Where…Jesus sits on a mat in Varanasi

 

It’s HOT in Delhi in April.

 

The sidewalks are dusty, each persons strides bring up whirling dervishes that bite at the ankles and coat the skin. The traffic fumes in the city hover above the roads and cloak the people in fog as they go about in cacophonous, frenzied activity, unabated by the rising mercury. In the countryside lakes are drying up, as though their edges are being chased back by the sunshine itself, shrinking into themselves until cooler winds prevail.

 

At night-time we retreat to the city rooftops to seek solace in the wispy evening breeze, waiting for a breath to lift the heavy calm under the starlit sky.

 

And, as I journey on, I find myself in Varanasi, by the shores of Mother Ganges.

 

‘A holy river in a holy city’.

 

The heat does not abate, but keeps on pounding down. 

 

I am here to explore, to learn, to ‘be’, to read and write and dream in this intoxicating landscape of otherness.

 

But, I am thwarted.

 

Thwarted by my normally Cast Iron constitution that allows me to eat or drink anything that takes my choosing, which has obviously found the heat too intense and decided to up and go, leaving me at the mercy of whatever bug is ravaging my system.

 

It could have been the bread I shared in the park with the family who were so intrigued by my hair and insisted I join them, taking sneaky pictures on their mobile phones when they thought I wasn’t looking.  It could have been the not-quite-boiled tea that the Chai-Wallah pedalled to me, singing his lilting refrain as he came down the carriages of the train, swinging his metal can of sweet and fragrant goodness. It could have been the sticky sweet pastry I ate at the station, drenched in sugar and visited by a fair few of the army of flies that the seller was valiantly waging war against with his rolled up newspaper.

 

Whatever it is, and wherever it came from, it wins for a fair few days.

 

It’s all I can do to leave my room to walk up the lane to the bakery and then sit in the shade of the trees by the Ghat on the river and sip at flattened Soda and eat small pieces of warm fresh salted paratha, watching the boats and the people washing in the river, gently bidding my system to restore its balance and afford me the freedom to wander and explore, unabated.

 

I pass a chap each morning as I wander to my bakery of choice. He sits on a mat at the corner of the lane, his withered legs tucked under him, a bowl set out on the mat for those passing to throw their change into.  He smiles at me as I walk past, and I smile back. And he never asks me for money. Maybe he sees the wan look on my face and the slightly awkward gait of a person who is not sure how her insides will choose to behave at any given point. And he gives me grace in the moment.

 

It’s not until three days into my gentle restoring of self that I stop and sit down by his mat and ask him his name, explaining that I’ve been out of sorts but that I’ve appreciated his smiles each day. His name is Ali, and he tells me some of his story – about how he gets up early and gets a friend to help him onto a Tuk-Tuk to come down here and unroll his mat and sit at the corner of a well trodden way to the riverside.  He talks of how he never asks, never cajoles, never uses guilt to motivate people to give, but he smiles and offers the freedom to respond should people choose. And he gets by. We share a paratha and I journey on.

 

It’s now a couple of days later, and my strengthening body is affording me the joy of exploring this place. The river with its colours and mayhem and characters, the side streets with its temples and dust and watermelon sellers, the Ghats that line the waters with their various functions, with the scent of cremation and the sound of wailing hanging heavy on the air at Manikarnika Ghat, a sacred place for the peoples to come and say their last goodbyes to their loved ones before their ashes join with Mother Ganges on their journey to the ‘next’.

 

 

I head out onto the waters in the dusk to watch the sun sink below the horizon and float on the water, hovering at Dasaswamedh Ghat as the Ganga Aarti takes place, where the conch is blown and the incense is waved and the lamps are swung in hypnotic rhythms as puja plates are floated into the waters, filled with petals and candles that transform the river into watery starlight.

 

 

 

Varanasi is an assault on the senses and, as I make my way back to my room that evening, I find myself overwhelmed.

 

I sit on my bed and I sob. 

 

Salty tears are running down my cheeks as I wrestle with both the beauty and the darkness of a place in which I’m finding it hard to see where Jesus is amongst the offerings and the burnings and the rhythms of a life that ranks its peoples in castes. 

 

In that moment all I want to do is to open up my arms and gather up the ‘untouchable’, used by society for the tasks that are deemed beneath them, but ignored and invisible whenever they have lost their usefulness. 

 

I want to gather them in my arms and love them and speak words to them of the person that is Jesus, of hope and life and freedom. I want to speak to them of a world that is bigger than this existence, of an ordering where the last come first and the first come last, where they are invited to the table, in the best seats at the banquet.

 

And I think of Ali, sat on his mat.  I think of his quiet, gentle soul, deemed untouchable by those around him. I think of his beautiful smile and his open heart, inviting people to sustain his life with his well placed bowl, yet not demanding anything.

 

And I think that I haven’t given him anything. We shared bread and stories, but I haven’t given him anything.

 

And I ask God what I should do because, at that moment, I want to head out into the night to find him and speak the words of truth that were hidden in our encounters.

 

And God reminds me of the lame man at the city gate known as ‘Beautiful’, placed there every day to beg from those going into the temple.  I’m reminded of Peter and John as they head to prayer and encounter him, and see his story, and speak truth into and over him. “Silver or gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk.”

 

And I’m challenged right there, in my room by the river, with streams of salty tears on my face, that I am to do the same.

 

As the sun rises and the activity along the river starts, I get dressed and ready to head outside to meet Ali, the words of my conversation with God from the previous night still ringing in my ears. I will buy bread, ask Ali if I can join him, and if he allows I will sit, share story and table and tell him of Jesus, the one who brings life. I will ask him if he will allow me to pray. Because I have nothing else to give him but my prayer, and the truth of the one I follow.

 

As I round the corner to Ali’s chosen place I see an empty spot, a spot normally filled by a gentle, smiling soul, sat atop a ragged mat. I ask where he might be, and the people shrug.  I go back later to find that the place is still without Ali. And the next morning too.

 

And then, it is time for me to leave this place, and Ali is nowhere to be seen.

 

As I pack my sack to head for the trains I ask God some questions about those moments in my room that night, where my heart was broken wide open and, in the breaking, I glimpsed truth and beauty and life, and was invited once more to be a bearer of the Kingdom.

 

In that moment I am rendered breathless as the whisper of God speaks, ‘it was me. When you saw Ali, you saw me.  You were looking for me everywhere in the chaos and beauty and darkness of this place and I was right there, sat on a mat down the lane from you.’

 

And I wondered why I hadn’t seen it sooner.  I wondered that, like the disciples who only recognised the resurrected Jesus when he broke the bread, were my eyes so closed?

 

‘To love another person is to see the face of God.’

 

The lesson stayed with me as I wound my way back to Delhi, to join the Sisters of the Missionaries of Charity at their orphanage.

 

And there I meet Jefriel. A small, beautiful albino boy, abandoned and alone except for the care he received from the sisters and the rough and tumble of his room mates, living side by side in the many cots that lined the walls.

 

He has some learning difficulties and a twisted hand that, after but a brief moment in the presence of his smile, you don’t notice anymore. And the sisters explain to me that he will go to Kolkata to live with the brothers there when he gets older, because…oh, because…no-one wants him.  Who would adopt this little one with his pale skin and his twisted hand when there are perfectly formed little ones, ready for a home.

 

And my heart broke open again. 

 

But this time I was more ready for it.

 

Because I was in the presence of Jesus.

For the few days I was there, as I held his hand and loved him and cuddled him and prayed in my heart for his future, I saw the face of God.

 

And, oh, he is so very,very beautiful.

 

 

Where...there is ENOUGH

 

I was spent.

It was the end of a very full week, and I was utterly spent.

 

You see, there have been meetings and meetings and admin and programmes and planning and people and decisions and deadlines.

 

I’ve found that in the past few days the default answer on my lips whenever anyone has asked me how I am has been ‘Busy,’ and then, as an afterthought, ‘Busy, but good.’

 

I hate the word ‘busy’.  I hate when I use it to describe my life.

 

To me it communicates that there is no time, no space. It speaks of the fact that all that makes for fullness of ‘life’ is being squeezed out of life itself; drop by ‘busy’ drop.

 

But this week, through my own choices, I have lived as though ‘busy’.

 

Until this evening.

 

RiSE unplugged is one of my favourite spaces to be in. Our usual Sunday morning youth congregation comes together of an evening to create space and freedom.

 

Tonight that space was in the form of sung worship and ‘centring prayer’ – where we find a place amongst the cushions and ask Holy Spirit to speak a word in our ear.  A word to focus our hearts on, a word to sink into and allow God to speak to us through.

 

And Holy Spirit, well, she spoke a word to me in the midst of that place that resonated so sweetly.

 

It was ENOUGH.

 

There is ENOUGH of everything that is needed.

 

ENOUGH time to do all that God has called me to join Him in doing when I make good choices.

 

ENOUGH creativity to tap into so that life flows from a place of Spirit drenched vitality rather than a dusty landscape of drought.

 

ENOUGH love welling up within to share life with and journey alongside people fully and deeply without drawing from my own shallow well, resorting to living on only the surface of life.

 

ENOUGH resource for me not have to worry about what tomorrow might bring, but to live out what I have been called to today in the knowledge that tomorrow will worry about itself.

 

ENOUGH space in the world for me, my story and my words.

 

I was reminded of Elijah and the Widow at Zarephath who had only enough oil and flour to make bread for that day. But, in the economy of God, each time she came to bake bread she found that the jar of flour had not emptied and the jug of oil had not run dry, and so there was ENOUGH, day by day by day.

 

I was reminded that, in amongst the guidance given to the Israelites about Sabbath life and festival living, they are told to not harvest the whole of their fields but, instead, to leave the outside portions unharvested for the poor and immigrant amongst them. Because, when you live in sync with Gods heart there is always ENOUGH, and you do not need to scrabble around the edges, removing every last bit of life.

 

There is space and there is freedom and there is ENOUGH.

 

And so, this coming week I am choosing to not be ‘busy’.

 

I am choosing to re-learn ancient rhythms.

 

I am choosing that there will be space and freedom in the midst of a crammed diary.

 

I am choosing that, when people ask me about life and how things are, I will speak of ‘fullness’ and ‘wholeness’.

 

I am choosing to live in the truth that there is, and will always be, ‘ENOUGH’.



Where the fair is coming to town and the air is mountain crisp, but the ground is deadly...

 

From the 10-13^th September this year there will be a fair in London.

Over 25000 people will visit the fair, from dozens of countries.

 

What kind of a fair could attract such visitors?

 

Will there be carousels, candy floss, coconut shies?

 

No.

 

This fair is one of a different kind.

You see, once every 2 years the DSEi (Defence & Security Equipment International) Arms Fair happens at Londond ExCel centre. It is the world’s largest arms fair, allowing arms buyers and sellers to network and make deals.

 

Arms dealers from all over the world, from the worlds richest to the worlds poorest states, are invited to come together, network and make deals.
 

Weapons are sold to countries at war with each other.  Small arms, battleships, missiles, tanks, fighter jets, riot control equipment and more are all on offer. Some are sold to regimes that attack their neighbours or oppress and kill their own peoples. In previous years, fearless activists have found banned equipment such as torture devices and cluster bombs for sale.

 

Countries that are involved in humanitarian crises and human rights abuses are offered space, alongside delegations from countries who need aid to provide their people with education, healthcare and economic stability, but are invited to use their metaphorical credit cards in this store of horrors.

 

And, as if all of that isn’t scary enough, DSEi is subsidised by the British taxpayer.

 

British weapons are demonstrated to foreign buyers by soldiers provided by the Ministry of Defence.

 

The event is co-organised by the UKTI’s Defence and Security organisation, which helps British arms companies to make invites, export deals and also hosts guests.

 

And, at a cost of over £4 million The Metropolitan Police provide security for the event.

 

It all makes me sick.

 

It makes me sick because it reeks of everything that needs changing in this world.

 

It makes me sick because I am told that the Kingdom of God looks like people who ‘will beat their swords into ploughshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore’ (Isaiah 2:4)

It makes me sick because I have shared table and broken bread with friends who have seen little ones blown up before their eyes by cluster ‘bomblets’ which look like toys to the eyes of small people who, despite their lands being ravaged, still live in hope of wonder and joy.

 Photo by Khristo Newall

 

It makes me sick because not that long ago I journeyed with peace-loving, peace-pursuing friends through Northern Iraq to hear the stories of and learn from the peoples there, and their faces are still imprinted on my heart.

 

It makes me sick because I still have vivid recollection of heading up into the mountains bordering Iran to meet with local villagers whose fields get shelled each harvest and planting season.

 

 

We went to hear their stories, to stand with them, to accompany them from the relative safety of the larger town back to their family lands in the mountains.

 

 

A deep mud track winds up the hillside leading to a solitary building, standing proud despite its many batterings.

 

The air is crisp and mountain fresh but the ground is deadly and land-mined.

 

This track is all that is safe to walk on. 

 

 

This track and the small orchard at the back of the hut, which Kaka Mahmoud and his sons have cleared of mines. But at no small cost, the wizened old man explains, pulling up the leg of his trouser and rapping his knuckles on the crude prosthetic limb that his woven cloth covers.
 

 

He shows us around the small areas of safety, showing us spent mines and safe places to walk, telling us tales of brothers blown up by these insidious hidden killers.

 

 

And we spend the night on that mountain top, drinking sweet tea and eating bread that his wife has stored in the pantry there.  We talk of what peace might be, of what it might look like for these lands and peoples to dwell in harmony and, from our place of privilege and relative ignorance, we seek to understand their stories and more of what it means to live in this tension.

 

There are jokes told around the fire.  The men find it hilarious when a couple of us wonder about how to navigate our way in the pitch mountain darkness through the treacherous land to the long-drop-toilet at the back of the hut.  They find it even more hilarious to sneak outside at break of dawn and wake us up to the sound of them shooting at rocks outside the hut with their rifle, declaring that the Iranian shelling has begun early.  The humour of a land in turmoil I guess.

 

But, around that fire and amongst the broken bread and sweetened tea, bonds were forged and truths were spoken.

 

It makes me sick because I have stood in the graveyards of Halabja and heard the stories of families choking on the poisoned air, gasping for survival.

 

 

I have walked the paths of a town decimated by chemical warfare and seen the ruins of a community still trying to rebuild its former beauty.

 

I have seen their faces and heard their stories and loved them for but a moment.

 

 

It is real.

 

This stuff is real.

 

And in September this year the weapons that cause such destruction will be pedalled on our doorstep.

 

And we must stop it.

 

We might not change their hearts, but we can make it harder for them to walk through those doors without having to face the reality of their trade.

 

We can look at their badges and learn their names and speak to them of other people who also have names.  Of Kaka Mahmoud and his sons, of little ones who once played in desert sands with their toys of destruction.

 

‘All it takes for evil to prosper is for a good person to do nothing.’

 

So, we should do something.

 

Go here:

 

http://www.stopthearmsfair.org.uk/say-no-to-the-arms-trade-in-2013/

 

or here:

http://www.elaaf.org/#about

 

or here:

http://www.caat.org.uk/events/national-gathering/

 

to find out more.

 

Because there are names and stories and families and hopes and dreams at stake.
 

 

It is real.

Where...I share my ‘word’ for 2013

And so, 2013 is upon us, filled with all that comes with the ‘New’ – anticipation, reflection, hope, sweet longing, curiosity.

 

New Year is a freeing time…anything is possible.  We reflect on the year gone by and we have the chance to make different choices. Resolutions are made, hopes are articulated, plans are birthed and conspired.

 

This year I haven’t made any ‘resolutions’ so to speak. 

 

No, not for me the resolutions that fade into a mist of hazy guilt at non-accomplishment and vague failure.

 

But, rather, a word.

 

Inspired by http://oneword365.com/ and that community of glorious peoples seeking to live into all they can be, I have chosen for this next 365 days to live into MY word.

 

A solitary word, percolated up from my Soul and Being, forming into a solid sense of what I shall lean into this next season.

 

And, for me, this word is PURPOSED.

 

Purposed in endeavour.

Purposed in being.

Purposed in becoming.

 

To live fully, intentionally, PURPOSED.

To know that my journey with Jesus is leading forward, pressing in, going deeper.

And not by accident. But on purpose.

 

I shall try to no longer get to the end of a morning, a day, a week, a month, or even a solitary moment and feel it wasted for lack of choosing to live intentionally, or for lack understanding its purpose with that glorious gift of hindsight.

 

I shall seek to rise each day and live into the day ahead. 

 

I shall choose to look at the purpose of each of my endeavours and seek what Gods purpose is in each moment – in the people I meet, in the tasks I set my hand to, in the dreams that rise up within me.

 

When I meet with people to listen, hear their questions and wrestling and, when invited, to try to speak truth and love into their lives, I shall press into the purpose of loving, of re-building, of whispering that a different story is possible.

 

When I see a glorious sunrise or sunset, or have my breath taken away by creation, I shall press into the purpose of JOY.

 

When I hang out with the people who KNOW me – and I mean, KNOW me – I shall rest in that glorious truth of being ‘enough’ for them, and know that the purpose of these times is sheer belonging, love, delight and open honesty with no fear.

 

When I rest and re-create I shall press into the purpose of knowing true Sabbath – that *today* I can live as though all my work is done, because God is big enough and I do not dwell in slavery but freedom.

 

When I make my clothes I shall press into the purpose of creativity, self-sufficiency, good stewardship and freedom from the tyranny of the sweat-shop.

 

When I teach and lead our congregation I shall press into the purpose of community, of city-on-a-hill and lamp-on-a-lampstand life.

 

When I bake for people I will purpose to bake love into my creations, so that the gift of my time and care will nourish and feed.

 

When I am handling my money, be that in shopping or gifting or saving or releasing, I shall think about the purposes of these things, about where they fit into the bigger picture, about whether my choices bring life and freedom or tie me or others up.

 

When I find myself ‘wasting time’ I shall choose to remember Theroux’s quote, ‘As if we could kill time without injuring eternity!’, and I shall ask questions about what is being built in my life in these ‘down-time‘ moments – am I truly being re-created and refreshed or is life passing my by?

 

When my heart desires to go in a certain direction, make a connection, speak a phrase, voice an opinion, I shall ask myself the purpose of these things so that I don’t just let things ‘happen’, but live INTO them.

 

And, in all of these things, I shall seek to remember that Gods purposes far outweigh mine, that some of the most gloriously joy-filled-intoxicatingly-achingly-beautiful-significant-moments seem to happen as if by accident and that, whilst in my PURPOSED living my hearts desire is to be in step with Holy Spirit and all that She is doing, there must always be that space for Holy and Divine Surprise that leads us into spaces we have never known before, and open up whole worlds in front of our very eyes.

 

And so, to a year of living as though PURPOSED.

 

What are you living into this year?

Honey, I'm home...

I'm back.  It's been a while, but I'm back.

I've been writing bits & pieces elsewhere, but in the last week or so I've felt something moving me back to this space, and so here I am.

I don't know how much I'll get back here, but I hope it will be often.

I think that a large part of this returning has been to do with reading the writings of others, feeling like I needed to find my voice again. Weird how that happens.

This last few days has been a whirl of reading and thinking and digesting, mainly because of the vote by the General Synod of the Church of England to not pass the motion to admit women Bishops at this time. I'm not going to write about that right now - enough has been said, by people much wiser and more eloquent than myself, and if you've read my post on Jesus being a feminist you already have an inkling about what I feel on the matter. 

Time to reflect and heal and ponder is needed.

But I did get to thinking about Mary Magdalene, Apostle to the Apostles, the first person to see the Resurrected Jesus and be sent out by Him...

I got to thinking about the conversations that might have been happening between her & Jesus as the House of Laity voted against the motion last week. I got to thinking about how she must have felt to see women being held back and about how, until Jesus came into her life, she must have experienced that same feeling - held back, restricted, not 'enough'.

Mary Magdalene holds a special place in my heart. I am fascinated by her journey, by her deep and wonderful relationship with Jesus. She reflects so much of the heart of Jesus to us.

This past Resurrection Sunday 2012 at the Church I get to journey with, we were thinking about the encounter in the Garden, and, indeed, gardens in general. 

Eden, The Garden of Resurrection, The Garden and the City at the end and beginning of all things.

I got to inhabit Marys world that Resurrection Sunday and in the weeks running up to it as I pondered her journey.  I got to stand before the gathered, Resurrection people and share her story in the hope that her words would resonate with our stories, that the truth of the Man who made all things right would bring life, and life in all its fullness.

So...as I re-start this journey, I share her story with you.

The woman who was released into fullness of life and fullness of ministry.

May it be so in our time.

Marys Journey

I just...

I just don’t know what to say.

I’m stood here, in this garden, and I…

I can’t…

I can’t believe it.

But I have to.

I’ve seen it with my own eyes.

We buried him you see.

I watched them torture him, then I watched them kill him, and I saw Joseph bring him here, to this tomb in this garden.

He was dead.

My best friend.

The man who saved me.

The man I would have given my life to follow.

Dead.

I just…

that was enough to get my head and my heart around, but this…

this…

Everything changed the day I met him you know. He literally saved me.

Up until that point I was alone, afraid, but he changed that. 

He taught me how to be alive again, to love, to care, to be cared for, to be ME again.

Mary.

Whenever he said my name, he said it as though I was the most precious person on earth, me, Mary.

I know he made everyone feel like that, it’s just the way he was. He had that kind of intensity - you know, the kind that when he spoke, you just wanted to drop everything and listen.

It never stopped being special, hearing him say my name.

I would have followed him to the ends of the earth and back again.

 

He wanted everything to be put right again you know.

No one was too crooked to be led back to the straight path,

no one was too sick to be healed,

no one was too far outside community to be loved.

He said that about himself once…how did he put it again…‘I am the Way, the Truth and the Life,’ he said.  And he meant it.

Everywhere he went, life sprang up, things were put back in their right place.

And we, this rag-tag mismatched bunch of friends and followers saw it all…

The dead raised back to life, the lame healed, the blind given their sight, enough food for everyone.

Life and life in all its fullness. That’s what he brought. Life in all its fullness.

And he just would not shut up, that man.

That beautiful, amazing, infuriating man.

 

Anywhere he saw injustice or religious pomp or lies or double standards, he spoke up.

One of the lads told me that even way back at the start of all this he stood up in the temple, took the scroll, read from Isaiah, and declared that the Spirit of the Sovereign Lord was upon him, that he was anointed to preach good news to the poor, proclaim freedom for prisoners, give sight back to the blind, release the oppressed. He declared the year of the Lords favour.

It’s not like we didn’t warn him that he was headed for trouble.

Peter tried a few times.

Everywhere we went there were whisperings, questions, people trying to trick him.

But he saw straight through it all, and he just carried on, as if he could see the bigger picture.

He just wanted everything to be put right again.

And a week ago, in the run up to Passover, it really kicked off.

Jesus had been doing what Jesus did, and it had gotten peoples attention – especially the religious leaders.  He didn’t help matters when he staged his entry into Jerusalem, coming through the back gates to the city riding on a donkey. The people started throwing palm leaves under his feet and crying ‘Blessed is the king of Israel’, whilst all the time on the other side of the city the Romans were making their very own triumphal entry, reminding the people that THEY were the ones in charge.  Jesus was turning everything upside down.

He was a marked man.

I don’t know if I’ve ever been so worried for someone in my whole life.

 

And all he wanted was for everything to be put right again.

The rest of last week seems to have gone past in a blur. It feels like we were on ‘fast forward’.

There were conversations and discussions and Jesus seemed to be making a lot of people very angry.

And then that night came. That insane, crazy beginning of the end.

Jesus was washing our feet, and then talking about the end, promising us that we wouldn’t be alone, that he was the vine and God was the gardener, almost like he was reminding us about the promise of Eden, the promise of God walking with His people in that Garden in the cool of the afternoon.

And he prayed this beautiful prayer for us that made me weep inside. This man. This amazing man.

From that point on it doesn’t seem real -  Jesus went off to the Garden in Gethsemane to pray, and they came for him. 

They came for my Jesus.

I don’t think I can put into words how the next hours felt.  Knowing that they had him, knowing that they wanted him dead, knowing there was nothing we could do.

There was that sham of a show trial that made me SO angry.

These people.

Did they not know who he was?

And they led him out.

Back bloodied, this awful crown of thorns on his head, digging in.

Carrying the heaviest of crosses.

We followed, all the way to the crucifixion site.

We were there to the end, the women and John and I.

If you listened hard enough I swear you could have heard my heart breaking inside my chest.

 

This man, who only wanted everything to be put right again, here on this hill.

And, just before he died, he made this amazing declaration…that ‘It is finished’.

 

It felt like it.

It felt like the end of all things.

Even the sun couldn’t bear to shine any more.

It was like the universe felt his pain, felt our pain, felt Gods pain.

And that darkness just continued.

Joseph and Nicodemus took his broken and bruised and torn body, and wrapped him so tenderly before laying him in the tomb in this garden.

And then the Sabbath began.

We couldn’t move, couldn’t do anything.

The Sabbath is supposed to be all about living as though there is no work left to do.

But it felt like life itself had ended.

The Sabbath of all Sabbaths.

As soon as the light came up I knew I had to come here.

I knew I had to be in this garden.

I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t bear it.

I didn’t care what people thought about me, this woman stealing through the streets in the half light.

I just wanted him to be here, and if he couldn’t be here I needed to be as near to him as I could.

I don’t know what happened in my head and my heart when I got here to see that the stone wasn’t rolled across the tomb any more, and that Jesus wasn’t there. I think the utter confusion and bewilderment of the last 48 hours had finally taken its toll. I just ran and ran and ran as fast as I could back to the house and got Peter and John, and they came running and saw what I had seen.

Jesus was gone.

I just…

I just didn’t know what to say.

I didn’t know whether I was coming or going.

I was here, in this garden, and I…

The boys left, but I had to stay. I couldn’t move.

The tears were flowing so thick and so fast.

Everything was changing. Nothing was the same.

I leant in to get a closer look and then I saw there were two men that were dressed in white sat where Jesus’ body should have been. They asked me why I was crying, and I couldn’t understand why they had to ask. Hadn’t they heard the stories, hadn’t they seen the empty tomb?

Why was I crying?!

Because my Lord, my everything, had been taken away, and I didn’t know where he was.

Couldn’t they at least have left us his tomb?

And then another man came up behind me and asked me the same question.

Why am I crying?

And I turned and I couldn’t see him through my tears and I thought he was the gardener and I begged him to tell me where he had put my Jesus.

And then He said my name.

He said my name.

He said my name.

Mary.

And as soon as heard him say my name I knew it was him.

My Jesus.

Here in the garden.

Calling me by name.

 

And I held him.  Oh how I held him.  I held him so tight he had to ask me to let him go.

And I looked into his face, and I heard him whisper my name, and then I knew.

He’d meant it you know, on that cross, when He’d said ‘It is finished.’

He’d only gone and done it.

He’d only gone and put everything right again.

 

I was stood with my Jesus in the garden in the cool of the morning.

And everything was new.

And he called me by name.

And he’d put everything right.

Death holds no power.

It is finished.

Have No Envy and No Fear...

So, it’s been ages since I last blogged. Shame on me!

Life has been rather busy you see, and inbetween ministry stuff, family times, making time for old friends, meeting new friends and the planning of adventures, there has been little time for blogging or even scrappy journaling…

Sometimes there are seasons of life like that I guess, so full of living that there’s no time to write about the journey.

But, today is my day off – this week is pretty jam packed, and so I’ve had to grab whatever bits of time I can. And so I have slept, drunk tea, done some work on an exciting non-day-job related project, and spent some much needed time strumming away on my guitar in my front room. My soul feels fed, which is what Sabbath times are all about.

As I strummed and hummed and disturbed whatever neighbours weren’t out at work, my fingers and voice found their way to the song ‘No envy and No fear’ by the lovely Joshua Radin (who, incidentally, is lovely because he writes beautiful truths and not just because he’s really hot.)

Here’s the song as it’s meant to be sung:

I think my fingers and voice found their way to that song in particular because my life seems to be shifting seasons at the moment, and the message to have ‘No Envy and No Fear’ is an attractive and timely one.

Something I have been dreaming big dreams about - along with my sister - for some time, is moving from dreaming to reality. I will blog more about that in the coming weeks, but suffice it to say that when something big shifts up from the dreaming stage to the making-it-a-reality stage, it brings with it many things.

It brings practical things - paperwork and framework and form filling and hoop-jumping.

It brings exciting things – vision casting and inviting people to be a part of the dream and the immeasurable sense of Father God smiling down on something that was His plan in the first place, and that He has allowed us to join in.

It also brings, as any emerging dream-into-reality does, moments of sheer terror.

I have likened this to the feeling that you get at the start of an epic rollercoaster.

You’ve queued. You’ve strapped in the harness. And now you’re making that slow, creaking, clicking journey to the top of the first drop.

You know that as soon as you crest that rise you will go flying down at speeds unimaginable. You will be flung all over the place, and all that will be holding you in is the force of gravity and a flimsy plastic seat belt.

There’s no getting off at that point.

But it will be the ride of your life.

And all of this ‘nearly-at-the-top-no-going-back-now’ emotion has been causing me to mull on the ideas of seizing the moment and daring to leap into the unknown…themes which I think are always present for those who want to both feel, and actually be, fully alive.

I think that sometimes we settle. We settle for the comfortable, for the safe, for the predictable.

Sometimes this is an act of self preservation – sometimes we need to be in that safe place, to consolidate all we have learned, to be healthy and stable and secure so that we can move on to the next stage of adventure from a place of strength. That can be positive.

But sometimes, and I suspect most of the time, we settle because of fear.

Don Miller wrote a great blog on this the other day – you can find it here: http://donmilleris.com/2011/07/11/facing-your-fears/

This fear may come from our experiences of what happened the last time we stepped out in that area.

To that fear I choose to say ‘why do you assume it will be the same THIS time? Things have changed, YOU have changed, lessons have been learned. Don’t assume it will be the same this time and, even if it turns out to be the same or similar, what is the alternative?! Living in a secure closed off bubble of self-preservation?!’

This fear may come from worrying about what might happen if we fail.

To that fear I choose to say ‘So what. So what if you fail. At least you tried. At least you had the courage to step out into the unknown and give it a shot.’ If you were my friend and you stepped out but failed, even if you failed spectacularly, I would still be on the sidelines cheering you on, I would still be immeasurably proud that you had the balls to move out of your comfort zone and go for it, and I would stand with you in the moments afterwards as you learned the lessons from the journey. After all, some of the most valuable things we learn are from our mistakes, and everyone is entitled to make them. I know my friends would say the same to me.

Or, this fear may come from the fact that we don’t think we have what it takes.

We are paralysed by an awareness of our own limitations, or a de-valuing of our worth. I happen to be a Jesus-Follower, and so live my life daily in the knowledge that my own limitations are nothing to fear as it is ‘Christ who works in me’. And, armed with that knowledge, Me plus Jesus is an unbeatable combination.

And so, to that fear I offer the challenge of a quote from Marianne Williamson, which was used by Nelson Mandela in his inaugural speech:

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that frightens us most. We ask ourselves, 'Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and famous?' Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that people won't feel insecure around you. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in all of us. And when we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”

Of course, our understanding of what it means to be 'brilliant, talented, gorgeous and famous' is all rooted in what those things look like from a heavenly, Kingdom perspective rather than a shallow, worldly one...a Kingdom where the first will be last and the last will be first, a Kingdom where the creator of the universe became man, and washed His disciples feet. Brilliance, Talent, Beauty and Fame all look very different through the Kingdom lens.

To live with No Envy means to be able to champion the causes of those around us, to cheer them on as they become all they were created to be and join in the Great Adventure of life-in-all-its-fullness. It means to be comfortable enough with who we are that we have no need to envy others, as we know that we are who we were meant to be, and that in itself is enough. Why be a pale imitation of someone else when you can be a dazzling version of YOU, with all the adventures and opportunities that brings? When we have no envy we are free to pursue our dreams, because they are not dependant on a flawed perception of our own value or capability based on comparisons with others. It brings a huge freedom to just be who we were created to be and do what we were created to do.

To live with No Fear becomes much more easy when we first learn to live with No Envy. When our souls are free from the measuring sticks we impose on the world, ourselves, and the people around us, when we are no longer bound up by our concern with the opinions of others, our definitions of what it means to ‘succeed’ and not ‘fail’ change, and the things we are fearful of diminish drastically in the light of this freedom.

When we realise that we are free to be who we were created to be, free to dream huge dreams, free to be people who CAN change the world, fear becomes a much less attractive emotion than the raw excitement and anticipation that are offered by the ‘pursuit of the dream’.

And so, as I walk into the journey before me I will choose to have No Envy and No Fear, only the heady scent of adventure and the vague feeling of butterflies in my stomach as I approach the top of a very high, very scary, but kick-ass exciting roller-coaster.

I hope you will do the same.