Teskas

[journeyman]

He does, every time! Glad you're in one piece! That definitely sounds like warfare. Did you accomplish what you needed in Atlanta?

[Christian Soldier]

Sometimes... things like that are creepy. It's like this really cool God were in control or something, but what do I know, right?

[Teskas]

Yeah, it was pretty uncanny. Especially since there was no damage to the car. And I got to Atlanta okay. I hadn't thought of a spiritual warfare angle, but considering what's been happening in the last few weeks, maybe I ought to spend a little more time in prayer--if nothing else, in thanksgiving, because the Lord has been awfully good about pulling through in more than a few incidents.

[Teskas]

I was never one for Eng Lit, either in high school or college. Reading Pride and Peajuice wasn't nearly as thrilling for me as The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, so I dragged my carcass to the required classes and rejoiced when I had notched up one more requirement for my transcript. It was only as an adult I returned to fiction, and learned to enjoy it (including Jane Austen). From that it was a short step to attempted imitation. Really good writing has been a guide, and I return to it constantly trying to improve my own.

As part of a 2010 New Year resolution, I read Gone with the Wind. It must be the American equivalent of War and Peace. At least it goes on and on like War and Peace. Alas, Ashley Wilkes is no match for Pierre Bezukhov. And is it just me, or is Scarlett O'Hara really, really irritating?

Anyway, I'm trying to winnow the good from the bad, because even though Margaret Mitchell seems to break every rule Jeff has tried to teach us, she has written quite a story. The scenes and dialog can be compelling. She pays attention to detail, and there are some interesting characterizations. It's almost as though the reader can spot the people Margaret Mitchell drew from real life (Rhett seemed real to me), as well as the paste versions she supposed (Gerald was a stage Irishman if ever I saw one).

Gone with the Wind struck me as an important novel without being great literature. The story has epic sweep, the characters are varied, some characterization is spot on. So why is it that at the end of reading the book, I felt let down? Why did I feel there was a hole in its soul when it finished?

I'm asking myself this because I don't know the answer. I suspect it's a clue to what can make or break Christian literature. Maybe I should have paid more attention in Eng Lit.

[Christian Soldier]

... and now I want to read it for myself. I barely made it through War and Peace, and I was going through my Russian phase at the time. Still, now I am wondering what you saw. Hmm...

[Teskas]

I haven't blogged in ages, but today is Lady Day. That is the traditional English phrase to describe the Feast of the Incarnation. Every March 25th the Church tradition is to celebrate the visitation of the angel Gabriel to Mary.

I came across a poem today by Edwin Muir. I'd like to share it with you. We sometimes wonder on the boards here whether fantasy fiction is compatible with Christianity, but when I read such a lyrical meditation on a Christian theme such as what Muir has written here, I am left astounded. The truth of God is stranger than any fiction. I hope you enjoy Muir's poem.

Annunciation

The angel and the girl are met
Earth was the only meeting place.
For the embodied never yet
Travelled beyond the shore of space.
The eternal spirits in freedom go.

See, they have come together, see,
While the destroying minutes flow,
Each reflects the other's face
Till heaven in hers and earth in his
Shine steady there. He's come to her
From far beyond the farthest star,
Feathered through time. Immediacy
Of strangest strangeness is the bliss
That from their limbs all movement takes.

Yet the increasing rapture brings
So great a wonder that it makes
Each feather tremble on his wings

Outside the window footsteps fall
Into the ordinary day
And with the sun along the wall
Pursue their unreturning way
Sound's perpetual roundabout
Rolls its numbered octaves out
And hoarsely grinds its battered tune

But through the endless afternoon
These neither speak nor movement make.
But stare into their deepening trance
As if their grace would never break.

--Edwin Muir

[Teskas]

Okay, I just did something really crazy, especially considering I've had writer's block for about a year or so. I just signed up for NaNoWriMo. Yes, insane, but this is The Anomaly. Excuse me now. I need to get into the shower and dream up a plot.

[Kessie]

I was wondering if Nanowrimo would feature in here. Keep us posted on how it goes!

[Teskas]

Happy New Year, everybody. May you be richly blessed in 2012.

[Teskas]

There is a discussion going on Learned Disputations:Disillusioned with Evangelicalism. It has been absolutely gut-wrenching for me to read. Now and then I've had an evangelical come up to me and ask, Are you saved? I usually mumble a reply followed up with a smile bordering on rictus, and he goes away.

I believe in the Sacrifice of Jesus as a propitiation of the sins of the whole world, including mine. But, honestly, I have to say that when the hour of my death comes, and I wake up, I am in a place right now such that I shall be thoroughly surprised if it is anywhere but hell.

Over the last three years, the more I consider the sin part of the Sinner's Prayer, the more aware I have become of how I am ensnared in sinfulness. It isn't the sort of thing that will make the National Enquirer. No, it is the petty, subtle kind of wickedness that seems to go unnoticed. C. S. Lewis referred to it somewhere as "sin among the tea cups." Genteel sinfulness. Nothing-to-worry-about-dear sinfulness. It sickens me because I can seem to escape it.

So, I'm left almost frozen. I don't read my Bible. I used to read it everyday. My prayers are sporadic. And although I still attend church every Sunday, I feel alienated from church. I can't write. I can't concentrate. Daily living is just plain hard to face. The life that matters to me seem to have just fallen apart.

I'm posting this here because, well, just because. I guess the discussion hit a nerve. I don't know how or if ever this will resolve, but it is an awful place to be.

[j2starshine]

Praying for you.

[metalikhan]

I think all of us have times we spend in spiritual deserts, fraught with doubts, feeling separated from God, struggling with sin we can't seem to shed. We want more than knowing we are forgiven, more than knowing we have the Helper as well as our Advocate with the Father when we are weak and when we fail. We want the flawless perfection of spirit, mind, and body we'll have one day when all Creation is remade — but that day isn't today. We're still in a fallen world.

Once we're covered by Christ's blood, our spirits are blameless before God, but the renewing of our hearts and minds is a process. We can put on righteous facades, we can speak the Christianese lingo, but every one of us knows how very flawed we are. We're saved sinners; we're saints in training. We aren't finished works yet.

I left the evangelical, non-denominational churches. The last one where I was a member spiraled into services that were long ear-blasting, bone-jarring concerts with book reports (not the Bible) of someone's interpretation of what a Christian should do and be. I was raised Southern Baptist but attended Protestant and non-denominational churches all over the country over the course of forty years.
I'm now attending a Catholic church; and in the discipline of the liturgy, I've heard more scripture read and more application taught in four months than all the years of being among the Evangelicals. The sense of the holy and respect for the sacred I found there — I've not seen it matched in any churches I've attended since I was a small town Baptist decades ago. I can't completely agree with all the doctrine and practices, but I couldn't agree completely with the doctrines and practices of the other denominations either.

Have you considered, Teskas, that part of your spiritual desert might be because God is trying to move you in a new direction? Perhaps He's changing the core of your writing or molding you for service in a way you hadn't imagined before. If you're alienated from the church where you're attending, perhaps it's because your season with it is ending or you simply need time away from it; consider exploring some other churches where you might feel better able to let God bring you out of your desert and draw close to Him again.

He is patient even when we're impatient with the growth we think we should have. He loves us even when we know we're unlovable. He is faithful even when we falter in our faith.

Praying for you, sister.

[Bainespal]

May 21, 2012 21:30:42 GMT -5 Teskas said:

I'm posting this here because, well, just because. I guess the discussion hit a nerve. I don't know how or if ever this will resolve, but it is an awful place to be.

I am sorry to have distressed you. I only hope that in our distress, there is something that God will redeem, that it really isn't all useless, that by grace we really will ultimately prevail.

May 22, 2012 2:49:44 GMT -5 metalikhan said:

I'm now attending a Catholic church; and in the discipline of the liturgy, I've heard more scripture read and more application taught in four months than all the years of being among the Evangelicals. The sense of the holy and respect for the sacred I found there — I've not seen it matched in any churches I've attended since I was a small town Baptist decades ago. I can't completely agree with all the doctrine and practices, but I couldn't agree completely with the doctrines and practices of the other denominations either.

The sense of the holy and respect for the sacred of the Roman Catholic church matching that of the small town Baptist. Now, that encourages me. Part of my own distress was hearing Baptists criticize Catholics constantly, grudgingly admitting that a few of them might be saved, but not willing to accept Catholicism as Christianity; while Pentecostals sometimes say nearly the same about Baptists. But the "sense of the holy and respect for the sacred" is there among all God's people, transcending creeds and hostile traditions.

[Teskas]

Thank you for your prayers, j2starshine. It was kind of you to say so.

May 22, 2012 16:02:23 GMT -5 Bainespal said:

I am sorry to have distressed you. I only hope that in our distress, there is something that God will redeem, that it really isn't all useless, that by grace we really will ultimately prevail.

Please don't apologize for your posts. This is obviously an important matter. I read about five years ago that the evangelical churches make many new disciples, but that most only participate in church for two years on average before leaving. Something isn't working if that is true. Obviously a lot of people have their struggles.

metalikhan said:

Have you considered, Teskas, that part of your spiritual desert might be because God is trying to move you in a new direction? Perhaps He's changing the core of your writing or molding you for service in a way you hadn't imagined before.

Well, no, now that you mention it. I hadn't been thinking in that direction at all. I don't know what to say other than I'd better go away and think about that. And try to pray about it, too. Thank you, Metalikhan, and for your prayers.

God bless all of you.

[metalikhan]

May 22, 2012 20:19:01 GMT -5 Teskas said:

metalikhan said:

Have you considered, Teskas, that part of your spiritual desert might be because God is trying to move you in a new direction? Perhaps He's changing the core of your writing or molding you for service in a way you hadn't imagined before.

Well, no, now that you mention it. I hadn't been thinking in that direction at all. I don't know what to say other than I'd better go away and think about that. And try to pray about it, too. Thank you, Metalikhan, and for your prayers.

I mentioned it because, in my own experience, there was often some kind of conviction about myself that preluded God moving me in a new direction. The conviction brings to the forefront of my heart and mind what hidden sin(s) I still needed to repent so the work He has for me isn't compromised by my own sinful stupidity.

We know that any sin is still sin to God; there's no hierarchy of one being a lesser sin and one being greater. But when we haven't done the really "bad" stuff like theft or murder, sometimes it takes longer for us to really see that a heart attitude can also be sinful. And when the heart attitude has been wrapped up in a Christian façade, it's like a deep little splinter that festers rather than a great big gash everyone can see. It can take time to dig out such a tiny splinters.

The "sin among the teacups" you've been agonizing over is the Holy Spirit illuminating where you need work and growth. That you're aware of it is witness to the Holy Spirit working in you and on you. Trust Him. He'll bring you through it.

May 22, 2012 16:02:23 GMT -5 bainespal" said:

The sense of the holy and respect for the sacred of the Roman Catholic church matching that of the small town Baptist. Now, that encourages me. Part of my own distress was hearing Baptists criticize Catholics constantly, grudgingly admitting that a few of them might be saved, but not willing to accept Catholicism as Christianity; while Pentecostals sometimes say nearly the same about Baptists. But the "sense of the holy and respect for the sacred" is there among all God's people, transcending creeds and hostile traditions.

I am sorry to have distressed you. I only hope that in our distress, there is something that God will redeem, that it really isn't all useless, that by grace we really will ultimately prevail.

Please don't apologize for your posts. This is obviously an important matter. I read about five years ago that the evangelical churches make many new disciples, but that most only participate in church for two years on average before leaving. Something isn't working if that is true. Obviously a lot of people have their struggles.

It's been a long time since I heard this saying and I don't even know it's source, but I think it's still valid.

In essentials, unity. In non-essentials, liberty. In all things, charity (love).

The sticky part is that we believe everything we think is an essential. We're not very good at separating personal from important, so we go along with absolute (and erroneous) surety that we have the ultimate understanding in our pocket. We have to let go and realize that my way isn't the only way.

God's way is the only way.