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God’s story woven into lives of ordinary men…

There’s an interesting word of encouragement that the prophet Isaiah gives the Jews when they are in Exile, when they were poised between the choice of assimilation and despair. It says,

‘Listen to me you that pursue righteousness, you who seek the Lord. Look to the rock from which you were hewn, and to the quarry from which you were dug. Look to Abraham your father and to Sarah who bore you; for he was but one when I called him and I blessed him and made him many’. 

I like what Walter Brueggemann says about theses verses. He says that Isaiah is saying if you want to seek God, look to the oldest, most embarrassing beginning we ever had. He says firstly, remember Abraham. On the one hand, he is the strange, impressive father of the faith who leaves his home at God’s command & goes out on a long journey. On the other hand, Abraham is also a pitiful figure - often helplessness and filled with fear.  Two times he gives his wife Sarah away to other men to save his own skin. Despite God’s promise of a child with Sarah, he sleeps with Sarah’s servant Hagar, to get an heir.

Often Abraham appears so confused, so unsure, so barely faithful.

And when you are done reflecting on Abraham, remember Sarah your mother. Sarah is the beautiful woman who other men desire. She is also the mother of Isaac, the promise carrier. However, when you remember Sarah, remember her oldness, remember her barrenness, remember her mocking laughter in the face of God when He promises her a son.

Yet when you remember Sarah, remember that this old and pitiful woman now laughs a new laugh - an Easter laugh. God uses her very barrenness to create newness. Sarah is the example for all barren people, who have within them no gift of life, no capacity for faith - yet God does something new and unexpected in the face of all the evidence.

What impresses me about this foundational story of Scripture, is what it says about the way God’s story is unfolding among us. Abraham and Sarah are people we can identify with because they are fragile and tentative, often moving forward with fear & hesitation. These are people just like us.

You know, God’s story often isn’t in the grand epics of history, the stories told by the winners. When I read the large sweep of Scripture, it seems to me that God’s story is mostly unfolding quietly, below the radar, twisting and turning - always with the very real possibility of failure. Yet when we remember this story of faith, remember that it is told and retold through the same fragile stories of other biblical characters. Remember the scheming of a timid Jacob, the stuttering of a reluctant Moses, the paranoid actions of a bipolar Saul, the treachery of a wife stealing David, the depressed and suicidal Elijah…

The very wonder of God’s story is that he achieves his purposes in the world through broken ordinary people, just like us.

Bruggemann says we remember these stories because they model faith and they invite faith.

We remember these stories because when these fragile people centered their stories in God’s story, they lived life BIG – filled with purpose, newness and imagination.

Between

Nothingness

and

Eternity

Managed to take a couple of prints while at a workshop. I can tell you that there is loads of difference from being an absolute novice and using a barren to print at home to taking a print with the full pressure applied by a printing press. The piece above is dark and sort of beautifully embossed. As you might've gathered I'm happy with the results! For the print taken at home there must have been other issues of not inking enough and / or not wetting the paper properly etc.. A problem, however, with both the prints is that the border was not cleaned well enough. This is a benchmark though in terms of the possibilities. The plan is to head back to the art college soon to take more prints. The home printing effort has been put below for comparision.

Some how-to's from around the web.
How to make a linocut
3 Colour Reduction Linocut Tutorial

Related posts on my blogs
Linocut : My first : WIP and
Linocut Print

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Now Hagar plays quite a significant role in the story of Abram and Sarai, because 10 years after they had moved into the land of Canaan, Hagar became a visual embodiment of the couple's doubt and confusion in God's covenant with them. God promised to make a great nation out of Abram and He also promised him a son of his own. But uh... Sarai can't have kids and it has been quite awhile and frankly... there's probably a bit doubting going on. 

But hold up, what does Hagar have to do with any of this? Well, this woman is Sarai's Egyptian maid and Sarai decides to use her in a strange way. She asks that Abram take Hagar as a wife and sleep with her. Hopefully Sarai would be able to have children through her maid since she can't by herself.

I know this all sounds strange but apparently this was a custom back in the day. You should know that women who couldn't reproduce were pretty much shamed by the rest of the world. After all, multiplying was such a huge deal back then and God did tell humans to multiply and fill the earth. And now here's Sarai and she is unable to do so and it's obviously quite devastating to her. On top of that, she's getting old and soon enough (if not already) she will be unable to give Abram any children whatsoever. So basically what she does is give her husband a substitute wife, as is the custom of the time. Then whatever child was born to Hagar would be considered Sarai's child.

Either way, apparently Abram's doubt must be growing as well, because he agrees to go through with his wife's idea. He has sex with Hagar and she gets pregnant. And along with this pregnancy, Hagar gives birth to a new attitude towards Sarai. Now she treats Sarai with a sense of superiority in herself because Sarai has pretty much become a small threat to her. This frustrates Sarai and she decides to take it out on her husband. 

“This is all your fault! I put my servant into your arms, but now that she's pregnant and she treats me with contempt. The Lord will show you who is wrong—you or me!”

Uh lady... why couldn't you just have trusted God?

We had just finished reading the past couple days about God’s glory and mystery working in Abram’s life. First He speaks audibly to Abram telling him to leave his hometown of “Ur of the Chaldeans.” Then the next thing you know, He “appears” to Abram telling him that He will hand over a decent chunk of land to his descendants. Then he gives Abram the power to wipe out 4 strong kingdoms of warriors with a little over 300 people. And then some mysterious firepot and flaming torch are moving between some carcasses as a sign of a covenant with Abram to assure him that his descendants would inherit the land He already promised them. God even goes into decent detail about when, where and how! He also tells Abram that he will have a son of his own so that his servant won’t inherit the land. Oh yeah, and the dude is crazy rich.

My, my Sarai. You should have just been patient.

Abram responded by saying, “She's your servant, so deal with her as you see fit.” Of course, now there is a decent bit of anger behind Sarai and so she decides to rule over her maid with an iron fist. In fact, she ruled over Hagar so harshly that the maid ran away.

But God saw her. He knew her pain.

And God sent His angel (the angel of the Lord) to find Hagar, which he did. She was beside a spring of water in the wilderness along the road to a place called Shur.

The angel spoke to her. “Hagar, Sarai's servant, where have you come from, and where are you going?”

“I'm running away from my mistress, Sarai,” she answered.

“Return to your mistress,” said the angel. “Submit to her authority. I will give you more descendants than you can count. You are to name your son Ishmael, for God has heard your cry of distress. This son of yours will be wild, as untamed as a wild donkey! He will raise his fist against everyone, and everyone will be against him. Yes, he will live in open hostility against all his relatives.”

Hm... sounds like a good kid.

But something huge happens in this moment. Something that can be talked about, but not truly understood until you realize it for yourself. God has seen and heard Hagar. This is actually the reason Hagar's son is to be named Ishmael because Ishmael means “God hears.” Now any Christian when told “God hears you” would probably not think twice about it. In fact they may not even think about it at all. I never gave it that much thought until I had a particular incident in my spiritual formation class one day.

We were supposed to meet up with someone else in the class we knew nothing about whatsoever and ask God to give us something to pray for them for. I had two things on my mind and I knew that if God was going to give this dude something to pray for me for, it would be one of the two. But I didn't expect anything to really happen.

And I definitely did not expect my newly acquainted partner to pray for both the things I needed prayer for. Man he nailed it right on the dot. And for whatever reason, it became absolutely clear to me in that moment that even though there are a couple billion people on the face of the earth, God had heard me. God had seen me. And now He was speaking right to me through the heart of another believer.

God had heard my prayers. This was proof.

Hagar was so moved by this experience that after this time, she referred to God as El-roi, meaning “You are the God who sees me.” That's how much this moment made an impact on her. Her name for her son is audible and her name for God is visual! 

She also said “Have I truly seen the One who sees me?” Because of this she named the spring of water (or well) the angel had met her at “Beer-lahai-roi. This means “Well of the Living One Who Sees Me.” This happened on the map between Kadesh and Bered.

So at the age of 86, Abram had his first son through Hagar who had named him Ishmael, just as the angel had told her.

Despite how many people there are in the world, God sees you.

Genesis 16

As a rolling husk of weed in November.

Parched heart, brown seed,

Mouth thick with spit

Like puss,

Unspeaking.

Mind as barren as a stubble field

and cold as tundra.

Oh God, my hands curl

like dried fruit.

My lips and skin part and crack.

I stink of dust.

Shake me from your sandals, Lord.

Draw and pour fresh well water over Your head.

Let it trickle between Your toes.

Tread, mash, and swish me around.

Return me to that clean, bright,

Slick, rich wetness:

The clay under the fingernails of God.

Click on image to view at full size.

While she doesn't make me feel guilty, as a matter of fact she does just the opposite.  She is openly excited for Paul and I.  She asked to see my belly so I obliged and she seemed giddy with excitement.  I still couldn't help feeling dirty, like I was the only little kid at the playground who had candy showing it off to everyone, but not willing to share.  I felt rude, but I mostly felt guilty.

Why I am so blessed when I know plenty of other women who are probably more deserving than myself of this gift?  There are people with more money, better things, more patience and not even one child.  How did I get so lucky to be blessed with one already and one on the way? 

To be completely straight on the subject.  Am I happy to be pregnant?  Yes, in every way!  I am so thankful that I can't express it in words.  However, I am sad for those that I know who have lost babies, lost pregnancies, and for those who are struggling everyday to become pregnant.  It is the longest, lonliest road a woman will ever walk:

The walk of the Barren Brides.

so my husband and i have been dealing with infertility issues (now has been diagnosed as unexplained infertility---great they cant even tell me whats wrong, but keep telling me something is wrong) for going on a year now. We both have this insanely huge desire to be parents and raise godly children, as difficult as that would be in the world the way it is currently. but regardless, we want children. so we've been trying....and trying......and here we are hitting our one year anniversary....been off of any preventative measure since may...and we're still about as non-pregnant as it gets. I've taken metformin, clomid, starting IUI's soon. but what baffles me is the fact that i am 22 freakin years old?!?! what the heck is wrong with my body? and i got pregnant 6 years ago and lost it...........why could i get pregnant then at the most inconvenient time of my life and now i cant even ovulate without getting some hormone extracted from a pregnant woman's pee injected into my right buttcheek? who knows.....i pray and ask God all the time but i am so consumed by my frustration that i cannot hear whatever he is trying to say to me. That is, if he is saying anything at all.

The thing that really peeves me is that E-V-E-R-Y one of my close girlfriends in my life that is married and wants children is pregnant, or has recently had a baby. even a friend who didnt want to be pregnant, but is now and is "soooo cute" according to everybody. Everybody but me....when i see her i want to vomit. not because i hate her, but because i hate that she got what i wanted when i wanted it and she didn't. and i dont know how to channel that anger elsewhere without pointing it to God and accusing him of punishing me and hating me. I know he doesnt, but why does the blessing i pray for end up caught up in the wind and lands four blocks too far to the east? would i be a horrible mother? is there something God knows about me and my future that i don't know and this all makes sense? not that i am aware of.

anyway....i title this entry HOW DARE YOU!?! because of a recent incident i had with one of these friends of mine who is a new mother. So last friday we're sitting in my living room talking about whatever and all of a sudden she tears up. So, of course, i ask her what is wrong and she proceeds to tell me that she THOUGHT she might be pregnant and got her hopes up (despite the fact that they are on the pill to prevent this) and her doctor told her to take a test and she did and it came back not pregnant. and she's sitting there across the room from me, holding her son... (INFERTILE CHILDLESS ME) crying about how much she was disappointed. Although i was a raging ball of emotions on the inside, on the outside i kept my cool and just said, "oh". and had nothing more to say.....but here i am almost a week later still angry and hurt over this and i have to say, How dare you sit across from me in my living room after telling me time and time again that I should just have faith and trust that God will bless me with children in His time......and you CRY because you didnt accidentally get pregnant again........WTF? what makes you think that just because we're close i wont be insulted by your insensitivity? When did you decide that i have to just suck it up and deal with my infertility and yet you can have the nerve to cry to ME that you're not getting blessed with your second child in a year......in my home. i just felt utterly disrespected....like she could care less if i hurt or if i was in pain at all because of what she said.

Its like, HELLO i have been TRYING to get pregnant for eleven months......and EVERY cycle you better believe i get my hopes up and stupidly misread all sorts of PMS and convince myself that its all pregnancy symptoms. And i've dealt with people just spouting off that they're pregnant, thrown baby showers for girls who got married after me and already have a little one.........do you just think i've accepted my lot in life as an infertile BARREN woman? NO i dont care what the doctors say....i will always always always convince myself that God is bigger than my stupid body and messed up hormones. So unless you've gone through it, and by gone through it i mean T-R-I-E-D to get pregnant for six months or more and FAILED just like me....dont you even THINK that you have the right to act like i should comfort you. yes, you can pout when your period comes, but not until you've been trying for a year will your doctor even consider looking very far into your problem. So just deal with it a little while...and you know, maybe if they were trying trying trying....like timing sex and using OPKS and temping and just plain werent on the pill to PREVENT IT...maybe i would have had some pity. But she needs to remember that I AM one of the small percent of women who aren't as lucky as she was and i will never get to say, "we had our little surprise" . i just wish people werent so ignorant.....

Infertility quote of the day..."i always knew i wasn't the smartest woman i knew, but really how do you fail a pregnancy test even when you take fifteen retests?"

photo by joanna eleanor

emptiness inhabited by never fulfilled desires

crawled and twisted almost forgotten

catapulting from decades before

mixing times and seasons

troublesome space of dreamed fantastic accuracies

woven through dangerously attractive prophecies

how could that be

barren became a friendly soul

fading memories having the last chance of resurrecting

from distant horizons balancing upon the ocean of divine whispers

bringing me nearer

to this one thing

I will look toward the everlasting captivation

faintly but truly

I desire

"Several years ago Chuck called to tell me he had cancer... In typical fashion Chuck shaved his head before the chemotherapy began, covered it with glue, sprinkled it with gold glitter, and walked around the house in his underwear, calling himself 'Chemo-Man.'

"...The chemotherapy destroyed his appetite; he was unable to keep food down; he became so gaunt and emaciated that he was almost unrecognizable even to his children...  But Chuck pulled through, and eventually he completed treatment. Chemo-Man had prevailed.

"A month later... the cancer was back... at levels as high as they had been before treatment. Being a doctor himself, he knew that the return of the cancer this strongly, this quickly, meant that he was going to die. It was a death sentence.

"At 6:30 the next morning, Chuck called again. 'You won't believe this,' he said. Someone in the lab had mistakenly switched his results with those of another patient, who had not yet even been through treatment...

"'I'm going to live,' my friend said. 'I'm going to see my kids grow up. I'm going to grow old with my wife. I'm going to live.'

"...Chuck told me he was filled with a gratitude he had never known. He couldn't stop touching his kids or hugging his wife. Things that had bothered him before faded into utter insignificance... We don't earn it, can't control it, can't take a moment of it for granted. Every tick of the clock is a gift from God." - The Life You've Always Wanted   by   John Ortberg.