Tag Archives: New Year

Religion

New Year, and thoughts on prayer

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A new year. My… well, the number for me is over 70th… trip around the great nuclear furnace.

I was going to do a post about where I’m standing in terms of my work – that I seem to be on track with my translation (I worked a little late last night to meet a personal deadline). That I’ve been temporarily sidelined in my effort to get Troll Valley into paperback. I was going to mention that I’m recovering pretty well from my eye surgery, feeling better every day.

But that will do for that stuff.

It occurred to me to mention something I learned recently – or think I learned. (One is never sure, in matters spiritual.)

It’s about prayer.

I’ve never been very good with prayer. I’ve told you more than once that I have no stage fright (an abnormal condition). The one exception is that I hate praying in public. I hate doing that. I always feel I’m doing it wrong, that I’m sounding foolish, that I’m… embarrassing God, somehow.

It’s not quite as bad with private prayer, for me. I do that regularly. But I’ve never felt my prayers counted for much. I felt my prayers were small and weak things, set up against the great evil and sadness of the fallen world.

However, I had a thought recently that may have some relevance. Maybe it will be helpful to others.

If you recall, a while back I was rhapsodizing about how the science of physics seems (in my ignorance) to feed into theology. I actually forget the details, but it was pretty heady stuff for me. Waves and particles, and how the created universe is like a story or a song. All proclaiming the character of their Creator.

Anyway, it occurred to me to think that when I pray, I’m not there alone in front of God. I’m part of a great wave, a great song, a great dance. I’m not creating anything, I’m not composing something out of my own material. I’m just joining in. Participating in an ongoing story – or hymn. Or dance. Whatever. It’s not on me alone.

The call goes out – “Join the dance!” And I join.

I like that. It helps me relax when I pray.

Still can’t handle the public praying, though.

A blessed new year to you.

Poetry

Cheer for a New Year from Milton

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Haste thee nymph, and bring with thee
Jest and youthful Jollity,
Quips and cranks, and wanton wiles,
Nods, and becks, and wreathed smiles,
Such as hang on Hebe's cheek,
And love to live in dimple sleek;
Sport that wrinkled Care derides,
And Laughter holding both his sides.
Come, and trip it as ye go
On the light fantastic toe,
And in thy right hand lead with thee,
The mountain-nymph, sweet Liberty;
And if I give thee honour due,
Mirth, admit me of thy crew
To live with her, and live with thee,
In unreproved pleasures free;
To hear the lark begin his flight,
And singing startle the dull night,
From his watch-tower in the skies,
Till the dappled dawn doth rise;
Illustration of running nymph with Jest
Verses from John Milton’s “L’Allegro”
Authors, Music, Religion

‘The Sands of Time Are Sinking,’ and a glass is raised

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As the new year begins, the great Presbyterian hymn, “The Sands of Time Are Sinking,” has been in my mind. It’s not a hymn I grew up with, but one I learned to appreciate as an adult. It’s about time, and our ultimate hopes as believers. Suitable, I think. The hymnwriter Anne R. Cousin based it on something the Scottish Presbyterian divine Samuel Rutherford said on his deathbed.

I heard somewhere, once, that this was Moody’s favorite hymn, and that they sang it at all his rallies.

Or it may have been Spurgeon. I wasn’t there.

Today, it should be noted, is J. R. R. Tolkien’s birthday. It is the custom for every Tolkien fan to take a moment tonight at 9:00 p.m. local time, stand, raise their beverage of choice, and say, “The Professor!”

I doubt the Professor would have approved of the orange soda I plan to drink, but I do what I can within my personal limitations.

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In a Perfect World, We Would Ruin Everything

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Here’s a thought for the new year: Take away all your trouble, all the hardship in your life, and you’d invent new trouble on your own.

Eden was a perfect garden. It lacked no plant that was “pleasant to the sight and good for food” (Gen. 2:9), and then man came along to ruin it.

When Abram told Lot they should separate their clans, Lot looked at the well hydrated Jordan Valley, “like the garden of the Lord,” and took his people into it (Gen 13:10). In that beautiful valley nestled Sodom and Gomorrah.

If you’re inclined to blame your environment over the coming year for your indiscretion, peevishness, overaction, or pride, remember the environment in which sin first entered the world and remember you brought it with you when you came in.

Photo by Emiel Molenaar on Unsplash