The Book Worm

Travelling Companions.

2011-03-14T14:46:00.000-07:00

On long train journeys, where I drink tea, read good books, watch the countryside fly by, I also talk to strangers.

On a train to London, I met another Rebecca, a nursing student from Dundee, confirming her shifts via text en route and visiting her older brother. I was visiting my brother in London too, and so we talked and exchanged mobile numbers. Same-name people who meet on a long journey.

A few months later, I met Lucy, a dentistry student studying in Sheffield and working as an events organiser, on this occasion at a stately home. Again, we laughed and talked- she was going to Paris- after finishing work that day. And so complete strangers, we exchanged numbers and she texted me when she made it to France. Later texts at Christmas went back and forth.

Yesterday I met Gordon. A man in his 70s who recently lost his wife to breast cancer. He said "life is hard".
"You work all your life and save up money but it does not mean anything."
So I asked questions and listened. He told me about his son, his career in the Nuclear Physics department at Oxford University. his too-big four bedroom house, how his wife did all the cooking and he did the cleaning, going on holiday on his own. But he had friends through church and good neighbours- but I will pray for him for he is right. Life is hard.

After Gordon, I met Izzy. Half Italian and from the Isle of White, and studying French and Spanish at Oxford. Capacious leather hand bag and obvious huge appetite to learn and study. Kindles. You can't turn pages. And Trinity College library probably has not digitalised all it's archives to fit on a kindle. Such encounters light up the sky.

I love train journeys.

"He ate and drank the precious words..."

2011-03-01T14:55:00.000-08:00

During this month, http://www.ylcf.org/, a blog I read regularly, is doing a month of book reviews, and book-related posts.

In addition on the 5th March, World Book Night will take place, where thousands of free books will be handed out to encourage the non-reader to read. (http://www.worldbooknight.org/)

"One million books will be given away free in the UK and Ireland on 5 March for the inaugural World Book Night.
Some 20,000 volunteers will hand out 48 copies each of their favourite book from a 25-strong list. A further 40,000 will be distributed by organisers.
Would-be volunteers apply through the event's website, choosing a book from the list which features Alan Bennett, John Le Carre and Margaret Atwood."
Will Gompertz
(http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-11905619)

I have always loved to read, and believe that books have enormous power to inform, inspire and give the reader tremendous pleasure. Benjamin Franklin said, "Give me 26 lead soldiers and I will conquer the world." The written word - books- have unlocked potential. I cannot go anywhere without a book to read, even if the opportunity of actually sitting down and reading is limited. Books can take the reader from the living room, the cafe, the train, from under the covers - to another place, another country, without moving a step.

"He ate and drank the precious words,
His spirit grew robust;
He knew no more that he was poor,
Nor that his frame was dust.
He danced along the dingy days,
And this bequest of wings
Was but a book. What liberty
A loosened spirit brings."

Emily Dickinson, Poems, pg 47 (1948)

In keeping with YLCF's March of Books I will be writing as many book reviews as I can during the next month. I initially resolved to do one every day, but I fear the quality would inevitably decline as I tryed to churn them out, so instead I will write as many "good" reviews as I can.
And may the many recipients of all those books on the 5th March, become a whole nation of book worms.

"I can face tomorrow....."

2011-02-26T04:23:00.000-08:00

I read a great review of the last 10 years of a friend's life and decided to steal the idea. So here we go (thanks to Chantel Brankshire...).

15 years ago....
1. I was 15 years of age and in Standard 10 at Hebron School, Udagamandalam, (more commonly know as Ooty) Tamil Nadu, South India.
2. Standard 9 (the previous year) was my most favourite year of secondary school (no public exams), but had many interesting subjects and I loved being in the "senior" school. Standard 10 brought my first public exams, IGCSEs in Maths and RS.
3. My best friend Rachael Delano (nee Schwalbe) and I were as thick as thieves, and we talked up a perpetual storm and drank copious amounts of "proper" sweet chai. She taught me some American Sign Language so we could keep up the conversation in class. We also joined the Inter-school cross-country team together (Why? Why? Why?) and dodged cows, cow dung, more cows and Cheran (Indian public) Buses and got hot, sweaty and covered in mud in the process.
4. The best adventure Rachael and I had was running 22 km from Kalhatty (in the hills) to Quiet Corner (SU camp-site in the plains) through the wilderness. Most of which was in total darkness, as we only started our "incredible" journey at only 4 pm after school. And then when we arrived hot and covered in dust, just 5 minutes ahead of the school bus, we discovered there was no running water. Oh how I love the bucket bath. But we were both ridiculously pleased anyway. Then that night (I have to finish the story now) Rachael managed to explode a bag of crisps all over our room (which she cleaned up immediately) but we were attacked by ants in the middle of the night. They could smell the crisps. A good weekend all round.
5. I spent a holiday in Kerala, at the beach, January 1995 and nearly got swept out to sea by some big waves. That holiday I "re-discovered" my bible, and found really for the first time, God speaking to me personally.
6. My parents started taking care of the youngest dorm at Hebron School (Standard 3-5 boys and girls) and I put them to bed every Thursday night for the next 4 years.
7. Three days before my 15th birthday, I was baptised in my parent's home church in Nottingham.

10 years ago....
1. I was 20 years old and in my second year of medical school, at Aberdeen University.
2. I lived on Sunnyside Road in a room painted bright orange.
3. I was a bible-study group leader and then became book secretary (best best job) for the Christian Union.
4. I planned a summer, doing beach missions, holiday club on Skye and week of evangelism at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.

5 years ago...
1. I was working as a junior doctor at the Gilbert Bain Hospital, Lerwick, Shetland (was that really 5 years ago?).
2. I bought my own flat (started paying a mortgage) that following summer and have lived there ever since.
3. I do not appreciate it's light, airiness, restfulness- and yes-this-is-all-mineness enough! I have 2 bedrooms, bathroom, hallway, living room and duck-egg kitchen. (Must say thank you to God for this more often.)
4. I was interviewed for and accepted on to the General Practice (Family practice) rotation for August 2006.
5. I slowely collected pieces of furniture from the Candle Close gallery, The Pier and British Heart Foundation Charity Shop and bought another book shelf, and another and another...There still is not enough.
6. I started making friends with my "up-stairs" neighbours, a Muslim family from Algeria and South Africa.

1 Year ago...

1. I was working as a part-time GP registrar at Great Western Medical Practice.
2. I learnt so much more about Conservative politics in the run-up to the General Election in May. I read biographies and commentaries. I even emailed David Cameron with a comment- and recieved a reply from his PA. And I cast my vote.
3. I had 2 American flat-mates briefly.
4. I went to Keswick, listened to Don Carson and celebrated my 30 birthday with a Barbeque.

Yesterday...
1. I put my car in for it's MOT and it passed.
2. I did my first Research session at the Academic Department of Primary Care where I want to work next year.
3. The sun shone in the most warm way probably since last August!

Today..

1. I have washing, cleaning, and general tidying to do.
2. I will drink lots of tea.
3. I will relax and watch more Gilmore Girls on DVD.
4. I will read a book.
5. I will read my Bible.

Tomorrow

1. I will go to church and enjoy the morning service as don't have to teach Sunday School.
2. I will buy a present for my sister-in-law.
3. I will do some e-portfolio upkeep for my job.

In 5 years...
"Because He lives I can face tomorrow,
Because He lives all fear is gone,
Because I know, I know, he holds the future,
And life is worth the living just because He lives..."

1. I will be 35- quite a thought.
2. I would love to be married but Trusting God is the important thing with that one!
3. I want to be closer to, love and know Jesus Christ better.

Big lessons from the last 15 years...
1. God takes care of me. Writing all this down has reminded me of that.
2. I am loved, forgiven, held and He won't let me go. His grace is wider and deeper and higher than my greatest sin.
3. The hardest things to trust God with at my present stage of life (wanting to be married) are things that make me depend on him more.
4. I have much to be thankful for and I need to remember to say "thank- you" to God everyday.

Saturdays

2011-02-05T07:08:00.000-08:00

Come, rest awhile

Come, rest awhile, and let us idly stray
In glimmering valleys, cool and far away.

Come from the greedy mart, the troubled street,
And listen to the music, faint and sweet,

That echoes ever to a listening ear,
Unheard by those who will not pause to hear

The wayward chimes of memory's pensive bells,
Wind-blown o'er misty hills and curtained dells.

One step aside and dewy buds unclose
The sweetness of the violet and the rose;

Song and romance still linger in the green,
Emblossomed ways by you so seldom seen,

And near at hand, would you but see them, lie
All lovely things beloved in days gone by.

You have forgotten what it is to smile
In your too busy lifecome, rest awhile.

Lucy Maud Montgomery

My flat is quiet- not as tidy as it could be, laminated floors winter cold. I think about putting the heating on (off it's timer)- but go for the dressing gown over everything else.

I savour the peace, make tea, peanut butter and white bread.

Household tasks to be done, laundry, lounge to tidy- things to do later, but first I read Day 1 of Gentle Rain on Tender Grass (readings from the Pentatuech) by Sharon James. Genesis ch 1 verses 1-25.

"But ask the beasts and they will teach you;
the birds of the heavens, and they will tell you;
or the bushes of the earth, and they will teach you;
and the fish of the sea will declare to you.
Who amoung all these does not know
that the hand of the Lord has done this?
In his hand is the life of every living thing." Job 12:7-10

Writing in the new notebook (never did a girl have so many notebooks), diagrams to remember the days of creation, and a prayer.

I make some lunch, DVD playing and I start sorting out study materials for my exam. Reading to do later.

White curtains hang in the lounge, light filtering through, the winter sky faded from cool blue to cloudy white.

And so I rest and take stock and say thank you for the blessings.

CS Lewis from "Learning In Wartime" in "The Weight of Glory".

2010-11-11T10:35:00.000-08:00

"The war creates no absolutely new situation: it simply aggravates the permanent human situation so that we can no longer ignore it. Human life has always been lived on the edge of a precipice. Human culture has always had to exist under the shadow of something infinitely more important than itself. If men had postponed the search for knowledge and beauty until they were secure, the search would have never begun. We are mistaken when we compare war to "normal life." Life has never been normal. Even those periods we think most tranquil, like the nineteenth century, turn out on closer inspection, to be full of crises, alarms, difficulties, emergencies. Plausible reasons have never been lacking for putting off all merely cultural activities until some imminent danger has been averted or some crying injustice put right. But humanity long ago chose to neglect those plausible reasons. They propound theorems in beleagured cities, conduct metaphysical arguments in condemned cells, make jokes on scaffolds, discuss poetry while advancing on the walls of Quebec, and comb their hair at Thermopylae. This is not panache; it is our nature."

"It is only our daily bread that we are encouraged to ask for. The present is the only time in which any duty can be done or any grace received."

"What does war do to death? It certainly does not make it more frequent: 100 percent of us die and the percentage cannot be increased. Yet war does do something to death. It forces us to remember it. The only reason that cancer at sixty or paralysis at 75 do not bother us is that we forget them.All schemes of happiness centered in this world were always doomed to final frustration. In ordinary times only a wise man can realize it. Now the stupidest of us knows it."

CS Lewis. The Weight of Glory.

The MRCGP week.

2010-11-04T17:50:00.000-07:00

I am writing for the YLCF's peek into your week.

I have just sat my (part one) exam of my MRCGP, which is my post-graduate qualification in General Practice (Family Practice) with results due in 2 weeks time so I am in post-exam mode meaning that other things can become important again!

So my "schedule" has adjusted this week to account for this. I work part time on a General Practice training scheme, Tuesdays, Wednesday morning and Thursdays. So I will write about this past week because that is becoming the new normal.

Monday

I had a few appointments to keep but was up and reading my bible around nine am. I tend to take extended periods on my non working days to read my bible and pray. This is not due to some great amount of discipline on my part but because of my own need of it. At the moment I reading through Isaiah, Luke and 1 Samuel. Especially at the moment I am struck by passages in Isaiah that demonstrate God's sovereignty and control of our lives.
Mid-morning I drive to the doctor's surgery where I use to work and pick up a dictaphone ordered for me by the practice manager. I sit and chat with the doctors during their coffee break. Back home I quickly eat some lunch and walk into town for my hairdressing appointment. I managed to leave my purse at home so have to run home to pick it up, go back to the hairdresser to pay the bill. On the way home through the park, rain is sprinkling, scattered clouds against the cool blue and red and orange leaves falling from the trees.
I meet a lady from church going to pick up her grandson from school and we talk, wind tugging at the trees. I fly back into town pay my bill and meet with the Church minister for a coffee.
Back home I eat, my dinner and start thinking through work the next day.

Tuesday

I am doing the unscheduled care clinic in the morning, lots of variety and last-minuteness and then have an afternoon discussing different issues with the pharmacist. I need creams and gloves from Body Shop due to my hand ezcema flaring up so rush to the shops in the late afternoon for this.

Wednesday

I go to GP Registrar teaching, small groups of doctors meeting to discuss cases and different educational topics. In the afternoon, I need to do various jobs including going to the bank and decide to watch the Social Network at the cinema. After the film, I sit in the theatre cafe and start writing an article for the church magazine which I need to submit at the end of November. Then I go to the church bible study which is looking at King Jehoshaphat in 2 Chronicles 20.

Thursday

Today I am duty doctor so at work early, dealing with house calls in the morning, telephoning advice and last minute appointments in the afternoon. In the evening, I take things easy, unwinding from quite a stressful day.

Friday

Today I meet a friend who has finished night shift at the children's hospital for breakfast at a cafe- pancakes, bacon and maple syrup and tea or coffee and lots of conversation. Then I buy some mint tea bags from a special coffee shop that I want to give to a Lebanese friend as a gift and grab another quick cup of tea and finish my book in a different cafe. I text my Lebanese friend to arrange meeting up and my arabic lesson. This afternoon I have practiced the piano, and have various admin and computer work to do.

Saturday and Sunday

Neither of these days have arrived yet but I have a meal to look forward to at an Italian restaurant with a friend on Saturday night before the prayer meeting along with more computer work and housework. Sunday will be playing in the church music group, relaxing in the afternoon and then the evening service.

I have been challenged of late to regard my singleness as an opportunity to be flexible, to have a wide circle of friends and interests, to show hospitality and to read and the study the bible in a more focussed way. I have at times been full of self-pity and so wasted time that I could of used better and forming a more disciplined schedule for Monday and Friday especially is part of this. There are a few things I wish to focus on :-

Keeping "home" in my flat and so finding it easier to be generous with hospitality.
More focussed bible study
Giving a "whole heart and mind" at work and so being a good witness and showing care to those who need it.
Arabic language study

Those are my big projects and so I need to break down my days to see those through.

"Be very careful, then, how you live - not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil."
Ephesians ch 5 vs 16-17 (NIV)

What makes us write.

2010-08-13T15:11:00.000-07:00

Writing is like an excitement and bubbling up of ideas that are crying out to be there on the page, where images spring to life in the reader's mind and descriptions and concepts make the mind soar.

Good writing feeds the mind, so that the heart is stirred.
Reading of books conversely fill us up with what can then be expressed well, so that the mind is strengthened and it's powers of articulation improved.

I have been reading in Sharon James' Gentle Rain on Tender Grass (readings through the Pentateuch) of God's creativety. We are made in his image so that his creativety is in us, and a meaningful expression of this is the written word.

I have such a mix and variety of thoughts as to how we are at one and the same time, enthused to seek truth and knowledge out (through reading of God's word and good books) but at the same time create our own stories and ink on the page.

Oh, that I might treasure what has been given me and seek it with all my heart.

Nightly journeys- where is this place?

2010-07-15T15:13:00.000-07:00

Out in the deep blowing darkness
Sky finally turned navy blue at eleven pm
With gaps of pale turquoise left as patches
Glimmering in the darkness a star

Twilight at six pm, dusk suddenly imminent
Cicadas making music in the trees
Evening star, venus, pale blue looking down
Dusty warm air cooling down

Long journey in second class three tier
Plunging through the dark night
Lights in the bush, a distant village
Fires burning bright

Taxi ride through rubber plantations
Trees standing tall in straight lines
Climbing into the cool hills, darkness falls
Headlights chasing each other up the road
Night rushing past till journey's end.

Rebekah Dickinson July 2010

Love

2010-06-09T12:40:00.000-07:00

Sonnet 116

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O no! it is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come:
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

William Shakespeare

"Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres."

1 Corinthians 13:4-6

Bitter Things

2010-05-21T09:33:00.000-07:00

Be strong
We are not here to play, to dream, to drift
We have hard work to do and loads to lift
Shun not the struggle; face it
'Tis God's gift.

Phillips Brooks

I thank God for the bitter things;
They've been a friend to grace
They've driven me from the paths of ease
To storm the secret place.

Florence White Willets

William Wilberforce (1759-1833)

2010-05-09T08:03:00.000-07:00

Let us not despair; it is a blessed cause, and success, ere long, will crown our exertions. Already we have gained one victory; we have obtained, for these poor creatures, the recognition of their human nature, which, for a while was most shamefully denied. This is the first fruits of our efforts; let us persevere and our triumph will be complete. Never, never will we desist till we have wiped away this scandal from the Christian name, released ourselves from the load of guilt, under which we at present labour, and extinguished every trace of this bloody traffic, of which our posterity, looking back to the history of these enlightened times, will scarce believe that it has been suffered to exist so long a disgrace and dishonour to this country.

William Wilberforce,speech before the House of Commons, 18 April 1791

Reviews that are worthy of a great review.

2010-05-09T06:00:00.000-07:00

I love old books. I love Little Women, Jane Eyre and Anne of Green Gables. Such books are such a feast of word and thought that you can read again and again and you find such a balm in going back to them. The heroines inspire and amuse and wake up a well of creativety.

I don't know I have come accross a recent contemporary writer with a similar propensity with one notable exception. This writer is not well known and she has not written any published material in the normal sence of someone with such a gift.

Her name is Lanier Ivester and she is a housewife and lives in the state of Georgia. She has not published in the traditional sence but she blogs at http://www.laniersbooks.com/

Read here to find reviews that recommend, and teach just as much as they enthuse on the books themselves.

They are worthy of a review and the author should consider writing and publishing herself, as she has been told before!

Extracts from Psalm 73

2010-05-07T13:19:00.000-07:00

Surely God is good to Israel,
to those who are pure in heart,

But as for me, my foot had almost slipped;
I had nearly lost my foothold,
For I envied the arrogant when I saw the
prosperity of the wicked
....

When my heart was grieved and
my spirit embittered,
I was senseless and ignorant;
I was a brute beast before you
....

Yet I am always with you;
you hold me by my right hand.
You guide me with your counsel,
and afterwards you will take me into glory.
....

Whom have I in heaven but you?
And earth has nothing I desire besides you.
My flesh and my heart may fail,
but God is the strength of my heart
and my portion for ever.
....

Those who are far from you will perish;
you destroy all who are unfaithful to you
....

But as for me it is good to be near God.
I have made the sovereign Lord my refuge;
I will tell of all your deeds.

The Love of God by Frederick M. Lehman

2010-04-27T05:25:00.000-07:00

Could we with ink the ocean fill,
And were the skies of parchment made,
Were every stalk on earth a quill,
And every man a scribe by trade;
To write the love of God above
Would drain the ocean dry;
Nor could the scroll contain the whole,
Though stretched from sky to sky.

The love of God is greater far
Than tongue or pen can ever tell;
It goes beyond the highest star,
And reaches to the lowest hell;The guilty pair, bowed down with care,
God gave His Son to win;
His erring child He reconciled,
And pardoned from his sin.

Refrain

O love of God,
how rich and pure!
How measureless and strong!
It shall forevermore endure
The saints’ and angels’ song.

When years of time shall pass away,
And earthly thrones and kingdoms fall,
When men, who here refuse to pray,
On rocks and hills and mountains call,
God’s love so sure, shall still endure,
All measureless and strong;
Redeeming grace to Adam’s race—The saints’ and angels’ song.

Refrain

Could we with ink the ocean fill,
And were the skies of parchment made,
Were every stalk on earth a quill,
And every man a scribe by trade,
To write the love of God above,
Would drain the ocean dry.
Nor could the scroll contain the whole,
Though stretched from sky to sky.

By Frederick M. Lehman. Written in 1917, and published in Songs That Are Different, Volume 2, 1919, based on the Jewish poem, Haddumut, written in 1050 by Neir Ben Isaac Nehorai.

Mrs Mary Livingstone

2010-04-27T04:08:00.000-07:00

Mary Livingstone

A Poem written for her husband David, after a long separation :-

Do you think I would reproach you with the sorrows that I bore?
Since the sorrow is all over now, I have you here once more.
And there is nothing but the gladness and the love within my heart,
And a hope so sweet and certain that never again we'll part

A hundred thousand welcomes! How my heart is gushing o'er
With the love and joy and wonder just to see your face once more.
How did I live without you all those long long years of woe?
It seems as if it would kill me to be parted from you now.

You'll never part me darling, there is a promise in your eye;
I may tend you while I am living, you will watch me when I die.
And if death but kindly lead me to the blessed home on high,
What a hundred thousand welcomes will await you in the sky!

Mary Livingstone (1821-1862)

Written for the 11th December 1856 after his return from Africa.

(Source : Good Wives? by Margaret Forster pg 57-58 Vintage 2001)

Ode to a Nightingale

2010-04-22T10:30:00.000-07:00

Read at the end of the film Bright Star.

Ode to a Nightingale

MY heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains

My sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk,

Or emptied some dull opiate to the drains

One minute past, and Lethe-wards had sunk:

'Tis not through envy of thy happy lot,

But being too happy in thine happiness,

That thou, light-wingèd Dryad of the trees,

In some melodious plot

Of beechen green, and shadows numberless,

Singest of summer in full-throated ease.

O for a draught of vintage! that hath been

Cool'd a long age in the deep-delvèd earth,

Tasting of Flora and the country-green,

Dance, and Provençal song, and sunburnt mirth!

O for a beaker full of the warm South!

Full of the true, the blushful Hippocrene,

With beaded bubbles winking at the brim,

And purple-stainèd mouth;

That I might drink, and leave the world unseen,

And with thee fade away into the forest dim:

Fade far away, dissolve, and quite forget

What thou among the leaves hast never known,

The weariness, the fever, and the fret

Here, where men sit and hear each other groan;

Where palsy shakes a few, sad, last grey hairs,

Where youth grows pale, and spectre-thin, and dies;

Where but to think is to be full of sorrow

And leaden-eyed despairs;

Where beauty cannot keep her lustrous eyes,

Or new Love pine at them beyond to-morrow.

Away! away! for I will fly to thee,

Not charioted by Bacchus and his pards,

But on the viewless wings of Poesy,

Though the dull brain perplexes and retards:

Already with thee! tender is the night,

And haply the Queen-Moon is on her throne,

Cluster'd around by all her starry Fays

But here there is no light,

Save what from heaven is with the breezes blown

Through verdurous glooms and winding mossy ways.

I cannot see what flowers are at my feet,

Nor what soft incense hangs upon the boughs,

But, in embalmèd darkness, guess each sweet

Wherewith the seasonable month endows

The grass, the thicket, and the fruit-tree wild;

White hawthorn, and the pastoral eglantine;

Fast-fading violets cover'd up in leaves;

And mid-May's eldest child,

The coming musk-rose, full of dewy wine,

The murmurous haunt of flies on summer eves.

Darkling I listen; and, for many a time

I have been half in love with easeful Death,

Call'd him soft names in many a musèd rhyme,

To take into the air my quiet breath;

Now more than ever seems it rich to die,

To cease upon the midnight with no pain,

While thou art pouring forth thy soul abroad

In such an ecstasy!

Still wouldst thou sing, and I have ears in vain—

To thy high requiem become a sod.

Thou wast not born for death, immortal Bird!

No hungry generations tread thee down;

The voice I hear this passing night was heard

In ancient days by emperor and clown:

Perhaps the self-same song that found a path

Through the sad heart of Ruth, when, sick for home,

She stood in tears amid the alien corn;

The same that ofttimes hath

Charm'd magic casements, opening on the foam

Of perilous seas, in faery lands forlorn.

Forlorn! the very word is like a bell

To toll me back from thee to my sole self!

Adieu! the fancy cannot cheat so well

As she is famed to do, deceiving elf.

Adieu! adieu! thy plaintive anthem fades

Past the near meadows, over the still stream,

Up the hill-side; and now 'tis buried deep

In the next valley-glades:

Was it a vision, or a waking dream?

Fled is that music:—do I wake or sleep?

John Keats

Mending up holes and learning lessons.

2010-03-26T05:07:00.000-07:00

"I must put down a dear little story told me by my friend this morning. Her small niece, aged somewhere between three and four, was heard telling the parable of the lost sheep to a cousin a year or two older. The finale was, "So the Shepherd put back the lamb into the fold, and then he mended up the hole where it had got out."
All of sanctification as well as salvation lay in the wisdom of those child-lips" (Ezekiel 34:15-16)

"Oh the desert is lovely in it's restfulness. The great brooding stillness over and through everything is so full of God. One does not wonder that He used to take His people in to the wilderness to teach them." (Mark 6:31)

Lilias Trotter from "A Blossom in the Desert"

Thomas Brooks and the right focus.

2010-03-16T15:50:00.000-07:00

Focussing on the Right Thing:-

"The first device that Satan has to keep souls in a sad, doubting, and questioning condition, and so making their life a hell, is by causing them to be still poring and musing upon sin, to mind their sins more than their Savior; yes, so to mind their sins as to forget, yes, to neglect their Savior, that, as the Psalmist speaks, 'The Lord is not in all their thoughts' (Psalm 10:4). Their eyes are so fixed upon their disease, that they cannot see the remedy, though it be near; and they do so muse upon their debts, that they have neither mind nor heart to think of their Surety. A Christian should wear Christ in his bosom as a flower of delight, for he is a whole paradise of delight. He who minds not Christ more than his sin, can never be thankful and fruitful as he should."
- Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices

Grace on the Horizon

2009-12-10T14:46:00.000-08:00

"Only when we turn away from looking at our sin to look at the face of God, to find his pardoning grace, do we begin to repent. Only by seeing that there is grace and forgiveness with him would we ever dare to repent and thus return to the fellowship and presence of the Father...Only when grace appears on the horizon offering forgiveness will the sunshine of the love of God melt our hearts and draw us back to him."

Sinclair Ferguson

"No sin can crucified in either heart or life unless it is first pardoned in conscience, because there will be a want of faith to recieve the strength of Jesus, by whom it alone can be crucified. If it be not mortified in it's guilt, it canot be subdued in it's power."

William Romaine

"We're changed when we look at Jesus, delight in Jesus, commune with Jesus." Tim Chester

Quotes from You Can Change by Tim Chester published by IVP 2008 page 56

CS Lewis on Temptation

2009-11-13T09:19:00.000-08:00

“I know all about the despair of overcoming chronic temptations. It is not serious, provided self-offended petulance, annoyance at breaking records, impatience, etc. don’t get the upper hand. No amount of falls will really undo us if we keep on picking ourselves up each time. We shall of course be very muddy and tattered children by the time we reach home. But the bathrooms are all ready, the towels put out, and the clean clothes in the airing cupboard. The only fatal thing is to lose one’s temper and give it up. It is when we notice the dirt that God is most present in us: it is the very sign of His presence.”

CS Lewis, Letters

A day in the life of a GP registrar in Scotland.

2009-10-29T03:31:00.000-07:00

Written for the YLCF "A day in the life of..." Carnival (http://www.ylcf.org/)
I have just got back from a 2 week holiday in India, so still in that strange state of having passed between 2 worlds. The journey took 30 hours from door to door with not enough sleep so passed 12 hours on Saturday night in deep slumber and slept very well on the Sunday night too. Today as yesterday the sun is shinning, and it is a beautiful autumn day with some trees already bare but others covered in glorious reds, oranges and browns.

But Monday morning sadly, it is grey, but not raining, with that coolness in the air, that is so very refreshing after the hot stickiness of South India (but I still miss it!).
I wake up at 7:15 am, wash my hair, get dressed, dry my hair, eat some breakfast, make sandwiches, put on a necklace and earrings and head out the door just after 8 am. I have a little second hand green Corsa with a lovely dent in the side and it makes all manner of funny noises but it gets me to work and it start thankfully despite the previous 2 weeks of non-use.

I listen to the Today programme as I drive, some politician being ruthlessly interviewed. Arriving, at work I have forgotten my password for the computer so phone the help desk and my first patient is seen 10 minutes late but I catch up. The morning is full of variety as it always is, different faces and problems, prescriptions and health advice leaflets, compromising and advising. I finish my surgery/clinic at 10:30 on the dot but not all the paper and computer work, but make a cup of tea before embarking on my dictation and case notes. I miss the doctor's coffee break partly because there is so much to do but so does everyone else as far as I can see. I am doing visits with my GP trainer, and so we jump in her car head first to the house of a 99 year old and then to a Nursing Home to see five of the residents. We discuss my holiday in India, and then on the way to the Nursing Home, a book based on the diary of a lady who was born in 1900 and died at the age of nearly 100 and all the changes she would of seen. The Filipina Nurse at the Home is full of the cold, but she directs us here and there and all is done by about 1:30 pm but we are still late for the doctors meeting arriving at 1:45 for the last 15 minutes. I eat my peanut butter and marmalade sandwiches and drink tea as talk shifts around the table.

I then have an hour to do more paperwork before a tutorial at 3 pm. I make a list of issues and questions I have, but before starting make more tea for us both. Later we set up a video camera that I will use later in the week for a video surgery. I dash out of the surgery leaving some things to be sorted the next day, as I drive to a friend's house prior for dinner to a missionary ( OMF) prayer meeting. The speaker works for OMF in Singapore advising parents and families in regard to home-schooling. The hostess and my other friend are both teachers so discussion focuses around this and other OMF chit-chat. We eat spaghetti bolognaise and a fruit flan and then Linda and I do the washing up and Sheila (the prayer group leader) and Moira (the speaker) set up in the living room. Everyone starts arriving, different voices mingling including that of Quest, Meryl's faithful guide dog.

Moira speaks in 20 minute sections, rewarding us with a prize for a question in each section, but they are all rather obscure. However I manage to win a batik cloth with Emmanuel in Chinese and English for pointing out Swine Flu to be the likely cause of a Giant Teddy Bear with a mask sitting on the pavement of Orchard Road, Singapore. Health Promotion Exercises in a country understandably frightened after SARS. And we pray for missionary kids and how they can be educated in the situations where their parents work.
I drive home as everyone starts to drink yet more tea as am still tired and jet lagged. I shower, watch some Spooks (a BBC drama about MI5)and then fall into bed with a John Simpson (BBC journalist) book but so tired read only a few pages and then fall quickly asleep.

Inspired by CS Lewis and Esther Bhasme

2009-09-17T16:01:00.000-07:00

I am the product of ...

humid hot weather
inventing of imaginary places
far too many notebooks
mango and sticky rice
inky fountain pens
musty libraries and
the smell of rain on hot concrete

Rebekah Dickinson 18 September 2009

A product of endless books

2009-09-17T15:31:00.000-07:00

"I am a product of long corridors, empty sunlit rooms, upstairs indoor silences, attics explored in solitude, distant noises of gurgling cisterns and pipes, and the noise of wind under the tiles. Also, of endless books." -C.S. Lewis

Ruth Myers

2009-08-31T13:18:00.000-07:00

When I was at University, a friend gave me a copy of a prayer from Ruth Myer’s 31 Days of Praise. I have often come back to this over the years.
“I’m so grateful that the Christian life is not a rigorous self-improvement course or a do-it-yourself kit...that it is not a call to prove myself or improve myself by overcoming my own shortcomings and failures, in my own way, by my own resources. Thank You that, instead, You are at work in me and in my situation to break old patterns of thought and action, to create within me both the desire and the power to do your gracious will...and to make me a joy to You in new ways.
I praise You that “Jesus Christ is able to untangle all the snarls in my souls, to banish all my complexes, and to transform even my fixed habit patterns, no matter how deeply they are etched into my subconscious” (Corrie Ten Boom).Thank You for the many ways You use other people to counsel me and help me grow..and yet that Christ Himself is the Answer to my hangups, the one Source who can meet my deepest needs. How I rejoice that He is wonderful in counsel and mighty in power, and that He heals from the inside out. Thank You, too, for the Holy Spirit-the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and strength. I praise You that He is in me to enlighten me through Your Word, to flush away my anxieties and fears, my resentement and hostilities, my guilt and regrets, as water flushes away dirt and trash..to keep me filled with Himself and to flood my heart with Your love..to produce through me that fruit of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control..and to enable me to give thanks for all things as the hours and days and weeks pass. I rejoice that You are able and do far more than all I ask or think, according to Your power that is at work within me-the same power that raised Jesus from the dead!” Ruth Myers 31 Days of Praise Page 74-75

Blotted out.

2009-04-19T07:07:00.000-07:00

This was on Facebook daily bread and a great and timely reminder.
The Best Eraser
READ: Luke 16:19-31
“ I have blotted out, like a thick cloud, your transgressions. —Isaiah 44:22 ”
What is memory? What is this faculty that enables us to recall past feelings, sights, sounds, and experiences? By what process are events recorded, stored, and preserved in our brain to be brought back again and again? Much is still mystery.

We do know that memories can be blessings—full of comfort, assurance, and joy. Old age can be happy and satisfying if we have stored up memories of purity, faith, fellowship, and love. If a saint looks back on a life of Christian service and remembers the faithfulness of Him who promised: “I will never leave you nor forsake you” (Heb. 13:5), his or her sunset years can be the sweetest of all.

But memory can also be a curse and a tormentor. Many people as they approach the end of life would give all they possess to erase from their minds the past sins that haunt them. What can a person do who is plagued by such remembrances? Just one thing. He can take them to the One who is able to forgive them and blot them out forever. He’s the One who said, “Their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more” (Heb. 10:17).

You may not be able to forget your past. But the Lord offers to blot out, “like a thick cloud, your transgressions” (Isa. 44:22). — M.R. De Haan

The deep remorse that’s in the soul
No human eye may trace;
But Jesus sees the broken heart,
And can its woes erase. —Bosch

The best eraser is honest confession to God.

Ahl al-Kitāb Book Club

2009-02-03T11:24:00.000-08:00

This is currently just a germ if an idea, but watch this space for further developments and watch out for more writing on new blog www.ahlal-kitabbookclub.blogspot.com (Ahl al-Kitāb means People of the Book in arabic).

If you don't have this book then sell your coat to buy it!

2009-02-02T15:35:00.000-08:00

"What matters supremely, therefore, is not, in the last analysis, the fact that I know God, but the larger fact which underlies it- the fact that he knows me. I am graven on the palms of his hands. I am never out of his mind. All my knowledge of him depends on his sustained initiative in knowing me. I know him, because he first knew me, and continues to know me.

He knows me as a friend, one who loves me; and there is no moment when his eye is off me, or his attention distracted from me, and no moment therefore, when his care falters.

This is momentous knowledge. There is unspeakable comfort-the sort of comfort that energises, be is said, not enervates-in knowing God is constantly taking knowledge of me in love, and watching over me for my good.There is tremendous relief in knowing that his love to me is utterly realistic, based at every point in prior knowledge of the worst about me, so that no discovery now can disillusion me about him, in the way I am so often disillusioned about myself and quench his determination to bless me.

There is, certainly great cause for humility in the thought that he sees all the twisted things about me that my fellow humans do not see (and am I glad!), and he sees more corruption in me than that which I see in myself (which, in all conscience, is enough). There is, however, equally great incentive to worship and love God in the thought that, for some unfathomable reason, he wants me as his friend, and desires to be my friend, and has given his Son to die for me in order to realise this purpose..."

Knowing God Ch 3 pg 45-46 J.I.Packer

Why I love Bookshops

2009-02-02T10:10:00.000-08:00

"It is the most friendly vocation in the world,” he announced…“A bookseller is the link between mind and mind, the feeder of the hungry, very often the binder up of wounds. There he sits, your bookseller, surrounded by a thousand minds all done up neatly in cardboard cases; beautiful minds, courageous minds, strong minds, wise minds, all sorts of conditions. And there come into him other minds, hungry for beauty, for knowledge, for truth, for love, and to the best of his ability he satisfies them all…Yes…it’s a great vocation.”

“Greater than a writer’s?” asked Felicity.

“Immeasurably,” said Grandfather. “A writer has to spin his work out of himself and the effect upon the character is often disastrous. It inflates the ego. Now, your bookseller sinks his ego in the thousand different egos that he introduces one to the other…Yes…Moreover, his life is one of wide horizons. He deals in the stuff of eternity and there’s no death in a bookseller’s shop. Plato and Jane Austen and Keats sit side by side behind his back, Shakespeare is on his right hand and Shelley on his left.” He paused for a moment while Felicity took Pride and Prejudice and Wuthering Heights gently away from him. “Yes. Writers, from what I’ve seen of them, are a very queer lot, but booksellers are the salt of the earth.” "

Elizabeth Goudge

The Homeliness Factor

2009-02-02T09:18:00.000-08:00

There is some literature I love, because of the ordinariness it focuses on, the everyday grittiness, and gentle normality of it's content. When it also is combined with poetic and lyrical language, books like these are a real delight.

The books that I love the most and reread over and over again often fall into this category.
One example of this is A Severe Mercy by Sheldon Vanauken. But I want to write about this another time.

Jane Eyre is the book I was thinking of today. I love the way it begins:

"There was no possibility of going for a walk that day. We had been wandering, indeed, in the leafless shrubbery an hour in the morning; but since dinner (Mrs Reed, when there was no company, dined early) the cold winter wind had brought with it clouds so sombre, and a rain so penetrating, that further out-door exercise was now out of the question.
I was glad of it:I never liked long walks,especially on chilly afternoons:...."

Jane Eyre Ch1 pg1 Charlotte Bronte (1847)

You will have to read it if you want to know what happens next!

"...this amazing day..."

2009-02-01T12:00:00.000-08:00

"i thank You God for most this amazing
day: for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky; and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes

(i who have died am alive again today,
and this is the sun’s birthday; this is the birth
day of life and of love and wings:and of the gay
great happening illimitably earth)

how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any—lifted from the no
of all nothing—human merely being
doubt unimaginable You?

(now the ears of my ears awake and
now the eyes of my eyes are opened)"

e.e. cummings

This is proving to be too much fun.

Reading Plan

2009-02-01T07:54:00.000-08:00

I have read a number of times Luci Swindoll's book, "Wide my world, Narrow my bed". One particular chapter is entitled Academics and she outlines two different goals and reasons for reading and books that might fit into each category.
These are her goals and the suggested list of books for each goal.

"God-A knowledge of His Abilities. Suggested goal from the Bible:
1 Chronicles 28:9
....know the God of your father, and serve him with a whole heart and a willing mind; for the Lord searches all hearts, and understands every intent of the thoughts. If you seek Him, He will let you find Him;.."

"Suggested Reading List
1) The Confessions of St. Augustine
2) Ethics-Dietrich Bonhoeffer
3) Pilgrim's Progress-John Bunyan
4) Mere Christianity-C.S. Lewis
5) Knowing God-J.I. Packer
6) Man's Problems-God's Answers-Dwight Pentecost
7) Robust in faith-Oswald Saunders
8) The God Who is There-Francis Schaeffer
9) True Spirituality-Francis Schaeffer
10) Basic Christianity-John R.W. Stott
11) The Strong and the Weak -Paul Tournier
12) The Knowledge of the Holy-A.W. Tozer

Humanity-A Knowledge of Our Responsibilities

Suggested Goal, from Report to Greco by Nikos Kazantzakis
"Nothing is certain. For that very reason, every individual, has a great responsibility in our amorphous uncertain age, a greater responsibility than every before. It is in such uncertain, possibility filled times that that the contribution of a people and of an individual can have incalculable value.
What, then, is our duty? It is to carefully distinguish the historic moment in which we live and to consciously assign our small energies to a specific battlefield."

Suggested Reading List
1) The Speeches of Winston Churchill
2) Civilisation-Kenneth Clark
3) Crime and Punishment-Fyodor Dostoevsky
4) An American Tragedy-Theodore Dreiser
5) Interpretations of Life-Will and Ariel Durant
6) Markings-Dag Hammarskjold
7) Scarlet Letter-Nathanial Hawthorne
8) Report to Greco-Nikos Kazantzakis
9) Orthello-William Shakespeare
10) Travels with Charley-John Steinbeck
11) Anna Karenina-Leo Tolstoy
12) The Power of Art-John Warbeke"

Wide my World, Narrow my Bed by Luci Swindoll (1960)

So there are the two lists. If you are reading this what would be your goals in reading? And if your goals were similar, what books would be on your list?

Emily Dickinson on Books (not a relative by the way!)

2009-01-31T10:51:00.000-08:00

"He ate and drank the precious words,
His spirit grew robust;
He knew no more that he was poor,
Nor that his frame was dust.
He danced along the dingy days,
And this bequest of wings
Was but a book. What liberty
A loosened spirit brings."

Emily Dickinson, Poems, pg 47 (1948)

Starting out

2009-01-31T10:11:00.000-08:00

I have always admired those who blog and do it well and have resolved to begin myself. As I am such an incurable bookworm, this will be a definite theme. However I love to read books that describe the ordinary and everyday and I hope to write about this as well. One of my favourite passages in the bible is in Luke where he writes that Mary the Mother of Jesus pondered and treasured "all these things" in her heart. I wish to be a ponderer of the things that God shows to me of himself and a treasurer of his good gifts.