in collaboration for the discovery of hope and healing.

And what of those similes?  Well, I saw that hospitality offers an invitation of hope to those who seek, in their lament, to repair hope grown tired or lost along the way. So, invitation and repair seem at this point to be apt similes for hospitality and lament. 

*This echoes Andy Crouch's suggestion that lament is the seedbed of creativity, but that is an upcoming post. 

A Path

This is a tentative outline of upcoming posts laying out my discussion of hospitality as the soil for lament. You can read the impetus here. 

The first set of posts will give background information on hospitality from ancient, medieval, and biblical perspectives. If time permits, I plan to take the time to examine how the meaning of the term "hospitality" has changed to our present understanding. For certain I will show the connection between hospitality and lament from the Latin root word "hospitalis". 

The second series of posts gives a broad overview of suffering historically and biblically. I'm indebted to Tim Keller and his thorough coverage in Walking with God through Pain and Suffering.

The next series will cover the practice of lament from ancient through present times. 

A fourth series explores the practices of lament as seen in the record of protestant Bibles. I hope at some time in the future to look at other traditions as well. 

A smaller series will look at how, and if, various protestant traditions, have included lament within their times of corporate and private worship.

A post or two will feature Andy Crouch's suggestion that lament is the seedbed of creativity. 

The last of the posts will examine how each of the Narnia books show us lament practiced within hospitality. 

Why the Chronicles of Narnia?  Reading, and re-reading, the Narnian tales as an adult can be a vastly different experience than reading as a child.   As C. S. Lewis, author of the Narnian tales, these stories allow us to

 "steal past a certain inhibition which had paralysed much of my own religion in childhood. Why did one find it so hard to feel as one was told one ought to feel about God or the sufferings of Christ? I thought the chief reason was that one was told one ought to. An obligation to feel can freeze feelings. And reverence itself did harm. The whole subject was associated with lowered voices; almost as if it were something medical. But supposing that by casting all these things into an imaginary world, stripping them of their stained-glass and Sunday School associations, one could make them for the first time appear in their real potency? Could one not thus steal past those watchful dragons? I thought one could.” ¹ 

When someone is paralyzed, it is difficult to grow physically, emotionally or spiritually. These stories can show us our paralysis. On a personal note, when reading The Horse and His Boy, particularly the chapter, "The Unwelcome Fellow Traveler", I finally saw God's sovereignty of goodness and generosity in my own life, not the begrudging god I had created and which had paralyzed me, when Aslan invites Shasta to "Tell me your sorrows."   As we see a little further in the story, Aslan full well knew Shasta's sorrows and his questions, but Shasta's re-telling was necessary for Shasta to acknowledge his hurt and paralysis and Aslan to give comfort and freedom. 

Some have noted the overuse of and overreliance on Lewis's works, and some even go as far as to dismiss him, his works, and those within the Inklings universe due to that overuse and overreliance. To those, I say, abusus non tollit usum.² It seems from the quote above my use would be in line with his purposes. 

1. C. S Lewis, "Sometimes Fairy Stories May Say Best What’s to be Said" in On Words and other Essays on Literature, ed. Walter Hooper (Harvest, 1982) pg. 47

2. Misuse of something is no argument against its proper use

Resources

There really aren't any new ideas (but always new connections) so a bibliography of sorts is needed and hopefully this will list most of the materials I will reference in blog posts. I'm not including links, but I will include ISBN numbers where appropriate. If any of these materials interest you, please consider purchasing them from Byron Borger at Hearts and Minds Bookstore or other independent booksellers. If it is not listed on Bryon's site, email him and he can probably get it. This list will be updated.

Hospitality:

• Making Room: Recovering Hospitality as a Christian Tradition by Christine Pohl 0802844316
• Real Love for Real Life: The Art and Work of Caring by Andi Ashworth 0877880484
• Illiad Elizabeth Vandiver Great Courses Lecture

Suffering and Grief:

• Walking with God in Pain and Suffering Tim Keller
• Embodied Hope by Kelly Kapic
• Companions in Suffering by Wendy Alsup
• Grace Disguised by Gerry Sittser
• Affliction by Edith Schaeffer
• How Long O Lord by D. A Carson
• Making Sense of Suffering by Peter Kreeft
• This Too Shall Last by K. J. Ramsey
• Prayer in the Night: For Those Who Work or Watch or Weep

Lament:

• Praise and Lament in the Psalms by Claus Westermann
• The Psalms as Christian Lament
• Hurting with God: Learning to Lament with the Psalms by Greg Pemberton  0891124004
• Dark Clouds, Deep Mercy: Discovering the Grace of Lament By: Mark Vroegop 1433561484
• A Heart Set Free: A Journey to hope through the Psalms of Lament By: Christina Fox 1781917280
• A Sacred Sorrow: Reaching Out to God in the Lost Language of Lament By: Michael Card 1576836673
• Prophetic Lament: A Call for Justice in Troubled Times By: Soong-Chan Rah 0830836942
• The Psalms of Lament in Mark's Passion: Jesus' Davidic Suffering by Stephen Ahearne-Kroll 0521130409
• The Uncertainty of a Hearing: A Study of the Sudden Change of Mood in the Psalms of Lament [Supplements to Vetus Testamentum, Vol. 121] Villanueva, Frederico G.
• After Lament by Glenn Pemberton
• Rejoicing in Lament

Death:

• The Lost Art of Dying: Reviving Forgotten Wisdom by Lydia S. Dugdale  0062932632 
• The End of the Christian Life: How Embracing Our Mortality Frees Us to Truly Live By: J. Todd Billings 1587434202

Other:

• Inexpressible: Hesed and the Mystery of God's Lovingkindness By: Michael Card 0830845496
• Reflections on the Psalms By: C.S. Lewis 0062565486
• Surprised by Paradox: The Promise of And in an Either-Or World by Jen Pollock Michel
• Strong and Weak: Embracing a Life of Love, Risk, and True Flourishing by Andy Crouch
• Prayer: Experiencing Awe and Intimacy with God by Tim Keller
• The Chronicles of Narnia print and audio

Why?

Why? Why put these ideas out here? For one it is a way of me thinking through how hospitality, fully practiced, tills the ground to allow the gospel of Christ to be heard and lived in, especially those places of lament.  

A friend of mine and I were texting back and forth a few months ago about an idea I had for post-Covidtide. It involves clearing a path and setting up space beside a stream, a place where small groups or individuals could come for a day to slow down, sit, pray, think, reflect, and lament. Perhaps some of these posts will be provided to use as a guide if needed. While it will be years, if ever, before we understand the impacts this time has had on all of us, the time is ripe for some to walk down that path and sit quietly. Some have lost loved ones, jobs, money, time with family and friends. We have all experienced an overwhelming sense of instability at times. But loss and uncertainty, as with good fortune, is best lived with others. True no one can experience or live loss for you, but we can share it with each other. 

 

Between The Lion's Paws - Laying Down a Marker

PNG Pic Lion

I'm following in the footsteps of Alan Jacob in the way that a child does her father on a sandy beach. She attempts and misses but continues in belief that he knows where he is headed or least, he has an idea. Why I am choosing to share this project on my blog can best be expressed in this post  where Alan explain the difference between the blogosphere and blogging.  Specifically, he contends that blogging can be dialogical:

... I post a thought; later, I return to it with an update; someone responds, and I incorporate their thoughts into a new post that links to them and to the original – basically, what I am doing right now. Note also that blogging, when done in this fashion and in this spirit, is also seriously dialogical, and I think there is a close connection between a dialogue-friendly medium and a forgiving medium. More on that another time, perhaps.

In this blog post he writes of a new project, saying that he is  "Just laying down a marker here, by way of a beginning."

And so, I do the same. Laying down a marker, by beginning. More accurately continuing and combining several themes I've read about, mulled over, and noticed connections between for over ten years now. It's time to put the pieces on the table, see if they fit and if they do how.  If they don't at least I will know.

The themes I've worked with are lament, suffering, hesed, the goodness of the Lord, hospitality, and The Chronicles of Narnia. Subsequent posts will list resources and initial thoughts of these themes and others. While at times lament will take a prominent seat, it is only because we have lost this God-given practice, and I am convinced, as you will see from others as well, one we need to recover quickly.

First, I am indebted to Michael Ward for sparking this line of thinking via passages in his brilliant book Planet Narnia. Ward makes a convincing argument for his theory that each of the Narnia books corresponds with a planetary influence properly understood within medieval cosmology. You can watch here for a summary of that argument. While living through a season where many if not most of my beliefs about grief and suffering, and the goodness of God were challenged and dismantled, this passage from the chapter "Saturn" helped to begin a rebuilding. (Saturn being a vehicle to express the sorrows of this life.)

Despair or outrage at crookedness only makes sense of one has a notion of the straight, and that notions could not have arisen if everything were bent or even if everything were dualistically good and bad, for dualism is a truncated metaphysic which cannot account for the natural human preference for happiness over sorrow. Saturn with his plagues and pestilences therefore cannot be sovereign, Indeed, it is only by virtue of his deferral to Jove that Saturn can exert his true influence, making his patients into contemplatives who see beyond sorrow. 

It was in re-reading the Narnia stories with his theory in mind that I noticed that each book begins with a lamentable state.  A state with hints of Saturnine influence that could and did lead to expressions of lament. But the more surprising element began to appear on subsequent readings. Without the presence of Jovian hospitality (Jupiter being the god who presides over hospitality, read the story here),  true lament could not occur and accomplish the work it is given. 

Said another way, from a  psalm that I came to learn is a psalm of hospitality,

Psalm 23

The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing.

    He makes me lie down in green pastures,

he leads me beside quiet waters,

    he refreshes my soul.

He guides me along the right paths

    for his name’s sake.

Even though I walk

    through the darkest valley,

I will fear no evil,

    for you are with me;

your rod and your staff,

    they comfort me.

You prepare a table before me

    in the presence of my enemies.

You anoint my head with oil;

    my cup overflows.

Surely your goodness and love will follow me

    all the days of my life,

and I will dwell in the house of the Lord.

 

I wrote this as a response to a post I saw on IG. Putting this here as reminder of where I'm going.

Thanks for asking about my thoughts surrounding the lament, common good, etc. My thoughts are not fleshed out at all but this is a very brief outline of what I hope to work through more fully. A bit of background to set it up. I’ve been in a lamentable situation for about 6 years with no end in sight at this point. It has been an extended period of lamenting. I’ve read a few books, have a couple of close friends with whom I can share, but other than that I have been at a loss as to live in this period. And yes, part of the reason is the loss of the practice of both corporate and individual lament. We grieve, but that is short-term.  Last year, at Hopewords writers conference, Andy Crouch’s keynote address was how our best creativity is born out of lament. Yep, there was my key. I practically tackled him after the address to thank him and to pass on another resource.

All that to say this is my current outline for understanding how the topics below are integral to one another.

1)      Understanding what the phrases “common good” and “flourishing” mean. Are they universal and/or local? Does the beatific vision guide us here? I’ve read Jake Meador’s book, In Search of the Common Good, and plan to work through James K. A. Smith’s Kingdom series.

2)      When flourishing/common good are lost due to sin/fallenness what does our grieving and lament look like? Does the loss tell us, show us what has been lost, tell us something about the good that has been lost? Does experience of loss precede knowledge of the good? Does the practice of lament help us to name the loss and the good? If it does, then perhaps the loss of corporate lament has been a larger factor in our loss of common goods. More here: https://fisherlane.blogspot.com/2019/09/recently-i-was-asked-about-lament_30.html

 Working with books by Tim Keller, Wendy Alsup, Kelly Kapic and other essays on suffering, grief, lament.

3)      Creativity, as Andy illustrated, is a natural outworking of those who seek shalom while working from a place of lament. Unfortunately, I can’t lay my hands on my notes, but when I do, I will send you more details on this. (why am I so disorganized when I’m home all the time? 😉 ) Creativity is needed to recognize, repair, recover as best we can the good. I’m compiling a list of books about creativity, theological anthropology, etc.

4)      To recognize, repair, recover will require struggle and sacrifice.

5)      And now to the question that is more difficult for me at this point. Can we come to an agreement on the common good, or that fact just one common good, that we can all agree on and all struggle and sacrifice for? If so, what? If not, how do we go forward?

Prayer in the Night

Prayer in the Night: For Those Who Work or Watch or Weep by Tish Harrison Warren


“What I most love about this line—’and give hour angels charge over those who sleep’—is that it pulls together supernatural cosmic strangeness and the most quotidian of human activities: sleeping.” With that, and other carefully chosen words, Tish Harrison Warren proves once again in Prayer in the Night that she is a master of revealing glimpses of how our lives in the temporal sphere meet the eternal one.
In her opening note she tells us that wisdom is a “slow work”, and it is. Painfully so at various times and in various relationships in our lives. To guide us through this slow work, she walks us through the Prayer at Compline in The Book of Common Prayer:

Keep watch, dear Lord, with those who work, or watch,
or weep this night, and give your angels charge over
those who sleep. Tend the sick, Lord Christ; give rest to
the weary, bless the dying, soothe the suffering, pity the
afflicted, shield the joyous; and all for your love's sake.
Amen.

She helps us to see how prayer and faith are related; “Faith, I’ve come to believe, is more craft than feeling. And prayer is our chief practice in the craft.” With each phrase or word of the prayer, she reminds us to whom we pray, of his goodness toward those for whom we pray, including ourselves, and our work that proceeds from this prayer. Works of belief, rest, struggle, as well as justice and mercy.

I could have, and practically did, underline the entire chapter, “Shield the Joyous”. I tend to see the dark and twisty side of life too easily. I practice pessimism as naturally as a child is afraid of the dark. To petition my Creator to “shield the joyous”, feels foreign to me. The other shoe always seems to drop and who am I to get out of its way. But I miss the mark when I practice my faith this way. I miss “intentionally and habitually open[ing] [my]self to God’s unconditional love…and practice living in the reality that his love is deeper and more substantial than any need we could present to God.” The practice of joy and asking for it to be shielded “is a vulnerable and courageous choice.” It is the slow work of wisdom. Warren reminds me not only who I am, His Beloved, and that I can pray this petition, but the loving Father of whom I am asking.

As with Liturgy of the Ordinary, Prayer in the Night is a book to be read both in one gulp and then re-read slowly, thoughtfully and practiced. This is the first book I’ve read in 2021. I look forward to re-reading this throughout the year with pen and notebook in hand.

I received an ARC from the publisher.


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Spring and Fall

Spring and Fall

to a young child

Márgarét, áre you gríeving

Over Goldengrove unleaving?

Leáves like the things of man, you

With your fresh thoughts care for, can you?

Ah! ás the heart grows older

It will come to such sights colder

By and by, nor spare a sigh

Though worlds of wanwood leafmeal lie;

And yet you wíll weep and know why.

Now no matter, child, the name:

Sórrow’s spríngs áre the same.

Nor mouth had, no nor mind, expressed

What heart heard of, ghost guessed:

It ís the blight man was born for,

It is Margaret you mourn for.  

               -Gerard Manley Hopkins              
                        

This arrangement by Natalie Merchant convey's the poignancy this poem contains.



More of Natalie's work and work can be found here, including mention of her song "Wonder" which is both on the soundtrack for and the inspiration of the movie "Wonder".

Psalms 23 George Herbert

The 23 Psalme.

THe God of love my shepherd is, And he that doth me feed: While he is mine, and I am his, What can I want or need? He leads me to the tender grasse, Where I both feed and rest; Then to the streams that gently passe: In both I have the best. Or if I stray, he doth convert And bring my minde in frame: And all this not for my desert, But for his holy name. Yea, in deaths shadie black abode Well may I walk, not fear: For thou art with me; and thy rod To guide, thy staff to bear. Nay, thou dost make me sit and dine, Ev’n in my enemies sight: My head with oyl, my cup with wine Runnes over day and night. Surely thy sweet and wondrous love Shall measure all my dayes; And as it never shall remove, So neither shall my praise.

Lament as praise

Walter Brueggemann wrote here that lament is a form of praise.

The loss of lament in our worship and the need to regain the practice

Lament. This has been something I have been reading about, mulling over, and beginning to think through as a practice.  At the very least we need some of the older hymns that acknowledge our struggles and need of Him.

I have watched a friend in pain struggle painfully evident on her face when only praise music is offered in the worship service. I have had severe relationship breaks that seemly have gone unanswered and no amount of "praise music" can replace the wrestling and healing my soul needed and still needs.  My sister recently became a widow at 58 and I sat with her in services that only emphasize the good God gives us, with no mention of the struggles/heartaches/knock-you-on-your-face hardships this life includes, and how it did not comfort, but added to the grief she carried. I felt like it taunted her. I watched a young mother deal with a lifelong diagnosis for her child and her feeling the silence of God.

It is just, right and good when we declare His goodness, but unless we see that goodness juxtaposed with life's hardships, that declaration rings shallow and strips His goodness of the depth it deserves and the slow transformative healing His goodness will bring. Because it is slow transformation, weekly lament around our sins and sorrows with our local church community, brought to Jesus as we partake of the Eucharist, will be the place that forgiveness (for sins), healing (for the brokenness we experience), and fellowship (to show us we are not alone in our sins and sorrows) are experienced and can do that transformative work. As His word is declared, we hear and experience His goodness.

The older I get, the more I see the need for regular, corporate lament and quite frankly the more frustrated I am at my generation (I'm almost 60) for ignoring, dismissing, or making peripheral the weekly practice of lament and necessary taking of the Eucharist.

My plan is to use this space to record what I read, hear, see and think. No answers, just writing to know what I think and to learn.

Psalm 77

To the choirmaster: according to Jeduthun. A Psalm of Asaph.

I cry aloud to God,
    aloud to God, and he will hear me.
In the day of my trouble I seek the Lord;
    in the night my hand is stretched out without wearying;
    my soul refuses to be comforted.
When I remember God, I moan;
    when I meditate, my spirit faints. Selah

You hold my eyelids open;
    I am so troubled that I cannot speak.
I consider the days of old,
    the years long ago.
I said, “Let me remember my song in the night;
    let me meditate in my heart.”
    Then my spirit made a diligent search:
“Will the Lord spurn forever,
    and never again be favorable?
Has his steadfast love forever ceased?
    Are his promises at an end for all time?
Has God forgotten to be gracious?
    Has he in anger shut up his compassion?” Selah

Then I said, “I will appeal to this,
    to the years of the right hand of the Most High.”

I will remember the deeds of the Lord;
    yes, I will remember your wonders of old.
I will ponder all your work,
    and meditate on your mighty deeds.
Your way, O God, is holy.
    What god is great like our God?
You are the God who works wonders;
    you have made known your might among the peoples.
You with your arm redeemed your people,
    the children of Jacob and Joseph. Selah

When the waters saw you, O God,
    when the waters saw you, they were afraid;
    indeed, the deep trembled.
The clouds poured out water;
    the skies gave forth thunder;
    your arrows flashed on every side.
The crash of your thunder was in the whirlwind;
    your lightnings lighted up the world;
    the earth trembled and shook.
Your way was through the sea,
    your path through the great waters;
    yet your footprints were unseen.
You led your people like a flock
    by the hand of Moses and Aaron.

English Standard Version (ESV) The Holy Bible, English Standard Version Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.

Hope Heals: A True Story of Overwhelming Loss and an Overcoming Love by Katherine Wolf
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

A poignant tale from a couple who have faced great suffering and have learned to walk in it because of the faith and trust they have chosen to place in God who wounds and gives life out of that suffering. Highly recommended.

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These are thy wonders, Lord of love

Music link below

The Flower

 By George Herbert

How fresh, oh Lord, how sweet and clean

Are thy returns! even as the flowers in spring;

         To which, besides their own demean,

The late-past frosts tributes of pleasure bring.

                      Grief melts away

                      Like snow in May,

         As if there were no such cold thing.

         Who would have thought my shriveled heart

Could have recovered greenness? It was gone

         Quite underground; as flowers depart

To see their mother-root, when they have blown,

                      Where they together

                      All the hard weather,

         Dead to the world, keep house unknown.

         These are thy wonders, Lord of power,

Killing and quickening, bringing down to hell

         And up to heaven in an hour;

Making a chiming of a passing-bell.

                      We say amiss

                      This or that is:

         Thy word is all, if we could spell.

         Oh that I once past changing were,

Fast in thy Paradise, where no flower can wither!

         Many a spring I shoot up fair,

Offering at heaven, growing and groaning thither;

                      Nor doth my flower

                      Want a spring shower,

         My sins and I joining together.

         But while I grow in a straight line,

Still upwards bent, as if heaven were mine own,

         Thy anger comes, and I decline:

What frost to that? what pole is not the zone

                      Where all things burn,

                      When thou dost turn,

         And the least frown of thine is shown?

         And now in age I bud again,

After so many deaths I live and write;

         I once more smell the dew and rain,

And relish versing. Oh, my only light,

                      It cannot be

                      That I am he

         On whom thy tempests fell all night.

         These are thy wonders, Lord of love,

To make us see we are but flowers that glide;

         Which when we once can find and prove,

Thou hast a garden for us where to bide;

                      Who would be more,

                      Swelling through store,

         Forfeit their Paradise by their pride.

(if you do not have a Spotify account, Spring I can be heard by clicking on link)

The End of This Story and the Beginning of All the Others

   "'Understand, then, that it would have healed her; but not to your joy or hers. The day would have come when both you and she would have looked back and said it would have been better to die in that illness.'
   And Digory could say nothing, for tears choked him and he gave up all hopes of saving his Mother's life; but at the same time he knew that the Lion knew what would have happened, and that there might be things more terrible even than losing someone you love by death."

The Magician's Nephew

C. S. Lewis

In Dreams

When the cold of winter comes
Starless night will cover day
In the veiling of the sun
We will walk in bitter rain

But in dreams
I can hear your name
And in dreams
We will meet again

When the seas and mountains fall
And we come, to end of days
In the dark I hear a call
Calling me there,
I will go there
And back again

-Howard Shore

Joy in the Journey and Jesus Let Us Come To Know You

There was no Joy in [my] Journey. There was anything but. These songs came during what was in my life, a period of time that was soul-crushingly difficult. Over the course of a year I lost a lifelong young friend to ovarian cancer, dealt with my husband's brain surgery and partial hearing loss, wrestled with marital difficulties, and then after a head-on collision faced almost four months of bed-rest in order to keep my younger daughter alive, well, and in the womb. After the collision I remember bewilderingly, hopelessly asking God, "What are You doing?". That's when I began to learn that what I longed for and still do is to see His face.

Jesus let us come to know you
Let us see you face to face
Touch us, hold us, use us, mold us
Only let us live in you Jesus draw us every nearer
Hold us in your loving arms
Wrap us in your gentle presence
And when the end comes bring us home

Answers may come but what I wanted and still do is to simply see His face.  And knowing that I will  is what teaches me that there is Joy in the Journey.

There is a joy in the journey
There's a light we can love on the way
There is a wonder and wildness to life
And freedom for those who obey

And all those who seek it shall find it
A pardon for all who believe
Hope for the hopeless and sight for the blind

To all who've been born in the Spirit
And who share incarnation with Him
Who belong to eternity stranded in time
And weary of struggling with sin

Forget not the hope that's before you
And never stop counting the cost
Remember the hopelessness when you were lost

There is a joy in the journey
There's a light we can love on the way
There is a wonder and wildness to life
And freedom for those who obey

And freedom for those who obey...