Wearily upward

It's a scary thing to be officially unemployed for the first time in a very long time. I'm not changing jobs, I'm changing careers, and as such am now in a waiting time before I start retraining. And there is always an element of risk to doing this. Questions frequently come to mind: Are you insane to do it at this age? Are you sure you want to do this? What about your family? What if you fail? What if you go down this road and you realise halfway through that it's the wrong path? Where will you get the money from? What if...? What about...? Who do you think you are to change anything? I am aware that I am not the first person to go through this, and I am certainly not the only person facing these questions at this very moment. It seems that one of the consequences of a global pandemic is that people re-evaluate their lives and priorities (rightly or wrongly...) and that changes inevitably occur as a result.  It seems that change (whether we choose it or not) is, ironic...

As we get closer to Easter the regular Easter songs and Easter readings start popping up at church a bit more frequently. Almost like Carols, Isaiah 9 and Michael Bublé come out of hibernation in the run-up to Christmas. One of these Easter readings is the prophecy of Christ's crucifixion from Isaiah 53. It's a fairly well-known passage quoted in many songs and sermons, but the bit that stood out for me this morning was right at the start of the chapter in verses two and three: "He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering, and familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces he was despised, and we held him in low esteem." It got me thinking about how I judge and value people at a glance most of the time. I had to ask myself these questions: Would I have held Jesus in low esteem if I met Him back in Biblical times? Would I have missed ou...

My mother-in-law and I had a brief but awkwardly interesting conversation about protective gear for male cricketers recently. She and my father-in-law are visiting us from Namibia, so I appreciated the rare chance to have face-to-face awkward conversations. I was watching an IPL match when a batter adjusted his er... abdominal guard* while on screen. This prompted the question from my mother-in-law about whether wearing protective gear is very uncomfortable and limits mobility significantly. She had no experience in wearing any protective kit like that at all. I replied that it can be uncomfortable at times, but that everything in its design is intended to make the guard as effective against hits, yet as agreeable to wear as possible. The choice is either to wear something slightly uncomfortable that limits movement to a very small degree, or risking immeasurable pain and discomfort if a hard leather ball moving terribly fast uses parts of one's anatomy as a punching bag. It really...

Have you figured out what the one thing is that makes you you ? There are so many things we (humans) have in common, but what is the one thing that makes you uniquely you ? I suppose a good way to rephrase that question is: Who are you? Or maybe: Who are you meant to be? I wonder whether answering that question might get easier - because, let's face it, it's a really tough question to answer - if we know what our reason for being alive is. To phrase it slightly differently: What is the one thing that needs doing/saying that only you can do/say - no one else - and if that thing is not done/said the world will be a worse place for it? What do you think yours is?  In Christian circles you may hear people describing this as "God's calling on your life" or something along those lines. Some of us may call it our reason for living, or our purpose for being. We can often see it as JUST one thing, and when that thing is done/said, we can peacefully slip away into nothingne...

The following letter was found in a baking-powder tin wired to the handle of an old pump that offered the only hope of drinking water on a very long and seldom-used trail across Nevada's Amargosa Desert: "This pump is in working order. I put a new sucker washer into it and it ought to last five years. But the washer dries out and the pump has got to be primed. Under the white rock I buried a bottle of water, out of the sun and cork end up. There's enough water in it to prime the pump, but not if you drink some first. Pour about one-fourth and let her soak to wet the leather. Then pour in the rest medium fast and pump like crazy. You'll get water. The well has never run dry. Have faith. When you get watered up, fill the bottle and put it back like you found it for the next feller. (signed) Desert Pete. P.S. Don't go drinking the water first. Prime the pump with it and you'll get all the water you can hold." I wonder how many of us would be tempted to drink ...

If today's walk was the only one I ever did in Richmond Park, I would not believe anyone who told me that there are free-roaming, wild deer within its boundaries. I spent more than three and a half hours lugging a camera around the park to get a nice photo, and I didn't see one single deer. Not one. Not even in the distance. But luckily today was not my only time in Richmond Park. In fact, I have been there many, many times (I want to say hundreds of times...) and there has only been about three occasions on which I saw no deer. I know the deer are there, I just didn't see them today. {I took the above photo there myself on 11/02/2022.} If it wasn't for my previous experiences of the fullness and riches of Richmond Park, I would have (wrongfully) written the place off as a dud for photography hobbyists; one disappointing experience preventing me from ever going back and seeing more than I could ever have imagined... Isn't that our attitude towards God sometimes: One...

I am always struck by the profoundness of C.S. Lewis's words (whenever I remember them...): "We must lay before him [God] what is in us, not what ought to be in us." ~Letters To Malcolm: Chiefly On Prayer~ What a liberating thought! I don't know about you, but I often feel pressure to pray the right prayers, to say the right words, to be as eloquent and holy as I can when I talk with God. He is, after all, the King of kings, Lord of lords, Sovereign over the world! Like when the biship visits our church. Or when I meet someone with a really posh accent. I wonder, though, whether God is at all impressed or even influenced by my hollow attempts at articulacy (when is the last time you tried to pray to the Almighty in your second language in front of people?) or profound insight into "what God wants me to pray for." The more I think about it, the more I realise that it is, indeed, futile. God looks at and knows our hearts (1 Samuel 16:7; Romans 8:27). He listen...