bellbird

The other day, as I was shepherding my straying 2 year old across the tanbark on the way into school to pick up the kids, I heard a familiar "tink!" in the gum tree above. I looked up, and there it was: a small green bird, flitting from branch to branch. A bellbird!

I grew up with bellbirds in our backyard. There's no more beautiful or evocative Australian bird song that I know of, apart from the carolling of the magpies in the early morning. Like the single metallic chime of a high-pitched bell, but far more piercing and beautiful, the bellbirds' "tink!" rings through the bush. You don't often see them, but you can't help but hear them.

I heard another bellbird as I woke up the other morning, chiming from the lemon-scented gums behind our bedroom. And another "tink!" just interrupted my thoughts as I wrote this post. Yes! There's another! And another, and another! Somewhere in the trees near our house there's a bellbird, dancing from tree to tree, piping his little song.

The bellbirds no longer come to the backyard of the house I grew up in. You don't often hear them inside the city limits. But here they are, in the homely surroundings of our suburb. I think they might be fugitives from the burned bushland only 30 minutes to the north of us.

Welcome, little refugees! I hope you've come to stay.

If you've never heard a bellbird (or, more properly, a bell miner) you can listen to it here or here.

image is by Fir0002/Flagstaffotos from Wikimedia Commons.

Memoirs of an Ordinary Pastor (1) to be faithful

Don Carson's Memoirs of an Ordinary Pastor: The Life and Reflections of Tom Carson is a tribute by a son to his father. It's a moving and encouraging book, and a wonderful antidote to pride.

The man who transcribed the English part of Tom Carson's diaries says,

I used to aspire to be the next Henry Martyn [heroic British Bible translator and missionary to the Muslim peoples of India and Persia]. However, after reading your dad's daires, the Lord has given my heart a far loftier goal: simply to be faithful. I know we as men are but dust, but what dust the man I read about in these diaries was!

Tom Carson was an ordinary pastor, but also that most extraordinary of things: a man who sacrificed himself to tell others about Jesus, who didn't seek the praise of men, who spent much of his life in his knees, who dealt with conflict with humility and forbearance, and who struggled through his own "dark night of the soul" (brought on, as mine is so often, by perfectionistic guilt - but also, as mine so often isn't, by passion for the cause of the gospel) with perseverance and faith.

I cried when I read the closing paragraphs of these memoirs:

When he died, there were no crowds outside the hospital, no editorial comments in the papers, no announcement on television, no mention in Parliament, no attention paid by the nation. In his hospital room there was no one by his bedside. There was only the quiet hiss of oxygen, vainly venting because he had stopped breathing.

But on the other side all the trumpets sounded. Dad won entrance to theh only throne room that matters, not because he was a good man or a great man - he was, after all, a most ordinary pastor - but because he was a forgiven man. And he heard the voice of him whom he longed to hear saying, "Well done, good and faithful servant; enter into the joy of your Lord."

I went away from reading this book determined to aim for that rarest of things: not to be praised or respected, but simply to be faithful.

The highlight of the book for me was the chapter on Tom's depression and discouragement in ministry. What Don Carson says is so significant for anyone in ministry, that I'm saving it for another post.

tangles untangled

For a long time now - just over a year, to be exact, since I started this whole blogging business, and forcibly ripped my brain from the murkiness of breastfeeding and babies into the competing demands of childrearing and ministry - I've been struggling to keep the different strands of research projects and family needs and books to read and household tasks and ministry responsibilities separate in my head.

Like a tangled ball of yarn, they knot themselves around each other, a mess of incomplete ideas and unmet responsibilities and unfinished tasks, and sit somewhere inside me, an undigested mass in my gut, pressing upwards on my diaphragm, pressing on my lungs, making it hard to breathe.

I pray for God to untangle the ball. Occasionally, I tease a thread loose and pray about it. God responds, and unknots a strand or two, relieves the tightness and anxiety, and replaces it with his peace. But I glance away from him, and before I know it, another pressing responsibility, another incomplete project, another forgotten task tangles itself into the ball, and there it is again, cutting off my breath. Am I the only one who feels this way?

Some weeks ago, as I sat on my rock and prayed, an amazing thing happened: my perspective shifted sideways and I saw things differently.

The tangled ball of yarn was still there - the threads of ideas half-examined and tasks half-done and topics half-tackled and responsibilities half-met and books half-read and people half-cared for. But the threads were no longer tangled in my mind's eye.

Each thread lay, a separate and glowing strand, weaving over and under one another, but without knots or tangles. Some strands had been laid aside for a time, to be picked up later; others ended or began at certain points; still others lay in my hand, being woven into the pattern. Not a mess of knotted and tangled threads, but a neat bundle of coloured yarn, with each strand finding its place in the whole.

What this means for me, perfectionist and control-freak that I am, is that I don't need to keep track of every thread. I can lay one down and pick it up again or not as the case may be. My life doesn't depend on my ability to keep things organised, understood, and under control. Thoughts come and thoughts go, responsibilities are taken up and laid aside, projects are tackled and abandoned, but I can trust God to take care of the whole.

And if I (speaking sententiously and in cliches now!) am God's tapestry, and he is the weaver, who am I to think I can keep every strand clear and distinct and in my sight at all times? My job is to be faithful to God's word and to the people he has given me to care for, but only God sees every motive and perceives every thought and watches over every responsibility. I make plans, but he is the master designer who shapes my days (Prov 16:9, 19:21).

When I look back over my life from the perspective of heaven, I will see how every thought, every task, every responsibility was taken and used by him for the glory of his Son. And that is enough for me. That is knowledge too wonderful for me.

Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you. (1 Peter 5:7)

images are from stock.xchng

John Milton on Satan's pride and fall

These are the words of Satan to his lieutenant Beelzebub after being cast out of heaven, as imagined by John Milton in Paradise Lost. They describe the essence of pride at its first beginning, handed down to all of us who know what it is to be proud.

What though the field be lost?
All is not lost—the unconquerable will,
And study of revenge, immortal hate,
And courage never to submit or yield:
And what is else not to be overcome?
That glory never shall his wrath or might
Extort from me. To bow and sue for grace
With suppliant knee, and deify his power
Who, from the terror of this arm, so late
Doubted his empire—that were low indeed;
That were an ignominy and shame beneath
This downfall ...

Farewell happy Fields
Where Joy for ever dwells: Hail horrors, hail
Infernal world, and thou profoundest Hell
Receive thy new Possessor: One who brings
A mind not to be chang'd by Place or Time.
The mind is its own place, and in it self
Can make a Heav'n of Hell, a Hell of Heav'n.
What matter where, if I be still the same,
And what I should be, all but less then he
Whom Thunder hath made greater? Here at least
We shall be free; th' Almighty hath not built
Here for his envy, will not drive us hence:
Here we may reign secure, and in my choice
To reign is worth ambition though in Hell:
Better to reign in Hell, then serve in Heav'n.

pride (4) a short history of pride

Pride: to seek for yourself the glory and authority that belong to God, forgetting your dependence on him.*

If this is pride, then before humans were made, there was pride. Satan and his cohorts, bright and glorious angels, raised themselves against God, seeking his glory and power for themselves. They were cast out of heaven into the depths of hell (2 Pet 2:4, Jude 6 cf Isa 14:3-23, Ezek 28:1-19). But the fruit of devilish wisdom is still pride.

If this is pride, then the first sin on earth involved pride. Why did Adam and Eve rebel against God? Because the serpent promised they would become "like God" (Gen 3:4). They doubted God's true word, threw off his rightful authority, and set themselves up as mini-gods, masters of their own destiny. God ripped away their immortality by throwing them from the garden (Gen 3). But we still bear the proud likeness of our father Adam (Rom 5:12-21).

If this is pride, then it’s the main characteristic of humans when they get together. The Tower of Babel was supposed to be a grand monument to human achievement, built "so that we may make a name for ourselves" (Gen 11:4). God, of course, stepped in and showed just how much bigger he is than puny humanity: he scattered humans to the four corners of the earth, separated by different languages and cultures (Gen 11:1-9).

If this is pride, then it fuels all opposition to God and his people. Through the Bible there's a line of kings, obsessed by power and wealth, who want to throw off God’s rule and turn themselves into gods, to be worshipped and obeyed (Isa 14:3-23, Ezek 28:1-19): Pharaoh (Exod 5-15, 9:29-30), Nebuchadnezzar (Dan 3-4), Sennacherib (Isa 36-37), Herod (Ac 12:19b-25). God laughs and scoffs at them, for they are puppets in his hands, to be raised up or cast down as he sees fit (Ps 2, 37, 73).

If this is pride, then it lies behind all the long history of God's people. Raised up from a single wandering herdsman (Gen 17), the smallest and most insignificant of nations (Deut 7:7-8), like a woman lying in her filth and chosen to be God’s bride (Ezek 16): there’s no reason for pride here. But God’s people continually become puffed up by their God-given blessings: they forget what God has done for them, turn to more easily manipulated gods, and refuse to submit to God’s word. He brings them low, they repent, he raises them up, and the cycle starts again (Neh 9).

If this is pride, then we are still guilty of it. Every time we try to earn God's grace, or doubt his love because we haven't lived up to it (Rom 4:2, 10:1-4, Eph 4:9). Every time we're motivated by envy and selfish ambition (Phil 2:3, Jam 3:14-16). Every time we quarrel (Prov 13:10, 1 Tim 6:3-5), show favouritism (Jam 2:1-12), oppress the weak (Isa 13:11, Ps 10:2, Ezek 16:49), or boast (1 Jn 2:16, Jude 16). Every time we become secure in our wisdom, beauty, wealth, or strength, and forget we are like wild flowers, here today and gone tomorrow (Jer 9:23-24, 1 Tim 6:17, Jam 1:9-11).

If this is pride, then it is time to humble ourselves before the Lord, for we are all guilty of pride. It is time to grieve, mourn and wail, to acknowledge our need for God's grace, and to seek his forgiveness, knowing that he is the one who opposes the proud and gives grace to the humble (Jam 4:1-10).

If this is pride.

* I took this definition from verses like Deut 8:14, 2 Chron 25:19, 32:25, 2 Kgs 19:22, Ps 10:4, Isa 37:23, Jer 9:23-24, 13:15, 17, Hos 13:6, and Neh 9:16, 29.

If you want to read more about the history of pride, you can view John Stott's excellent article "Pride, Humility and God" from Alive to God: Studies in Spirituality online at Google Books.

Images of statues are from stock.xchng; fresco of Adam and Eve is by Masaccio's fresco in the Santa Maria del Carmini church in Florence, Italy; "Tower of Babel" woodcut is by MC Escher; Israel poster is available from All Posters.

Bettina Arndt on sex

It's interesting to see a secular article in a secular newspaper saying the same things about sex which some Christians (and, more importantly, God - thanks for the reminder, Carmelina!) have been saying for years. Here's what Bettina Arndt has to say:

[A] woman on a mothering website ... suggests that women put sex on the to-do list ... Hang on a moment. Isn't that suggesting that women just do it? That sometimes they have sex when they are not in the mood? The very suggestion runs into a massive ideological roadblock. Women's right to say "no" has been enshrined in our cultural history for nearly 50 years. It was one of the outstanding achievement of the women's movement to outlaw rape in marriage and teach women to resist unwanted advances. But it simply hasn't worked to have a couple's sex life hinge on the fragile, feeble female libido. The right to say "no" needs to give way to saying "yes" more often. ...

The case is best made by a letter I received ... "If sex is mutual, when both people want it, that's wonderful. If one partner wants sex and the other doesn't but offers it as a gift, that too is pretty darned good. But my first wife regularly refused, complaining about my unreasonable demands. Sometimes she begrudgingly complied, which made me feel like a thief, as if I had stolen something that was not rightfully mine. Sex was rarely mutual and never a gift. ...

"Rose, my second wife of seven years, has a demanding job as a manager. Nevertheless, she has never said 'no'. She has never used the headache defence, never been too tired. Always, she makes sex a gift if she is not in the mood herself. Often she find herself enjoying the moment. She does this because she cares about me, about my feelings and my needs. In my case, I'm sure you can guess the outcomes. If I notice Rose is run down and tired, seldom will I reach for her, other than to give her a cuddle. If she is not well, I look after her, tuck her into bed and either read or veg out in front of the TV ... I am far from the perfect husband, but I do love and care for her, not because I am a wonderful bloke, but because her so very obvious caring for me can lead to little else other than reciprocity."

Sam makes it sound simple. But it seems extraordinary that sex is treated so differently from all the other ways in which a loving couple cater to each other's needs and desires. We are willing to go out of our way to do other things to please each other - cooking his favourite meal, sitting through repeats of her beloved television show. Why, then, are we so ungenerous when it comes to "making love", the ultimate expression of that mutual caring?

You'll find the rest of the article, an excerpt from Bettina Arndt The Sex Diaries, in today's Good Weekend.

Saturday blogging?

Just to let you know, like Sundays, I'll no longer be writing posts every Saturday (today's was unplanned!).

another gun?!

Oh yes, another gun is created from an educational toy by our 5 year old son Thomas (who, despite appearances, is a gentle, affectionate child). From this:to this:And yes, that's the first thing Thomas made with this new toy. Having got that out of his system, he deigned to put some cogs together.

Alfie top 5

A few of us were having a bit of a guessing game in the comments here about which of the Alfie and Annie Rose books by Shirley Hughes are in my top 5. It turns out that one of my top 5 Alfie books, Dogger, isn't actually an Alfie book at all, but I had no trouble coming up with 5 others. I could keep going - top 10, top 15, top 20 (are there that many Alfie books?) - but these are the 5 which create storytime magic for me. Here they are:

Alfie Gets in First
This was the first Alfie book Shirley Hughes wrote. Alfie is horrified to find himself locked in the house with his mum and sister outside. All the passersby try to rescue him, but he eventually (and proudly) rescues himself. It's a beautifully crafted book: on many of the pages, the left hand picture shows what's happening outside the house, while the right hand picture shows what's happening inside the house. A lively story with a subtle message about one preschooler's independence and courage.

A Journey to the North Pole from Alfie Weather
How I love stories (as I've said before) which celebrate a child's imagination! Here's another. The story and pictures have two layers: what's happening in real life, and what's happening in Alfie and Annie Rose's imagination. Shut in during a wet and cold day, they bravely explore Grandma's house until they reach the North Pole in the freezing attic. This is the first story in Alfie Weather, the most beautifully produced of all the Alfie books.

Winter Stars from Alfie Weather
This is from the same Alfie collection. It's a story, as you might guess, about stars: stars scattered across the walls and ceiling from the night light, star-shaped cookie cutters in Grandma's kitchen, stars crackling in the ice underfoot during a night time stroll, and stars sprayed across the sky viewed from the safety of Daddy's arms. The simplest of stories, it's absolutely arresting visually.

Bonting from The Big Alfie Out of Doors Storybook
I've already told you why I love this one!

Rhymes for Annie Rose
These poems are a glorious celebration of ordinary life: building cubbies, splashing through puddles, washing clothes, meeting cows, learning to count. Some, like The Knobbly Tree, have entered our family folklore, quoted every time we see a hollow tree. Others, like Footprints and One Winter Evening, send shivers down my spine every time I read them. These poems are simple enough to read to a 2 year old, but adults will also enjoy reading them over and over again.

take 5

When I tuck my 10 year old daughter Elizabeth in at night, the last thing I do is pray with her.

I pray that she will come to know Jesus' love more and more. I pray that she will become as beautiful on the inside as she is on the outside. Often, I pray that God will give her courage to tell her friends about Jesus.

A couple of weeks ago, she had to bring 5 things to school to share with her class. Each object was supposed to reveal something about her. Last year, I suggested she take in a Bible, but she was reluctant, and I didn't want to force her, since I thought this had to come from her.

This year she took in a book to show she loves reading, some crayons to show she loves drawing, a Nintendo DS game, and her gym costume: a potted summary of her interests.


She also took in a Bible. Even though she felt nervous, she told her class she's a Christian.

It's wonderful to see God answering my prayers for my daughter. How faithful he is to answer the prayers of his people! So often I doubt him, and wonder if he's really working in my children's hearts, but it's clear he's been slowly and silently changing Elizabeth, helping her to live courageously for him.

I've been encouraged to keep praying for my children with confidence, for God is good.