Evening Mists

I brought this novel in South Africa last week by Tan Twan Eng. Now I mostly don't have time to read novels and can't even say why I bought this book. It seemed like a totally impulse buy at the time and I wondered if I would ever read it. Then this weekend I smashed a finger and much of what I needed to do I could not do, so I took advantage of having the time to read and read my new novel.

And am delighted.

This is a story set in Malayasia, over the last 70 years and includes the Second World War and the Insurgency.   So much of the story is familiar in the sense that it is set in a third world country that had some similar history to my own. I am finding it delightful to read this well written story that speaks so to my own experience.

Diamonds

We are in Pretoria, South Africa for Vetboys graduation. His is a two degree programme so he still has four years to go! The ceremony is tomorrow which meant that today we were free to please ourselves. On the recommendation of the guesthouse manager we sallied forth to visit one of the biggest diamond mines in the world, not as you might think at Kimberley but at Cullinan. We were treated to a fascinating tour of the working mine, including being shown replicas of famous diamonds found there such as those found in the British crown jewels and the teardrop diamond that Richard Burton bought for Elizabeth Taylor. Later we wandered through the old town with it's period buildings transformed into shops until we found a lovely restaurant for lunch. It is ages since my beloved and I had nothing that absolutely had to be done and in which we have been free to simply play. We took full advantage of this unexpected gift of time together and have laughed and been quiet and comfortable together sharing the fun and excitement of discovering somewhere new. Refreshment for both our souls, even if our soles are worn out and we are sitting with our feet up and our noses in our books - well mine shall be shortly!

Peace

Everyone talked about Thomas today but I never really heard the familiar story.

I was caught, mesmerized by Jesus's greeting  to the disciples

"Peace be with you"

 and again

"Peace".

Perhaps it is because I have lived through some unspeakably bleak times when the

darkness descends
               and reason rocks
                                and faith founders

that I so treasure those rare moments of peace that I receive as gifts from the Merciful Father.

Yesterday was such a day. Redolent with peace. Easy, magical, a time out of time.

Walking in a gorgeous dawning morning and breakfasting with a friend, idle shopping and lunch with my beloved husband and a visit to the local homeless animal shelter with our contributions for the month and time with some very loving cats.

Small inconsequential things in the grand scheme of things but to me the richest bouquet of gifts from the Loving God imaginable.

"Come and have breakfast"

Everyone seems to have their own favourite Resurrection story. Mine is this, from John.

It began for me more than thirty years ago when I was living on a kibbutz in Israel in Galilee and thought it was the coolest thing to put Galilee as the return address on my letters ..... it being the time still of snail mail. I arrived in Galilee in the autumn, which was warm and sunny and as soon as I could made my way down to edges of Lake Galilee. It happened that I was there, that first time, early in the morning and found my way to a small sandy beach surrounded by rustling reeds.  There I watched and dreamed or perhaps it might be called meditation today. Back then I just imagined what it must have been like, a practice that seemed faintly blasphemous but which continued all through my year there as I visited places of pilgrimage.

That morning the sun was just rising, fiery red in a clear sky that promised heat later in the day, and the faint breeze carried the tang of fresh water on it. Sitting silently I sunk into the story which came to me, which was this.

I imagined that Peter and the other disciples had returned to Galilee as instructed, having seen the empty tomb but still not really understanding and impatient Peter had said "I am going fishing". Fishing was what he knew after all, and perhaps he thought he could go back. The others, following as so often, joined him. What a hopeless night they had of it. Casting the nets out and drawing in nothing. Frustrating and fruitless, like their lives felt perhaps. In the early dawn a man on the shore called for them to cast their nets on the other side of the boat. Once more they obeyed their Lord, albeit unknowingly. Though it seemed to me, dreaming that morning, that they weren't expecting Jesus, but had followed Him for long enough to recognise his commands even if they didn't recognise him.

As the net was hauled in full to bursting John suddenly knew who had called to them from the shore, from a spot very like where I was sitting. Pointing the Lord out to Peter, Peter leapt into the fresh, cold water desperate to pour out to his Lord the happenings in Jerusalem, his denials, the empty tomb, needing Jesus to make sense of it all and make things aright again.

The others came on with their haul of fish, some prosaic soul counted them - 153 fish. Fantastic fishing.

Jesus called them to breakfast.

Breakfast, such a menial task amongst fisherman, given to the least important of their company. Yet He said "come and have breakfast". To my very homesick self that morning, "come and have breakfast" was a phrase full of love and care - Jesus feeding my body, feeding my soul. Jesus welcoming me, comforting me. Grilled fish and hot warm bread, fresh from the ovens and the gentleness of His Presence.

Come and have breakfast.

When my Dad died, this was the Gospel I chose for his funeral, and as it was read I imagined once more Jesus calling one to of his sons. His "come and have breakfast" full of love and caring and welcome once again.

Judas and Peter

I find myself thinking, unoriginally,  about Judas and Peter.

Both betrayed their Lord. An argument might be made, I suppose, that Peter's betrayal was not as severe as Judas's, that Judas was way more active, Peter's a reaction only. After their betrayals both seem to have realised and been crushed by their actions. Both went out and wept, Judas even attempting to give the money back in an effort to undo what he had done.

It what happens next that exercises my imagination.

Judas commits suicide. I can imagine far too vividly his sense of being blocked in, of there being no way out. He is unable to see that the Lord's love for him would reach beyond even his betrayal, and that his suicide would not hide him from God. Peter, though, does something entirely different. He runs toward the Lord, at the news of the empty tomb, when they are fishing he leaps out of the boat and flounders ashore to be with Jesus more quickly. He clings to the person of Jesus.

I see both Judas and Peter in myself but pray this day for the grace to keep running toward the Risen Lord and his re-creating love just as Peter did.

That Inbetween Place

Easter is that Inbetween Place.  Well at least to me.

That place when I have to drop the carefully accumulated husk of constructed religion that somehow grows like limestone coating throughout the year and stand cracked and broken in a place where the light pours in. The encapsulating darkness is smashed suddenly against the hard horror of Good Friday.

But it is not that new place where faith flourishes and grows.

Easter is Inbetween.

Maybe there is a joy is being cracked open, it lets the light in.

Kindness

I find myself facing Holy Week with a certain degree of trepidation. Again. My life has been chequered deep hurts and the pain and betrayal of our Lord in the final days of His earthly life are hard to bear, too vividly easy to imagine. It always seems like a time of unmitigated horror. No kindness to be found anywhere. Yet today a Buddhist friend arrived with a small beaded angel as a gift. To remind me, she said, that despite the grimness of Holy Week the angels watch, as they must have watched Him. Even when He was in darkness to deep to see them.

And I wonder how I often I miss the kindnesses shown me because I am so wrapped in my own misery.

Here was a hand that reached out to care, even in the midst of her own lack of understanding of my own recoil at what must come.

Holy Week

Everyone in my small faith circle seems to be focused on Holy Week.

To be expected I suppose. If you are Christian then, as St Paul puts it, our faith is a folly without the Resurrection and we are to be pitied.

But to get to the Resurrection one has to get through Good Friday. The death. Unimaginable cruelty. Abandonment. The Chosen One dying just like a common criminal. Like no one special. It doesn't help that I recognise my own behaviour in that of the disciples. I don't even have the lofty moral high ground to distance me from the gasping pain of it all.

I can't hide as I am reading the narrators part for Good Friday's Gospel. I will be in the midst of it. A front row seat to the most gruesome and tragic show on earth.

Today though I have been finding small pleasures where I can. Breathing in the fragrance of magnolia, the taste of cheesecake and the hug of a son and the gentle love of my husband. Building up courage and strength for the horror to come.