ch-ch-ch-changing

hola,
I have moved.......
to wordpress!

I decided it is more aesthetically appealing and provides more options for formatting....

please follow my new blog "hallelujah" at
 http://caitlynbrynneparris.wordpress.com

muchas gracias...

peace,
Caitlyn

the wanting

I have all these "hungers": desires, longings, wishes.  They well up inside me.  When I am attentive to them, they fill me til I think I might burst. 

I hunger physically.  This is the most basic hunger.

I read because I have an insatiable desire to know the thoughts of others.  I want to connect. I want to see what beauty comes from their minds. 

I also read because I want to understand.  I crave knowledge; I am endlessly curious.

I long for delights: to laugh with friends and family, to discuss what is near to our hearts, to create memories.

I long to write.  I long to spill out my thoughts, test them, hold them to the light, unwravel them, and understand myself.

I wish to travel: to see that which I have not seen before, to marvel at the sights that overwhelm me even in their picture form.

Yet, in all these things, there is a common thread.  My God is interwoven into all of it, and all of it is encompassed within His being.

He gave me a material body with which I hunger.  

He gave the talent of writing to many; this allows them to share their imaginings.  He gave us imagination.

He gives us knowledge and allows us to peek at all the intracacies He has created.

He knit me together, fashioned my personality, talents, and desires.  He understands me and knows all my thoughts.

He created the world; He created the sights that astound us.

In these material things I will always need more.  My stomach will utilize its contents relatively soon after I eat.  I will finish a book and want for a new one.  I will learn concepts and move on to new or more in depth ones.  I will seek new experiences and to see those people I love again when I have  parted from them.  I will constantly develop new thoughts with which I will need to grapple.  I will never see the entire world, and so I will always want to see new places.

Perhaps this needing of "more" is innate within each of us in varied ways.

He is more. He is all. He Is. 

So in the words of C.S. Lewis, "If I find in myself that which this world cannot satisfy, the only logical explanation is that I was made for another world."

We were made for the new Heaven and the new Earth when we were remade.

All other hungers are subhungers; they point to the greatest hunger of all creation.

I hunger most of all for my God.  That is the greatest hunger.

a lost art?

So...Question: why is fasting not a thing anymore?
Is it because it's antiquated?
Is it because it makes us uncomfortable?
Is it because we weren't taught to fast growing up?
Is it because we don't know how?
Is it because it's not a priority?
Is it because we are afraid of thinking we are righteous and becoming puffed up in pride?
Is it because it's weird?

It is probably a number of things.  I read some of "The Celebration of Discipline" by Richard Foster about a year or more ago.  [It takes things a while to sink in for me.  It's a dense book, and I like to chew on stuff. I also got distracted with other books and kept having to come back to it.]  If we claim to follow Christ, we should follow His teachings, and if we claim to love God we should follow His commands.

("In fact, this is love for God: to keep His commands.  And His commands are not burdensome, for everyone born of God overcomes the world.  This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith." 1 John 5: 3 & 4)

 But perhaps you say, "Jesus never commanded us to fast!" That would be correct.  To my knowledge, there is nowhere in scripture where Christ says, "You MUST fast!"  However, in Matthew, Jesus does say "when you fast."

("When you fast, do not look somber as the hypocrites do, for they disfigure their faces to show others they are fasting. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, so that it will not be obvious to others that you are fasting, but only to your Father, who is unseen; and your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you." Matthew 6:16-19)

This passage is placed right after the passages on giving to the needy and praying.  We know how important both of those things are in regards to the ministry of Christ, and in result leading a Christian life.  A few chapters later in Matthew 9,  Jesus speaks to the Pharisees on fasting.

("Then John’s disciples came and asked him, 'How is it that we and the Pharisees fast often, but your disciples do not fast?'

Jesus answered, 'How can the guests of the bridegroom mourn while he is with them? The time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them; then they will fast.'" Matthew 9: 14 & 15)

We are modern day disciples, and we are the church, the bride of Christ.  He is our bridegroom; though He is indeed with us in spirit, materially, we are separated for a time.  Now is the time for fasting as we long for His return and live actively loving others with the love He gives until the return of our sweet Savior.  

I pour out these examples not to condemn or scold the church and my fellow Christians, but I am just saying that maybe we have been missing an opportunity.  I have come to believe that fasting is as integral to a healthy faith as prayer, reading the Bible, worshipping, fellowshipping with other believers, loving justice and mercy, and helping those around us who are suffering.  Fasting can be from food, media, social interaction, video games, candy, or anything that we are tempted to think sustains us or that draws our attention away from God.

I believe that by depriving ourselves from something that "feeds" us for a time, we will stem the spiritual starvation that so frequently leaves our spiritual selves emaciated.

I am not claiming to say something new, but I was recently gently convicted of this.  I hope to engage in this ancient practice more often, and I hope that you will too. 

I am no pro, so I say do exactly what Jesus says.  Be private about your fast.  Ask The Lord how He wants you to fast, and I pray that you will be filled "with the knowledge of God's will through all the wisdom and understanding that the Spirit gives." (Colossians 1:9)

awkwardness

This is the first of what I'm sure will be many "married" life posts.  Married life, as I had anticipated in quite an adventure.  It's fun; it's easier than dating in some ways and harder in others.

Anyway, apartment living is a new aspect of life for me.  I like it though.  It's cozy and has just what we need for this stage.  It is even better now that the smoke smell is gone.  However, dealing with multiple families around us is interesting.  A couple days ago we were witnesses of a domestic dispute.  A woman near us and her significant other really got into it.  There was a lot of yelling, and Ben and I were temporarily trapped in our apartment.  (Our's is the apartment right beside the stairs, which is where the dispute was going on, loudly.)  As annoying and awkward as that whole situation was, I felt compassion toward this woman.  The human part of me was 100% annoyed.  The compassion is solely from Christ.  I've often heard it said to be polite yet distant from your neighbors.  Common sense tells me to do that as well, and left to my own devices, it is exactly what I prefer to do.

BUT of course, The Holy Spirit will tug at you about stuff.  I feel the tug to move past simple polite smiles and courteous "How are you's?"  Those things are comfortable, and Jesus calls us to more. I'm convinced that every aspect of life is fertile ground for "mission work."  We like to put "mission work" into a nice neat category, and it is usually a category that doesn't infringe on our every day comings and goings. Therefore, I know that this apartment situation is not accidental. If I want to be a missionary in my career one day, I need to practice and be missional now. In the struggle I see around me how can I even begin to dare to hoard the hope I have found.

This is going to be awkward. I know it will be. Sometimes I think Jesus thrives on awkward.  I mean think how awkward He made the pharisees feel.  And He definitely made his disciples feel awkward...He washed their feet. That was so weird. It is so weird.  And He said walk the extra mile.  What do you even talk about for that long?!

It is time to take this step though, no matter how awkward it is.  It is time to take this bigger step because I believe in a Christ that is bigger than nice smiles and positive attitudes.  I believe in a Christ who destroys darkness, shatters chains of hopelessness, and stomps the ploys of the enemy.

yielding

from a tangle of thoughts,
writing yields order and focus

from a misshapen lump of clay,
sculpting yields shape and form

from a rigid block of wood or mass of stone,
carving yields movement and realization

from soundless air,
song yields resounding emotion

from a bland canvas,
painting yields enlivened color



from dust and ashes,
The Creator yielded life.





we are like our Father.  we must create. art in all forms is amazing to me because it makes concrete those things of the Spirit.  it is a projection of the things unseen, yet shared throughout humanity.  

fissures

At what point do our hearts break for the world?
Is it in an instant?
Is it a buildup?
Is this question like asking at what point grains of sand become a mound?
Does it happen after watching too many violent news reels?
Could it be the weight of the words from the radio bearing down and creating more and more fissures in the fortification surrounding our fragile hearts?
Is it all of these things at once?

My heart seems to have a habit of breaking and mending.
It is tender, but it is resilient.
It is interwoven with the threads of the life-giving Holy Spirit.
I listen to the news, and it hurts.
I listen to the news, and sometimes I cry.
I listen to the news, and sometimes I despair.
I listen to the news, but it always leads me to pray.
I cry out to my God for this world because there is no fixing it without my God.

I listen to the news because even though it hurts, I would rather be aware than be numb.
I would rather ache than be filled with bubble-gum happiness.
I would rather experience heartbreak over the conditions of the world and know that my joy and hope are not confined by those conditions.

I pray to my God; God is the source of my hope for a new day, a brighter future, peace, and love.
I know that prayer is more powerful than I may feel it to be. So, I do what I can, and I pray.

So as for "the news,"
I have to know. I have to be aware.
I am interlocked with those who are hurt and those doing the hurting.
Our flesh is the same substance, and our souls are the same mystery.
The same God hears all our suffering, and the same God cares.

departure

and so I left, as quietly as I came.  The immanency of my departure making every word weighted and the love I had to give urgently yearning to be poured out. I was a blip. I was a single puzzle piece from the 1,000 piece puzzle.  I was one voice within a choir.  I was one plane ticket out of thousands.  I was one girl from america there for one week. Insignificant but significant.  Humbled and overjoyed.  Made low and brought to the heights all at once.   Even so, at this point I was leaving behind more than luggage.  This second visit had caused my love for that place, La Romana, Dominican Republic to delve deeper into my very being, to carve itself upon the post and lentil of my heart. The connections I had made, lines I cast, the strings of my heart were now all pulled taught with distance.   The guarantee of seeing these people ever again absent. But it was beautiful, like a firework, short-lived, yes, but brilliant and memorable.  

At 2:30 am the plane lurched toward the runway, and I, inexplicably wide-awake, pressed my perpetually sweaty face to the oval window, which was not much larger.  The runway lights waved me away, and as we broke gravity the excitement that comes with the miracle of flying welled up inside me.  We slid into the air in that hollow aluminum tube, my mind whirring with the impossible physics of it all.  In not so many breaths I could see the street lights, car lights, motor-bike lights spread out beneath me.  I saw miles from my minuscule width of glass.  Where was I seeing?  Had I been there? Was Clara there? Was David there?  Was Estella there?  Was Emilio?  Louis?  Nadia?  Marie? 
How many lives were in my view but absent from my sight right now?
Surely, they were as numerous as the stars that I could see above.
It was as if the strip of darkness that separated the clusters of of stars and the land sprinkled with lights, imitation stars, served as a mirror. 

The two mysteries, the stars and the people, above and below, gazing, mirror-images, at one another.

The lives, miracles on the earth.  Each one burning with passion, the will to thrive, the courage to stand in the face of uncertainty, endurance under hardship, the brilliance of the human spirit.
These were reflected by the audacious stars that refused to be extinguished by the darkness about them.
For at each star's boundary of light, the darkness was forced to stop; it had to bow to the defiant star.

And when I see the sky, indeed, I am not ignorant of the presence of darkness, yet I choose to marvel at the vivid light of each star.

And so, perhaps these people where surrounded by what would be considered "dark" conditions.  Yet, while the conditions were evident to me, I had no choice but to be taken with and marvel at their joy, their passion, their free-flowing laughter, their sound, their shouts of praise, their love, their generosity, their God-given light.

*I, too, have loved the stars too fondly to be fearful of the night, and I have chosen, indeed, to look joyfully at their light.

[*reference to Sarah Williams's poem, "The Old Astronomer"]