Tag: change

Dance with Me

On By Charis PsalloIn Uncategorized6 Comments
Flowers by the Dead Sea
Flowers by the Dead Sea

I fell in love at Christmas.

I didn’t intend to. In fact the only reason I went out with this guy, who was persistent enough to ask eight times, was to prove to him that we had nothing in common and that it would be colossally boring.

It wasn’t. He talked to me like I had a brain. All my male friends were boys I had grown up with; this was a man. That fact was kind of intimidating so I said goodnight and that was that. But…..later I needed an escort to a posh event with the opera company I was a part of and none of my male friends would be caught dead in a place like that. I was desperate so I asked him, and he obliged. One of the women at the reception asked me how I snagged a “gold key blazer man.”  I didn’t even know what that was, but the fact she was impressed made me look again. He drove me home and we sat in the car and talked for hours. We went out several times after that. He bought me expensive gifts. He took me to fine restaurants. He introduced me to his friends who were in a different world than mine.

On Boxing Day, all those years ago, my brother and I were at our grandmother’s house. I remember being a bit of a grouch and not wanting to join in the usual annual family crokinole tournament. I overheard him ask Grandma, “Sheesh. What’s the matter with her?”

“Nothing,” Grandma said. “She’s just in love.”

I was a bit annoyed and then I realized, Oh my goodness! She’s right! I miss him and I would rather be with him than with my family on Christmas! Oh, no!

The “Oh, no!” was because I knew this demanded a response and would change my life and mess with my plans.

It did. But in a good way.

We’re still together and we still talk and talk on long drives to visit our grandchildren.

In the Bible God often uses the image of the bride and the suitor -in Song of Solomon, Isaiah, Hosea, and again in Revelation where He talks about returning for his bride.

I remember singing this old carol with a small ensemble in a concert once and the bass protested that He had no idea what the words meant or how it related to Christmas. Men sometimes have difficulty with the whole concept of being the object of God’s pursuit. Some of them become quite angry at songs they call “Jesus is my boyfriend songs.”  My husband says it’s because men like to see themselves as the one who initiates. (I think the Lord obliges and uses other human experiences like Father/son and  shepherd/lost sheep as well.)

The bride image is one I understand though. I hear the Lord throwing little pebbles at my window in the night and softly singing, “Come away with me.”

This ancient Cornish Christmas carol, “Tomorrow Will Be My Dancing Day,” reminds me that everything he did, from laying down his right to be recognized as the king of the universe, to washing the feet of his disciples, to laying down his life and conquering death was to pursue us and invite us to dance with him -because He is in love with us.

Tomorrow shall be my dancing day;

I would my true love did so chance

To see the legend of my play,

To call my true love to my dance;

          Sing, oh! my love, oh! my love, my love, my love,

          This have I done for my true love.

Then was I born of a virgin pure,

Of her I took fleshly substance

Thus was I knit to man’s nature

To call my true love to my dance.

          Sing, oh! my love, oh! my love, my love, my love,

          This have I done for my true love. 

In a manger laid, and wrapped I was

So very poor, this was my chance

Between an ox and a silly poor ass

To call my true love to my dance.

          Sing, oh! my love, oh! my love, my love, my love,

          This have I done for my true love.

     

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)

Oh Holy Night: Chante ta délivrance!

On By Charis PsalloIn Art, Music, Photography7 Comments
Midnight The Solemn Hour
Midnight
The Solemn Hour

I try to be positive. I really do. I usually appreciate any attempt at singing. Song is a free gift that can be enjoyed by anyone. But to me some songs are sacred, holy, set apart and meant to glorify God. They are not meant to be recorded by pop singers with no sense of phrasing, or breath control, who have inadequate diction and obviously no emotional connection to the lyrics, and then piped through the aisles of Stuffmart to create background noise for harried shoppers who don’t give a damn. I’ve threatened to go postal if I hear Santa Baby in the produce aisle one more time -but that’s just irritating. It’s hearing one of the greatest hymns/carols of all time massacred over and over that makes me want to plop down on the floor by the gift boxed baubles and weep.

(Rant over)

When I taught singing my students often asked if they could work on “Oh Holy Night.”

“Not for a few years yet,” I told most of them. “And when you do it will  in the original language.”

“Why?”

“Because your voice isn’t ready and because you have heard it so often in English you can’t hear the words anymore. Most versions drop half the lyrics anyway. I want you to study it, to translate it, to concentrate and savour every note and every word.”

Like songs that are sung year after year and have lost their flavour like chewing gum on the bedpost overnight, we can become so familiar with the goodness of God we cease to grasp the depth and height and width of it. We fail to comprehend the massiveness of His love. We take it for granted. We develop a sense of entitlement, as if God owes us freedom, and deliverance from slavery to sin. We fail to pay attention.

Translations that have to fit the meter and accents of a set piece of music are never entirely accurate, but here is another English translation of Minuit, Chretien. Listen to the words again.

Midnight, Christians, it is the solemn hour,
When God as man descended unto us
To erase the stain of original sin
And to end the wrath of His Father.
The entire world thrills with hope
On this night that gives it a Saviour.

People kneel down, wait for your deliverance.
Christmas, Christmas, here is the Redeemer,
Christmas, Christmas, here is the Redeemer!

May the ardent light of our Faith
Guide us all to the cradle of the infant,
As in ancient times a brilliant star
Guided the Oriental kings there.
The King of Kings was born in a humble manger;
O mighty ones of today, proud of your greatness,

It is to your pride that God preaches.
Bow your heads before the Redeemer!
Bow your heads before the Redeemer!

The Redeemer has broken every bond:
The Earth is free, and Heaven is open.
He sees a brother where there was only a slave,
Love unites those that iron had chained.
Who will tell Him of our gratitude,
For all of us He is born, He suffers and dies.

People stand up! Sing of your deliverance,
Christmas, Christmas, sing of the Redeemer,
Christmas, Christmas, sing of the Redeemer!

Attend ta Délivrance Pay Attention
Attend
ta Délivrance

From the English version:

Christ is the Lord! Then ever, ever praise we,
His power and glory evermore proclaim!
His power and glory evermore proclaim!

(Link to video in comments)

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.

IMG_5910

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)

And to the Earth It Gave Great Light

On By Charis PsalloIn Black and white, Photography2 Comments

*And to the earth it gave great light*IMG_5733 Old Man Mountains dark2

 

But who can discern their own errors?
    Forgive my hidden faults. (Psalm 19:12)

Here’s the thing about light: it reveals.

Sometimes we would really rather not see the things it reveals especially if those revealed things are in the lives of people we trust to be shining examples for us. When light reveals our own errors and faulty thinking, those embarrassing weaknesses hidden from even ourselves, we want to squirm in shame. Light can be uncomfortable.

But God is merciful, and willing to exchange the lies we have believed for truth. If we avoid kicking them into another dark corner or assigning their ownership to someone else, but rather own up to them, he is willing to show us a better way. He is faithful and just. He will forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Yesterday an error on my part was revealed to me by a man in a car with flashing lights on top. It was not a deliberate disobedience of the law, but nevertheless a serious oversight on my part and I was extremely embarrassed by it. Mortified. My first response, when the light shone upon it, was to want to make excuses, but the better response was to say, “Yes, Sir,” and go get the problem fixed before I went any further. So I did. Today I my conscience is clear and I am actually glad that he stopped me when he did, before something much worse happened. (And to all my friends and acquaintances who drove by while the man in uniform and I chatted on the side of the road and then he gave me a ride in the back of his squad car –“Hi there!”)

Repentance means to turn around. Change. Have a different thought.

 What we are telling you now is the very message we heard from Him:

God is pure light, undimmed by darkness of any kind. 

If we say we have an intimate connection with the Father but we continue stumbling around in darkness,

then we are lying because we do not live according to truth. 

If we walk step by step in the light,

where the Father is,

then we are ultimately connected to each other through the sacrifice of Jesus His Son.

His blood purifies us from all our sins. 

If we go around bragging, “We have no sin,”

then we are fooling ourselves and are strangers to the truth. 

But if we own up to our sins,

God shows that He is faithful and just

by forgiving us of our sins and purifying us

from the pollution of all the bad things we have done.

(1 John 1:5-9)

Reconciled

On By Charis PsalloIn Mountains, Photography, Winter7 Comments

 

purcells dec. IMG_5916*Peace on earth and mercy mild, God and sinners reconciled* -Charles Wesley

There is a difference between forgiveness and reconciliation. A relationship can only be restored when there is honesty on both parts. We can offer forgiveness to people who have harmed us, but if they do not acknowledge a need to be forgiven, the relationship is not healed. The same goes for the forgiveness God offers us. If we do not admit our need for forgiveness and insist on a no-fault clause in our settlement, there is no actual  reconciliation. Our hearts will remain unchanged. Peace is the result of an honest response to God’s mercy.

Wash me and I will be whiter than snow. (Psalm 51:7b)

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.