This past week contained the day set aside for Saint Sava and that means that hundreds, ney even thousands of Serbians are celebrating Slava's. The notion is oddly superstitious to me, not that i would claim it is so, just that it appears that way. The notions of spinning bread and lit yellow taper candles alongside incense seems to be key to any religious celebration here. The notion of faith, in a life altering way also seems to be mostly devoid of essential. Once again the priest came to the house, reminding me of that kind of reverence for a man that I've been so brought up to reject. It saddens me so, for my experience has a real optionality about all three elements of incense, bread and candles, even the priest on occasion. Somehow the radical wanderer actions had been reduced to motions. It's a sickness that i knew was prevalent in much of the world, but can't cease to cut me. I also met people this past week who enlightened me about the faith of some of the non-catholic, non-orthodox churches. There was something imported about their nature but my language skills had shielded me from the extent. There really are still people being converted by the idea that they will be better materially, the first wave of persecution shifting their sandy foundations. The idea that you can google your sermon and just translate it appals me. The triangular model of leadership is the only one you'll ever encounter, and accountability in any of society seems to be ranked pretty low. There is a thin line between freedom and anarchy, controlled by apathy and poverty. This country that once seemed to sparkle is showing the dirt the diamonds foster. The religion seems to have squashed the faith and i feel unanchored. It's not the only thing unanchoring me, I'm floating pretty free. There is also a thin line between floating and drowning, and I'm not sure which side I'm on. I want to clear the closets, somehow make my life fresh, but i just can't. They are full of important things, things that can't be thrown away, things that will remain with me for eternity. I want to be content with a lack of faith input in my life, but I'm not. I want to be able to ask questions without starting arguments. I want to use the gifts god bestowed, be the servant he made me, but there is nowhere to serve. So for me slava is not the celebration that is intended, it does not honour the life of one of god's chosen, but leaves this child of the Almighty wondering when he got shown the door?
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There once was a little rippled red marble. He loved his life. Every day a large hand would remove him and his brothers from the big glass jar upon the shelf and watch them spin across the table. His brothers were red too, deep red, and marbled red, some had specks of other colours in, but most were simply red, pure and beautiful. There were other jars they were sure, green and yellow marbles were often met on the table-top, but the brothers would always meet again. Sometimes they would find orange marbles in the jar when they were put away, they would push them to the sides to show they how the world glowed pinky red as the light reflected off the glass. Some of these marbles stayed, became more red or wore their orange tint with pride, others went away, to where they didn't know. One day the marble went missing. Though the other marbles noticed his rippled reds were no longer visible in the jar, they knew he was a strong marble and they would see him again some day. He had rolled across the smooth wooden tabletop and dropped right off the edge. The colourful world full of reflect red light disappeared and he found himself in the shade. There were marbles here, but there were also sights he had never seen too. At first it fascinated him, the depth of the carpet, the towering furniture. The marbles here didn't have a jar. Their rules were different and their movement slowed by the carpet but freed by the space. They had been in the shade so long they had turned blue, or perhaps they had been blue to start with. There were deep and delicious blues, while others glowed like moonstones in their pale shells. The little red marble was so very aware how bright he looked, and how much there was to explore. In the Beginning he laughed as the blue marbles talking enviously about the land of jars where you could not run free. As time passed he started to miss the red land, the warm glow. Many colours were here, especially as the bright light of sunrise crept under the table and vivid shades were found in the furnishings. But, there was nothing red, not that deep red he knew. The blue marbles found him purple marbles, brown burnt orange marbles, and strips of murky red fabrics trying to help. Yet when he rolled up to them it made him feel even more red, and them look more blue. Eventually the large hand found him, pulled him out of the carpet and placed him back in the jar of red marbles. He was welcomed back, he told the stories and missed his new blue friends. His brothers noticed a difference in him, for there in his ripples the marbles noticed a tiny speck of blue. It was so small it was almost invisible, but they knew it was there. It was his love in that other land, the marbles there, that formed it. So one evening, when the sunset dropped he pushed his way to the top of the jar. Asking all his brothers to pile up he pushed himself him right to the rim. Then he let himself drop, roll down the shelf, across the table, and back into the deep soft carpet where his new friends greeted him. He knew one day the big hand would find him again, perhaps the blue marbles too. He had realised he could never abandon the love he had found. He knew he would always search for the red none the less, for the feeling of security and home. He would live in that tension, surround himself with anything red, however blue it may be. Some days that would not be enough, it would not meet the crave in his heart for the pure pink and red glow. Perhaps he would never be fully blue, he didn't really want to lose his vivid reds, but he knew for now he belonged here in this shadow land. On days i too go looking for red, i was assured of purple at least, but all i find is blue. It isn't enough. There is a wonderful zealous feeling that you feel when something is fresh, when your life is wrapped up in your mission, when you think you have the answers. There is something much more approachable about the sinful, messed up, slightly screwed up human. I find myself wanting to level the playing field, but is it more my need to knock them off the pedestal? I want to pull others out of that holy hovel and yet i want to crawl back into it and feel the coziness of certainty again. i listen to the music, read the book, hum hosanna's as i wash the dishes, but really life is the broken cooker, the salty drips that threaten to wash my face when i hear the teenagers gossip and laugh on the bus, the pulling the covers of my head until the bird goes berserk for food. Some days though the weight of the words i so happily spew hit back in my face, they threaten to topple me and i realise that i can't philosophise, but i need to step up. Today it was reading back and realising i've so insulated myself that i have removed the possibility of being wreaked as i was before. I was struck by this title as i listened to the passage set for this weekend, coming to me via the pray-as-you-go daily meditation, yesterday. I must admit i feel quite a lapsed Christian at the moment but oddly reassured that everything is in plan when i lift it up in prayer. But this little phrase stuck out like a sore thumb in the overly familiar reading of the disciples calling. The passage, like many others, often gets centralised on the few little words, the ones that sum up the overall movement of the story, the ones where four young healthy men leave their profession, their homestead, their responsibility some may say, and go following a relative stranger who simply said "come". But Matthew is not content without pointing out little prophecies. He needs to link us back to Isaiah (9:1-2), he has to make us remember that this region Jesus started to call home is 'the Galilee of the nations', 'the Galilee of the gentiles', don't you love that description. Jesus goes to the part of the world not for the chosen people of god, the ones blessed through the ages. Oh no, he goes and dwells in the world, not in the religious heart of things. And not only that, he goes there as it was foretold he would, it's not a random wander-off kind of thing. Why of why have i not seen the power in those words before? How reassuring is it to those on the outskirts of the church, to those who battle between the lines where faith and reality mix? How many times could you say, hey, this is your Galilee of the nations, this is the chosen place destined for you to be, this is the unreligious, down to earth, smelling of fish and unsanitized place Jesus walks. (not always the fish bit i admit.) This is not the place that God's riches have been poured upon yet, it's the place God has sent you pour his riches upon. Oh for the songs my heart sang as i dwelt in these simple words, passed down through time like a lantern of grace. We live in a falling apart world, held together by sticky tape and paperclips. Our components are failing, layered with dirt and infection. Some of us fight with tiny rags, others rub oil onto fractions of worn joins, some of us push the dirt down the holes and lay a button on-top and pretend it's pretty. Some times the cracks are called art, celebrated, embraced. Mostly they are feared. Occasionally i wonder if the cracks are what is quite so wonderful about this world. For out of the cracks come dependence, out of the cracks comes need, out of the cracks the world recognizes that it can't hold itself together. Out of the cracks one small human voice is not enough to drown the panic, but one divine love is large enough to fill the hole left behind. That is large enough to make the healing, large enough to let those lines on the ground be a picture of compassion, and a beautiful fragmented, fluctuating dance. I'm sitting posed, ready for what's coming next. There is music in the background, there is a bounce in my step. Outside the temperature, that had steadily tried to give birth to spring, has fallen back under winters spell. The windows are steamed, enclosing me in this little world as the night draws it's slow curtain. I sit with my Serbian lesson, my reluctant teacher, and start to study. This mountain is one i dislike climbing but now it's precipice is so clear i must strive for it. Yesterday i sat for what seemed like hours as Zeljko batted with a computer and i battled to communicate anything to the relatives that surrounded me. Their grace and acceptance humbled me. I knew i could go hide in the technical universalism of computer problems, but somehow it was better to be here, to try. I don't get far in my studies, but i learn something. I don't feel the need to run before i can walk, but i long to learn to dance rather than stumble. I think much of life is like leaning to walk. the child sits until frustration pushes it to move, further and further. he shuffles, crawls, does anything he can to avoid the need to balance on it's two feet. Finally he yearns to be higher, perhaps have more dignity, perhaps just to feel like those surrounding him, and he pulls himself up, more leaning and gripping on than really standing. Then comes the walking, the real movement, little steps that are supported by other things, other people. Finally, he legs go, stumbles into a run like walk, moves alone... and then he crumbles, they always crumble. A big step is crumbling and getting back up. i think I've not seen the last of my crumbling yet. However, i know one day that little wobbly language will be a poetic thing. I resonate with Thomas today, the doubt and the dumbness, the sureness and the hesitation that this companion of Jesus held. He was so willing to die with Jesus, but so confused on where Jesus was going, so quick to doubt but equally fast to proclaim divinity. He threw his heart before him and wandered far away from the home he once knew. His brashness is oddly comforting, and his failure and mistakes being his nickname is wonderfully human. I imagine him walking and stumbling, and as he fell seeing that battered hand, he once so publicly demanded, before him to pull him up again. i did not send me Christmas letter this year. i hoped to send it a week ago as the Serbian new year started but alas this is all i came up with... This past year of Our Lord two thousand and ten, i recovered. I recovered from a year spent in Serbia, a year that had taken my life and spun me upside-down. I stayed in the vicarage and battled the forces of unemployment agency staff and the teenage like obsession of a long distance relationship. I recovered from the dreams of youth work careers and the calling that still sings in my soul, and hid in the dreams of a white dress and more pale blue decorations than was possible. I jumped the hoops that are required as i settled back into a life of luxury, but my mind was fixed on the imaginings of what my life would be like. I lived and breathed wedding, surfacing only for brief moments. Some of those moments are wonderfully memorable. Heidi, a very close friend, finally bid farewell to Sunnyside and set of for Romania, echoing through to me the change of time. Once again I saw the streets of Lymington and heard of the radical plans made. I also was very fortunate to go on a Methodists in world mission conference which showed me the gentle inclusively of a denomination (and it's rare to put those two words together). Most of my time was punctuated by skype calls and mind-numbing delays in Luton or Belgrade airport. I read the propaganda of the wedding industry and even brought myself low enough to watch wedding TV ( a feat i would advise anyone strongly against in the future). I survived by grace and immense kindness, and if i had my time over again i would probably feel more guilt than i do now. I poured myself into a day and realised that the day was not about me. It was a day i will remember forever, not simply for the vows i exchanged with my beloved, but because it was a day i felt was for everyone. My dream had surfaced, many a detail had changed, and many a thing i would have liked differently, but they are things and the spirit of the day was amazing. I will not bore you with the details for most of you were there to see for yourself. What followed was straight out of a mills and boon novel. The fairytale castle for our first week, the anxious first night in the Serbian flat, the humorous side plots and the cultural clash of the second wedding reception. The first month or two was sickly sweet and utterly delightful to live through. Indeed it had a few issues and in was by no means roses, but love conquered and homesickness was kept at bay by the promise of Christmas visits. The visit to England was not the salve i had hoped and left me more homesick than before i went, the honeymoon period started to abate and the grit of married life started to rub upon this travellers soles. I found myself displaced in both lands and the first week of 2011 was punctuated with tears. Now both the calendars of this country have declared the new year i am left with an uphill struggle, but the tears have abated and the challenge is on to see how this life is to be lived. I have found the notion of legacy is one that i've found hitting me out of the blue recently. perhaps it's the songs that have played out, or the idea that one day i may be a mother (no that is not a hint). Probably it's the idea of eternity and the journey's end. When a journey gets tough you tend to look back and forward more, i wonder why. Anyway, i started to wonder if legacy is a more selfish concept than we credit it for. Obviously we have legacies that are utterly selfish, but even legacies of complete grace often draw attention to themselves, and will it really matter when the heavenly gates open. Though i may go in after Mother Teresa, i will bet that some mother of little Timmy will surpass her in the cue. But, isn't the great hierarchy, or even the hierarchy of the least such an earthly concept which is so un-heaven like. Don't get me wrong, I'm not vying for sainthood, or knocking those who have the honour, but in some ways it's the invisible legacies that i strive for. It's the little acts of kindness that get no thanks but still continue, the biting of your tongue, the moments that leave no trace but in the memories of the ones who saw it, and often not even that. I strive to be counter-cultural in not being motivated for praise, not being motivated by what i feel i should do as a christian, but by being the person God created me to be. i like almost everyone else will fail a great deal more than i succeed, but i will strive nonetheless. i find on my travels moments of inspirational stories, seconds when humankind act in the way they were created to, and somehow people hold them as amazing, and some angel in heaven sighs 'duh'! i'm struggling, i'm not afraid to admit that. i'm struggling with old ghosts that have new names and with new phantoms for which i don't have any clue on how to fight. I'm feeling trapped, and confused, and part of the great circle of love that a marriage brings. I've very little notion of home and even less on what i should be doing in it. Some days the windows are prison bars, other days they are a way to see the world i can now be a part of. I got to thinking last night, after the fireworks of Serbian new year had ceased and i'd settled to sleep, that perhaps struggling is ok. perhaps i should embrace it, love it even. Then i got to thinking about this flat, this home, perhaps i should make the whole flat a place struggling is allowed, perhaps i should anticipate some of my reoccurring ghosts, perhaps like a family in times of change i should have some house rules. And so as my eyes finally closed i drew up a list. Inside these walls nationality steps back and allows other in and they bow to recognise the ground they walk on inside these walls everyone is included to the furthest reach of each individuals ability those we enjoy and those we struggle with inside these walls love lives and breaths and allows imperfections inside these walls confusion is accepted and tears are as valid as laughter inside these walls we build collectively rather than individually things that last seconds and memories that last a lifetime I sleep, i wake, i weigh the possibility of hiding in the covers for a while longer, i rise, i wash, i turn to activity and at the end i return to the same covers i emerged from. Some day's i balance the numbers, others i throw caution to the wind. Days like today i face my consequences and pray for a way through, while all i really want to do is bury my head in the sand. This is the order of life, this is the order of my existence. i made a decision, be it rushed or considered, be it rash or unavoidable, i made it, now i must life with it and the challenges it brings. I finished my TEFL training, and now can teach, but first i must find students. i found new resources to learn the natives language, but now i must make myself use them. i wiped away my tears, but the bedclothes did not change (well they did cause they needed to but that's not the point!). i still return to that order of life, i still wake with the option to just sit this day out, to procrastinate, to let a few hours slip by, put on the light box and forget my world. it feels like all i can manage right now is to juggle those essentials, and some days even that feels too much. And then a little voice whispers what i am doing, where am i serving, how is this straining to just survive and live in this culture really witnessing. What could i do, how could i be more, tell more, tell anything? I try and tell myself that time is dripping away, that my life's role model, the one i aspire to be like, did not just sit about and wait for life to happen, but went out there. The problem is he didn't. He ran from the crowds at times, he spoke powerful words but he wandered for three years and we only can account for about 3 weeks of that time. No, he didn't sit at home, or did he. I turn thirty this year, and that's exactly what he did until he was thirty as far as we know, he worked with his family, he was a son, he did what he was told and learnt his fathers trade. Some days this radical visionary going to meet people on their doorstep seems far away from the humble man who loved his friends and took opportunities to minister where they were needed. i wonder if he had day when he drew his clock back to reveal the sunlight and thought.... one more hour? |
The other siteWho is GfeefGfeef is the name that my writings have been under for some years. As far as I know it's unique to me. Originally from the UK, I now live in Serbia but continue to have a passion for childrens and youth ministry. Archives
October 2014
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