Psalm 63

Well, I am about to take the plunge and post POETRY. How scary is that--I am about to go emotionally skinny dipping. Ah, well... let's not get on the subject of nudity. This blog is a lady. Here we goooo...!

Psalm 63

The ache only grows
for my God Jesus
I feel it in the lament of empty arms and fingertips
I taste it on honeyed lips ready to flow to my beloved
My belly flames with longing
Miss you, Jesus. I miss you God.

Do you remember the garden I only know through thick glass?
I have seen you—I have—
and yet it is never enough.
I would shrink back, half-dead with heartache,
but for your strong hands on my shoulders holding me fast, even washing my feet
as I stagger on.


Tell me again the story of us, stars singing for joy as the world careened into motion, into love, into singing.

You fill me like a tidal wave drowns
You change me like fire ruins clay
You cripple me and break all my brokenness
Until you are my only help, you my only life.
O kind Love, kindly kill me
Until charred flesh gives way to glory.

 the only Cadence


my joy is your joy
my name is your name
let all else be ravished
let love remain



(mostly july 5th ’11)
*cadence is music-speak for 'ending'.

Eyes of the heart

Well, I missed June.  Oh well!  Happy July to all.  Go play some Christmas music (Am I the only one that does that?).

Anyhow... It's astonishing how critical perspective is.  In short, I suppose that perspective is a fancy word for how you see.  Your box seat in life. 

To step just one metre (i miss the Queen's English) deeper--Jesus is life.  There is no life apart from Him.  So all that matters truly is how you see Jesus.

"Who do you say that I am?" I LOVE that Jesus asked his disciples this question. 
He knew who he was.  But Jesus wanted to hear them name him.  He cares incredibly about who we can say he is.
And that dictates how we see.  If we can say You are GOOD--then even in really horrific circumstances, we will see through the lense of His goodness.

I also think he cares about us answering honestly.  He's never gone in for robot worship.  If we cannot honestly say that in our lives, Jesus is kind and gentle with perfect leadership, he doesn't pout or shrink back in disgust. 

It's an invitation to wrestle.  And the more we fight INTO him, the more we truly see him and his kindness.  Really, like Madeleine L'Engle writes (oh Jesus thank you for Madeleine L'Engle), the only unbearable thing is the refusal to love.  Because that seperates, and that is death.  As long as we're kicking and screaming and bleeding and yet still engaging Him, then I believe that He will perfect our sight.

I really want to see Him. 

To give a little anecdote--God often gives me songs a few days or weeks before I absolutely need to sing them to survive.  Or he might have others compliment me or bless me right before I'm really attacked in that certain area. 

This could be considered cruel, and I could grit my teeth whenever I receive anything encouraging or any song.  Or it could be taken as a tender touch by Jesus, preparing me and blessing me before hard things.

All depends on how well you see. 

Eph. 1:17-19.

rainy day post

Time for a Taiwan memory post... other topics require too much brain power at present. :)  

The rain...

There are several seasons in Taiwan: hot and humid, hotter, rainy, and typhoon season.  The rainy season was the closest we got to winter, in the low 50s, and it actually did feel cold because we didn't have heating.   Sometimes it would rain for weeks.  I would daily lean out our apartment balcony, parting the waters of drying laundry, and strain to see how misty the mountains were.  If I couldn't see them at all, it would rain all day.  

Nothing ever really dried during the rainy season.  We would pin up sheets and everything else until they were close to dry and then use them.  The humidity injected an unavoidable musty smell on fabrics that you didn't notice until you visited another country.  

We didn't go on as many walks to the university (our neighborhood park equivalent) during the rainy season, but would have fantastic make-believes with random dress-up clothes.  Looking back, I had no idea where we found them all, but we had furry vests (think John the Baptist camel hair...mostly used for Native American characters), lacy scarves, and a pink panther costume.  

And a decidedly Asian tepee made from bamboo poles and mosquito netting that my resourceful father constructed.  Armed with these tools and a little (well... a lot, actually) facepaint, my siblings and I would create tunnels and houses and rescue each other from lava.   

My sister and I would dance to the Nutcracker, and Mom would dance to Ron Kenoly.  We would, too... and I would drag my brother into it as well.  My brother would write a million stories and we'd all draw and paint enough to fill a museum.  Paint each other, too.  My poor mother.

There's something about rainy days and the arts.  Maybe it's the ambiguity.  There's space in the blank white/gray sky to imagine all sorts of worlds.  That sky always reminds me of Chinese watercolor paintings, when often over half of the canvass is left blank.  The white could be snow, sky, sea, a lake... 

I like it because it leaves room for all the messiness of life.  There are things that are clear, and if there weren't, we'd have no painting at all (e.g. absolutes).  But there must be room, must be tension, for those things that are not so tidily compartmentalized into boxes (e.g. would this doctrine fit into every culture and age?).   How much tension can we live with?  How much must we, especially in international missions?

Rainy days also make me sleepy.  It's like the sun got tired of its conspicuity and felt like shyly hiding away for a couple of days.  Makes me want to hide away, too, and read and bake muffins.  And play Chopin.  Mozart's a little too brash for rainy days, and Liszt would be too much period.  But Chopin... and Debussy...would be perfect.

Ok well i think this post has enough random ideas in it for present.  :)  may your rainy days have lots of good books, music, hot tea, and lovely company. 

quenched

Well...it's April!   I vaguely remember blogging in the ancient past, before weeks started to speed up like they were on a bet with the energizer bunny (oooh man I just made a corny blog joke.  What is this blog coming to??).    Well.  Let's begin.

I miss rain.  Torrential tropical downpours that give meaning to the word 'drenched.'  In Singapore, every single road, no matter how miniscule, had ditches along either side.  Major roads had twenty or forty foot chasms dividing their lanes.  If it were not for these drains, the city would be constantly flooded.

During downpours, the huge ditches would violently churn with yellowish water, tree branches, and whatever trash that immaculate Singapore could conjure.  During the rainy season, even the drains reached their limit and trash cans would slowly float down the street like congenial neighbors.

And you know what I miss about it the most?  It was WARM.  You could take a walk in the rain and get delightful soaked and never ever be chilly.  For the longest time I had no idea why Westerners would always link rain walks with catching colds.  Just like I never understood why those silly people would check the weather outside before getting dressed.  Now, with a couple of temperate seasons under my belt, I still haven't learned--if I decide it's the day for flip flops and a skirt, it will undoubtedly snow.  And hail.  And sleet.  (I live in Colorado.  enough said. :> ),

I love walking in the warm rain and getting so wet that it takes half a day to dry off.  Just like it's marvelous to soak in the sun so long that you feel your bone marrow sizzling.

QUENCHED.  I really like that word.  Partly because it starts with a 'q' and there aren't many like that.  At least in my vocabulary. :)  And it's an... onawanapeia.  I have no idea how to spell that!  It's when a word sounds like its meaning, like...  ok, I'm cheating and googling it.

Onomatopoeia (well, I was kind of close.  not at all.)--e.g. hiss, buzz.  They're fun.   I guess quenched isn't REALLY....that hard-to-spell word... but it is in my world.
_________________________________________________________________________________

When is the last time you felt quenched, drenched to the utmost?  That's what tropical thunderstorms make me think of, when you're sure that even your muscles are filling up with water.  And that's how I feel in worship, in God's presence.  It is tricky though, because the more quenched in God I am, the deeper the ache grows for more.  This seems mean of God, frankly.

But I'm slowly learning that I must trust who God is (His goodness, that He IS LOVE) in order to walk through spiritual doorways.  Then that goodness will be apparent.   And He just adores that place when faith is not yet made sight--it is precious to Him.

God cares so much about how we love Him.  It's crazy.

He calls us out when we're lying helpless in our own blood (Ez. 16), loves us, gives us His love to love him, and then meticulously orchestrates circumstances to allow us to choose Him (and gives us the grace to do so).  And celebrates our feeble movements toward Him!  Maybe He just likes to party.  :)

And so the deeper ache is carving out more room for Him.  So we can truly be quenched.
Ach, it's late and I need to go to sleep.  I'll finish with poetry--first read this poem in one of Madeleine L'Engle's books, and loved it.  Had to look up 'replete', though (it roughly means 'full of').  There's some dispute over the authorship, but it's either Thomas Brown or Sir Thomas Browne.  Here you go:

If thou couldst empty all thyself of self,
Like to a shell dishabited,
Then might He find thee on the Ocean shelf,
And say — "This is not dead," —
And fill thee with Himself instead.

But thou art all replete with very thou,
And hast such shrewd activity,
That, when He comes, He says — "This is enow
Unto itself — 'Twere better let it be:
It is so small and full, there is no room for Me."

KeQi

OH there's so much I want to write about! I've been holding off on some subjects because I didn't feel wise enough, but thankfully I'm realizing that I'll never be wise enough.

I'd rather just take a stab at it; hopefully I'll hit at something worthwhile. Although it will sure to be like stabbing a rhinoceros with a toothpick. hehehe. God WHERE did you get my mind? It's so wacky.

This past Sunday I went to the Chinese fellowship after church. The Chinese church meets at 11:00 and has homemade lunch afterwards. This is really typical of Chinese churches; it's a great time of fellowship and delicious fan (rice... food). I've always kind of wanted to go to the service, but was intimidated and knew that my Chinese wasn't good enough to understand everything.

BUT through another friend who teaches English to a few Chinese tai tai's (older married ladies), and also learns Chinese from them, I was invited to the lunch. So I went!

:)

It was so good to be in that culture again. *sigh* SO good. And the Pastor Rachel (yes, the pastor of the church is a woman.. that's cool, too) came over and welcomed me and found me a place to sit (very Chinese). We talked in Chinese, and she said that I was very good (which was very ke qi (kind, polite... also has the connotations of being flattering, but this is positive, not negative in this culture).

I of course denied this, partly because I knew it wasn't true, and partly because I knew what to do when given a compliment. Which is so refreshing; in English, sometimes it's keqi not to accept, sometimes it's keqi to accept them.

Then I had rice and hong dou tang (red bean soup--hadn't had that in AGES!) and cha ye dan (boiled eggs soaked in tea. marvelous) and glass noodles... delicious.

And I chatted with a few ai yi's (aunties; what you respectfully call any older woman. Rachel mu shi (pastor) introduced ME as ai yi to a middle-schooler! yikes). I understood and pieced together more than I thought I would, and did the smile-and-nod routine the rest of the time. They had moved from China, and thought that Americans were friendly, greeting people on the street, and also that the air/weather was very nice here. But they would also like to go back to China. They had been Christians there... I had tried to tell them about Jesus in Beijing but forgot how to say the title of a book.

Anyhow, one ai yi wanted to invite me to her house and cook for me, so we exchanged phone numbers. And I got to write my Chinese name a few times! To people that could read it! One person said it was very beautiful; I love my Chinese name. It means 'rhyming poetry,' and has old romantic and musical connotations. (shi yun)

connotations

This actually brings me to what I wanted to blog about regarding the whole experience: truth.

In the culture in which I grew up, truth is delicately wrapped in circumstance and connotation.

In the West, truth is black and white, and if the dress looks awful you should let the person know. If a store is out of tuna, there will be a sign about it.

In the East, truth is found in guan xi (relationship--but that word is pathetically lacking. guan xi is one of the driving forces of the culture. Think of connections). Truth is an art, not a dividing line.

Indirect answers are given because the truth is, the truth is complicated. Many details are needed for complete understanding, for a round full truth.

If the dress looks awful, they may say nothing or compliment you on it because the truth is, this relationship is important, and matters more than what you're wearing.

If a store is out of something they will not tell you, even if you ask for it several times (this happened several times in Taiwan).

Because the truth is... we will have it eventually, this is a reliable store and we want you to come back. (Although sometimes the only 'real' truth is--we want you to come back! :) )

Of course, this is the truth that they want to project. But I think it's rather pompous to think that what we think of as 'truth' in the West is absolute, and not also the truth that we want to project.

Now--there is absolute truth. You get into dire straights if you apply this to theology. The Bible offends and challenges every culture. That's why we need EVERY culture and tribe to be redeemed and come together for the richest, fullest TRUTH of the gospel.

While the Western church loves those verses about freedom and honesty, the call to leave worldly riches and die to self is preached, if at all, with lumps in the throat.

The Eastern church glories in dying to self and sacrifice to the point of idolatry while the message of grace and lavish love is meagerly expressed.

Obviously, all of these observations are just that; and I'm trading in gross generalizations here. I had to add that part because I'm Asian. :> do you understand?

Oh I think I am just scratching the rhino now. Maybe I should try again on this later.

But to summarize-- JESUS is the TRUTH.

He's the truth behind the Western black-and-white, clear (sometimes garish) statements. e.g. "I am the bread of life... you must eat my flesh and drink my blood."

Couldn't you have COUCHED that or something, Jesus?!

He's ALSO the truth behind the guan xi and keqi of Eastern culture, in the way that he lived out truth in love and tightly wove the truth of the kingdom in layers of stories.

God draws near, God waits to be sought after. God rises up shouting and breathes in the wind.

Just a LAST thought:

What if the gospel had spread SOUTHEAST instead of NORTHWEST? I know it did spread SE to a certain extent, but it has generally spread up to Europe, West to the Americas, then West to Asia and West/South to Africa, and now the world is awaiting the final movement West, back to jerusalem.

But... if it had spread East to Asia and South to Africa--what would current Christian culture be like?

hmmm.

In-Between Land

Aaah I haven't blogged in forever! There have been even more hundreds of thoughts swirling around in me lately, but I think that the sheer vastness of topics has hindered writing.

Also, I'm realizing more and more that I don't know anything about anything... which is an exciting place to be. I trust myself more here.

But all this does not contribute to blog posts, and I've also been aching to write. Well, enough about me. Let's talk about...

In "The Magician's Nephew (C. S. Lewis)," there is an intriguing land with many pools. Each pool, or puddle, leads to a different world, and characters travel time and space through wearing rings and slipping into these pools.

I don't remember if the land had a name, but I like Jack Johnson's album title: "In Between Dreams." Let's call it the "In-Between Land." I've always felt an affinity for the characters in this place, and can picture the look of it.

If it were music, it would be Peruvian wooden flutes and pipes, with low cello and bass sliding scales... and maybe an accordian. A bland wind blows half-heartedly through eerie space, just enough to chill you into picking a destination. Grey and gray and dirty browns stain the mossy floor, and the sky blankly keeps the seasons secret.

It's been years since I've read the actual book, so I forget how Lewis described it.

In-between worlds. In-between time. No-man's land. transition. pause.

Translation?

Between the motion and the act falls the shadow (T.S. Eliot, "The Hollow Men".).

Airplane rides. Not the ones for vacation but the ones that are the finality of months of labeling boxes and smelling packing tape and quietly observing a life shrinking, by degrees, into __________.

First the books then the less-used clothing then the extra bedding then the cookware (leaving a remnant), then the crafts then the toys then the boxes of superfluity that no one knew existed, then more clothes, then giving away furniture, then the night on a mat and the mad dash for the last items on your bed stand that were almost forgotten because they were so close...

Then the eery time when you brush your teeth in airports for morning, night, and morning.

You glide over "In-Between Land" and fall as the plane's nose gently dips into another pool. Then you continue falling in freeze frame. Living in the pause. It takes time to fully materialize. Does that make any sense?

The whole thing is quite fascinating.

I've spent a good amount of life in the "In-Between Land." I've been told that TCKs disconnect six months before a move. My lease is up in 5 and I'm already saying goodbye to parts of my apartment. I'm already there and can hear the delicately painful music. In a minimal way, of course. I didn't even think that I'd mention it when blogging, but there you go.

I have the sand of nations in my soul... please don't wash it away...

Typically one day a year I ache for every place I've lived and visited and loved--where I just miss EVERYTHING. I've experienced it to a lesser degree each year, but I desperately hope it won't go away. It's not this awful thing; on the contrary, I think it's healthy. It feels like remembering who I am. And an honest grieving that I can't ever go back.

But God is ushering me forward--instead of "The Magician's Nephew," the present and future feels like "The Voyage of the Dawn-Treader", which is probably my favorite. Although it's SO hard to choose.

Instead of passively watching worlds emerge and fade, God is weaving me through all kinds of waters, visiting distant islands and having marvelous adventures. Instead of "In-Between Land" there is a constant Presence upon which I ride; singing under mighty wings and tasting sweet water.

He's been the only one who's always been there, and I know that He is faithful. He's been my rings that slipped me in between worlds. And we've had lots of conversations in "In-Between Land", God and I. Lots of whispers and tears and screams.

Maybe I wouldn't have longed for Him as much otherwise.

Thanks, Jesus. Ni mei tian yao wo, mei tian xiang wo, mei tian ai wo.

flower in the rain

I don't really have thoughts congealed enough to shape tonight. But read this--

"Again [the Shepherd] smiled, but only remarked quietly that the important thing about altars was that they made possibilities of apparent impossibilities, and that it was nice that on this occasion it had brought her peace and not a great struggle.

She noticed that he looked at her keenly and rather strangely as he spoke, and though there was a beautiful gentleness in the look, there was also something else which she had seen before, but still did not understand. She thought it held a mixture of two things, not exactly pity—no, that was the wrong word, but a look of wonderful compassion together with unflinching determination.

When she realized that, she thought of some words which one of the Shepherd’s servants had spoken down in the Valley of Humiliation before ever the Shepherd had called her to the High Places. He had said, “Love is beautiful, but it is also terrible—terrible in its determination to allow nothing blemished or unworthy to remain in the beloved.” "

Hind's Feet on High Places (Hannah Hurnard) p. 163

for all the things that don't resolve

that sink below the memories

for all the things we lost along the way

for all the things that used to shine

but cried themselves to rust

I pray I pray I pray

~~~~~~~~~~

oh I know that there are holes

and scars too deep to mention

but

you bring beauty again

and it's alright

if all is dead tonight cause

you raise the dead in the morning.

carve my heart into your art

no matter how I scream about it

make it so that I can hold the rain

hold my sorrow in your eyes

that wept when mary cried

just show me how to live another day

~~~~~~~~~~

I know that there are holes

and scars too deep to mention

but

you bring beauty again

and it's alright if all is dead tonight

cause you raise the dead in the morning.

darkness and sighing will flee away

death's swallowed up by life today

darkness and sighing will flee away

death's swallowed up by life today

~me. A few months too early, as usual. It's always weird when you write something and then God teaches you what it means--or puts it to good use--later.

it's a song (of course it is).