The First

This is a piece of art by Akiane Kramarik. She normally writes a story or a poem to accompany her painting's, but she did not for this one. This one is called "The First," she was 15 when she painted it. She invited others to write something for the piece, as it "defied explanation" for her. Following certain events, I was moved to write. What follows the painting, is an attempt. It is as Walt Whitman wrote, "the powerful play goes on, and you may contribute a verse" (Leaves of Grass).

the First Two had a Fall—

Yet, stayed as One

through it all

The Divine’s hand-wrought pair—

Yet, the Man failed—

to protect
 

a new Two had a Break—

Yet, not mended

ne’er to be
 

They were their First Loves each—

Yet, the Man failed—

oh the Flesh!
 

The Two were reconciled

Yet, new pathways—

To Be walked
 

his heart aches to be One

Yet, our lips will—

never meet

 

"One day," was the oft repeated refrain. Now, tears fall as most precious dreams dissipate before the very eyes beauty once beheld as their own. A finality that is terrifying and all too real has come, as blitzkreig on a slumbering village or the seizing gasp in one's chest before a plunge. I have yet to wake up or take the dive, nor shall I.

Soli Deo Gloria

 - The Reader

 

Childlike Wonder

A blogger I follow posted about childlike wonder, entitled The things we used to treasure. I loved the post. Especially this masterful analogy: Changes in life aren't abrupt steps. Life is a slow change in color. Like when an watercolor artist smooths out a color into another. Brilliantly we transition without even knowing we left one color or entered another. Trying to figure out when you entered a new color is about as easy as trying to remember when you entered a dream. It's when we are in the deepest darkest part of the color do we realize we are in a new place.

I often think about how age seems to harden one's sensitivity and wonder, we can get used to just about anything from great suffering and despair, to great wealth and ease. I hunger for the newness, the freshness, the pure, the awe-inspiring, the glorious. I'm also reminded of the song Wake Up by Arcade Fire, I love the lyrics. I looked at these paintings after reading her post that reminded me of them. I hope you enjoy them. These painting are by Akiane Kramarik, who is a child prodigy. I love her work and have even written poetry to some of it. She often writes poems or stories to accompany her paintings. Here are a few:


                                      Title: Wonder   Age: 13


                  Title: Hope  Age: 11 (an interesting story with this one)



                            Title: Metamorphosis  Age: 16


                 Title: A Young Sage   Age: 15


                        Title: The Swing     Age: 16


She writes for The Swing:

Catching the middle of the rainbow, the center of the cosmic spectrum, the pulsating green is the most visible hue to human vision.

Green is the balance between the two extremes that influence the child's life in unexpected ways.

The light green represents learning, growth, health and harmony, but a mistreated green suddenly becomes murky and muddy with worry, pain, weakness, bitterness, and resentment, and it seems that no amount of light can return her to its original vibrant color. Except... for the swinging...

Whatever troubles that come along she needs to let them pass like a creek passing the callous stones. Let her keep on going and flowing, swinging and nurturing her love. Let the disturbance of the childhood memories find its own current of restoration that shelters others.

The direction of her soul is a balanced and continuous movement. The purpose of her soul is to keep on catching the color of peace, balance, protection, a sense of order, safety, tolerance, trust, healing and well-being, so others who are also vulnerable could be protected and healed as well.


         Personally, I along with many groan within myself waiting for the redemption (Rom 8). I wait for the day when all is put right, with infinite abundance and eternally so, when all things are made new (Revelation 21).

Soli Deo Gloria
 - The Reader

Tim Keller, Church Planting, and Watergate: A Tale of Sovereignty

Tim Keller is on of my favorite pastors, and perhaps the most culturally relevant and winsome in the United States. I am truly greatful for his ministry and am a student of it because of how Christ-centered, Biblically faithful, and God-honoring it is in an incomparably wise way. Here is a rather fascinating tale that he relates parts of in two different sermons. Tim Keller started Redeemer Presbyterian in NY because of Watergate; sort of.

1. Tim Keller planted Redeemer Church because he entered a Presbyterian denomination that encouraged church planting.
2. Keller entered that denomination because in his last semester at seminary he took two courses with a professor who convinced him to adopt Presbyterian theology.
3. Keller sat under that professor because at the very last minute the professor arrived at the seminary after having bureaucratic visa problems. (The professor was British.)
4. While that professor was having visa problems, the seminary dean prayed one day about how he didn’t know how they were going to get the professor to arrive, and his prayer partner happened to be a seminary student named Mike Ford.
5. Mike Ford happened to have some clout to get them through the bureaucratic snag because he was the son of Gerald Ford, the sitting President of the United States.
6. Gerald Ford was President of the United States because Richard Nixon resigned.
7. Nixon resigned because a bunch of burglars broke into Watergate and were caught.
8. The burglars were caught because one of them happened to leave a door unlatched to an office they had just bugged, and then a night watchman just happened to walk by and notice the unlatched door.
9. So “if that [burglar] had latched the door,” Keller half jokes, “if that door had been closed just two more inches, we wouldn’t be here tonight. Even Watergate happened for you.”

Andy Naselli comments: Keller’s point is that you can’t muck up your life. There is no plan B. We may perceive one of about a billion reasons for an event. Very seldom do we get a millionth of a millionth of a millionth of a glimpse of how God is working all things together for good for those who love him, but He is.

Thank God that He is in control and He is working all things [on a level realized only by what we call omniscience] for the good of those who love Him (Rom 8:28). There is a reason this verse is so quoted, and its because of the stories like the one above. I am ridiculously comforted by meditation on this wonderful truth.

Soli Deo Gloria!
 - The Reader

G.K. Chesterton on Private Religion

G. K. Chesterton (1874–1936), “Introduction to the Book of Job”:

The modern habit of saying “Every man has a different philosophy; this is my philosophy and it suits me”—the habit of saying this is mere weak-mindedness. A cosmic philosophy is not constructed to fit a man; a cosmic philosophy is constructed to fit a cosmos. A man can no more possess a private religion than he can possess a private sun and moon.

Soli Deo Gloria!
 - The Reader

5 Lessons from Winston Churchill's Life

 

Paul Johnson, Churchill (New York: Penguin, 2010), 122–25 (numbering added):

Winston Churchill led a full life, and few people are ever likely to equal it—its amplitude, variety, and success on so many fronts. But all can learn from it, especially in five ways. . . .

1. Always aim high. . . . He did not always meet his elevated targets, but by aiming high he always achieved something worthwhile. . .

2. There is no substitute for hard work. . . . The balance he maintained between flat-out work and creative and restorative leisure is worth study by anyone holding a top position. . . .

3. Churchill never allowed mistakes, disaster—personal or national—accidents, illnesses, unpopularity, and criticism to get him down. His powers of recuperation, both in physical illness and in psychological responses to abject failure, were astounding. . . . He had courage, the most important of all virtues, and its companion, fortitude. . . . In a sense his whole career was an exercise of how courage can be displayed, reinforced, guarded and doled out carefully, heightened and concentrated, conveyed to others. . . .

4. Churchill wasted an extraordinarily small amount of his time and emotional energy on the meannesses of life: recrimination, shifting the blame onto others, malice, revenge seeking, dirty tricks, spreading rumors, harboring grudges, waging vendettas. Having fought hard, he washed his hands and went on to the next contest. . . . There is nothing more draining and exhausting than hatred. And malice is bad for the judgment. Churchill loved to forgive and make up. . . . Northing gave him more pleasure than to replace enmity with friendship, not least with the Germans. . . .

5. The absence of hatred left plenty of room for joy in Churchill’s life. His face could light up in the most extraordinarily attractive way as it became suffused with pleasure at an unexpected and welcome event. . . . He liked to share his joy, and give joy. It must never be forgotten that Churchill was happy with people. . . . He got on well with nearly everyone who served him or worked with him, whatever their degree. . . . He showed the people a love of jokes, and was to them a source of many. No great leader has ever laughed at, or with, more than Churchill. . . . . He liked to sing. . . . He was emotional, and wept easily. But his tears soon dried, as joy came flooding back.
 

Soli Deo Gloria!
 - The Reader