Across the Page

His thoughts said, The way is rough.

His Father said, But every step bringeth thee nearer to thy Home.

His thoughts said, The fight is fierce.

His Father said, He who is near to his Captain is sure to be a target for archers.

His thoughts said, The night is long.

His Father said, But joy cometh in the morning.

(Amy Carmichael, His Thoughts Said… His Father Said…)

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John Eldredge points to the story in Daniel 10, where Daniel has a troubling vision and prays for understanding, but no answer comes for three weeks.

Something has happened to Daniel that he does not understand. I think we can all relate to that. We don’t understand about 90% of what happens to us either. Daniel is troubled. He sets out to get an answer. But three weeks of prayer and fasting produce no results. What is he to conclude? If Daniel were like most people, by this point he’d probably be headed toward one of two conclusions: I’m blowing it, or God is holding out on me. He might try confessing every sin and petty offense in hopes of opening up the lines of communication with God. Or he might withdraw into a sort of disappointed resignation, drop the fast, and turn on the television. In an effort to hang on to his faith, he might embrace the difficulty as part of “God’s will for his life.” He might read a book on “the silence of God.” That’s the way the people I know handle this sort of thing.

And they would be dead wrong.

On the twenty-first day of the fast an angel shows up, out of breath. In a sort of apology, the angel explains to Daniel that God had actually dispatched him in answer to Daniel’s prayers the very first day he prayed — three weeks ago. (There goes the whole unanswered prayer thesis, right out the window.) Three weeks ago? What is Daniel to do with that? “The very first day? But… I’ve… I mean, thank you very much, and I don’t want to seem ungrateful, but… where have you been?” You haven’t blown it, Daniel, and God isn’t holding out on you. The angel goes on to explain that he was locked in hand-to-hand combat with a mighty fallen angel, a demonic power of dreadful strength, who kept him out of the Persian kingdom for three weeks, and he finally had to get Michael (the great archangel, the captain of the Lord’s hosts) to come and help him break through enemy lines. “Now I am here, in answer to your prayer. Sorry it’s taken so long.”

I have no idea how to conduct my prayer life in a way that takes these things into account.

I’m not talking about the “warfare phrases” I sometimes hear people use in prayer. I’m talking about laboring in prayer. Daniel’s response here implies strenuous labor. It reminds me of Elijah’s prayer for rain.

Shoot, I don’t even know how Daniel prays and fasts for three weeks! Three weeks? I’ve never even fasted for three days. And to pray for that long… What does Daniel say? How do you pray for a long period of time? I know there’s talking and listening, but…

There is a deeper life I have never attained — never even known truly how to access.

The Archangel Michael Defeating Satan (Guido Reni)

We live in a development maybe three miles out of town. But we’re enjoying what seems like more than our share of feathered and furred guests. Or maybe we’re the guests?

Today in the middle of the afternoon, Bambi stopped by.

When he left, my youngest daughter said, “Oh well. At least the bunny’s still here.”

“Bunny?” I asked.

“There. Under the swingset.”

He’s one of the babies we found in a nest in my flower garden in early May. I prefer to see him relaxing there by the swingset, rather than ruminating beside the lettuce (as he was doing yesterday):

Then there’s this lovely hanging plant I got for Mother’s Day. Last night when I went to water it, I found myself scolded aggressively by a slate-colored junco. Then I noticed a hole in it:

Closer investigation today revealed that Mrs. Junco has claimed my Mother’s Day plant:

I suppose I could arm-wrestle her for it, but I’m unwilling to sit on the eaves at all hours to patrol my territory.

I guess as long as it’s being used in the cause of motherhood, I don’t mind — birdlover that I am.

Nonconformity: An unwanted sunflower spreading its wings amongst the lettuce. Who knows how it got there?

Survival: Mrs. Downy flew hard into the window and landed in a heap 2 stories down, beak bloodied, wings akimbo. At the sight of me she fluttered under the shelter of our swing and, over the course of an hour or so, revived enough to fly away.

Audacity: This little guy stayed on the path till we were almost on top of him yesterday.

Summer salads: We planted lettuce, carrots, tomatoes, cukes, zucchini, summer squash, corn, and green beans this year. The only real flop has been the corn; we’re eating our first lettuce of the season now.

Peace: Yesterday we took a walk at a nature sanctuary...

Afoot and lighthearted, I take to the open road

Healthy, free, the world before me

The long brown path before me leading

wherever I choose…

(Walt Whitman)

A deadly peril has come upon us, which only great hardihood shall turn aside. But in this matter numbers will avail little; we must use cunning, and hope for good fortune… For I do not believe this Dragon is unconquerable, though he grows greater in strength and malice with the years. I know somewhat of him. His power is rather in the evil spirit that dwells within him than in the might of his body, great though that be…

So says Turin, son of Hurin. A dragon — no, a Dragon — needs slaying. A great-uncle of Elrond must avenge his father’s injustice at the hands of a predecessor of Sauron who spreads his dark thought over Middle Earth. A family is cursed, shattered, seeking restoration. Turin emerges in this posthumous Tolkien tale to face the evil dragon Glaurung, who is subservient to Morgoth as the one ring will be subservient to Sauron 6,000 years after the action of this story.

That’s Turin, reflected in the eye of Glaurung in Alan Lee’s illustration above. Indeed the gaze of this diabolical entity serves as a mirror for Turin. The excerpt above gives a taste of both this tale’s spiritual suggestiveness and its darkness. It was interesting for me to read this after Waking the Dead, with its references to spiritual warfare. But even without that precursor to my reading experience, it would be hard to miss the cosmic scope of the good vs. evil struggle in The Children of Hurin. Glaurung is an accuser and a deceiver as well as a destroyer.

But I’ve gotten ahead of myself. The Children of Hurin is a tale from the background mythology of Middle Earth, assembled by Christopher Tolkien, but from manuscripts written by J.R.R. Tolkien and only minimally edited. I found this article by Brian Appleyard offered a fascinating perspective on this work in the context of Tolkien’s other writings. It rightly notes that the timing of its publication (2007) brought the focus from the films back to the books, in which “The modern mind is clearly being dragged by the scruff of its neck away from its literary comfort zone.”

Recently, a couple of people have mentioned that they struggled in trying to read Tolkien. I struggled myself when The Hobbit was assigned in 7th grade; I remember the teacher slapping my graded exam on my desk and muttering, “It’s a good thing you can write, Janet!” Meaning, I suppose, that it was obvious I hadn’t read the book but had entertained her with my flowery writing. (?) It wasn’t till 20 years later that the book drew me in like a lit fuse that burned right on through LOTR.

The Silmarillion, though, is a different story. Tolkien considered it his masterpiece. I’ve tried two or three times, and haven’t been able to read it with its more elevated diction and — oracular? — mode.

The Children of Hurin falls between Lord of the Rings and Silmarillion in its style. The narrative voice is much easier to contend with than The Silmarillion. But the characterization is more flat than LOTR. It reads more like a myth whose characters are static, and move through a series of adventures — it’s a picaresque, I suppose — that carries them to their ultimate fate without changing them.

There were times I wanted to scream at Turin. He’s so predictable, in tragic ways. He seems to go from one bad decision to another. (Can you tell I’m also re-reading a parenting book at the moment?) But… I hate to point out that this is sometimes all of us. Often I’m less of a bildungsroman character in real life, less of a changing and growing person, and more a person who behaves as if she’s already set in stone. Turin may not be an example of flat characterization, but of human nature, in this respect — especially when he’s hampered so often by faulty information and deception. (…again, as we are.)

I have to mention Alan Lee’s illustrations. Alan Lee did the concept art for the movies, and he’s illustrated a number of other books including Black Ships Before Troy. He has captured the mood masterfully in The Children of Hurin, and the illustrations invite you to stop and ponder. They add a whole dimension to the work.

This reading experience was different than LOTR. I remember that I read that trilogy when my first daughter was newborn, and I spent lots of time sitting on the couch feeding, rocking, and burping her — with that tome on the couch beside me, open, so I wouldn’t have to waste a second finding my place again when she fell asleep on my shoulder. This book was less gripping, but more grown-up, and packed with food for reflection. I’m not sure I recommend it to everyone — but for Tolkien fans, definitely.

Have you gotten this in your email yet? I tried it and it worked.

• First of all, pick the number of times a week that you would like to
  have chocolate (more than once but less than 10)
• Multiply this number by 2 (just to be bold)
• Add 5
• Multiply it by 50 — (I’ll wait while you get the calculator)

• If you have already had your birthday this year add 1759… If you haven’t, add 1758.
• Now subtract the four digit year that you were born.
• You should have a three digit number.The first digit of this was your original number (i.e., how many times you want to have chocolate each week). The next two numbers are……. YOUR AGE!

(Good ol’ chocolate. I knew it could be trusted!)

Waking the Dead performs a necessary surgery for me. It peels back layers of resignation and hopelessness and returns me to the true gospel, the true good news: Jesus came to give us abundant life, and if I’m missing that, I shouldn’t settle for the status quo.

I’ve read this book before. A few years ago my husband was introduced to Wild at Heart: Discovering the Secret of a Man’s Soul, and I read that book, this one, Epic: The Story God Is Telling, and Captivating: Unveiling the Mystery of a Woman’s Soul before surrendering in sheer exhaustion. I guess it’s obvious that there’s something in John Eldredge’s books that speaks to me. This one remains my favorite (and it’s not only because Eldredge draws liberally from a number of my favorite books and movies — LOTR, Narnia, Phantastes — but that doesn’t hurt!).

Here’s the summary from the Ransomed Heart Ministries website:

Waking the Dead explores the power of God’s New Covenant with us - the power to restore our hearts and set them free. For the heart of the believer no longer wicked - it is good. Your heart is good. How God restores us is usually experienced through Four Streams: Counseling, Healing, Walking with God, and Spiritual Warfare. This is how we discover that “the glory of God is man fully alive” (St. Irenaeus).

I struggled off and on in this reading with feeling like Eldredge’s insistence that “your heart is good” was gimmicky. But he is coming against what he feels is an established and virulent confusion of the “desperate wickedness” of the fallen heart with the condition of the new heart God gives to the restored believer. When we believe our hearts are “bad” even after we’re saved, he reasons, we give up, and settle for a dull and semi-anesthetized life of church attendance, sin management, and blindness to much that the Bible promises about the vividness and joy and power of the Christian life here and now.

Not everyone will relate to this, but I do. I felt this book gave me some conceptual tools I needed to distinguish between the reality of my place before God, and the things I tend to believe (lies of the deceiver, according to Eldredge) about it. I go to church, read my Bible, take care of my family, feel lonely and “nicheless” a lot, and shrug off the idea of life being glorious as “metaphorical.”

What Eldredge has to say about “fellowships of the heart” stirs a longing in me for a circle of friends like he describes. It did last time I read it, too, and at the time I was in a circle that seemed to offer some promise. But it didn’t work out that way, and it was poignant to remember as I re-read. “Listen carefully,” Eldredge writes, “any movement toward freedom and life, any movement toward God or others, will be opposed. Marriage, friendship, beauty, rest — the thief wants it all.” I guess I would agree.

I hunger for the kind of community he describes here, one that isn’t formed through a program. When I was a child growing up in the church, my parents were always involved in one Bible study or another. My mother helped with Sunday school. My father sang in the choir after he was saved when I was around 5. But in addition to this kind of programmed social life, they were included in a circle of folks from church who just enjoyed doing things together: canoe trips, camping and hiking, making apple butter in the fall. It was a large, flexible, open pool of people, not a clique. They were at different stages of life. When someone needed help with a project, the others were there. I observed faith that was not done in isolation, not done only inside church walls, and that felt connected to others and to much of the beauty of God’s world.

I’ve never found that since. “Your life is at the narrow part of the hourglass,” my dad has reminded me, and he’s right. We have young children who need care. Family life takes a lot of energy. We don’t have a babysitter.

But my parents were at the narrow part of their hourglass too in those days. I’ve always figured it’s because I’m more internal, or not as likable, or for some mysterious reason unworthy of that kind of fellowship. But first, that’s not true. I’m no more or less worthy than the next person. Second, I think in general, that kind of fellowship is dying out everywhere as we surrender to technology as a substitute for human interaction, suburbia instead of the kind of community Wendell Berry describes where neighbors actually need each other to help out with practical tasks, and a church life that often either reflects culture or is insulated from it, but doesn’t truly engage it or know how to retain the life of the gospel within it. As Bill McKibben says in The Comforting Whirlwind, “Convenience and comfort and ease are secondary goals at best, and sometimes very much in the way of actual experience of the world’s glory.”

Listen to me ramble. That’s what this book does to me. I’ve given up on and pushed down and not talked about some of these things for too long. But ranting, or wallowing, doesn’t solve the particular equation my life presents. Prayer (Eldredge includes a daily “prayer for freedom” in this book) and reorientation are the places to begin.

Just two books to highlight from this week’s reading aloud. The first is The Black Book of Colors.

How does a blind person understand color? By using other senses. Helen Keller once remarked that sighted people are really the blind ones, for they “have no idea how fair the flower is to the touch, nor do they appreciate its fragrance, which is the soul of the flower.” This book’s text — given in in both print and braille — tries to give us a sense of a blind child’s vision (his name is Thomas) through non-visual description of what each color might mean. Yellow, for instance, means yellow things — it tastes like mustard and feels soft, like a chick. Red? Strawberries, of course, described in all their multidimensional wonder as “sour like unripe strawberries and as sweet as watermelon.” It’s also blood: “It hurts when he finds it on his scraped knee.” The illustrations thrust us into the shoes of a blind person, because they’re all black-on-black; the pictures are simply done in a glossier black, slightly raised on the page:

Simply put, it’s ingenius. Yet in all honesty, I was more impressed by it than my children. Perhaps it was too “educational”? Not enough narrative for their tastes? I’m not sure, but it’s still an amazing attempt to give us a new way of “seeing,” and of appreciating those who can’t depend so heavily on physical eyes in the process.

(Correction: Since publishing this post, my daughters came into the living room and picked up the book enthusiastically. “So… You like that book?” I asked. “Yes,” they chorused. My youngest added, “I like it because of those funny letters.” Guess you never can tell the impact a book may or may not be having!)

The second book is my children’s favorite this week. I chose it for its author:

This time, it was my turn to feel underwhelmed — but my daughters loved this and have requested a re-reading several times. The House Gobbaleen is a fanciful story that pits a lazy mortal against the “fair folk.” It reminded me of Jamie O’Rourke and the Big Potato. It’s out of print, but any library worth its salt would probably have this picture book by the author of The Book of Three and the other Prydain Chronicles. Now I have it to refer back to when the girls get a little older, and I can say, “Remember that book about Tooley and the house gobbaleen? That same author wrote another…”

Head over to Amy’s place at Hope Is the Word to see what others have been reading this week.

“Empathy is the highest form of love.”

Is this true?

For some reason, I balk at this sentence from the excellent book Boundaries with Kids. I’m refreshing my memory of this book I’ve already read twice, listening to the abridged audiobook version during my morning walks.

Cloud and Townsend continue, “The ability to sense the plight of our condition is what moved God to create, sustain, and redeem us.” First, how could God “sense the plight of our condition” before we were created? Second, doesn’t this make God merely reactive? — I tend not to think that God conceived of redemption because he “sensed” something going wrong, but because he knew before the foundations of the world that it would need redeeming — and created it anyway.

If empathy is the highest form of love, doesn’t it make me the standard and final rule of existence? Doesn’t it make what I’m capable of feeling the limit of my ability to love?

Isn’t love supposed to transcend self?

What’s On Your Nightstand? is hosted on the fourth Tuesday of each month at 5 Minutes for Books. It’s an opportunity to look back (and forward) and share your reading.

Here’s what I’ve finished since last month’s round-up:

1. The Harsh Truth about Public Schools (review here): A merciless account of public education.
2. A Circle of Quiet (review here): Another of Madeleine L’Engle’s Crosswicks Journals.
3. The Man Who Listens to Horses (review here): Memoir of horse whisperer Monty Roberts.
4. Trailing Clouds of Glory: Spiritual Values in Children’s Books (review here): Another by Madeleine L’Engle. Organizes a number of books for younger readers by theme. A great resource with lots of excerpts and summaries of stories.

At the moment, I’m re-reading John Eldredge’s Waking the Dead. (Didn’t wake me sufficiently the first time, I guess — good stuff!) I’ve also started Tolkien’s The Children of Hurin, a novel not published till 2007 but all in Tolkien’s words. It’s somewhere between LOTR and The Silmarillion (which I couldn’t make it very far through) in style. Last but not least, I have 3 Cups of Tea on hold at the library.

What’s on your nightstand?

Whew! It’s been a busy weekend, with out-of-town family activities both days. I wasn’t able to write my Spring Reading Thing Wrap Up until this evening, but (drum roll please) here it is, a day late.

I set modest goals. Here’s the report on what I set out to read:

1. The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart. I loved this “children’s book” with themes relevant to readers of all ages. Review here.
2. Dark Night of the Soul by St. John of the Cross. Technically this doesn’t fulfill my goal to read “one of the theological works suggested in Sacred Pathways.” It wasn’t suggested in that book. But it counts as a thought-provoking theological read. Review here. I also read some in John Wesley’s Renew My Heart and completed Roy Hession’s Calvary Road, both of which discuss holiness. Dark Night is my favorite of the three (what does that say about me?).
3. My third goal was “30 minutes of sustained reading aloud to my children each day.” We succeeded most, but not all, days. We’ve enjoyed several excellent chapter books, and numerous picture books, together.
4. Fourth goal was to finish Isaiah, which I did. Reflections here.
5. Children of Men. I liked this one, my first P.D. James read. Review here.

Did you finish reading all the books on your spring reading list? If not, why not?

Yes, I did.

Did you stick to your original goals or did you change your list as you went along?

I revised my theological reading goal to make it more general.

What was your favorite book that you read this spring? Least favorite? Why?

I read a number of other books in addition to those on this list. But of the ones listed here, my favorite would be a toss-up between Dark Night of the Soul and The Mysterious Benedict Society. Very different books, both very strong in their category. My least favorite was John Wesley’s Plain Account of Christian Perfection — not listed here, because I couldn’t get through it. I’m not sure why. It just wasn’t the season for it yet, I guess.

Did you discover a new author or genre this spring? Did you love them? Not love them?

Trenton Lee Stewart was new to me. I look forward to introducing my children to his books in a few years!

Did you learn something new because of Spring Reading Thing 2009 — something about reading, or yourself, or a topic you read about?

Sure. It would be too much to try and summarize here, though. I’ll leave my reviews to speak to that question.

What was your favorite thing about the challenge?

It was low pressure. Spring is a busy time; it takes a lot of energy to wind down the school year, but I was glad for an opportunity to focus and set some goals — then cross them off the list. It felt good.

That’s about the size of it. I’m linking to the round-up over at Callapidder Days and looking forward to seeing how others have done in their spring reading. Best wishes for summer full of superb books.