Trains, Pigs and Autocorrect

My Bible in a year thing is kind of going to plan. In that the plan is still there. And with a month left to go, I am just under a month behind- so I should be finished by the end of February next year. Except by then I'll need to start again and repeat the exercise and actually concentrate on the minor prophets this time as they've all been a bit of a blur. And the Kings. Aside from David (good) and Ahab (bad) I'm having trouble remembering who's who and what side they were on.

Anyway. I am loving the Psalms. They are so raw and intense and full of honesty. There's celebration, tears, laughter and complaining, the whole spectrum of human emotion- sometimes even within the one Psalm. Read this a while ago (this whole thing has been stuck in a draft for ages- but at that point I was less than half the year in and The Plan had a far higher chance of going awry)...

Psalm 25
Show me your ways, Lord,
teach me your paths.
Guide me in your truth and teach me,
for you are God my Saviour,
and my hope is in you all day long.

Teach me your paths (vs 4)
Isn't that cool? God's plans are multiple and varied and there's almost always more than one way of doing things. And actually, even if we screw up, God remains God and can autocorrect as we go, making sense of chaos and tweaking a million different background details so the trajectory of our lives remains within the parameters of his will and the ultimate destination is still reached. We just get to where we're going a different way with a different assortment (or greater volume) of baggage. Like Gwytheth Paltrow in Sliding Doors - if we ignore the haircut and the minor detail that she ends up dead in one universe and not in the other and instead focus on the way that she ends up with John Hannah whichever train she catches.

So... if a cosmic-wide autocorrect is in progress, then one day life will make sense. If God's working through the mess and chaos of the planet, compensating for and redeeming bad choices (some made before we even got here) in a million seen and unseen ways- then this should relieve the burden on us a little bit.

• Perhaps the years between cradle and grave will ultimately be quantified in some other way, rather than the sum of our achievements
• Maybe it's more about how and why we do what we do rather than what
• More about our conduct within a situation rather than the situation itself
• More about motivation than action
• More about how we deal with success and loss rather than what we did to get the success in the first place - and what we would compromise on in order to keep it
• More about stewarding than owning

Either that or the Hokey Cokey really IS what it's all about.
In which case we are all screwed.
But I doubt this very much.
Just consider the lilies of the fields, the birds of the air or bacon.

Facedown

Have recently started this Bible in a year plan, as I've never read through the whole book before. I've attempted it on a few occasions but always got bogged down among bloody animals or a minor prophet.

Am really enjoying it this time. The readings are divided up into chunks from different sections so we hop around a bit. There's stuff in there that I'm reading for the very first time, things I vaguely remember from ages ago but have forgotten the details of, stories I am very familiar with and enjoy reading again and again and other things that confuse me so I end up googling them - like laws about compulsory side burns or avoiding sex during menstruation.

It's an eclectic book, really.

Anyway... from a few days ago:

Psalm 24:1-10
Who may ascend the mountain of the Lord?
Who may stand in his holy place?
The one who has clean hands and a pure heart,
who does not trust in an idol or swear by a false god.

Clean hands and a pure heart.
Who can live like this?!
Really and honestly?
No one will be on their feet in God's presence.
NO one.
We'll all be hitting the deck.
Face down.
Completely humbled and overwhelmed in the proximity of holiness that hurts the eyes.

Will it be like the scene in Goldfinger where the plane flies overhead releasing nerve gas and all the soldiers below collapse to the ground as one?

Or the fainting goats - who don't actually faint but their muscles lock up when startled and they keel over and become temporarily paralysed.

I picture the whole of humanity collapsing like narcoleptics. All of us dropping like startled goats or poisoned soldiers.

Some intentionally- the ones who have loved Jesus on earth. Those who are excited and welcome his return. Sheep who know and love the shepherd.

There will be others though- who are hard of heart and refuse to acknowledge his authority- or maybe even any higher power beyond what our limited senses can know and touch and see. 

It doesn't matter- physiologically we are all the same: our muscles will seize in his presence and we will HAVE to fall to the ground and assume a position of worship anyway. Facedown, we will all look the same.

Oh dear God. Then you will separate the sheep who follow you willingly from the paralysed goats who are only bowing because their created muscles and tendons honour your presence even if the goats themselves don't.

This is sobering, frightening and thrilling all at the same time.

And makes me question all the time I waste blogging...

Being quiet

I am at a church leaders meeting where we have an hour just to be with God and have no demands or interruptions. I didn't read the email properly and am unprepared. I have no phone, Bible, nothing. And a million thoughts in my head as normal. Drat. Everyone in the room is ready for this and we're off. OK. Start somewhere. Start with the thing Martin just said. Streams. Being refreshed. Being thirsty. I am thirsty actually. Water is fantastic stuff. Without it we would all be dead in 3 days and it just falls from the sky as a gift. Thank you God. I love water. There are a ton of verses about that. I've read them. I want to read them again. I have no Bible though. Ah but K has his phone. And he's not using it. I'll wander over like this. I'll gently try to take it and raise my eyebrows when his eyes meet mine so he knows I'm asking for it and he says YES you can have my phone. Thank you, I love you. I launch the Bible app and find verse after verse after verse about water and all other kinds of stuff. It's a goldmine in here! Read. Pray. Read. Pray. Read. Pray. And scribble like a woman possessed on the prayer wall. Scriptures, illustrations and song lyrics from ages ago that probably no one but K will recognise. Pray. Scribble. Read. Scribble. Pray. Read. Pray. Pray. Pray. God is real and he's here. Yay! And now K needs his phone back. And the background music has stopped. And there is silence. And more silence. And no Bible- paper or digital. And nothing in my long term memory. How is that possible? I know there are memorised verses there somewhere. It must be a short circuit due to the panic of trying to find them. Like trying to find your keys when you're late for school. Why don't I read the Bible more? And why don't the bits I do read sink down into my brain and allow themselves to be remembered when I need to refer to them? I need the Bible. I need it need it need it. It's just too quiet now. Everyone else is praying or reading or scribbling on the wall I've just moved away from and comfortable with all of this and I'm struggling with the no music and no Bible. There must be one round here somewhere. 
Ah you want to read the Bible now then, do you?
Well yes, I do. 
How badly?
Really really badly.
You have one at home.
Yes I know.
More than one actually.
Yes... (I know what's coming next)
And you didn't read it this morning did you?
Yes I know. You know too- me and mornings...?
And how about after the second cup of tea that woke you up?
I kind of got busy with work.
I have work too y'know.
Yes, but-
And I have more to do than you do.
Ah of course. Good point - well made.
There's probably a Bible over there- in the youth room.
Thanks God.

Books books books

Our 3 kids couldn't be more different. You hear people saying it again and again but it's really true- use the same biological building blocks to create new life, donated by the same two parents, raise the products in the same household applying the same principles and you will get very different small people. Our household is no exception to this universal law and here's my favourite example: Reading.

I vividly remember when our eldest realised that the tiny random squiggles on a page of paper actually meant something. He was 2 years old and far too young to appreciate ‘The owl who was afraid of the dark’ (my favourite book from childhood which had made its way onto his bookshelf in a dog-eared-held-together-by-Sellotape kind of condition). He pulled it off the shelf and asked me to read to him.

After a brief but useless explanation that he wouldn't understand it we snuggled down together and began to read. I moved my finger below each word as usual but only got to the end of the first paragraph. Eldest was awestruck. He was giggling and pointing his finger at the words too, alternating between looking at me then the page, and bouncing up and down on his knees in excitement.

He had no clue what I was saying. He didn't appreciate Plop's predicament or understand that the little owl was in considerable distress (and therefore a jovial response was somewhat inappropriate).

But he had discovered something new: the words coming out of my mouth (whatever they were) were intrinsically linked to the book I was holding. In fact, the words were also quite probably connected to my finger that continued to move across the page as I spoke.

Eldest child LOVED this discovery and took over the bedtime reading himself. For the next 10 minutes he babbled, pointed and laughed his way through Plop's stilted conversation with his owl parents and, stopping to turn the page occasionally, told me of their helpless frustration at parenting their fearful little barn owl and their worries for his future in owl world.

Even before starting school eldest child quickly latched onto the simple phonetic rules and applied them constantly- often stopping without warning in the street to spell out N-E-X-T, or C-O-S-T-A, then squeal as I rammed him up the ankles with the buggy as I'd not anticipated the emergency stop in time.

These incidents predicted that eldest child would prefer a mechanical, formulaic approach to reading which has proven true- both for reading and lots of other things too. The principle transfers seamlessly to other situations:

• c + a + t = cat

• 1 + 1 = 2

• Take crisps and juice into soft play area = We leave the soft play area. Immediately.

• Sit on baby until he turns red = Make mum go red and shouty and find yourself swiftly transferred to naughty step

Eldest child has thrived with this kind of learning and quickly got the rules. Educational people have probably got a name for it. It’s the kind of method that favours structure and predictable results- where effect is always due to cause. It's safe and constant and has boundaries that he understands and can function within.

For this reason he picked up reading really quickly and was free-reading reasonably complicated books by year 2. However, the flip side of this approach was a loss of engagement with the text. He could read stuff but not necessarily enjoy it. He would often race through his reading homework in record time, but on asking him what the story meant, he’d struggle to explain then become annoyed. Wasn't the primary goal to simply read the thing as accurately and quickly as possible, then move onto the next thing. Comprehension? Well that’s just unnecessary.

Cue child 2. Child 2 is very different from child 1. Child 2 has always loved books and stories and TV. Child 2 enjoys the story for the story’s sake and gets soooo excited by the cliff hangers at the end of The Famous 5 chapters that he’s been known to do handstands.

According to the universal law, Child 2 also has a very different approach to reading. And learning. And life. For him:

• c + a + t does not necessarily = Cat

• 1 + 1 may not always =2

If we dialogue about these things and I prove to him that they are true, he will accept them. But only after he has challenged them and I have proven them worthy. (For this reason Child 2 was a very interesting toddler…)

Child 2 also hated me pointing to individual words as I read to him, which took a lot of adjustment for me after the hours of pointing and reading I had shared with eldest child. For Child 2, the story’s primary purpose is to entertain and be enjoyed. Thinking about the elements that create the words only distract from the narrative and should therefore be avoided.

For a long time this was a bit of a struggle and I couldn’t quite get how a child who loved stories so much could be so reluctant to read for himself. He also spent a lot of time batting my finger away from the page sighing ‘NO mummy, just read it!’

At school Child 2 has progressed more slowly with reading. And compared to the freight-train approach of eldest child, reading with him takes forever- because we must discuss every picture in great detail. (Why do I think the tent in the story is red and not blue? Do I remember the blue tent we used to have? It was a bigger tent than this one, wasn’t it? But I seem to remember that ours leaked- is that right? What happened to that tent anyway? etc etc).

I can learn a lot about my own approach to stuff by looking at my kids.

I do life like Child 2. I spend time on people detail and piecing together the little bits that I know to make a whole. I love the connections I can help make happen between people and projects and enjoy watching events unfold without necessarily having a long term goal. Technicalities like sorting the broadband and arguing with the sky people who promised us xxGB? That's my husband's sphere.

And I approach cooking in eldest child mode- it’s a means to an end and should take as little time as possible. In fact, if someone else wants to do it so I can play with tidy up the lego, then they are very welcome.

I also approach my relationship with God in a cutting the corners kind of way. I recently heard the learning approaches being applied to the Bible- as there is more than one way to read that too. Rush through it to get it done and tick the box for today, or slow down and make space for God to speak to you. Don’t just read- engage with your creator and expect him to respond. Enjoy the journey rather than racing ahead to the destination. There are no shortcuts to spiritual maturity (unfortunately).

So am working on this. But so far today, have spend endless hours creating this blog (do you like it??) and not read my Bible AT ALL. I have a long way to go.