Category: Uncategorized

Upon a Midnight Clear

On By Charis PsalloIn Mountains, Photography, Sky, Uncategorized2 Comments

IMG_0465 steeples moon ch

Yet with the woes of sin and strife The world has suffered long; Beneath the angel strain have rolled Two thousand years of wrong; And man, at war with man, hears not The love-song which they bring; O hush the noise, ye men of strife And hear the angels sing.

And ye, beneath life’s crushing load, Whose forms are bending low, Who toil along the climbing way With painful steps and slow, Look now! for glad and golden hours Come swiftly on the wing. O rest beside the weary road, And hear the angels sing!

For lo! the days are hastening on, By prophet-bards foretold, When with the ever circling years Comes round the age of gold; When peace shall over all the earth Its ancient splendors fling, And the whole world send back the song Which now the angels sing.

 

-from “It Came Upon a Midnight Clear” by Marcus Tidmarsh

May the Peace of Christ be with you today and always!

And a very special blessing to a friend of Jesus (and friend of mine) who, just this week, donated a kidney to someone she doesn’t even know. Many, many blessings on you!!!! You are already famous in heaven!

Rise Up. Go.

On By Charis PsalloIn Mountains, Photography, Uncategorized, Water, Winter4 Comments
On Track
On Track

I would like to know the eternal repercussions of every decision before I make it. I want to figure out every possible permutation and be prepared for it. (Maybe that explains my tendency to pack too much.) Change is not easy for those of us reluctant to let go of the past before we grab on to the future.

Sometimes, when we pay attention, we can hear the promptings of Holy Spirit, but then we want a complete itinerary -with an accompanying accurate weather report. Sometimes the only instruction He gives is, “Move. Get out of the driveway.”

Train engineers don’t need to worry about the myriad of options laying before them at every turn. It’s pretty much a matter of go, stop, pull over and rest and go again. They can trust that the tracks ahead of them will take them where they need to go and switches will be prepared for them. The train in this photo is on it way through the historic Crowsnest Pass. (That’s Crowsnest Mountain peaking around the corner there.) It makes provision for wheat and other commodities from the rich bread basket of the Canadian prairies to be shipped to the port on the Pacific Ocean. It’s path has been clearly laid. The train doesn’t need to forge new trails. It needs merely to start moving and follow the two lines of steel before it.

The story of Christ’s birth includes so many angelic interventions. It seems as if the information they gave was on a need-to-know basis. Different people had different parts of the story. In hindsight we can see the marvelous plan laid our from the beginning of time, but most people only had little bits of it to work with at the time. For some, the message was simply, “Go.” Joseph learned the importance of paying attention to God’s timing. His job was to protect the young woman who carried the most important message in the world. That’s why God chose a man who would listen and act on a message in a dream. He needed someone who knew how to trust.

Trustworthy people know how to trust.

When we trust God to lead us we can trust Him to have made a way for us before we get there. When He says go, we go. When He says stop, we stop. Good enough.

But first we need to leave the comforts of the familiar and  move. Rise up. Go.

Trust God from the bottom of your heart;

don’t try to figure out everything on your own.

Listen for God’s voice in everything you do, everywhere you go;

he’s the one who will keep you on track. (Proverbs 3:5,6 The Message)

What Can I Give Him?

On By Charis PsalloIn Music, Photography, Uncategorized, Winter3 Comments

DSC_0180 kin park snow

In the bleak midwinter, frosty wind made moan,
Earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone;
Snow had fallen, snow on snow, snow on snow,
In the bleak midwinter, long ago.

Our God, heaven cannot hold Him, nor earth sustain;
Heaven and earth shall flee away when He comes to reign.
In the bleak midwinter a stable place sufficed
The Lord God Almighty, Jesus Christ.

Enough for Him, Whom cherubim, worship night and day,
Breastful of milk, and a mangerful of hay;
Enough for Him, Whom angels fall before,
The ox and ass and camel which adore.

Angels and archangels may have gathered there,
Cherubim and seraphim thronged the air;
But His mother only, in her maiden bliss,
Worshipped the beloved with a kiss.

What can I give Him, poor as I am?
If I were a shepherd, I would bring a lamb;
If I were a Wise Man, I would do my part;
Yet what I can I give Him… give my heart.

-Christina Rossetti

God Keep You Joyful, People

On By Charis PsalloIn Music, Photography, Uncategorized, Winter8 Comments

Let nothing steal your hope.

IMG_5912 mountain ash berries

I have older friends who refuse to use computers.

“They make me feel stupid,” said one person (she who managed to ace a statistics course after one weekend of cramming since her shift schedule conflicted with actually attending lectures.) “It’s the words. They have been hijacked by computer geeks with odd senses of humour to mean something completely different from what they meant before. If they had used new words I could have learned them, but no, now I have to un-learn the old meanings and assign new ones. It’s too much work. Give me a typewriter and some ribbon.”

I grew up with archaic English. My mother learned English from reading Charles Dickens novels her teacher gave her. Living on an isolated prairie farm where everyone in the area spoke the same dialect of German, she didn’t realize Canadians didn’t speak in Victorian English. As she later said, “It behooves one to attend to tales at tea time.”

I grew up in a church that used only “The Authorized Version” of the Bible. (I thought that meant that God Himself had authorized it, not just a political figure.) I was encouraged (forced and coerced) to memorized large passages of scripture with Thees and Thous and hasts and words ending in eth. I do appreciate the beauty and poetry of the language. (I’m still a big fan of Shakespeare and the metaphysical poets too.) It’s cadence plays like music in my head and like He promised to do, Holy Spirit often brings to remembrance reminds me of verses I have read, and they come in that language. But I need to translate them for people who don’t have my background. Often familiar words in that translation have different meanings -awful, and terrible for example. And the formal and familiar forms of Thee/You are actually the opposite of what many people think. (Thee/Thou was used between family and close friends. You was used for authority figures.)

Some of the old Christmas carols need translating as well. God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen doesn’t necessarily mean that guys need to take a break from joking around. For one thing, it needs a little punctuation in the form of a comma after the word merry. Rest is an old word meaning to keep or let it be. Merry could mean something more than joyful, but joy was always contained in the word. Mankind and men have often been used generically for people in general for many years (the exclusion of women and children from person-hood is a topic for another day).

So the first lines of the song actually mean, God keep you joyful, people! Don’t allow anything to cause you to lose hope.

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We’ve hit one of those deep freeze weeks here. Well, actually the term deep freeze is misleading too, because it would have to warm up by about 20 degrees to be the temperature of a deep freeze. It is so tempting to be dismayed by cold and dark, but the bright red berries on the mountain ash tree outside my window sing themes of joy and hope in the midst of winter. Thank you, Lord, for red berries. They rest me merry.

IMG_5914 mountain ash 3

God rest ye merry,

gentlemen

Let nothing you dismay

Remember, Christ, our Saviour

Was born on Christmas day

To save us all from Satan’s power

When we were gone astray

O tidings of comfort and joy,

Comfort and joy

O tidings of comfort and joy

 

In Bethlehem, in Israel,

This blessed Babe was born

And laid within a manger

Upon this blessed morn

The which His Mother Mary

Did nothing take in scorn

O tidings of comfort and joy,

Comfort and joy

O tidings of comfort and joy

 

From God our Heavenly Father

A blessed Angel came;

And unto certain Shepherds

Brought tidings of the same:

How that in Bethlehem was born

The Son of God by Name.

O tidings of comfort and joy,

Comfort and joy

O tidings of comfort and joy

 

“Fear not then,” said the Angel,

“Let nothing you affright,

This day is born a Saviour

Of a pure Virgin bright,

To free all those who trust in Him

From Satan’s power and might.”

O tidings of comfort and joy,

Comfort and joy

O tidings of comfort and joy

 

The shepherds at those tidings

Rejoiced much in mind,

And left their flocks a-feeding

In tempest, storm and wind:

And went to Bethlehem straightway

The Son of God to find.

O tidings of comfort and joy,

Comfort and joy

O tidings of comfort and joy

 

And when they came to Bethlehem

Where our dear Saviour lay,

They found Him in a manger,

Where oxen feed on hay;

His Mother Mary kneeling down,

Unto the Lord did pray.

O tidings of comfort and joy,

Comfort and joy

O tidings of comfort and joy

 

Now to the Lord sing praises,

All you within this place,

And with true love and brotherhood

Each other now embrace;

This holy tide of Christmas

All other doth deface.

O tidings of comfort and joy,

Comfort and joy

O tidings of comfort and joy

 

The Only Praise That Will Ever Matter

On By Charis PsalloIn Uncategorized3 Comments

*His law is love and His gospel is peace*

mountain contrast

The word judgment is often burdened with an association to the concepts of condemnation and punishment. Sometimes judgment is about determining what is praise-worthy. Since only the Lord understands our deep motives and thoughts, and since we are easily manipulated by appearances, only He is qualified to judge.  It is the judge who awards the trophies -and His law is Love.

I think we may be surprised by what He chooses to praise in us.

“It makes little difference to me how you or any human court passes judgment on me. I even resist the temptation to compare myself to the ever-changing human standard. Although I am not aware of any flaw that might exclude me from this divine service, that’s not the reason I stand acquitted—the only supreme judge, our Lord, will examine me in the proper time. So resist the temptation to act as judges before all the evidence is in. When the Lord comes, He will draw our buried motives, thoughts, and deeds (even things we don’t know or admit to ourselves) out of the dark shadows of our hearts into His light. When this happens, the voice of God will speak to each of us the only praise that will ever matter.” (1 Corinthians 4:3-5 The Voice)

Prepare Him Room

On By Charis PsalloIn Man made, Mountains, Photography, Sky, Uncategorized7 Comments

*Let every heart prepare him room*airport mountain clouds IMG_5869

 

I do love to watch friends and family crowd the doors in the airport terminal building as they wait to embrace new arrivals. Yesterday at the airport I thought about the preparations needed for a plane to land. The ground is leveled, paved, and lit. Air traffic controllers, setting up various sensitive instruments, watch the skies. Airport workers clear the run-way, and prepare to move baggage carts, set wheel blocks, and at our little airport, get ready to secure stairs to the aircraft door.

I tried to imagine what people who populated this valley a hundred years ago would have thought if they saw a light in the sky grow bigger and move toward them in the clearing. Would they run toward it, or away from it?

I asked myself, “Self? If you saw something beyond your usual experience approaching, would you run toward it or away from it?

Honestly, I would probably yell, “Run away! Run away!” and head for a cave with wifi so I could research it.

I know some adventurous people who run toward new experiences. Sometimes it works well for them, and other times….   Still, I admire their fearlessness, their raw faith, and their willingness to risk making mistakes — and  honest admissions when they miss it.

Preparing room in our hearts and heads for the presence of God, whose thoughts are higher than our thoughts, whose ways are greater than our ways, who is there and is not silent, requires preparation. Making room sometimes requires bulldozing established forests of old ideas and creating a landing-place for something that hasn’t arrived yet.

The Advent season reminds us of a time when the world, tired of sinful darkness, waited in anticipation of something more. The prophets told them something more was coming, but it was difficult to comprehend what the Messiah would look like. The scholars of the day had clues in the Book, but they still got it completely wrong, and humility demands that we admit even though the Bible is central, trustworthy and sufficient, we might not have the complete interpretation either. Maybe the people who take the risk of running toward a deeper understanding of the nature and plans of God are just ones who are trying to prepare Him room.

Abba, may I anticipate your plans with the same enthusiasm.

Ask and Wait

On By Charis PsalloIn Uncategorized12 Comments

prairie dawn

I had a dream a few weeks ago.  I went to an A & W restaurant and ordered food for myself and friends at the counter. The girl said they would bring it to me when it was ready. Instead of tables and chairs, the restaurant had beds (hey, it was a dream). Since I felt tired I lay down and took a nap. It seemed like a long nap, but when my order was ready I got up and went to pay for it with a credit card. That’s when I discovered a $50 bill in my wallet I didn’t realize I had. It easily covered the cost.

An ordinary kind of dream, but I felt like I should pay attention, so I wrote it down in my dream journal. As I did I remembered that when I was a teenager, with a brand new driver’s license, my friends and I would borrow Daddy’s car and go to the drive-in where the car-hops wore brown and orange parkas – the A & W. We jokingly called it “The Ask and Wait,” although the service was probably faster than most other places. I made a note in my journal and promptly forgot about it, until a few days ago.

Right after this dream my dear friend suddenly became critically ill with a perforated ulcer (a hole in her stomach). She said it was the most painful thing she had ever experienced. I rushed back from Alberta to be with her. The first emergency surgery looked like a success, but it wasn’t. Instead of being released from hospital after a few days, she landed in ICU with complications and then found out, when she tried to eat some apple sauce, that the hole was still there. After several unpleasant invasive procedures the plan was to wait. So she waited. We prayed and she waited some more.

The hole was still there.  I felt so badly for her laying in bed, unable to eat, hooked up to I.V.s and various uncomfortable tubes, watching room mates arrive, recover and leave. Then I remembered the dream -ask and wait, and you might as well get a good rest while you’re waiting. So her friends and husband and I prayed and  asked the Lord for healing, and waited together, and learned to rest in God’s love. (She was better at it than I was, but I wasn’t sedated.)

Finally doctors proposed a more drastic surgery that would remove part of her stomach and intestine and scheduled another surgery. After it was postponed due to other emergencies with priority for the O.R., one of the specialists ordered another test to check on the size of the hole. This time the message was good: no hole found. It had closed “on its own.”

I think finding the $50 in my wallet was about finding unearned provision -God’s grace when we needed it.

Learning to rest in the middle of trouble is not a natural response for me -nor is shouting for joy. My upbringing valued decorum more highly than emotional expression. I’m more likely to fold my program into smaller and smaller squares at an exciting sports event than I am to actually cheer out loud. My friend’s Norwegian reserve is even greater than my Anglo/Germanic decorum (although I have seen her dance in the aisles on occasion) but we celebrated with shouts of joy that would not disturb the patient in the next bed -and gave thanks on American Thanksgiving with a feast of blue jello.

Thank you, Lord!

Permit me some joyful cyber-shouting: GOD IS GOOD!!!!!

One generation commends your works to another;

they tell of your mighty acts.

They speak of the glorious splendor of your majesty—

and I will meditate on your wonderful works.

They tell of the power of your awesome works—

and I will proclaim your great deeds.

They celebrate your abundant goodness

and joyfully sing of your righteousness.

(Psalm 145:4-7)

Ask and wait. He is faithful.

Thanks for What?

On By Charis PsalloIn Uncategorized4 Comments

plants ice 046

I’ll be honest, winter has always been a tough time for me. It’s like I feel grief for the flowers and trees that drop their dying leaves and petals. It seems, especially on overcast days, that all the colour has been sucked out of the world. I tend to stay inside on days like this, trying not to be envious of places that know perpetual summer. I know the winter is an essential part of the ecosystem, and snow can be pretty, but my flowers are dead, and I am sad.

When I was a kid I was taught to recite the verse that says, “In everything gives thanks for this is the will of God concerning you.” They told me that every bad thing that happened was God’s will for me. For many years I tried to bear pain and shame because I thought this is the life God chose for me, this is my cross to bear. Frankly it left me feeling more like God’s victim than his beloved child.

There are religious systems in the world that teach that everything that happens is fate doled out by god or gods, or is the result of punishment earned by sins in a former life. Some go so far as to teach that trying to raise yourself out of poverty by getting a better education, for example, is wrong because it does not accept fate. How can we pray for ourselves, or for others, when we call illness and poverty and broken hearts “God’s will?” How can we risk change or compassion when it appears God himself lacks compassion?IMG_5835 winter flower 2

I have found that when something seems like an insurmountable obstacle, it is wise to back up and see the bigger picture. In this case I needed to back up and see the bigger context of the passage this verse came from. I looked it up in several translations. Many made it clearer that “this” referred to more than “everything.” The Phillips version:

Live together in peace, and our instruction to this end is to reprimand the unruly, encourage the timid, help the weak and be very patient with all men. Be sure that no one repays a bad turn by a bad turn; good should be your objective always, among yourselves and in the world at large. Be happy in your faith at all times. Never stop praying. Be thankful, whatever the circumstances may be. If you follow this advice you will be working out the will of God expressed to you in Jesus Christ. (1 Thessalonians 5:13b-18)

So what is the will of God?

Live together in peace

Reprimand the unruly (patiently)

Encourage the timid

Help the weak

Be very patient with all people

Help each other not to return a bad turn for a bad turn

Make goodness your objective

Be happy in your faith

Never stop praying

Be thankful whatever your circumstance (there is always something to be thankful for)

So the will of God is not degenerative bone disease, or rebellious children, or financial devastation, but a way of life that brings about change from the inside out.

See the bigger picture. Back up and look at scripture in context. If some verses appear to contradict the character of God, and who he has revealed himself to be through Christ Jesus (who said “If you have seen me you have seen the Father,) then it is worth searching the scriptures for their setting. In this case it is inconsistent with the character of God to ask his beloved children to thank him for everything evil thing that happens to them. He says we can be thankful in every circumstance though.

There is something about being in Christ Jesus that gives us the strength to have a thankful attitude and look for hope in the middle of a mess, knowing God has a solution for every problem, and invites us to ask him for it.

Thankfulness is a mindfulness of the love and goodness of God, even when our circumstances are dismal, even when winter hides the dormant flowers.

Thankfulness allows us to walk by faith and not by sight. Thankfulness facilitates change; it reminds us that Jesus said he came to destroy the works of the devil, not glorify them.

day lilies pink rain drops flowers DSC_0094

See the Big Picture

On By Charis PsalloIn Black and white, Fields, Mountains, Photography, Sky, Uncategorized4 Comments

 

IMG_5692 Black Diamond hay mtnThere is something about this area on the Cowboy Trail in Southern Alberta that seems to catch my attention every time I drive through it. This photo was taken in the area between Longview and Black Diamond. So many times the sun burst through the clouds in a dramatic eye-catching display just as I approached Longview that one day I jokingly said to the Lord, “Are you saying something here?”  Immediately I got that “pay attention” feeling. Then it came to me -Longview -long view. Take the l-o-n-g view. See the big picture.

Sometimes we are so swamped in the dailiness of life it is difficult to see the big picture. Many of us, like so many high school and university students, still complain that we don’t see the point of learning a lesson that seems annoying and time consuming. “I want to be a film-maker. What good is algebra going to do me?”

When I was a child learning to play scales on the piano to the slave ship drumming of a metronome, I yelled at my mother that I saw no purpose to such a pointless exercise. I wanted to be a singer! I could see no possible application for this time-waster in my adult life. I knew even then I did not have the fine motor control it took to be a good pianist. Piano playing was not my gift. Too many accidental accidentals. It was utterly frustrating.

Eventually I became a singing teacher. I may have played a million scales and vocal exercises in my career. I never did develop good piano playing technique. I hired good accompanists for my students for exams and competitions, but in my studio I actually played the piano a lot more than piano teachers do.

Sometimes we go through lessons and testing that seems like a frustrating waste of time. I get the feeling the lesson I have been complaining about lately is a unit on perseverance and endurance. It’s not my favourite, but I hear the great teacher say, “Trust me. This will come in handy. I have a purpose in all this. Longview…long view…get it? See the big picture.”

 This is what the Lord says—Israel’s King and Redeemer, the Lord of Heaven’s Armies:

“I am the First and the Last;

there is no other God.

Who is like me?

Let him step forward and prove to you his power.

Let him do as I have done since ancient times

when I established a people and explained its future.

 Do not tremble; do not be afraid.

Did I not proclaim my purposes for you long ago?

You are my witnesses—is there any other God?

No! There is no other Rock—not one!”

(Isaiah 44:6-8 NLT)

Shaping the Future

On By Charis PsalloIn Mountains, Photography, Sky, Uncategorized4 Comments

 

3Mt. Baker form WildhorseJesus leads us into a place of radical grace where we are able to celebrate the hope of experiencing God’s glory.

And that’s not all. We also celebrate in seasons of suffering because we know that when we suffer we develop endurance,  which shapes our characters.

When our characters are refined, we learn what it means to hope and anticipate God’s goodness.

And hope will never fail to satisfy our deepest need because the Holy Spirit that was given to us has flooded our hearts with God’s love.

(Romans 5:2-5 The Voice)