Light Lenten Reflections

Week 3

God-Art

I was born into an artsy family. My maternal grandfather was a skilled cabinetmaker, crafting beautiful objects from wood. My mother briefly attended art school in Greenwich Village when it was a cool, hip thing to do, could draw and paint, and spent her retirement years doing calligraphy and watercolor painting. It's no surprise, then, that I should find myself drawn to artistic pursuits from an early age, drawing and painting as a child, spending some of my adult years with fabric and yarn and thread, later taking college art classes, honing my drawing and design skills. The more I learned about art, participated in the creating of art, the more I grew to appreciate other artists. I love going to art museums of any kind, always finding something to marvel at whether it be Winslow Homer's The Herring Net at the Art Institute of Chicago, the exquisite glass collection at the Toledo Museum of Art, or the quirky but amazingly intricate thread portrait of Darth Vader in the Star Wars exhibit at the Racine Art Museum.

Though I appreciate so much of the art I see in museums, the art that stops me dead in my tracks every time is the amazing display of creativity I see in the natural world around me. The Artist at work there is the ultimate mixed media artist, using materials few others have dared to try. This Creator-driven school of art I've chosen to call God-Art. And though I have been surrounded by it my entire life, the awareness of it struck me in my early adulthood as I was walking through the gorge of Watkins Glen State Park in upstate New York. The trail meanders through a series of nineteen waterfalls along a two mile stretch of a shale-limestone-sandstone gorge shaped by a creek flowing through it. The layers of stone are skillfully sculptured in a multi-leveled gracefully twisting pattern. Were someone to hang a gallery placard in the gorge, it would read something like this:

God (Eternal)

Untitled (From the beginning of time)

Time and water on shale, limestone and sandstone

On loan to mankind from the Artist

Time and water on stone...wow...but the God-Art didn't stop there. There was some contemporary performance art going on simultaneously with the eons-old time-stone-water thing. Moving water, forming multiple waterfalls throughout the gorge, throwing out clouds of mist and spray, being caught by the sun in places, projecting clouds of rainbows in the moist air. Amazing...

Since that first God-Art realization, I've been on the lookout for more of this Guy's work. And it's everywhere:

• In a perfect snowy morning; the artistic medium – a just right temperature to make the titanium white snow wet enough to cling to every branch and twig for miles around, no wind, just enough light sun to make it all glisten.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
•  In a sunrise or a sunset; the artistic medium – sun, the right amount and texture of clouds, the earth's rotation, an occasional body of water to reflect the riotous performance piece going on in the sky.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• In a partially iced pond, after a thaw, during a rainstorm; the artistic medium – water sitting on ice, the wind driving the rain into swirling patterns of light and dark on the shallow waters above the ice, constantly moving, constantly changing speed and texture.
  
  
  
  

• In fish (Of course, fish!), a spawning bluegill, a pumpkinseed sunfish; the artistic medium – life and breath and scale and water and iridescent colors, perfectly applied.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

• In the small things, the structure and smell of a flower, the veins of a leaf, the fragrance of an herb, the texture and glint of a stone; the artistic medium – an endless array of materials and time, too many to name.

And the list could go on and on. Yep, this Artist is everywhere...

Something to Ponder:

Do you still see the God-Art around you? Or has something – distraction, busyness, familiarity - made you go blind to it? Make a point of noting some God-Art this week. Be mindful of the Artist.

Something to Pray:

Grab a Bible or go to BibleGateway.com. Read Psalm 104, a thanksgiving prayer for God's creative variety. Think about your favorite God-Art pieces and spend some time giving thanks to the Artist á la Psalm 104.

Sculpting every move you compose a symphony
You plead to everyone, "see the art in me"

                                    - See the Art in Me, Dan Haseltine, Jars of Clay

Light Lenten Reflections

Week 2

Something Fishy about Fasting?

Growing up Catholic, my brother and I loved Fridays. In addition to both of us inheriting a love of fishing, we both also inherited a love of eating fish. In the Catholic tradition of abstinence from meat on Fridays, meatless meals translated into fish meals in our house. During Lent, our grandmother, in keeping with an older eastern European tradition of abstinence on Wednesdays as well, would serve us fish twice a week. Heaven! On Sundays, my grandfather would take us down to the docks in Freeport and wait for the trawlers to come in. We would buy bags of fresh fish, whatever the catch of the day might be, and bring them home, fish so fresh they would still be flopping around in the kitchen sink, much to the chagrin of my grandmother who had the task of cleaning them. These fish would be our Lenten delights for the week. We kept with the traditional Catholic Lenten mandates of abstinence from meat on Fridays (Wednesdays were freebies.) and fasting (defined as not eating between meals and eating only one full meal a day, the other two meals not to equal the full meal). The spiritual purposes of such eating were lost on my brother and me, sometimes the meatless meals bringing out the sin nature in each of us - “Mom! He got one more shrimp than I got!” “Well, she got more flounder last week!”

As this good Catholic girl grew up, I fully participated in all the Lenten observances, both the mandatory and the voluntary. And I pondered them. Giving up sweets for Lent, a form of abstinence or what is also known as partial fasting, was an exercise in self-discipline and self-control, a good thing. But that “self” part haunted me. Yeah, I could see some spiritual benefit in fasting to build my self-control muscles, but 40 days without sweets would be a bigger benefit toward me getting a smaller body. Fasting from TV would give me more time to read or draw or do other more noble things, but unless I purposed to read only spiritual books, I would probably only grow in my understanding of the nuances of mid-twentieth century teen novels. And, well, the meatless meals during Lent would always have the subtext of “Yay! Fish!!!!” I was beginning to realize there was something fishy about my view of fasting...

Over the years my understanding of true fasting and abstinence has grown and matured. The insights into fasting that have come to most resonate with me see fasting less as strengthening my self-discipline and more as strengthening my relationship with God. David Mathis, in his excellent article Fasting for Beginners,* outlines six simple but important points to think about while contemplating fasting. In his second point, planning what to do instead of eating, he says:

Fasting isn’t merely an act of self-deprivation, but a spiritual discipline for seeking more of God’s fullness. Which means we should have a plan for what positive pursuit to undertake in the time it normally takes to eat. We spend a good portion of our day with food in front of us. One significant part of fasting is the time it creates for prayer and meditation on God’s word or some act of love for others.

Before diving headlong into a fast, craft a simple plan. Connect it to your purpose for the fast. Each fast should have a specific spiritual purpose. Identify what that is and design a focus to replace the time you would have spent eating. Without a purpose and plan, it’s not Christian fasting; it’s just going hungry.

Mathis goes on to encourage fasting from things other than food:

Fasting from food is not necessarily for everyone. Some health conditions keep even the most devout from the traditional course. However, fasting is not limited to abstain from food. As Martyn Lloyd-Jones said, “Fasting should really be made to include abstinence from anything which is legitimate in and of itself for the sake of some special spiritual purpose.”

If the better part of wisdom for you, in your health condition, is not to go without food, consider fasting from television, computer, social media, or some other regular enjoyment that would bend your heart toward greater enjoyment of Jesus. Paul even talks about married couples fasting from sex “for a limited time, that you may devote yourselves to prayer” (1 Corinthians 7:5).

(Emphasis mine.)

This Lent, I felt a gentle tugging to give up what had become a time-sucking, growing habit of computer solitaire. I've laid aside Forty Thieves, Spider, Terrace and an embarrassingly large number of other games, as well as my justification for playing them - “Oh, they're just short bouts of mental exercise!” I'm using the time previously spent thinking of card-playing strategies to both pray more and write more, and to pray about writing more. This kind of fasting doesn't have that fishy feeling of my youth. This kind of fasting feels less about giving up something and more about going toward Someone. Nothing fishy about that...

Something to Ponder:

Inside or outside Lent, how do you view “giving up” things? Is it all about you – losing weight, healthier life style, more time to pursue other interests? How would your life look different if you put an Other/God-focus on “giving up” things?

Something to Pray:

Grab a Bible or go to BibleGateway.com. Read Isaiah 58, or at least verses 6-12. This is a good picture of what true fasting looks like from God's eyes. Reread the beginning of verse 9. Wherever you might be in your thoughts about fasting, ask God to teach you how to call/cry out to Him in the midst of it. Reread verse 11. Ask God to guide you continually and to show you how to give over your “scorched” places and live like a watered garden.

A fast is not necessarily something we offer God,

but it assists us in offering ourselves. - Jen Hatmaker

Fasting confirms our utter dependence upon God by finding in Him

a source of sustenance beyond food. - Dallas Willard

*http://www.desiringgod.org/articles/fasting-for-beginners

Thought I'd come back from my writing break with something a little different. I'm calling it “Light Lenten Reflections” and am aiming to post something every Wednesday during Lent. There will be two short assignments at the end of each post you may either run with or ignore. And there probably will be at least one post on fishing...this is The Angle, after all...

  Light Lenten Reflections

Week 1

God of the Gray Day

The sun came out yesterday. Briefly. I appreciated it, but I hadn't really missed it. It's the early part of February, another gray month in the Midwest, and I'm fine with that. Seriously. I prefer clouds to sun, rain to clear skies, cool over warmth. My son is wired the same way, coming in from running on cool, cloudy, misty days, waxing poetic about the amazing weather. He spent two years living in El Paso, Texas, before moving back to the Midwest. One of his reasons for his return? He said he couldn't stand the relentless sun any longer. Weird, huh?

No, not really weird, though most cloudy day lovers know we are perceived that way by others. There are, in fact, many people out there who share the same love of meteorological gloom my son and I share. Instead of the gray of winter or a rainy day depressing them, they often describe feeling both invigorated and a peaceful calm. These people range from pluviophiles – lovers of rain who find both joy and comfort in rainy days, relishing being out in it – to those who suffer from “Reverse S.A.D.” (Seasonal Affective Disorder), a depression caused by exposure to too much light, manifesting itself during the summer months, often in warm climates. My son is definitely a pluviophile, running in the rain when temperatures are above freezing. I'm only a mild pluviophile. I love rainy days, thunderstorms (minus the tornadoes), the sound of rain on the roof, the pattern of rain falling in ponds and puddles, but I prefer to watch it all through a window or from a sheltered porch. I also suspect I have a touch of Reverse S.A.D, suffering from what I perceive as the excesses of Midwest summers. Retire south? No, thank you. I'm heading north...

Since childhood I've pondered why I am so fond of the cloudy day. I was born in April. Was it a rainy spring day and is that what I've come to expect as my most comforting weather? I'm a mildly optimistic realist. Are sunny days for wildly optimistic idealists and cause too much internal dissonance for my personality? 

Comforted...enveloped...surrounded...protected...energized...hugged... these are the words that best describe how I feel on a dark, cloudy day. But why? I recently had an “aha” moment while reading Psalm 18, providing new insight into my fondness for the dark day.

I've always been a fan of Psalm 18. It's seen me through some very difficult times. In its 50 verses, God shows up as both an equipper and a powerful rescuer. My favorite section:

He reached down from on high and took hold of me;

he drew me out of deep waters.

He rescued me from my powerful enemy,

from my foes, who were too strong for me.

They confronted me in the day of my disaster,

but the Lord was my support.

He brought me out into a spacious place;

he rescued me because he delighted in me.*

My “aha” moment came when I started to read backwards from my favorite verses. Before this great rescuing part, there is a description of God's mighty power and the means by which He manifests His coming to the rescue:

He parted the heavens and came down;

dark clouds were under his feet.

He mounted the cherubim and flew;

he soared on the wings of the wind.

He made darkness his covering, his canopy around him—

the dark rain clouds of the sky.**

And there it was...clouds...dark clouds...dark rain clouds...and God's personal, rescuing presence. My cloudy day feelings of being comforted, enveloped, surrounded, protected, energized, even hugged...were they a reflection of that personal, rescuing, reassuring presence of God? God hid His presence in a cloud when He was actively engaging with His people – going before the Israelites, leading them out of Egypt to the Promised Land.+ He hid His presence in a cloud when He spoke to Moses on Mt. Sinai.++ Are some of us wired differently from our sun-loving brothers, more easily able to receive comfort and hope on a gray day, perhaps unconsciously sensing that where clouds are, God and His comforting presence can't be far away?

What about our non-meteorological gray days? Do we find God in them?

Something to Ponder:

Whether you are a sun lover or a gray day lover, think about some gray, dark time of your life. Did you feel closer or farther away from God? If closer, how did that help your relationship with God, how did that help you through the dark time? Thank Him... If God felt distant at that time, what would you wish you could have felt/received from Him? Tell Him...

Something to Pray:

Grab a Bible or go to BibleGateway.com. Read Psalm 18, or at least verses 9-19. This is a powerful image of how much God is radically for us. Ask God to allow you to experience His saving presence, to be able to know Him in your gray days, your dark times. Reread verse 19. Ask God to allow you to know His delight in you.

*Psalm 18:16-19 (NIV)

**Psalm 18:9-11 (NIV)

+Exodus 13

++Exodus 19, 24

I've got sunshine on a cloudy day - Smokey Robinson