Living Wittily

Photos of Isaiah's Hopeful Imagination 4: "Arise! Shine! Your light has come."

Those moments of awareness, when our attention is drawn, when we see what we are looking at for the reality that it is; moments of what? Revelation? Epiphany? Summons? Attentiveness? 

Each of these singularly or in combination, perhaps. 

We were out walking recently in what used to be a forest, but following Storm Arwen, is now deforested ground covered with tree stumps, and disfigured further by the track scars of heavy machinery.

I remember it as a quiet mature forest, rich in bird life, with a network of paths giving a choice of direction, length and scenery. One winter morning we stood in it watching goldcrest wrens feeding on the ground and high in the trees.

But out walking the other day on the surviving paths, navigating machine tracks so deep they were flooded ditches after the recent flood-inducing rainfall, the land both looked and felt desolate.

Until I turned round. The sun was settling over Clachnaben, the sky like backlit Lalique. The hazy light and the layered landscape in the distance, was in stark contrast to the several square miles of dull dankness in close proximity around us.

The photo was taken from Garlogie,  21 miles away from Clachnaben. I had turned back to do a 360 degree survey. And away over there, the sun.

Isaiah is full of such moments. Light shining in darkness, the first finger line traces of dawn, the blazing radiance of the light of the nations. And the locus classicus of Advent hope:

"The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of deep darkness a light has dawned." (Isaiah 9.2)

That moment when you turn round and are made to see that life is backlit by the heavens, and the surrounding gloom of life's landscape is part of a world where light carries its own promise of luminous hope.

The horizontal layers of horizons, bathed in filtered sunlight, become a sacrament of the present moment, signalling an encounter with a Presence that intersects with the world, and touches into our own inner world of faith and longing, hope and uncertainty, love and loss.  

Maybe Advent faith is the unexplained urge to turn round and face the sun; and then to open ourselves to the God who is light. "Arise! Shine! Your light has come!" Such a moment of turning is hard to explain. What moves us to turn? What enables us to see what we are looking at? The Advent answer is as old as the human longing: "For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given..."

Photos of Isaiah's Hopeful Imagination 3. A Way to Travel and a Way to Go.

Not all roads make for an aesthetically pleasing photograph. I have photos of roads in the highlands and alongside lochs, and single-track not-quite roads running through several favourite glens. Roads of course don't have to be attractive, but they do have to be fit for purpose, which is to make travel easy, or at least easier

Isaiah knew about roads, because he knew also about trackless wastes, never ending desert, wilderness where travellers become disoriented, and run out of energy and water. At least if there's a road that goes somewhere you have a chance.

Seventy years earlier the exiles had trekked across some of the most inhospitable land in the middle east. All very well to say the Lord was going to set them free, that Babylon would fall, and they could go home.

How? What about transport, provisions, water? The logistics were hard enough. Add to that the dangerous terrain of desert, mountain and wilderness, and maybe Babylon wasn't so bad after all.

And Isaiah said, "A voice of one calling: “In the wilderness prepare the way for the LORD; make straight in the desert a highway for our God...See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland."

Not only will God bring them home to Zion, he'll build the road for them. It's this outrageous optimism that makes Isaiah the stand out prophet of Advent. I read him, year on year, to rinse my mind of pessimism and negativity, which often takes the form of an unhealthy realism, the kind of well reasoned caution that thrives by suppressing imagination. Isaiah is an adrenaline shot for jaded imaginations, and an antidote for resignation to the status quo. 

We all have our ways to go in the life that is ours, sometimes through arid, barren and even featureless landscape. You might even think that as a culture and society that's exactly where we all find ourselves right now - in a strange world where it's hard to find our way.

This year as every year, Advent has come at the right time. Advent is the promise of paths in the desert, roads in the wilderness, a way to travel and a place to go.

Five Hundred years later, John the Baptist would be guilty of breach of the peace as he shouted Isaiah's words back at all those seeking a new way, and a new hope. If ever there was a fanatic for Advent and a fan of Isaiah, it was John the Baptist.

Advent is when we remember again, that Jesus walked that way ahead of us, will be that way for us, and summons those, like us, who feel exiled, on the margins, held down and held back, to come, and follow him on the way. Advent is the time for finding our way again.

Photos of Isaiah's Hopeful Imagination 2. God's Long-Term Investment in Life.

It's true. To plant a tree is to trust in the future. A tree is a long term investment in life The prophet Isaiah repeatedly speaks about trees as symbols of hope.

Trees are those slow growing signposts that line the road to Zion. Listen to the applause of creation for the Creator as "the trees of the field clap their hands". Trees that in the long years of arboreal life are to be pictured as signs of God's promise that "as the days of a tree" so shall be the long life of his people.

Isaiah finds so many ways to encourage faith, to restore hope, and to find metaphors for the reality of the incomparable God, who when He moves in justice and mercy creation applauds, dances, and bursts into fruitfulness. 

In the hopeful imagination of Isaiah, God will grow trees of hope in a new landscape in which the wilderness becomes a forest, the desert an orchard, the barren place an olive grove.

This wonderful poem describes hope as the impossible reforestation of the desert.

I will make trees grow in the desert.
    I will plant cedar and acacia trees there.
    I will plant myrtle and olive trees there.
I will make juniper trees grow in the dry and empty desert.
    I will plant fir and cypress trees there.
   Then people will see and know
    that my powerful hand has done it.
They will consider and understand
    that I have created it.
    I am the Holy One of Israel.”

My guess is we don't pay enough attention to trees. Preoccupied by money, anxious about today let alone tomorrow, accustomed to think short term instead of a future oriented hopefulness - no wonder a walk in a wood makes a difference to how we feel inside, and how we look at the world.

This Advent, Christmas trees don't have to be artificial, bauble bedecked stumps cut off too soon. Instead walk the woods with Isaiah, and listen for the applause of creation- consider and understand - God makes all this happen. Immanuel, God with us.

Photos of Isaiah's Hopeful Imagination. 1. Deserts and Flowing Rivers

Isaiah's hopeful imagination for a people used to desert, wilderness and land made barren by the absence of water:

 

"I will make rivers flow on barren heights, and springs within the valleys. I will turn the desert into pools of water, and the parched ground into springs." (Isaiah 41.18)

 

I know Advent majors on the symbol of light - but when it rains, use your imagination. This small weir flows out of a lochan currently filled and still filling with rainwater. Over the summer this was a waterless waterfall.

 

God does this kind of thing when inwardly the heart feels like a waterless waterfall.

 

"Thou flowing water pure and clear, make music for thy Lord to hear."

 

Aye. That. Happy Advent.

Developing an Isaianic Mindset - Though for the Day, First Week in Advent.

"The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light...the light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it."

Monday: Isaiah 43.19 “See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.”

This week we are going to learn to think like Isaiah, to have an Isaianic mind-set. Isaianic:  Adjective. (1) To see things differently because God has announced Good News. (2) To look into the darkness and see the first finger-lines of dawn. (3) To hear God’s call to the Church to strengthen feeble hands and strengthen knees that give way. (4) To have strength renewed by waiting trustfully for God to act.

Tuesday: Isaiah 9.2 “The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of deep darkness a light has dawned.”

Isaiah understood not just the cost of living crisis, but the kind of crises that made folk wonder if life was worth living. Darkness can mean various things: fear of the future, anxiety about being able to cope, despair of where help will come from. Isaiah knew, and told the people, that hope is in God, and God has plans. Advent is about those plans, God saying yet again, “Let there be light.”

Wednesday: Isaiah 9.6 “For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”

Now that’s Isaianic thinking! God is on the move. You’ve heard of hostile take-over bids? This is a saving take-over bid. The governance will rest on God. By the birth of Jesus will come the light of life, the power of God, the Eternal entering time, the one who will rule in peace. Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit says the Lord. Looking at the mess the world is in, an Isaianic mind-set sees the coming of God.

Thursday: Isaiah 55.1-2 “Come, all you who are thirsty, come to the waters; and you who have no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without cost. Why spend money on what is not bread, and your labour on what does not satisfy? Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good, and you will delight in the richest of fare.”

How do you buy if you have no money? Isaiah is talking about the things money can’t buy. God’s love is free; forgiveness is free, but only because on the cross God has paid forward for our sins. These are Communion texts about bread and wine, which remind our Christian hearts of what truly satisfies as the richest of fare – our Lord Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today and forever.

Friday: Isaiah 40.28-29 “Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and his understanding no one can fathom. He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak.”

When you’ve had enough. Those times when the broken world and the endless crises and the suffering of so much of humanity, makes you want to switch off and have a holiday from reality. Listen to Isaiah’s questions - Do you not know? Have you not heard? Now read his reply, about God, not you, or me. And ask strength for your weary heart, and power for your weakness. This too is Isaianic thinking – when the going gets tough, God is tougher still!

Saturday: Isaiah 40. 30-31 “Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.”

This is Isaiah’s promise that comes after the questions. God doesn’t get weary and decide to walk away. We can’t know all of God’s wise purposes, but God’s wise love and merciful power give us hope. And hope gives us resilience, new energy, a deeper, surer trust. We will soar like eagles carried on thermal columns of faith; we’ll run like elite athletes in the power of the Holy Spirit; we will walk and not faint. This is Isaiah the life-coach teaching us the Isaianic mind-set.

Sunday: Isaiah 7.14 “Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and you will call him Immanuel. (God with us).”

Every Advent is a time for replenishment. Peace and justice, hope and faith, love and joy – we need refilled. Too often we have to live with the opposite vocabulary of war and injustice, despair and cynicism, hate and tears. So every Advent, God calls us to celebrate the coming of the Christ-child, and the Immanuel promise, God with us. Wherever you are in life right now, God’s there; wherever we are in life tomorrow and into the future, God with us. That’s the Isaianic mind-set.

Questions that Test Our Ecumenical Credentials.

Well, the things you get up to on a Monday afternoon. Down here to discuss a paper on "Who can preside at the Eucharist in a time of vocational decline." Of course the subject is specific to certain Christian traditions on the one hand, and on the other hand there are traditions in which the question barely arises - it depends on the sacramental theology and theology of priesthood / ministry that lies at the heart of any particular tradition.

But it fairly got us going - from the earliest post-resurrection communities, to the age of the Fathers, then Augustine, the Medieval church, the European Reformations in their diversity of Eucharistic theologies, and on into our own century.

Institutional ecclesial decline compels new ways of staying faithful to theological and liturgical traditions while also embracing wise pragmatism, changed rules, revised theology, liturgical relaxations and much else.

As a Baptist minister I have a different set of commitments when the community meets around the Lord's Table. These are no less rich, and no less valid, are held with the same deep devotion, and argued on theological and biblical principles held with equal conviction.

It was a test of our ecumenical sympathies, and also at times, a revelation of our significant ignorance of the varied sacramental theologies held across the traditions of Christian Faith. At other times, some humble learning, and generous agreements to differ, meant we could discuss safely and responsively. A good couple of hours.

Photo taken on the walk back to the car - parked a mile away.

The Camera, and the Coincidence of Time and Place.

This road has been closed for years now, because of a collapsed bridge.

Yesterday, the last few minutes of sun slanted across and were caught in the flood water running off the fields.

A broken bridge, protective concrete and steel fencing, old telephone poles, standing floodwater - and from such unpromising materials a display of winter afterglow.

And what used to be a passing place, complete with redundant sign, has become a temporary autumn mirror reflecting sunlit gold, delaying the shadows just a little longer. 

The coincidence of being, and seeing, being there and seeing what's there, at a precise moment of attentiveness - like many photos, this cannot be contrived, but must be noticed by a heart that sees.

An example of why I find a camera a contemplative aid, and the world around glowing with possibility.

Dealing with the Joy Deficit

“Britain has a joy shortage.” So says the Christmas advert for one of the big supermarkets. True enough. It’s hard to argue given the cost of living crisis, the climate change crisis, war in Ukraine, and now that feared word recession has made a comeback in the top ten joy-diminishing media buzz words. 

One of the odd things about the Psalms is the way the same prayer can talk about how hard life is, and then go on to say things like, “Weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning.” (Psalm 30.5)

Now nobody is helped by unrealistic promises that the difficulties we face aren’t important and don’t matter. Tears are real, worry is sickening, and yes, there’s a joy shortage. For folk struggling to heat their homes, care for their children, and work out how to get through the winter, false cheerfulness doesn’t help much.

Unless. Supposing we thought up and put into action ways we can practice joy-making for our neighbours, our work mates, those we know who are struggling. Maybe there’s a joy shortage because we’ve forgotten how to make joy happen as a gift to others.

How about donations to the foodbank, a knock on the neighbour’s door, the text that eases loneliness, thank you to the bus driver, the nurse, the shop assistant, the teacher, the bin men and women – why not make your own list?

Instead of bemoaning a joy shortage, and so adding to the joy deficit, we can become entrepreneurs, manufacturers in the joy industry. Then we may well find this is true: “The joy of the Lord is my strength.” (Nehemiah 8,10)

(Originally written for the Aberdeen Press and Journal as the Saturday Sermon, Nov 2022: Photo taken late November 2019, at Mains of Drum Garden Centre.)