this morning

even in my prayer I am greedy.
time to adapt a bit. . . . .


this might take a while

reading jeremiah

all I can think about this afternoon:
(it brings me out in a sweat)
churches with locked doors.

at first I thought this was an anglican problem.
it certainly isn't.

why do you come here?

what you seek you will not find here.
the desert is where I am.
go there and you will find me;

in the 'noplace'

scripture

this morning
I begin to realise just how central
the scriptures actually are -
without understanding how.

I think what you are driving at:
return to them, return to them
without delay!
over and over:
mainstay
anchor
support
purpose
joy
source of light
path!

not a place then;
not an idea either;
but 'where' I meet you nevertheless.

in the beginning was the word
(I never understood this)
do I now?
scarcely,

understanding is not essential!
I must remember this!
how many times has my need to 'understand'
held me back?

nothing new under the sun

I return over and over:
wanting to add to this blog
only to find that I said it all
in the psalms this morning.

the need to sing
to create
to make
to plan
to do
sometimes overwhelm

an end to dualism

that which is physical excludes the spiritual;
that which is spiritual includes the physical.
so that:
seen from below there are two;
seen from above there is only one.

or:
where we see two - divided -
God sees one - united.

if only

if only I could properly grasp [and memorise]
what I understood for a fleeting second
while I was washing up tonight:
that what you ask us to surrender
is a mere nothing
compared with the gift you have for us;
and that the surrender is not so much a question of courage,
more a question of faith born of insight.
and the glimmer of insight that we need
comes simply through patient asking.

blind faith is needed too,
but we are such fools to think
that the darkness is caused
by anything other than our own severest handicaps

now or never

there is a strange urgency -
perhaps not for the first time
(my memory is so short) -
it is essential that I respond
somehow

reality

you break upon us -
less like a dawn -
more like a crashing wave.

weary to death of my humming and ha-ing
to-ing and fro-ing
(which, let's face it,
would have gone on for ever)
you pinned me to the wall
and thrust me towards joy

an old diary

1990 eastbourne
days of shaky resistance.
events soon broke in;
time, and accident, your helpmates.
by 1992, the week in the cottage!
prayer among the pines.

cul de sac

the psalms are enough:
sturdiest companion.
so sing along:
voice of God

robert lee

his father was an evangelical preacher in arizona and he has decided to spend the rest of his life in the desert. I found his website when I typed christian hermits.

knowing nothing

knowing, at least,
that I know nothing.

start again
singing.
just don't expect to know why.

today change is perceptible.

shifting

something has changed.
the landscape almost unrecognisable.
main thing: trust.

today was important

I know this and behave as though I did not.

what happened last night?

my fussing about words:
me muddying the waters.
be still for once!

still on words

not words so much;
more patterns of words:
discourse.
Discourse, essay and logic are western classical inventions.
Starting with an idea, the orator must prove it by discourse.
Science, it might be argued, follows in this tradition,
as do the law and politics.
The lawyer may be called upon (in the name of truth?)
to argue that even black has a little white in it
or that 2 and 2 might sometimes make 3.
This tradition is so fundamental to our western civilisation that,
without it, establishments would crumble.

pilate said, 'what is truth?'
I recall my lawyer saying the same,
as though the truth were something negotiable,
flexible even.

this is not your way;
that much is clear.
but why does this seem important just now?

where you are: words muddy the waters.
discourse, far from clarifying,
builds truth after its own fashion;
and leads to obscurity and confusion.

of course, discourse and logic have their place.
but they must know their limits.
how far do we, in the west, understand those limits?

words

words can point the way
or they can lead astray.
they can cloud as well as clear.

very many words does this even better.

context is everything
and a large pinch of salt.

does that sound cynical?

a place I've never been

on one level: despair
on another: certainty
on still another: joy

browsing through

browsing through this blog I came upon this
'my main desire was to get unconfused.'

put more simply:
I longed for control;
to be in control;
to stay in control;

yes, I got things done
but never allowed anyone close enough
to do anything to me.
when you tried, I walked away.

this time though, you forced my hand
and led me where I would not go.
you broke me
and won my heart

relationship

your otherness.
your way so different.

to begin, we must unlearn;
your truth unteaches us.
the dismantling leaves us too naked.
'anything but that!' we cry

and yet it is your otherness we crave
more than anything!

kingship

no, it isn't that I don't understand kingship;
I misunderstand it:
human kings have brought the word too low to use.
your kingship something so different
that we just do not recognise it.

and yet the need for a king is as fundamental to us
as it was to the ancient tribes.

politics; religion
no division here that you recognise.
the connotations for us spoilt by history

dualisms

prayer:
not mind alone;
mind and body together.
the seperation is not one that you recognise.
[my mind must touch its body
and my body must touch its mind]

greek and jew;
body and soul:
you scythe these fences without remorse
and we cannot understand why.

but worse still:
when we try to understand
we build them again!
[language does not countenance holiness].

my agenda is in tatters.
my context: tiniest me.

yes it is true:
I cannot come to you except through . . . . . .
. . . . . . me?
[my inability to understand kingship
suddenly a barrier]

I cannot come to you except through . . . . . .
. . . . . . .us
[the psalms whisper triumphantly]

that rather fancy word agape
not one I've dared use before

from 'the hermit's thatch'

The ancient hermit was not only not consecrated, but not even authorized, to enter eremos. The hermit was not living a sanctioned office, nor even living a socially acceptable life by the standards of his contemporaries, for Christianity emphasizes duty and social service.
Rather, the hermit is a rebel, but not a revolutionary. The hermit does not intend to overturn institutions but to check them and assert contrary values. The hermit expresses dissatisfaction with both secular and religious contemporaries, with their practices and pretenses. This rebellion may be expressed, at first, involuntarily, circumstantial, accidental.

maybe this is true . . . .
for me, the call becomes so deafening
nothing on earth could drown it out

you

I say 'you'
and, briefly I know who I mean!
(you swing into view)

the word echoes and echoes;
not here but close to where you are.

not for the first time
but for the first time in several long days.

nigel helps
and perhaps isaiah?

realisation

I am singing the office slowly again
how still you are:
treelike

enemies

in me:
illness and fatigue:uncertainty.

in you:
steadfastness and joy

days of chaos

my excuses?
illness, lethargy, a very messy house
and the deepest sense of inadequacy
I can ever remember
(short memory)
the cares of this world:
my worst enemies!
today I struggled back
and daylight returned.