Mother Jesus

Luke 13:31-35

³⁴Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing! 


The first day of school is a big day. The big yellow bus came down the street at 7 30am and my little baby girl climbed the steps. I clicked the camera. She was on her own, out in the big world, responsible for her own actions. 
There have been times when I wanted to intervene. There was the day, in high school, when she had Sharpie and gave a wisecrack answer to the girl in front of her. Our baby was hence accused of drug sniffing. We lived in a very strict school district. The consequences were tough. Her father talked to the Principal. But what solved the situation was our baby herself having an adult conversation with the Principal. 
There were no more witty answers in dubious circumstances. A Lesson was learned.

Jesus wants to keep us safe but we are wilful children. He lets us grow and mature all the while wanting to gently nurture his offspring.

Anton Bruckner

Anton Bruckner wearing the Order of Franz Joseph (portrait by Josef Büche)

Ecclesiasticus 44:1-15

44Let us now sing the praises of famous men,
   our ancestors in their generations. 

⁵ those who composed musical tunes,
   or put verses in writing; 

Once upon a time, in far away Austria, there was a little boy. He would run into the forest behind the house. It was a large and seemingly empty forest. He was amazed at the intermingling of the forest sounds. Of course there was the tweeting of the little birds and the  wind whistling through the branches. Above this was the unmistakeable sawing of trees felled for the nearby papermills and in the distance the din of the mills themselves could be faintly heard. But listening more intently there were the sounds that only those attuned to nature can observe- the autumnal dancing leaves spiralling downwards and the not so the gentle plop of chestnuts as they thundered to earth. 
Not all was peaceful in the forest. Wild boar tore through the undergrowth chased by hungry huntsmen. Screeching, or is it croaking, pheasants were felled with a single shot.
Little Anton loved the forest with its melange of oral wonders. Just as the mustard seed grows into a tree so these sounds took seed in the little lad who later orchestrated them into symphonies in celebration of the Creator in whom he had delighted since his youth.
To the city dweller the forest is silent but to those who know it well the noise can be almost deafening. So it was for Anton Bruckner.

Luke 13:18-30

18 He said therefore, ‘What is the kingdom of God like? And to what should I compare it? ¹⁹It is like a mustard seed that someone took and sowed in the garden; it grew and became a tree, and the birds of the air made nests in its branches.’

Psalm 74

¹² Yet God my King is from of old,
   working salvation in the earth. 
¹³ You divided the sea by your might;
   you broke the heads of the dragons in the waters. 
¹⁴ You crushed the heads of Leviathan;
   you gave him as food^* for the creatures of the wilderness. 
¹⁵ You cut openings for springs and torrents;
   you dried up ever-flowing streams. 
¹⁶ Yours is the day, yours also the night;
   you established the luminaries^* and the sun. 
¹⁷ You have fixed all the bounds of the earth;
   you made summer and winter. 

²³ Do not forget the clamour of your foes,

   the uproar of your adversaries that goes up continually.

Sometimes Anton would accompany his father to the church organ. He would listen and learn. It was work and worship together. 

Anton's father also took him to school. He worked hard there striving to be a good student and succeeded. He became a teacher. But perhaps most of his striving was in his composition. He was continually making revisions. Is our spiritual life the same? Are we always reaching to attain the life of Christ? Did Bruckner not write organ music beyond the first piece because he knew that in his later years he had mastered that instrument?

Bruckner was a striver. He reached genius level because he worked hard to reach his goals. he reached goals that would have satisfied most of us but he was always looking to be better. He is a product of the reaction against the rationalization of the Age of Enlightenment. The straight lines of Georgian architecture gave way to ornate Victorian. Write it all down, include everything, leave no instrument out. Did I miss something? Should I change that? How difficult it is to be 100% perfect.

photograph
This work is in the public domain in the European Union and non-EU countries with a copyright term of life of the author plus 70 years or less.

All creatures great and small

Ecclesiasticus 43:23-33

²⁵ In it are strange and marvellous creatures,
   all kinds of living things, and huge sea-monsters. 


We took our eighteen month old daughter to the zoo. She was sitting in her pushchair as we arrived at the rhinoceros enclosure. "WoW" and she stood perirously to gin a better view of this out of her world creature.

Last week I was watching  programme about icebergs. I was fascinated of the excitement of the eminent scientist on seeing tiny living creatures that he had never seen before.

The world is certainly full of marvels.

Praise God the creator of us all.

My fig tree

Luke 13:1-9

This is my fig tree. I bought it about  eighteen months ago. This spring I repotted it. I thought if I give it a bigger pot perhaps it will grow. During the summer, maybe it had two leaves. Next spring I might try planting it in the ground. I know that Belgium does not have the best climate for figs but I bought the tree from our local vegetable grower so I am sure he has nurtured the tree from birth.
There are indeed two figs, they have been there and this size for most of the summer. Throw the tree on the compost heap? Never, unless it is well and truly dead, it is my baby. I will continue to nurture it.

I pray that God will do the same with me. I am his child after all.

Stress

Luke 12:49-59

What did you do today?
I missed my bus. The next bus was two hours later. I did not want to wait one hour and fifty-nine minutes. My options were wait until the next bus, walk eleven kilometres or wait half an hour and walk five kilometres. It was raining. We think of stress as a modern illness. We overload ourselves with commitments. I I took option three thus getting home at least an hour later than I have originally intended but with the same workload awaiting me on my arrival home.
I was not  happy camper though my plight was alleviated slightly by one of my classmates from yoga giving a ride part of the way home. I have been trying to finish some time, getting on for ten months. I had planned that today I would actually get the material under the needle of the sewing machine. But no, I had to recover from my cold and wet walk. Then there were other chores which had to be done, one of which was also making up for a mistake that I had made. I am frustrated with myself. There is no way that I will get to the sewing machine today. Maybe if I had not decided to share this thought. Will I ever finish the curtains?


⁵⁰I have a baptism with which to be baptized, and what stress I am under until it is completed! 

Jesus knew stress. I thought it was a modern illness, unique to our over committed life-style. No Jesus had a job to do and it was weighing him down. My frustration is not caused by anything so important to mankind as the mission which Jesus had to fulfil can now believe more fully in the verse which claims that Jesus new our temptations.

Hebrews 4: 14-16
For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

Ready

Luke 12;32-48

Have I locked it? I don't know, I better do it again. And since our car key behaves differently on the second click of lock I unlock the car and then press lock again. I am this neurotic about locking the car because one Sunday night somebody took our fuel card out of the car and used it, used it many times to our cost. We do not know how they got into the car but I expect I had not locked it. This of course did not give them licence to open the car or to take or to use the card.
Now I need to be as particular in following Jesus. I do not know when he is coming. I want to be prepared for him coming now.
Jesus loves me and he loves you.

Anxiety

Luke 12:13-31

I was brought up to eat what I was given whether I liked it or not. The result was that I grew up not knowing that one could dislike food. I went on a Brownie holiday and won the prize for the 'best eater'. 

I believe that the food that we are given is a gift from God, it is part of the world in which I live. I hate waste. of any kind. Perhaps that is why our house is full of artefacts that might be useful one day. 

I see each drip of water that comes out of the tap as a gift. It is easy to take water for granted in Belgium where seldom a week goes by without rain. We are too busy being anxious about amassing our wealth and keeping our precious time to consider our use of those mundane natural resources which we have at our disposal. Our concerns of course would be irrelevant without the natural resources which we take for granted.

I pray that on my striving towards the kingdom  will be a walk of justice and kindness to mankind and humbleness towards God trusting him for my needs.

(Micah 6:8)