Remembering

Dinner Guest

You know that familiar icebreaker? If you could create your perfect dinner party, who would you invite to be the guests? Your response might be something like Andrew Carnagie, Bill Gates, Oprah Winfrey, and Jimmy Carter (Okay, maybe not...). Well, a few years ago I had the opportunity to share a meal with one on my "dream" guest list before I even knew who he was.

A last-minute invitation to a local concert led me to share a table, a chicken casserole, and a conversation with singer/songwriter Andrew Peterson. As my friend and I waited for him to conclude his pre-concert soundcheck, I perused the merchandise table and realized I wasn't prepared for the coming encounter at all. However, Peterson was immensly kind, utterly humble, and deeply down to earth.

Dinner led to my first Peterson concert, which wowed me and wooed me and left me feeling filled and hungry at the same time. One concert has now led to five, and I know I am not alone. I know that he has many devoted fans who cherish any opportunity to see him perform live. I count myself among them.

What is it about Peterson's music that captures me so? Well, he may not look like the two artists I've celebrated in the prior two posts (give him 40 or so more years), but he has the same wise soul, the spirit of a storyteller, and the ability to awaken through his art.

He seems to share the lens through which I try to see the world: everything is spiritual. And he explores and reasons and wrestles and celebrates in his music in ways that leave me thinking, rejoicing, and agreeing with a wholehearted and hopeful "Yes!"

Just as I can gaze upon a work by Wyeth or ponder a powerful sentence of Berry with a silence and stillness that not many artists invite me into, I can enter into such a place with the music of Andrew Peterson. It invites me to live this line from Wendell Berry: "For a time, I rest in the grace of the world, and am free."

Storytelling

Since I paid homage yesterday to one of the visual artists who deeply moves me, it seems fitting to continue in that vein by sharing a dearly loved writer. How to begin to explain the power of Wendell Berry's writing? Berry is a writer among writers...nonfiction, fiction, poetry. He writes it all. His fiction happens to be where my devotion lies.

Berry's own notice at the start of his novel Jayber Crow preludes his no-nonsense, tell-it-like-it-is style (shown above). Just from this short passage, I can imagine conversing with this grandfatherly gentleman. And the words that would fall from his lips would be as rich and deep as the soil we would be walking on (because of course we'd be ambling across a fallow pasture on the outskirts of Port William...hopefully to sit a spell with Burley Coulter).

 

In his fiction, Berry creates a world (the town of Port William) and its inhabitants. He weaves together a community and a geneology and a history that will leave you knowing them, loving them, cheering for them, grieving with them. His writing is deceptively simple and straightforward, and simple sentences render the reader speechless with their power and beauty.

Port William reminds me of the small Southern town where I grew up. One where agriculture and family and community once shaped life. Berry is deeply devoted to the land, to community, to stewardship, and he both captures this fading world and communicates the beauty of it in his work.

Somethings wells in me when I read Berry's work. The same feeling I get when I pass through my hometown and see strip malls sprung up where pastures formerly spread. When we drive into the country where family farmland is now a golf course. As family names that stretched back generations fade from memory.

Thank goodness...In the works of Wendell Berry the best of this world is preserved.

Perspective

Art, music, and the written word have a power to evoke memories, stir the soul, and prick the heart like perhaps nothing else. Among my favorite artists is Andrew Wyeth. I remember as a young adult coming to an awareness of how his paintings and drawings affected me. And I continue to find myself mesmerized by both his technique and his vision.

One thing that compels me about his work is his perspective. So often his paintings show so much more than what is actually on the canvas. It's what is just out of sight that intrigues me. I'm drawn into the moment, into the scene, and ready to turn the corner, glance out the window, or step through the open doorway.

He said about his work, "It's a moment that I'm after, a fleeting moment, but not a frozen moment." I love this idea of a glimmering, passing moment captured on the canvas...a seemingly ordinary scene takes on a transcendent quality. It seems to communicate that nothing is ordinary and every moment, glance, and landscape is worth notice.

Andrew Wyeth (pictured above) died in 2009 at the age of 91. It's interesting to consider the work of his father, N.C. Wyeth, a famous illustrator, and his son, Jamie Wyeth, a realist painter, and to ponder the perspectives of three generations as revealed in their art.

It evokes the question, whether an artist or not, how do you see the world? If unsure, consider the art that captures you...perhaps you have a similar vision? I think my perspective echoes Wyeth's - a sense of expectancy, a recognition of beauty in what seems ordinary, and an appreciation of quiet moments.

Distraction

How much of your life is predetermined by lists, and how often do you go to God and ask "Lord, today what would you have me do?" Even if all of the stuff in our life is "good stuff," how often do we ask God if He wants us involved in something?

Today as I spent a blissful Saturday morning sipping chai and catching up on podcasts by Ransomed Heart, I ran into one titled "Distraction." And it felt like I literally ran into it - BAM! They nailed me with questions like the ones posed above.

In fact, just yesterday I was pondering this very issue when I found myself overcommitted and overwhelmed. Yes, I was doing all good things, but I was filled with dread, worry, and self-loathing because I had lacked the courage to say no. And I certainly did not consider how God would have me invest my time and attention.

I know I am not alone. I mean, how often do we say yes because it is seems like the "right thing" to do (i.e. "Yes, I'll be the room mom...I will sew those costumes...I will chaperone the youth trip). How often do we add and add and add to our To-Do list until it outnumbers the hours in the day? How often do we consider others (and their opinions of us) when we commit rather than considering God (and how and where He calls us to invest our time, gifts, and heart)?

Also, how indulgent does a little downtime feel? Time sipping a cup of coffee without catching up on e-mails...taking a walk without pushing yourself for calorie burn...listening to music without folding laundry...driving down the road without returning phone calls...reading a book simply for the pleasure of it. Do we ever consider what our heart needs and how saying "no" to other things opens up space for us to say "yes" to God?

John Eldredge and Craig McConnell, who were speaking on this podcast, discuss this compulsion we have toward busyness. They explain, "Busyness can make you feel important...however, it is the substitute for meaning. It does not equal fruitfulness, meaning, or significance."

What's the answer in a time when the Spirit of the Age seems to be busyness? John and Craig offer this insight: "The core issue is walking with God. Learn to pause and ask God, 'Lord, what do you want me to do?'" The devotional book I am following for Lent develops this idea:

Talk with Me about every aspect of your day...Remember that your ultimate goal is not to control or fix everything around you; it is to keep communing with Me. A successful day is one in which you have stayed in touch with Me, even if many things remain undone at the end of the day. Do not let your to-do list (written or mental) become an idol directing your life. Instead, ask My Spirit to guide you moment by moment. He will keep you close to Me. (40 Days With Jesus by Sarah Young)

The core issue here isn't what we accomplish or fail to accomplish (whether that means chores, work, volunteering, or ministry). It's the issue of abiding. Abiding in Christ. Walking with God. Listening for His voice, and walking in obedience. From there, we can give from a cup that overflows...not from an empty vessel cracked and drained.

Storm Clouds

Fear comes in all shapes and sizes. For many, fear comes in the shape of dark clouds and with the sound of thunder. Thankfully I don't have a fear of storms (but believe me, I have plenty of others). Unfortunately for my friends with a fear of storms, today was a challenging day. We had the threat of severe thunderstorms and tornadoes all day and into the night.

I was substituting at the front desk of my son's elementary school, which is a busy place to be on a stormy day. The weather radio periodically sounded its ominous warning to update us about the storm's path. My computer screen flashed with the radar tracking the storm's movement. And my phone continually rang with concerned parents calling in hopes of an early dismissal.

At one point, when a tornado warning was issued for our area, the children filed out into the hallway to assume their tornado-drill position. They crouched silently against the concrete block walls and waited. Trust me, that's the quietest these 400 students had been all week. It was an eerie time, all waiting silently for the storm to either go around or pass over...but we had no idea which it would be.

This afternoon we were fortunate that the storms moved around us. The children returned to their classes, the noise resumed, and afternoon pick-up proceeded like every other day. However, for those who had been grappling with fears that run deep during the storm, their hearts echoed what one second grader told me after the drill. With a solemn face and a small voice, he peered over my desk and declared unhappily, "That was intense."

Yes, little friend, it was.

On a Journey

This year my church, Providence, set out on something called The Journey. It emphasizes reading through the Bible in a year, praying deliberately, giving to Kingdom causes, connecting in community, and missioning either here or abroad one week this year. If this sounds familiar to you that's probably because it was inspired by the Radical Experiment at The Church at Brook Hills in Birmingham (and made known by David Platt's book by the same title).

One particular aspect of The Journey that I am enjoying is the Bible reading. I must confess that though I've been a Christian for 35 years, I have never read the Bible from cover to cover. Perhaps I've read it all in a hop-skip-jump fashion, but now that I've just completed Leviticus I tend to doubt it. It is solely the Holy Spirit's motivation and the accountability of my church family, who are reading along too, that will keep me from skipping chapters like Leviticus 14 and 15.

As I read through the first five books (Genesis, Job, Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers...we are reading chronologically), I'm excited to see The Story unfold from beginning to end in my reading. From years of Sunday school, Bible study, and sermons, I feel like I know it fairly well. However, I am already experiencing the text and understanding the unfolding of the drama with fresh eyes and an expectant heart.

As I embark on this journey through the Word, I consider my prior experience with it. Sally Lloyd-Jones, author of The Jesus Storybook Bible, writes,

[There] are children in Sunday schools who know the Bible stories and probably all the right answers, and yet they have somehow missed the most important thing of all. They have missed what the Bible is all about. They are children like I once was. As a child, even though I was a Christian, I grew up thinking the Bible was filled with rules you had to keep (or God wouldn't love you) and with heroes setting examples you had to follow (or God wouldn't love you).

Her words resonate deeply with me. It was well into my adult years that I came to understand the Bible as something more. That I came to discover the Word of God was alive and active (Heb. 4:12) and desiring to shape more than my behavior but mold my heart.

Instructions and exhortations aren't enough to bring about the change. No, it's the Storyteller and The Story he is telling. Lloyd-Jones goes on to write:

When we drill a Bible story down into a moral lesson, we make it all about us. But the Bible isn't mainly about us, and what we are supposed to be doing - it's about God, and what he has done! When we tie up the story in a nice neat little package, and answer all the questions, we leave no room for mystery. Or discovery. We leave no room for the child. No room for God. And that's why I wrote The Jesus Storybook Bible. So children could know what I didn't:

• That the Bible isn't mainly about me, and what I should be doing. It's about God and what he has done.
• That the Bible is most of all a story - the story of how God loves his children and comes to rescue them.
• That - in spite of everything, no matter what, whatever it cost him - God won't ever stop loving his children...with a wonderful, Never Stopping, Never Giving Up, Unbreaking, Always and Forever Love.

Of course, we are instructed, "Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says" (James 1:22). However, I believe our obedience is radiant and displays the glory of God only when it flows from a heart of love rather than a display of duty.