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See The Morning
FARMStrong is on location in Austin, Texas, the capital of the South for the Chris Tomlin See the Morning CD Release. More to come. Get the CD now. It's a winner. posted by John David Walt | at 9/30/2006 10:41:00 PM | 5 comments
Friday, September 29, 2006
The Fast of the Friends of the Bridegroom Friends of the Bridegroom
why don't you fast,
denying your voracious
appetite for authority?
Stop craving power;
its only dieting!
Why not be completely
changed into Love,
starved until weak
submissive
readying for the
Feast of Forever?
Dieting hungers for preconceived results. . . . . Fasting reveals poverty of spirit. . . . . . the readiness to receive the Gift. posted by John David Walt | at 9/29/2006 10:54:00 PM | 3 comments
Wednesday, September 27, 2006
I can see clearly now. . . . .
posted by John David Walt | at 9/27/2006 09:20:00 PM
| 4 comments
Ode to Fall
posted by John David Walt | at 9/27/2006 08:58:00 PM
| 2 comments
Sunday, September 24, 2006
Monastic Pose
To walk inside monastic walls
must gait as though belonged
shed looking as some out of place
and whistle Catholic songs
just swing about a rosary
now chant some somber Psalms
then sign the cross and genuflect
no papalistic qualms
to tread upon the turf of monks
like following a God
requires a habit made of skin
from beatific sod.
This one, written back in August while on a retreat day at the Abbey of Gethsemane, is dedicated to my favorite Roman Catholic friend, Matt Maher, (even more fun here) who may have the call. ;-)
Labels: poetry
posted by John David Walt | at 9/24/2006 04:43:00 PM | 1 comments
Thursday, September 21, 2006
Photos of the Week
e
That's David, Mary Kathryn and Lily with Mrs. Adams, David's teacher, who came by for a home visit dinner earlier this week.
The other one is Samuel-- who is crawling all over the place now. posted by John David Walt | at 9/21/2006 10:25:00 PM | 3 comments
Signs
We learned today that David (6) is going to need glasses. He's pretty excited about it-- and I'm bit concerned. They say he has far-sighted-ness to the point of being a "medical condition." While I'm not sure what that means, I don't like the sound of it. We are going to get another opinion nonetheless. Pray for David and for us on this.
Speaking of David, I was in his room tonight and I noticed post-it notes around the walls. There were two by his bed and two by his desk. I approached to read them and was deeply touched. They said, in his own pencilmanship, these words: "DAD LOVE YOU DAVID," and beside it "MOM LOVE YOU DAVID." I asked him what he was up to with these "signs." He said, "In case I wake up in the night afraid from a bad dream I can read them and feel better." Wow! That's practicing good theology. If you can see in the photo there is a little praying hands icon he has stuck in between the post-it notes.
I try to do the same thing. Most days, in the quiet of the morning, I actually speak these words aloud so i can hear them, "You are my son, my beloved. With you I am well pleased." These words, spoken by Abba over Jesus at his baptism-- are our words too. We don't hear them as echoes but as living breathing reminding words of the very essence of our identity.
Speaking of these words, they have a fascinating connection to fasting. You will remember that immediately following Jesus' baptism that the Spirit compelled him into the desert. Jesus fasted in the desert for 40 days, tempted by Satan. The first temptation: "Turn these stones into bread." His reply, "Man does not live by bread alone but by every word that comes from the mouth of God." I am indebte to Jason McAnalley, one of my interns last year who offered that it was the baptism word "My Son. . . my beloved. . . . with you I am well pleased," that was the Word from the mouth of God that was literally sustaining Jesus in these days. Fasting took him deeper into the realization of the reality--- where it actually took on the significance of the substance of food. Satan, in the end, through temptation was attempting to get the Son of God to validate himself. He chose to rest in the only validation there is-- the love of Abba. This is our constant temptation too. The question is are we knowing it in a deep enough way that we are actually being nourished by it-- feeding off of it in the constancy of abiding relationship?
What do you think about that?
Now take two minutes after reading and pray for David. Thanks so much. posted by John David Walt | at 9/21/2006 09:40:00 PM | 4 comments
Tuesday, September 19, 2006
Why Fasting? As our 7-24-7 prayer movement gets underway and as our seminary struggles continue, the issue of fasting seems to be taking on more priority and prominence. Just today, our KingdomTide Reader hit on the idea of fasting. You can read the text here Mark 2:18-22. I am going to post a poem I wrote last spring (Lent) below on the issue of fasting. My big question continues to be "Why Fasting?" Fasting is not unique to Christian faith. So what is it that makes fasting as a Christian distinct from fasting as a Muslim for instance. Mustn't there be some distinction? Help me think about this.
Feeding empty with Fullness
Indulgence aside
Tasting weakness
Shattering pride
Spiritual Gasping
Ironic Self Care
Inhaling Mercy
Exhaling prayer
Hunger for knowing
beyond taste's delight
Divine craving
Soul's appetite
Love's yoke of longing
Dross churning within
Fiery crucible burning
foisting Heaven on sin
Deer panting for water
Soul feasting on God
Reveals crucified power
True authority's Rod posted by John David Walt | at 9/19/2006 03:59:00 PM | 6 comments
Saturday, September 16, 2006
Prayer Room obscurity
small town
little house
nameless reputation of
irresistible
roof splitting
LOVE
jams every square inch
WORDS
transfiguring the
molecular properties
of air and water
and people
radiating
religion-shredding
holiness
beautiful
simple
unstoppable
. . . . .
Last Monday night a new door opened into an old room-- we began a 7 year journey into unceasing prayer at Asbury Seminary. The movement is forceful, fledgling and fragile. There is a sense of the brooding of the Holy Spirit over it-- as he brooded over the waters of chaos in the beginning. We consecrated the Fletcher Prayer Chapel on our campus in Wilmore as the prayer room.
As is our practice, each semester we release a Scripture Reader for the community as way of reading a common text together each day. (if you want a copy comment me with your mailing address and we will get you one in the mail Monday). Anyhow, Friday's reading was from mark 2:1-12-- the healing of the paralytic who was lowered through the roof. You can re-read the passage here. Following that was this fabulous word from Julian of Norwich which I don't have time to enter in now-- but hopefully later. As I read the text and the reading and thought about our prayer room in those terms-- the poetry above spilled out onto the page. posted by John David Walt | at 9/16/2006 08:25:00 AM | 13 comments
Thursday, September 14, 2006
God the Farmer A FARMStrong Keeper sent to me today from my friend, Jackson Lashier, who is doing doctoral work at Marquette, presently studying Patristic Era Theologians. This from Ephrem the Syrian, Hymn #3 , Stanza 14 of the Hymns on the Nativity:
"Glory to the Farmer, the Hidden One of our thought.
His seed fell on our earth and enriched our intellect.
Its harvest was a hundredfold for the storehouse of our souls.
Let us worship the One who sat down and rested,
who walked within the way, and He was the Way on the way
and the Gate of entry for those who enter the kingdom." posted by John David Walt | at 9/14/2006 03:32:00 PM | 3 comments
What's this about
For several years I have liked appreciated the poet Mary Karr. Her latest collection, "Sinners Welcome" which is both fun and deep, has rekindled my interest in one of her poems I read a few years back in The Atlantic Monthly Magazine. It's called "Who the Meek are Not." I will print it below and request you comment about whether you think she has it right or not. At first i thought she did-- now i wonder.
WHO THE MEEK ARE NOT
Not the bristle-bearded Igors bent
under burlap sacks, not peasants knee-deep
in the rice paddy muck,
nor the serfs whose quarter-moon sickles
make the wheat fall in waves
they don’t get to eat. My friend the Franciscan
nun says we misread
that word meek in the Bible verse that blesses them.
To understand the meek
(she says) picture a great stallion at full gallop
in a meadow, who —
at his master’s voice — seizes up to a stunned
but instant halt.
So with the strain of holding that great power
in check, the muscles
along the arched neck keep eddying,
and only the velvet ears
prick forward, awaiting the next order.
What do you think? posted by John David Walt | at 9/14/2006 09:47:00 AM | 6 comments
Wednesday, September 13, 2006
FARMStrong Poem of the Week
O.K. B.H. this one's for you. Thanks for reminding me of the poems.
I wrote this one this summer while at Yale University at the Conference on Revival and Awakening. I love how the imagery of Isaiah 55 brings together farming and faith and the work of the Word in the World.
I call it
Rain's Reversal (or Intercession)
Falling Words
like rain
soaking the dusty soil
down to hidden
seeds of waiting children
germinating
faith's
flowering Kingdom
of Love
any thoughts on what's going on in these words?
oh yeah-- the photo-- that's Molly, who is coming up on one year. we thought she was a golden doodle-- now we are sure she is a sheep. ;-)
Labels: poetry
posted by John David Walt | at 9/13/2006 03:54:00 PM | 5 comments
Tuesday, September 12, 2006
Taking on Self-Care. . . . . OK Farmstrongers-- you are going to have to print this one off and wrestle with it a bit. it's probably not even ready for public consumption. but that's what blogs are for. . . . right? anyhow-- i'm just going to trot out 14 point argument (i.e. 14 stations of the cross) that i have been working on for the last year or so.
So if you want to forgo this one and opt for a softer and gentler idea you might check out the fantastic Wendell Berry quote on prayer I posted on the Asbury Seminary blog a few minutes ago.
Christian Formation: Moving from the paradigm of self-care
to beholding Christ in the Other.
The Stations of the Cross
1. Ministers tend to burn out.
2. The diagnosis for burnout is often that they have failed to take proper “care” of “self.”
3. Strategies and patterns of “self-care” are often prescribed as a remedy for burnout. This is often done under the guise of “formation.”
4. A life of ministry becomes compartmentalized or bifurcated between self-care and other-care.
5. Having good “boundaries” becomes one of the marks of excellent ministry.
a. Poor boundaries are the bad fruit of a broken understanding of “self.” (i.e. one cannot distinguish their responsibility “for” others from their responsibility “to” others. The dysfunctional self often vascillates between being enmeshed with others or withdrawn from them.
b. Ultimately this diagnosis of “poor boundaries” is the condition or symptom and not the cause of the real problem.
c. The real problem is a self-oriented paradigm of life.
d. The prescription of “healthy boundaries” in effect treats the symptoms rather than the root cause of the problem.
6. Boundaries are articulated primarily by the budgeting of one’s time on a daily, weekly, monthly an annual basis.
7. This approaches makes time a commodity which is in scarce supply.
8. In this model the primary mark of excellent ministry is to skillfully manage time
9. But isn't the primary mark of excellent ministry to be formed in the image of Christ for the sake of others.
10. The authenticating mark of formation in the image of Christ is or equals to live for the sake of others. It is the learning of a pattern of life/ministry that simultaneously revolves around Christ and others.
a. Formation is not a two-step process consisting of #1. Being formed in the image of Christ and #2. Living for the sake of others.
b. This model has the unintended effect of creating two major compartments; one primarily oriented around Christ and one oriented around others.
c. The irony of this model is that compartment #1, orientation around Christ, becomes an unwitting orientation around the self. It is a model of self-referential formation. And Ultimately compartment #2 becomes an unwitting orientation around the self. The goal, remember, is to forget one’self or to “die” to one’self rather than to “take care” of one’s self.
d. Formation is a seamless way of practicing life/ministry that is decisively “others” oriented. The way of being formed in the image of Christ is through a life lived for others. This is demonstrated or evidenced through the practice of a “self-less” life.
e. Only One truly and fully demonstrates this life: Jesus Christ.
f. Christian formation is to be formed in his image. . . . to “have the same mind in us that was in Christ Jesus. . . . ” (see Philippians 2:1-11)
11. The question we seem to be asking is the wrong question: How can the practices of formation aid/enable/empower the practice of ministry? This makes formation an instrumental and utilitarian reality rather than an ultimate one.
12. The real question seems to be: How can the practice of ministry become truly formative?
13. Through the collapse the categories of formation and ministry/mission which leads to the dissolution of the dichotomy between the self and others.
a. This is to live a truly “worship-full” a seamless pattern of beholding Christ in every minute and in every person.
14. This is occasioned by the decisive death to self—to be “crucified with Christ so that I no longer live but Christ lives in me. . . .” (a practiced or actualized baptism)
15. Pastoral Imagination is the fruit of model—the resurrection of “seeing,” the practiced ability of beholding, giving to, receiving from and blessing Christ in the other. This is the place where formation and ministry embrace in union where “to live is Christ.”
what say you????? posted by John David Walt | at 9/12/2006 11:28:00 PM | 16 comments
Sunday, September 10, 2006
On Limitation, Incarnation, Overcommitment, Creativity, Burnout and Boundaries OK-- I'm back. . . . . I think.
I've been reflecting this summer and beyond about why people, particularly people in ministry, over commit. I do it. Don't you? It leads me to think a lot about the whole notion of "boundaries" and "self-care" and the entire industry built up around such things.
We've all done it haven't we. . . . . said yes to one or ten too many good things. Inevitably, it leads to the stress-filled, margin-less condition of life known as overcommitment syndrome. We do it for good and bad reasons. On the positive, we tend to over commit in serving others because the needs are just so astronomically massive. There are simply five oceans of human need out there and every need connects to a face, a real person, a priceless treasure whose potential screams at us to be released in real life. But this leads us into the main problem we have of failing to recognize our limitations.
Theologically speaking, we are getting into the big idea of Incarnation-- that God inhabits human flesh in the person of Jesus Christ to save the World. Perhaps the most amazing thing about Incarnation is its limitation. Did you ever consider that God severely limited himself in becoming a person. Sure, we see elements of demonstrated OMNIscience, OMNIpotence, and OMNIpresence in the life and work of Jesus, but nothing like the OMNI would suggest. He was a single, obscure, poor, small town, prophet-preacher, with a marginal following in a map-dot nation for a few years. God could have chosen many more less limited frames to inhabit. It's also fascinating that God chose a quite limited era in terms of human history in that it was a decidedly unmechanistic, non-technological age.
So what does this have to do with overcommitment? Everything, for in overcommitting ourselves we defy the incarnation. We overestimate our ability and underestimate our limitation. The irony hiding behind this reality is pride. What if instead we overestimated our limitation and underestimated our ability? While this feels like humility, it is actually pride in sheep's cothing ala false humility. I think true humility is the divinely empowered accurate estimation of both abilities and limitations. True humility is the presence of Christ. Think about Philippians 2:5-11, perhaps the first great hymn to Christ, recounting the journey of one who had no limitations who took on seeming total limitation. But look what happens.
The amazing reality of the Incarnation is that in accepting its limitation the limitation is mysteriously and miraculously transcended. Through the gift of embracing limited ability, God gives a mysterious unlimited capacity.
Think through the story of the loaves and the fishes. Apparent limited ability becomes mysterious unlimited capacity. It is, in parable form, the very story of Jesus Christ. And this becomes the story of Christ in us. Now consider the Bread and the Cup.
This becomes the story of Incarnation and creativity. I recognize I'm not connecting all the dots here, but here's why I think this idea of limitation is so important. When we come to grips with our own limitation in the face of unlimited need something happens deep inside of us. We finally cease to believe so much in ourselves and begin to believe in God. When we begin to believe in God, rest becomes possible. Rest is the presence of margins. Think margins-- like the literal white space surrounding a page of text. The margins-- the white space-- this is the place of creativity. This is the place where one doodles the design of the next good thing in life. The margins of life are where creativity happens.
Concluding. And so Rest, and consequently margins and subsequently creativity are only possible for those who have not over committed themselves. Doesn't this help us understand burnout. Burnout isn't so much the inescapable presence of tiredness but the drudging absence of creativity.
Still with me? See where I'm going now with the boundaries and self-care approach to ministry? Lets think also about how technology counterfeits unlimited capacity thereby defying incarnation. . . . . more to come. posted by John David Walt | at 9/10/2006 06:58:00 PM | 12 comments
Friday, September 08, 2006
The Red Moon is Rising photo unavailable. . . . . . . posted by John David Walt | at 9/08/2006 01:56:00 PM | 1 comments
Monday, September 04, 2006
The Crickets "The crickets sang in the grasses. They sang the song of summer's ending, a sad, monotonous song. 'Summer is over and gone,' they sang. 'Over and gone, over and gone. Summer is dying, dying.'
The crickets felt it was their duty to warn everybody that summertime cannot last forever. Even on the most beautiful days in the whole year--the days when summer is changing into fall--the crickets spread the rmor of sadness and change.
Everybody heard the song of the crickets. Avery and Fern Arable heard it as they walked the dusty road. They knew that school would soon begin again. The young geese heard it and knew that they would never be little goslings again. Charlotte heard it and knew that she hadn't much time left. Mrs. Zuckerman, at work in the kitchen, heard the crickets, and a sadness came over her, too. 'Another summer gone,' she sighed. Lurvy, at work building a crate for Wilbur, heard the song and kenw it was time to dig potatoes.
'Summer is over and gone,' repeated the crickets. 'How many nights till frost?' sang the crickets. 'Good-bye, summer, good-bye, good-bye!'
An apt quote to remember this Labor Day from my favorite story, Charlotte's Web. We took our children to see Barnyard on Saturday which was a lot of fun. I was delighted to see in the previews that we have the major motion picture of Charlotte's Web this Christmas. They have fashioned a quite perfect tag line for the film: "Help is coming from above." I have been studying Charlotte's Web for the last few years while reading it to my kids and find that it almost perfectly contains the story of God in Christ. More on that to come. Thanks E.B. White. posted by John David Walt | at 9/04/2006 09:28:00 AM | 4 comments
Today...