The Murmur of Rain

This week these two thoughts ran a parallel path in my mind, it seemed to me anyway. Truth was they were on subtle, but convergent tangents that crossed tonight. 

John Hull who went completely blind at the age of 45 wrote:

"I opened the front door, and rain was falling. I stood for a few minutes, lost in the beauty of it. Rain has a way of bringing out the contours of everything; it throws a coloured blanket over previously invisible things; instead of an intermittent and thus fragmented world, the steadily falling rain creates continuity of acoustic experience."

"[E]verywhere are little breaks in the patterns, obstructions, projections, where some slight interruption or difference of texture or of echo gives an additional detail or dimension to the scene. Over the whole thing, like light falling upon a landscape is the gentle background patter gathered up into one continuous murmur of rain."

In the video still above from the short film about John Hull called "Notes on Blindness" Hull's character says "If only rain could fall inside a room, it would help me to understand where things are in that room, to give a sense of being in the room, instead of just sitting on a chair." In the film the directors simulate rain inside the kitchen.

C.S Lewis grieving his wife shortly after her death:

"Slowly, quietly, like snow-flakes – like the small flakes that come when it is going to snow all night – little flakes of me, my impressions, my selections, are settling down on the image of her. The real shape will be quite hidden in the end. Ten minutes – ten seconds – of the real [Helen Joy] would correct all this. And yet, even if those ten seconds were allowed me, one second later the little flakes would begin to fall again." 


Tonight as the wind cuts around my little hut, bleeds through palm leaves, I can hear it distort, blunted by this, whistling through that. In fact, it is only because the wind comes into contact with resistance that we hear it at all. Like rain revealing contours or snowflakes of memory falling like a shroud over an image, that which can not be seen (at our vantage) is experienced still because of another unseen thing, the wind.

In Radiohead's video for their song "House of Cards", no cameras or lights were used. Instead, 3D plotting technologies collected information about the shapes and relative distances of objects. The video was created entirely with visualizations of that data. 

The bible says that faith is the evidence of things not seen. What if then, when we pray in faith, (and any prayer to an invisible God is faith) it is a little like 3D plotting or even echolocation. That is, prayers going out and revealing the contours of things not visible. But unlike Radiohead or the dolphin or bat or the stealthy submarine, what goes forth in prayer does not collide with Thom Yorke's head or fish or insects or treacherous underwater terrain, no, what if prayer goes out into the invisible world and collides with what is beyond our natural physical perception. 

And furthermore, while were on about this sort of thing, what if, (like we are want to sing), Grace does fall like rain. And what if, like Mr. Hull's rain, Grace falling creates a continuity of spiritual experience. Reveals the hidden world behind all worlds that corrupted sight cannot see. And like Mr. Lewis' snowflakes, Grace is God's impressions and selections and thoughts settling down on the true image, the true nature of things.

Hull finishes his poetic passage on rain by saying:

"This is an experience of great beauty. I feel as if the world, which is veiled until I touch it, has suddenly disclosed itself to me. I feel that the rain is gracious, that it has granted a gift to me, the gift of the world. I am no longer isolated, preoccupied with my thoughts, concentrating upon what I must do next. Instead of having to worry about where my body will be and what it will meet, I am presented with a totality, a world which speaks to me."

And isn't this just it! That God's grace rends the veil to reveal the world! Though we had eyes and could not see, He gives us the ability to truly percieve, and see beyond ourselves, beyond our isolation and our preoccupation with our thoughts-- and we too are presented with the gift of a new world, a world that speaks to us, a world where finally, our spirits can be at rest.

Gory Bits Gone Wrong

I was on my lunch break, lying skyward on a bench, reading an excerpt from John Hull's memoir about going blind called "Touching The Rock" when...

Something had happened. Something was wrong.

At that moment, her little world was only as big as the belly of that stuffed animal turned wrong way out, wires like blown arteries, sheared from a heart in the shape of a battery-less box. 

Something had to be done. Right then.

I walked to my shop, found a tiny screwdriver, some electrical tape and pliers to strip the sheathing from the wires. Her worry receded a bit, the implements in my lap meant -

Something was going to be done. Right then.

She was a steady nurse. Kept the little screws safe in the folds of her pillowcase dress. Scolded the boys for wrapping electrical tape around their appendages. But her eyes never wavered, never left our patient. 

Something was about to be done. Right then!

Her body language willed my fingers on as I twisted wire into wire, first the black and then the red. I turned my palm up and she placed the electrical tape into my hand. Slowly I wrapped the once severed wires, first the black and then the red. Her eyes had questions that her mouth never asked. 

Not now. Something was being done! 

I pushed new batteries into place.  Switched the little switch to on. And she held her breath, held it in, held back elation, held back joy. Not yet.... 

Is it done? Now??!!

Her eyes did not need a mouth to ask. I handed her our patient, quickly she pressed it's paws together and from somewhere inside it's belly, little electric currents carried a signal to a tiny speaker hidden behind fake fur flecked with dirt. 

NOW!!

When all my guts, all my gory bits have gone wrong. When my insides feel like they are on my outsides and I don't feel like it will ever be better. I hope I remember today. Remember this child. Patient and trusting and willing and hopeful. I hope I am like her when my Divine Physician must work on me, when He strips back the sheared places, and slowly twists my heart back together.

Market Day!

I think if you want to take the pulse of a people you walk through their markets. And if the heart of Haitian cities are the markets, then that pulse, that lifeblood is the women. In a sprawling maze of rusted tin and muddy ruts covered in low-hung and haggard tarps Haiti's woman sell their fruits and vegetables and other humble wares. 

These photos are all stolen, awkward and clandestine, as most Haitians (unless they are your friends!) are very wary of being photographed. The women of the market work so hard, such long hot days, to provide for their families. They are beautiful beyond words. These few pictures don't do justice to the chaos of smells and sounds and colors that are Leogane Market, you'll just have to visit yourself.

Fish!

L'Acul, Haiti the last day of 2013 from about 7:30am to 8am. The fish are Bonita, or Bonit (boh-nee) in Kreyol. I hope it's a sign of good things to come for these villagers, for all of bel Ayiti. So beautiful how everyone worked together. And this is one of the largest single hauls in many months in our little inlet. The waters are so over-fished anywhere in range of a paddled boat, and since fisherman don't have motors, the good fishing is usually unreachable.

The Face of God on a Child

The first time humanity ever looked upon the face of God, the face of their creator, it was the face of a child. God could have chosen any other way. He could have come first as a warrior, sword hilt deep in some monstrous enemy. He could have come as a politician with His golden pen and legislated equality and prosperity to the masses. He could have come as a revolutionary and killed the fatted rich, cut the powerful off at the knees. But He didn't. Nope, the first time humanity ever looked upon the face of God it was the face of a child. And I think we still see God's face more in the innocent play, the rapturous laughter, the unabashed dance of children than any other way. Or at least I think we should.

These are some pictures from the last few weeks. The kids whose snot and tears end up gloriously on my t-shirts. The kids whose imaginations restore my sense of wonder. Whose joy reignites my love for life. They teach me so much about Jesus, about how heaven's country must be. Where light is the color of laughter and anything is possible...just like in the mind of a child.

God is a Father who always calls His children home. But we have to be like little children to accept the invitation, to find our way. We have to believe in the mystical, the invisible, the impossible and the fantastic. We must believe in the wildest fairy tale of all, the miracle of Christmas, that God is with us, has come to save us, because of His great love for us. Kids don't act shy, or self-conscious, or defer out of some sense of false humility. Nope, they run to the Christmas tree, look for their name and start tearing the paper off. That's what kids do. And this morning, along with every other morning, the gift of Jesus is yours, wrapped in Love eternal and marked with your name. Run to Him this morning like a child would. Bet it'll be the best day of your life.

Sometimes I'm Just Lost

Sometimes I switch it up a bit. Take the wrong way to the right place, the long way round to a close one. And sometimes, sometimes I'm just lost and have to find my way back. Saw this church sign the other day on one such very long way wrong way round.

Geez. Of all the obnoxious, smarmy, stupid and banal ways to paint the need for Christ in our life to obtain wholeness of mind. Sometimes when I read these I want to go inside and scream why the particular message is catastrophically misrepresenting the Gospel and God's tenderness that draws the lost to His heart. But alas, business hours were 9-5 daily. I sat there, numb and dumb and full of a greater sense that we are failing in our dialogue with the world. 

My thoughts were all one way or the other after that. You know how you get, the pendulum of emotion. Your heart and will rally behind a noble thought, some great cause, and the next minute your mind waves the white flag of cynicism and surrender. 

Cotton clouds over cotton fields distracted me for a moment.

As far as I could see in every direction, cotton, fields white and ready for harvest. I pulled over to take this picture then closed my eyes, other pictures, creased and faded and colorless, workers harvesting the cash crop 150 years ago. Slaves, fingers raw from the prickly plant, picking next to their precious children. Lives stolen for what? Greed, ease of life for those that won a light skin lottery? 

I am reading Avengers Of The New World. It is the story of the Haitian Revolution, but the author Laurent Dubois does so much more than recount the details of the first successful slave revolt, he chronicles all the historical nuance, all of the minutia of the moment, the pulse of the people who were the prime movers in the French provincial slave trade. He recounts how laws were passed to keep anyone with so much a percentage of African blood from holding office or having other full citizen rights. He details how many of the descendants of Africa were much lighter skinned than some persons of European descent. And that the whole process was as convoluted and circumspect as one can infer by its idiocy. Businessmen and women, professors, even politicians having to prove their pedigree to the ridiculous godless blood-hounds bent on finding out light skinned impostors. Peoples of African descent whose dark poisonous blood would apparently be societies death, an acid bath of blood that would somehow corrode away and crumble the very foundations of white entitlement.

Geez....

So much of history is mired in the subjective. The viewpoint of one country or culture vs. another. So that the truth is hard to really know. But not this, never this. Slavery is evil, will always be evil. And anyone who didn't, doesn't fight against it, they are and always will be complicit. The garment industry has more slavery than any other industry. From forced labor in cotton fields to forced labor in factories. There are millions of children enslaved for the making of the garments that we all wear. Please buy fair trade, direct trade, slave free certified clothing (you can see which companies are doing there part here). And please read this book, it is so very very important as a historical narrative and more, a commentary on the perpetual state of fallen mankind.

I drove away thinking of the church sign, the cotton fields, the guilt of so many so called Christians in the enslavement and abuse, the murder and rape, of countless Africans. I thought, if someone can look at a darker skinned person and not see the image of God, well then they have never seen God. If someone can be so full of hate, well scripture is clear isn't it? They do not know God, who is love.

I drove and drove and then a grey rain came and stayed for hours but also a rainbow...

My thoughts are grey again today, grasping at God in the aftermath of the typhoon in the Philippines. There are 10 thousand feared dead. 10 million displaced, 4 million of them children now greatly susceptible to kidnapping and exploitation. The needs are so great as those island communities search frantic for water and food. Please if you can, donate to our friends My Refuge House in Cebu, Philippines. They will use the money in country to buy food and supplies and get it to families much quicker that way.

I leave for Haiti Monday. Soon I will be near again her sea. I will be back close to the country I love dearly, one that has suffered so long, so needlessly, that others might profit. It is a country still repressed by the lasting affects of political embargoes and aid policies that deconstructed a resilient indigenous Haitian economy while simultaneously creating dependence. It is heartbreaking and was to my way of thinking completely avoidable. I pray the next decade will be one of renewal for the indefatigable people of Haiti and for her unfathomably wonderful children. I'd like you to meet a few...

And meet my godson, Marc Finley!! Who shares my name and has stolen my heart. Oh and the loving lovely Madame Emmanuel, who spoils me so, with home cooked meals and warmth of home and heart.

And the proudest dad you've ever met! Fedeme, my dear friend who works harder everyday with such decency and determination. Can't wait to see him and his beautiful family.

Sometimes I do take the wrong way, the long way round. Sometimes, on days like today, I just feel lost. Sometimes I lose my grip. But Christ leads me round right again, He is The Way, in Him I am found. His is the grip that never slips. And sometimes when I spend my days on a diet of destruction and sexual exploitation and all the other bad news, when I start to wonder if it's a little too late in the history of things to do any good, well I try and remember mine is not to hold the whole world right side up, to keep it spinning on its axis. No mine is to realize the sorry state I am in and let the One who is in control do what only He can do. I guess I just needed to write today, to bleed off a little. Clear some cobwebs, some shelf space, make room for another days ramblings and rants, poetry and pretense. Thanks. Hope you enjoyed the pictures of the kids. Hope you're keeping it between the ditches. Hope beyond all hope you're holding on to Jesus, and if you're too weak for that, that you know He's holding onto you. xoxox

Killing God

I woke with a word on my lips. I spoke it into the cold grey morning as I wiped the night from my eyes. 

"Cross."

Partially because my mind was tired, and perhaps partially because it is a word so threadbare, so shop-worn with use, I sorta ignored it. But all morning it followed me. Into, out of the shower. It was in the first scent of coffee, in the bottom of that first cup. And then the second and third. It rode with me down the highway to pick my sister up for work, and then sat patiently waiting until I finally listened to what it had to say.

And so listen I did and wonder and listen and query and listen some more and I've thought about it for the rest of the day. And here are some things it said.

In an age of spiritual self-determination, where spirituality's highest law seems to be "do what you want as long as it doesn't hurt anyone else", the cross, the notion of atonement, the belief in a need for atonement have been so dismissively, so condescendingly deemed irrelevant, archaic, and unenlightened. And yes sin, and shame, and suffering were nailed to the cross. Death and it's power destroyed there. But for a world that doesn't much believe in sin, that doesn't see themselves as sinners, doesn't see the need for such horrible a sacrifice, maybe, beyond all these acts of reckless mercy, is something bigger still. Something people of every age deeply desire, and desperately need: that God be killed.

Scripture says it pleased God to crush Christ. God the Father killing God the Son and finding pleasure there. Why? Of all the grotesque and macabre ways...?? I think it's two-fold. God needed to be killed. That is, what everyone that has ever existed thought of God needed to be crushed, ground to bits and blown into oblivion. Every false premonition we collectively share. That God is far off, that He is cold and unfeeling in the face of our suffering. That He is a moral cop, judge jury and executioner. That He is a cosmic killjoy. That He is ethereal and unknowable. That He is a self-absorbed ultra narcissist. All of those false God's killed on the Cross, and secondly only the real God remaining, resurrected and ever living.

Dead the far-off unfeeling God, risen the God who is as close as our own skin. Who felt on that cross what we feel, all of our hurt and fear and shame and suffering. God who is as close as our own spirit where He comes to live when we believe. 

Dead the moral cop, risen the fair judge whose wrath is stayed, who Himself took the punishment for all wrongdoings on that cross. Who condemns no one that calls on Christ. 

Dead the cosmic killjoy, risen the one Sacred Heart where we can finally find true happiness. That place of total acceptance where we are finally free to find our deepest greatest joy.

Dead the unknowable God, Risen the God who gives His Spirit to allow us to know Him as we are known by Him, to lead us into all Truth.

Dead the infinite megalomaniac, risen the One who puts all others above Himself.

Dead every false God of our invention and risen our Hope, our Peace, our One True Love. 

So then the Cross, as foolish as it seems, does not stand in antagonism of modern man. No in fact it answers the heart cries in us all. And the cross itself is not it, it is just a symbol. Nothing magical or mystical about its shape, if Christ had come in these times a firing squad, gas-chamber or an electric chair would have been the altar God used to sacrifice His Son. The thing itself is not it, the whole point is that we were created with an eternal curiosity, it's what makes us distinctly human, and God, on the Cross, answers all our deepest questions, calms all our darkest fears. If only we will believe.