Different worlds
Well... a post a day didn't come over, did it. It is a bit of a struggle simply to write this blog, let alone really think through the whole Lent thing. Since my last post we've had the
CotC weekend away. We had a few talks/discussion on some of the parables of Jesus concerning the Kingdom of God.
We are too quick to portray God's Kingdom as some kind of club that you can join if you pay the membership fees (certain beliefs, going to church etc.), but inclusion not exclusion is the coup. Everyone's in unless they turn it down. I like that idea; it really is Good News.
There's a bit more thought needed on my part but I'm becoming a fan of this positive Christian message! There's too little of it in the world.
Maybe I'm just older: things aren't so black and white any more (although I still firmly believe that there are 'true' things, like the bible for instance). Perspective and experience are important to understanding and to faith. I love this picture by Escher; it is blatantly not about this but I was reminded of it because of the 'three worlds in one' aspect.
Life in Cold Blood
It would be morally unsound to let the first installment of
Life in Cold Blood pass unmentioned.
Sir David Attenborough.
Legend.
Old Hat
Hold yer horses!
Selflessness, seeking God, compassion for others - following Christ's example. What a great idea... I think I'll call it 'Christianity'.
I'm still not sure how Lent will be 'different' from what I expect of myself as a Christian on any other day.
I guess the fact of the matter is that these things are GOOD. Perhaps Lent is the time where we can rethink them, dwell on them, renew our decision to be disciples of Christ. Repentance - the real definition of the word. Today is Ash Wednesday; an apt time to remember the importance of repentance perhaps.
I'm beginning to think that maybe I do need some kind of physical aspect to this in order to get focused?
Extreme Pilgrim
The BBC recently aired a series called
Extreme Pilgrim. I caught the last episode: Peter Owen-Jones (yep, a long-haired vicar) spent a few weeks living in a cave in the Egyptian desert where St Anthony set up shop (and invented Christian monasticism in the process). Owen-Jones's aim was to investigate how we can reclaim a spirituality of the heart where often, in the English church and the CofE in particular, we know only a spirituality of the head. It was a pretty amazing process as, suddenly alone and isolated, he went through various states physically and mentally: exhaustion, absolute terror, illness, boredom and unending and often unanswerable questions. I think it was a positive thing in the end, though - it would be good to ask him.
How do I 'do' Lent without being an Extreme Pilgrim? It wouldn't really be fair on my wife and daughter if I went to live in a cave in the desert (although there are no doubt times they'd be fairly chuffed with the idea).
I was mulling over this question on the way into work this morning and ended up making a mental list of all the things I could give up/deprive myself of/commit to doing in order to feel as though I was actually accomplishing something rather than just thinking about it. It felt like a cop out: I want to be thinking and doing something that has some kind of external 'kingdom-building' effect. Ambitious!
I then spent a rather long and depressing day at work.
'Mulling it over' was getting rather boring by the time I was on my way home this evening. Sitting on the tube I watched a woman with some shopping get on. I had the usual 'shall I get up or not' quandary but she wasn't old, pregnant or disabled so I figured she could wait until someone got up at the next stop. Then I had a thought: I make a hundred (a thousand?) mini decisions every day that revolve around my self. Not just the cliche of giving someone your seat on the tube but a myriad of different situations - some seemingly important like what I do with my money or whether I swear at people when driving, but often issues that are much more subtle and that I may not even notice.
We're so immersed in our 'culture of self' that all things have to conform with our view of who we are and our plans. Despite knowing this to be true I am daunted by the prospect of conquering it: even noticing half the choices I make that are self-centered is pretty tough-going. My hope is that God will begin to point them out.
So that is my part-formed Lent plan but it does rather rely on some divine intervention. That's good though; working on it together will be much more exciting.
I didn't get up for the woman with the shopping but as she sat next to me she smacked me in the kneecaps with her bags. So we're all square.
Lent
I've never bothered with Lent. To be frank, I've never really seen much point... and I've never really wanted to give anything up, more honestly.
But thinking about it this morning at
CotC I was struck by how Lent should be a positive time; a time of 'realignment' if you like; a time of choosing freedom over slavery. I'm not quite clear on what that means yet but I feel invigorated by the idea of leaving my
self behind and focusing on God.
I'm hoping that dwelling on how this works before Wednesday will set me up for forty days of relationship building: with God, with others and with myself. On the whole I tend to be an 'all mouth and no trousers' kind of person, so I'm going to have to think about what will be different in the forty days of Lent that will really mean something. The plan is that this blog will be a record of my meditations (slightly pretentious way of describing it, but the word fits), successes, epiphanies, joys and - importantly, because I want this to be an honest record of an imperfect man - failures and 'down' times.
The whole idea is to cease trying to be God and start deferring to the real one, so honesty not false holiness is the name of the game - so this may not amount to a hill of beans. We'll see.
New look
I've spent most of the afternoon sorting my website out. Take a butcher's hook at
statmatt.com for the beginnings of the main page - it's only really some links to this blog and my photos on Flickr (take a look) at the moment, but hopefully I'll put some more on there at some point; I quite like the simplicity of it at the moment, so not sure how that will pan out.
Most updates will turn up on this blog. I've got some idea of what to post over the next few weeks so it should all begin soon. I'll try to update daily so this doesn't get too boring. My iPhone should prove handy with that (loving it!).
That's it; just a brief intro to the New Look.
After a short intermission...
there will be a relaunch of statmatt.
