August garden

My heart isn't really in my garden right now.  Yet, going out and browsing for spots of beauty to photograph seems healing.  I'm behind on deadheading; blossoms are faded and going to seed.  Even so, life abounds in the garden.

The sedum is beginning its autumn blush.

Life buzzes and flutters all over these plants.  

I was only able to capture a small proportion 

of the butterflies and bees, 

but one of these photos showcases four butterflies, 

which is getting close to the truth of it.

The sedum is nestled amongst zinnias 

which I ought to have pulled out from in front of it.

I have no will to uproot zinnias, 

even when they are much too tall for the front row.  

How can you pull out something 

that looks like this?

Zinnias are also butterfly magnets:

The zinnias have been blooming all summer, 

but like the sedum, 

the asters are just coming into their show of beauty.

I mostly try to plant pink flowers, 

because they are my favorite.  

But other colors are always creeping in, 

and I have no design discipline, 

so I let them grow and love them.

Nasturtiums

Nasturtiums in sunshine

Sunshine on a nasturtium is a glorious sight to behold.

I appreciate the unremarkable things,

like hostas...

and potted begonias who can't figure out where the sun is, 

and whether to reach for it or hide from it...

My Rose of Sharon has sprung up from its petite beginnings
into a gawky adolescent shrub with sparse foliage and gangly branches,
but the blooms are delightful nonetheless.

I've never seen this miniature white clematis before, 

but it appeared like a fairy mist in the shade outside my living room windows, 

and I left it be.

The best miracle was this praying mantis,

on a zinnia (of course).

I was trying to take a picture of the blossom,

when I went to brush off what I thought was a stray piece of foliage.

Then I realized the green was

a devout little insect,

peacefully bowing his head and folding his hands.

Author's intent

It is a common thing these days, in "literary analysis," to project one's own bias on a text and interpret it however the interpreting individual sees fit.

"What I bring to a text" is considered a valid lens for its interpretation.

In my college days, in the 1980s, the Feminists and Women's Studies people were doing all kinds of wacky things with Shakespeare.  Shakespeare is pretty bawdy to begin with, but the acrobatic interpretations that came out of the University of Minnesota in those days were mind boggling, and not (in my opinion) in a good way.  I am sure that Shakespeare never intended to communicate most of what they came up with, but they did not care.  Shakespeare's intentions were not their concern; their own view of reality, regardless of how accurate it may have been, drove their "research."  In fact, they would have argued that nobody had a right to say that their view of reality was inaccurate, although they would not hesitate to dismiss--as inaccurate--a view of reality that honored tradition or accepted the concept of objective truth.

My own children, in their high school days, often complained about their English teachers, and the free-flowing idea that, "There is no right or wrong interpretation of this text; it's all about what you see in it."  One of my children came home mad as hops about a teacher's ridiculous manipulations of a poem that was actually quite clear, as far as my child could see.

Recently I read an article by John Piper (or a transcript of an interview), in which he addressed how Bible study is subverted when people come to the table to discuss the question, "What did this chapter mean to you?"  [I wish I could find it, but I'm old, and the internet is an illusive thing.  I encourage you to look for it yourself.] Piper says that it doesn't matter what the chapter meant to you.  What matters is what God meant to communicate through the person He inspired to write the words.  The onus is on us, in our study, to seek to understand what God is saying to us.

Selfishness reigns supreme when we exalt our own perspective, experiences and biases as a lens through which we insist on interpreting texts, and even conversations.  Because, yes, this "literary technique" filters down all the way to day-to-day communications between people.  It is bad when we read secular texts and selfishly impose our personal interpretations on them.  It is disastrous when we do so with God's Holy Scripture.  And it is immediately destructive when we apply the same habit to our daily communications with one another.

This is a shining example of selfishness: "I have the right to decide what you mean."  It's pride, pure and simple, and it breeds misunderstanding and conflict.  You don't have to be brilliant to be able to see that the world simply cannot work if we all pridefully insist on interpreting it according to our own inclinations.  There is no unity in selfishness.

We need to humble ourselves and strive to understand one another.

We must be willing to put aside an initial feeling of being offended, and seek out what the other person truly meant to communicate.

We need to look deeply into the hearts of others, to the best of our ability, and try to understand where they are coming from, what they are hoping to accomplish, and why they would attempt to communicate what they are attempting to communicate.  Indeed, understanding someone's initial motivation will always help us better interpret whatever it is that the person said, regardless of how eloquent or awkward the communication was.

God calls us to love.  The loving way is to humbly release our own bias and enter into a realm of endeavoring to understand someone else at heart level.

This is not to absolve communicators of the need to try to communicate well, clearly, accurately and with a view to what a given audience can hear and comprehend.  It is not to say that, once understood, every person's communication has merit and is correct.  It is only to say that we don't even have a fighting chance of understanding one another if we won't begin by trying to understand rather than insisting on being understood.

Jonathan's birthday

Twenty-three years ago, on this day, I was giving birth to my fourth child, my beautiful brown-eyed boy.

It took me four tries to get a brown-eyed baby, but finally he arrived, the baby who looked like the baby I'd always imagined, the baby who resembled some of the old baby pictures of me.

Our babysitter, Debi, was with the other three kids, who were five (almost 6), four, and two (almost 3).

Jonno was the only one of our babies who was actually born at The Birthplace, that calmer, homier facility adjacent to the hospital.  It has since been shut down, in favor of keeping all births closer to emergency technology in case of complications.

Oddly, I don't remember much about leaving for the hospital, but it was sometime Saturday evening.

The Birthplace had regular beds, not hospital beds.  They were covered with quilted bedspreads.  It was all done in homey florals, with wallpaper borders and golden oak rocking chairs.  Today's homebuyers would sigh at the hopelessly out-of-date decor, nothing gray, nothing white, nothing stainless steel.  I think the idea was to escape a clinical, antiseptic look.  Personally, I thought it was charming, and comforting.

I took a bath while I was laboring.  They had a bathtub, and I tried to relax in a warm bath.

By Sunday morning, I was tired, and the labor continued.

In all my deliveries, I never had an urge to push.  I didn't ever dilate much past 8 cm, either.  I'd just get to 8 cm, and then it would stay there.  In the first three deliveries, they finally told me to push, even though I was only measuring 8 cm.  I did, and it was hard, and it hurt a lot.  It takes a lot of mental fortitude to push, inflicting that kind of pain on yourself, when you don't have any urge to push.

Finally, when Laura was born, (my third time around), I asked for a shot of novocaine (xylocaine?) at the point of exit.  This helped immeasurably.  So, I approached Jonathan's birth with the expectation that I would again have a shot of novocaine, for much needed help and relief in the final moments before birth.

However, I also hoped that I would develop an urge to push this fourth baby out.  I'd read everything about birth that I could find, and all the authors assured me that if one is patient and gives nature a chance, the body will eventually heave the baby out of its own volition.

At about 10:30 a.m. on Sunday morning, August 27, 1995, after something like 14 hours of laboring at the hospital, no sleep, and no food, I sat in a golden oak rocking chair and cried with exhaustion.

My midwife came in and told me that we could put an end to this dreary business, if I would just only push.  So I finally agreed to get on the bed and exert myself.  I said, "Can I please have a shot of novocaine, so I will not be so afraid?"

She said, "No.  It's still too early.  You will tear if we give you novocaine right now."

The bed was flatter than a hospital bed.  It didn't crank up into a supportive sitting position, nor did it have arms that flipped down for me to grab.  I sort of missed the hospital beds I'd had for my other three deliveries.

Meanwhile, Debi had taken the other three kids to church.  Everybody at church knew I was having a baby.  They prayed for us.  Jonathan's birth was covered by the corporate Sunday morning prayers of our church.

I told my midwife that I didn't want to push until I had a shot of numbing local anesthetic.  I told her I was afraid to push without that shot.  She told me I had to push until the baby's head crowned, and then she would give me the shot.

I was unhappy, but I complied.  I pushed until his head crowned.

"There's your baby's head!" she cheered.  "Do you want a mirror to see?  Do you want to feel his hair?"

"No!"  I replied, "I want my novocaine now."  Seriously, I am convinced that she thought she was going to be able to distract me into pushing him out without the shot.  I was mad.  She finally gave me the shot, and a few minutes after 11 a.m., my beautiful baby boy came into the world.  After the midwife delivered his head, Shawn pulled him the rest of the way out and cut the umbilical cord.  I remember he had the most delicious, plump little shoulders.

I took a long nap after that, while Shawn held our new son against his bare chest and watched TV in The Birthplace's living room.

That is the story of Jonathan's birth.  I am so thankful for this beautiful child, this gift from God, this son born on a Sunday, full of promise and hope, covered with blessing.

Limping

This month kicked the stuffing out of me.

Shawn says I shouldn't bother to try to do six posts this August.  Since I can't remember a time when I felt less like writing, the thought is tempting.  Still, I get precious few feelings of accomplishment in this life, and looking over at my sidebar, seeing a tidy collection of parenthetical sixes line up after the name of each month throughout the year, this is one of the few victories I ever achieve in the life I have attained for myself, which is devoid of report cards or paychecks.

Therefore, I will limp on.

I have a few ideas; it's whether I have the energy to try to express them.  It's strange to be so apathetic about writing.

I miss having a dog.  I miss Schubert.

It will be okay.

I'm thankful that God gave us the blessing of having sweet Schubert for 11 years.

Why is it so ridiculously hard to lose a dog?  I think it's because your dog is always there, always happy and excited to see you, always next to you, touching you physically, sleeping by your leg, resting a chin on your foot, walking up or down the stairs with you.  Sometimes I'd forget something and change direction halfway up or down the stairs, and I always felt so bad for Schubert when this happened, because the stairs are uncarpeted, and he had to balance carefully, attending to whether he slipped or not.  It was awkward for him to turn around on a slippery oak step in the middle of the staircase.  Sometimes I finished going to the top or the bottom, just so he could be on level ground before I went back to do what I had forgotten.

You get so used to your dog's faithful company, you don't even notice it.

Until it is gone.

And then there were none

Schubert

Best little dog a family could ever have had

6/6/2007-8/11/2018

Oh how thankful we are that you came to brighten our lives

and show us what it means to love unconditionally.

You wagged your tail so hard you would nearly throw your hips out

because you were full of joy and wanted to share it.

You were truly a wonderful gift from our Creator.

I hope you are frolicking in the presence of the Lord,

and bringing a smile to His face.

The Lord gives and the Lord takes away.

Blessed be the name of the Lord.

Job 1:21

What will I do with such empty arms?

Onward to August

Happy August!

Actually, it is always bittersweet to welcome this beautiful month.  The flowers bloom in profusion.  Tassels sprout atop cornstalks; the harvest is coming.  Nights lengthen and cool.  Summer is in its last chapter.

Speaking of blooming flowers, nasturtiums can be a confusing plant to grow.  They hold back their blossoms if you fertilize them, or even if you water them too much.  Usually they thrive on being left alone, but mine have been temperamental this summer, perhaps because it has been so hot.

Yet, they were bringing me joy:

Yesterday, though, I noticed a ravaged patch of them.  Do they look crushed to you?

This may be a result of the heavy downpour we experienced yesterday afternoon, thunder and all, traumatizing Schubert and inciting him to attach himself to my leg.  Yes, it rained quite hard, a deluge of water streaming straight down from the sky.

After the storm, a neighbor boy and his friend emerged from his house across the street, with a soccer ball.  I know, because an earth-shattering thud impacted my home, and the screens rattled in the front windows.  Wondering what could cause such a ruckus, I left my laundry and ventured outside to investigate.  It was then I saw the two youths, barefoot and full of teen bravado, awkwardly hurtling a soccer ball around their yard, driveway, and the street.

It could have been the rain, or it could have been a soccer ball, falling hard off our porch roof and onto these floundering flowers.

I am trying to psych myself up to bake some cookies for this kid, so he will not want to wreck my gardens.  It's hard to tell whether it happens because he is malicious, or because he is inept at controlling his ball.  We find quite a few soccer balls in our yard, and I must confess that we are sometimes tempted to drive over them.  I need to bake some cookies.

But.  On a bright note, seeing my crushed flowers helps me think about how much the Lord loves us, how much He even loves me.

When my flowers are struggling, failing to thrive, I do not get angry at them.  I feel bad for them, and I want to help them.  I deadhead the spent blossoms, and pinch back the broken stems.  I pull out weeds and try to arrange the plants around them to accommodate the right amount of sunlight.  If my nasturtiums are parched, I give them water.  I work to help them.  I am for them.

God is for us.

God is for us.  He is on our side.  He loves us, and His heart is set to help us, to give us aid.

I've been studying the Holy Spirit.  It is a tremendous blessing to read passages in the Old Testament about God pouring out streams of life on the earth to make it flourish.  Psalm 65 is one of my favorites:

You visit the earth and water it;

You greatly enrich it;

the river of God is full of water;

You provide their grain,

for so You have prepared it.

You water its furrows abundantly,

settling its ridges,

softening it with showers,

and blessing its growth.

You crown the year with Your bounty;

Your wagon tracks overflow with abundance.

The pastures of the wilderness overflow,

the hills gird themselves with joy,

the meadows clothe themselves with flocks,

the valleys deck themselves with grain,

they shout and sing together for joy.

~Psalm 65:9-13 ESV

Of course, God does send the rain and make the crops grow.  God is our Provider, giving us water and food so we can live.  But this psalm is also a metaphor for spiritual truth.  The Holy Spirit--the Living Water of God--comes down, poured out from above, to bring spiritual life to the children of men.  God nurtures us with his Spirit.

God is for us.  God loves us.  God demonstrated His love for us, clearly and decisively, when while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us (Romans 5:8).  Amazingly, it doesn't stop there! Since our great God did not spare His own Son, but gave Jesus up for us all, we can be assured that He will also--along with the gift of salvation through Christ--graciously give us everything else we need for life and godliness (Romans 8:32, 2 Peter 1:3).

God loves us.  His desire is to see us succeed, to grow in grace and godliness, and to walk in righteousness and victory.  He is here with us, through His Holy Spirit, and He never stops working on our behalf, helping us learn how to access His power and His wisdom which He graciously, freely offers.

God is for us, and He loves us.  He envelops us and indwells us with love.  Romans 5:5 tells us, God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.  This is amazing.  Maybe you've heard about God's love so many times, the words stopped meaning anything.  Stop and ponder it:  God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.

I was thinking about God's love, and also about the prayer in Ephesians 3, and I realized something.  Read the prayer, carefully, and then I will tell you what I realized:

I bow my knees before the Father . . . 

that according to the riches of His glory 

He may grant you to be strengthened with power

through His Spirit in your inner being,

so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith--

that you, being rooted and grounded in love,

may have strength to comprehend with all the saints

what is the breadth and length and height and depth,

and to know the love of Christ

that surpasses knowledge,

that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

~Ephesians 3:14, 16-19 ESV

This is what I realized:  God strengthens us with power, through His Spirit inside of us, so we can comprehend the vastness of His love and know the love of Christ.

We can't even begin to understand His love for us, until His Spirit in us strengthens us for the task.  We are rooted and grounded in His love, yet in order to comprehend and experience the infinite dimensions of this all-surpassing love, we need the strength and power of the Holy Spirit.  And here is the best news of all:  He pours His Spirit out on us abundantly, precisely so this can happen.

Dear Lord Jesus, thank you.  
Thank you for your all-surpassing love.  
Please pour out Your Spirit on me and into me, drench me and fill me.  
Help me to know and experience the fullness of Your love.  
Please give me more of You, more of Your love.  
Please enable me to feel how much You love me.  
Please make my heart sing because of how much You have done for me.  
I want to overflow with eager anticipation for what You are doing in me each day, and how triumphantly You can use me to reflect Your glory and draw people into Your kingdom.  
Even when I am crushed and beaten down, You are preparing for me an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison.  
Please help me confidently wait in steadfast faith for the unimaginable delights You have prepared for us in our eternal future with You.

But, as it is written,

"What no eye has seen, 

nor ear heard,

nor the heart of man imagined,

what God has prepared 

for those who love Him" --

these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit.  

For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God.

~1 Corinthians 2:9-10 ESV