Back from Cardiff

So, we are back from 2 days in Cardiff. A little bit of shopping and a nice hotel breakfast. I am a big fan of hotel buffet breakfasts even though I would never dream of eating cereal, full english and a danish for breakfast under normal circumstances; it means you don't need lunch so, is therefore a very frugal move on my part. 

The main reason we decamped to Cardiff was to see Caitlin Moran at St David's Hall. You may or may not have heard of her. She is a columnist for The Times, a writer and also has just written the script for Channel 4's Raised By Wolves. 

Caitlin Moran is very funny and smart with some important things to say. However, it would probably not be wise to go and see her with your maiden aunt (or with Roy Chubby Brown and Howard Stern actually) She has a colourful way with the English language and is also a passionate feminist. As part of this passion, she feels that certain female "things" need to be addressed in an open, out there sort of way. It is not for the faint hearted. 

Among subjects covered on the night were - body image, menstruation, shaving legs, not being a size 8, the thigh gap and a few things I probably shouldn't bother you with. If it's sounds a bit heavy, it really wasn't - she is very funny and sweet and kind. My daughter loved her and so did I. There were lots of things I didn't agree with but, it was great to hear a woman tell other women that they are beautiful, that they shouldn't take any notice of magazines and movies that tell them otherwise. I might be a bit old to be standing up with 1500 other people shouting "I am a feminist" but it was a great night. 

Politics

This is not the time or the place for politics even though everywhere seems to be full of it. However, this week, a promising breakthrough. I heard this weekend that there is enough money in the national kitty so that people with houses worth up to £1000,000 don't have to pay inheritance tax, which is nice. I am so pleased that that there is an unexpected windfall. You see, where I work we have a volunteer who was recently told that he is fit for work, despite his ongoing depressive illness - established by the fact that he can hold a pen and walk ten paces successfully. His doctor  is adamant that he shouldn't be working and should continue his therapeutic work for us but times are tough for everybody and there just wasn't the money in the public purse. But now - hurrah! It seems that there is some money about and I am sure that the powers that be will happily put it my friend's way so that he doesn't need to leave us. What?

Nothing

Living intentionally. That's the way forward. Not wasting a second. A plan for everything and everything in a plan. I like a list I do. Mainly because I forget so much these days - old age rather than a hectic lifestyle. Life is apparently like a cheque book or something and every day is a cheque waiting to be written which you can never return (unlike most cheques which can be returned if you don't have enough money in your account. I am not sure that I have understood this analogy.) Apparently we are all going to be lying on our deathbeds wishing that we had been able to tick more off our to-do lists.

It's just, do I always have to be balling socks when I am watching the telly? (I have never balled socks while watching the telly but am assured that some people do) Do I have to excuse listening to the Reverend Richard Coles on the radio by dusting while I am doing so? Does all my activity have to be useful or instructive or deep? Is there no room for sitting and staring out of the window and thinking about nothing? Is it still ok to put your head back and doze for twenty minutes when you get in from work - even though you know full well that there are shoes to be cobbled and roofs to be thatched? Am I still ok to kind of leave the room mentally every now and then? 

Jim Elliot said

" Wherever you are, be all there! Live to the hilt every situation you believe to be the will of God."

This is, I think, a call to living every moment for God, which no one could argue with. It's just that I think we should be careful how the word "live" is defined here. Just sitting contemplating with your chin on your knee, shouldn't be a bad thing. It shouldn't make you feel guilty. There will always be stuff to be done but sometimes you have to let it go - like the annoying Disney song. (Can I just say Frozen - no where near as good as Mulan. End of discussion) 

This is not a call to just sitting there and letting it all get past you. It's just about it being ok to stop every now and then. Sometimes to think things through, sometimes to give God time to speak and sometimes to suddenly wake up after unexpectedly losing consciousness while just closing your eyes while waiting for the kettle to boil. 

Read

Originally for me, this book fell into one of two buckets

This is a book deliberately written to provide a simple guide to return to simple prayer.

                                                OR

Someone famous who has just thrown together some well worn prayer certainties which has taken him about twenty minutes.

I have to confess that the first time I read this, it fell into the second bucket - leaving almost no impression at all. It was like eating one of those flying saucer sweets that melted on your tongue and then disappeared to nothing. (Although sometimes, if you were unlucky,  they got stuck on your teeth and you couldn't get them off and your mouth went all claggy.)

However, I wouldn't claim to be the queen of the world when it comes to attention spans, so I had another look, especially as I noticed that it was nominated for Christian Book of the Year. Having read it again,  I think that, if it is read a different way to the way that I did; slowly, prayerfully and possibly with a pencil and notebook, there is more to be had here than I gave it credit for. There are simple but strong truths here and it does no harm to read them again. There is also a study  area at the back where you can go over what you have read and apply it. It opens up even further then. I think it probably does people good to read that prayer can be simple and straightforward. We do not need to put on airs and graces to come to our Father to speak and it is important to know that. (However as a person who has few problems getting stuff off her chest to God and whines to him on an almost minute by minute basis, I sometimes wonder if God thinks he could do with a bit more reverence and all that hows your father from me - but that's my shortcoming not yours I expect.)

For me, other books on prayer - "Too Busy Not To Pray" by Bill Hybels and "The Road Of Blessing" by Pen Wilcock hit the mark a bit more. That is very much a personal preference of course - don't write to the Daily Mail. I would recommend the Lucado, as a basis to overhaul your prayer life and shake it up a bit. If you do it properly I think it is very useful.

I, on the other hand, am now going back to reading the next one in CF Dunn's "Secret of the Journal" series. It's very tense and a real knicker gripper as my old nana used to say.  

.

Dead

I do hope you don't mind this. This is a re-post from last year's Easter Saturday. It's not that I think  it's the bees knees or anything. It's just that today is important I think. Almost as challenging as Good Friday was for the followers of Christ. And it's important for those waiting for a miracle from God. When God seems distant, when we feel we have lost, when the waiting seems hopeless. That experience is rooted in Easter Saturday

This is Easter Saturday. A Holy Day for many Christians. A day of complicated theology. For me Easter Saturday means something else. It is the day before the miracle. The day when the tomb was still well and truly shut to those outside. A day when Jesus' followers were saying - Well what was all that about then? A day when the promised end seemed impossible. A day when God's power may not have seemed as powerful as they had hoped. The day that followed the darkest day and it showed no improvement - no sign of what was to come. Only cold, dark quiet. No signs from God, no encouragement, no answers.

Easter Saturday resonates with anyone on the journey of faith. A silence from God. A pause in the plan. No clues as to the coming miracle. Just a quiet, waiting game. We know now that Sunday came and with it, the extraordinary. But the Easter Saturday experience is just as important. The faith. The waiting. The unbelief. The expectancy. The confusion. This is where the pattern for faith is set. This is where we learn who God is, as we wait.