“Walk with me”
The words to your friends in Eden’s cool evening
tumble through history.
Enoch, walk with meNoah, walk with me whilst I explain carpentry and rainWalk with me, Israel, through parted seas and barren desert.I'll walk you to the promised land though you wriggle to escape my hand.
Even as they feasted on milk and honey,
they strayed.
So far that none could hear your voice.
So you yourself came
Looked us in the eye and bid, ‘walk with me’
And we followed and walked from Galilee to Jerusalem and back
many times,
walking and talking.
You were our friend, walking with us.
Your crown was hid, and when your plan was revealed
and disguise cast away
You merely asked us ‘pray with me’
yet we slept,
and on waking, we fled.
Death could not hold you.
Alive and risen you took again to the road
with ordinary people.
‘May I walk with you?’
And you walked and talked
explaining the plan,
only leaving when light had dawned upon our dull brains
that this was you and you were alive.
Despair dethroned by Hope.
Here we stand
Urged by ancestors to walk with you
A cloud of witnesses watching our steps
until we will come
to the city where no one shall say to another ‘know the Lord’ for all shall know You.
All shall walk with You
in a place beyond time itself.
But for now, as gravity pins me to earth
I hear the call of love
the call to friendship
You almost sound lonely, and certainly yearning:
“Walk with me”.
Why did the Holy One… All seeing. All knowing. Perfect in wisdom.
Supposedly!
See fit to encase my free and dancing spirit within this lumbering carcass?
That creeps, and crawls, and trudges with rhythmical torpidity;
That takes an eternity to get the shortest distance.
A twig across my path seems like a Giant Redwood
A stone like Butser Hill
A puddle like Heath Lake.
Even the busy wood louse scuttles past like an Olympic sprinter
With a cheery “Morning, slowcoach! Nice day!” as he leaves me trailing in his wake.
Why did the Creator choose to incarcerate me in this now fat and ever more wrinkled body?
That crawls inch by painful inch across the damp earth
Up the brown plant stem
All to reach the life sustaining leaf –
My daily bread, my nourishment that nourishes me less and less
As this geriatric body stiffens and crumbles, and finally gives up the ghost.
Why?
What is it all for?
I have never doubted how loved I am.
His love throbs and pulses through every cell of my body.
His delight in me;
His tender care;
His passion, and compassion, for me, even me
Surely the slowest and least important of His creatures.
And yet, His purpose in creating me remains a mystery -
At least to me.
Soon I shall breathe my last, and die.
Die, knowing I am so loved;
But die without knowing my deeper purpose.
If only I could know.
If only I had even some faint inkling of why He made me like this.
Ah well.
He knows.
That has to be sufficient.
He gives, and He takes away.
Blessed be His Holy Name.
The Word saw, and He smiled.
As creation was unfolding on that seismic fifth day;
All of heaven gasping with wonder and delight
As each new creature burst into life upon the Virgin Earth.
Each one revealing something of the Divine Mystery,
Divine Wisdom; Divine Glory;
The elephant’s strength; the gazelle’s grace;
The eagle’s pinioned, breathtaking beauty in flight;
Each one a mirror, a reflection, of one small part of the Holy One.
Then heaven paused; intrigued.
The humble caterpillar appeared;
Brought into being by a word from The Word.
“Now what reflection is this?” whispers one to another.
“What part of Him does this slow and tiny creature reveal?”
And now, Heaven sees, the caterpillar - having lived so briefly,
Stops, dies, and is encased in a funeral shroud of its own body.
The Word saw, and He smiled.
There are no mistakes.
All are so loved; so precious; so cherished.
All reveal something of His Divine Nature.
“Arise, my love,” whispers The Word.
Heaven holds its breath.
A tremor of movement in the dead pupa.
A flash of colour.
We came across two trees intertwined. One was old with peeling bark, the other younger smoother and vibrant. They were mutually supportive and reminded us of the Living Word – Old and New Testaments.
Neither of the Testaments stand alone. The Old points us to the New and the New is the fulfilment of the Old. Both grow in the same direction and teach us about God – His ways and His person.
Both were alive, producing dense foliage. The leaves that suck the unwanted things from the air and breathe out oxygen. His Word is alive.
Thus ended our walk. I love the way God is so present in all of His creation.
In John 15 Jesus talks in length about the vine and we were thrilled to find a young vineyard in the middle of nowhere on our walk. Jesus calls himself ‘The Vine’ and us ‘the branches’ but in another sense, since we are called to be like him, we are also like individual vine plants in His vineyard.
What struck us was the time every little vine spent alone in isolation in its little protective sleeve. At a time of national social isolation this was very relevant.
All the time the baby vine is in its sleeve, it feels alone and in the dark. Yet it is a necessary time in order to teach it to grow straight and to grow towards the light. The sleeve may feel restrictive but it is also protecting the vine from pests and predators that would attack its wood to strip its leaves. Whilst it is in the sleeve the vine has no idea that it is part of something vast, that one day it will be producing fruit and contributing towards the rich wine that will be be produced.
How vast is His vineyard and how tenderly He cares for each individual vine, training it to become part of the whole.
This time we opted for a forest walk and asked God to walk with us.
Whilst we know he is always with us, there seems to be specific times when He says ‘walk with me’ and this was one of them. We chose to ‘look up’. The majestic pines towered above us, refusing all distractions and reaching straight up to the light.
We felt small amidst the huge trees, yet looked down to find heart-shaped blossom at our feet.
A reminder that His love is all around us, if we have eyes to see.
We saw more of this right at the end of our walk, again reminding us that He – the King whose name is Love – is our Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end.
Today I walked on the beach. I was struck by how much more beautiful the pebbles and shells were when wet. Also that shells/pebbles out further on the sand bank were covered more deeply by the sea and for longer and stood out in their solitary beauty, rather than the shells on the shingle which got lost in the crowd.
It spoke to me about how I need to wet, how I need to be unafraid of being out further, and alone. There were footprints in the sane even far onto the sandbank. He is always with me.
I don’t need to strive to get or stay wet, I just need to be still and let the tide wash over me. He will polish and shape me with His waves if I choose to stay and simply be.
A mother weeping for her son The crowds jeering at a con man another deadbeat dying The rabbis see a blasphemer getting his just rewards And fold their arms in satisfaction The Romans see a rabble rouser put down And heave sighs of relief His friends see the end of their dreams Confusion and grief in their hearts Or 30 pieces of silver in their pocket The women weep. Some see a fellow convict Refusing to curse and die. Pilate sees a mystery. His enemies see revenge satisfied The disinterested see just another day The soldiers see just another criminal Too late they see that Truly this is the son of God
Who sees the opened armed sacrifice being made for all men and all salvation? Abundant life poured out In blood and tears At the place of the skull for us
After the stench of torture and death Comes a fragrance of life Doors flung open to eternity For all who chose to follow Who sees?
Surrounded by people Your greatest victory was born in solitude and pain Father forgive us, we know not what we do.
This is a blessing that finds you As you dare to divert from distractions. To turn off TV – even YouTube! To say ‘no’ to News To evade entertainment To step back from Social Media Mute the music and wave away Wassapp.
And in the stillness let Spirit Holy find you Let the sun be as His love Penetrating you. Warming and healing your heart. Let the breeze be His touch upon your skin For He never self-distances from you. Hear His praises sung by birds and lift your heart to Him.
Let rest be your strength. He is with you Your heart cries ‘Emmanuel!’ And so He is God with us. A blessing within.
Wailing – grief shrieking into empty skies. Protests and grumbles: ‘It’s too late now’ Shuffling and footsteps milling around in confusion Pushing and shoving, wanting to see what He would do Questions and puzzlement: ‘What’s He up to?’ A command: “Roll the stone away!” We didn’t all hear that above the noise – But then the heavy grinding, creaking Of the stone rolling. And a communal intake of breath.
Then there was this pause. This silence.
It may not have lasted long But it felt like an eternity And if you listened hard You might have heard shock And cynicism, and unbelief. And “I told you so’ Or You might have heard a burgeoning of hope In the waiting. A murmuring of faith Like ripples arriving on the shore.
Where there should have been a stench You might have smelt freshness in the silence. All eyes were fixed on Jesus.
And then a cry: ‘Lazarus come forth!’ A loud cry, like the ‘It is finished!’ that came later – The cry that had to be heard before resurrection could come.
And then this holding of breath. The silence deepened. Hope overcame doubt as shuffling was heard. Shock echoed around the burial ground. A final silence as Lazarus stood before us.
Oh, then there was noise! Unbinding and freedom Crying, rejoicing, laughing and hugging. Processing we sang As we danced home together to feast on the resurrection day.
So what is in my silence now? Doubt? Hope?
Eyes fixed on Jesus.
As we have the sure knowledge That again we will dance home together and feast on resurrection day.
