Psalm 23 -- look again

First of all, it's been...a minute since I was able to get a post up here...  And that after I thought I'd get all kinds of things up this year and go way over my minimum-one-per-month goal...  Ah well.  Something's going up now!

And this is a bit of a random thought, but bear with me.  So about things we've heard a time or two, and don't really get excited about anymore.

I know it can be dreadfully easy, when something is as familiar as the 23rd Psalm is, for me to blow past it when I come across it or think about it, even if I give it an appreciative nod as it passes.  I'd guess it's the same for you.  An "ah yes, very good and all that. Frightfully deep, I'm sure" just doesn't cut it when it comes to important things.  Like Scripture.

I'd also guess that, like me, you don't want that to be the case.  I don't want to treat any part of the Word of the Lord like just another slogan I see all the time on an ad I can't even remember from somewhere.  But to get my mind past the obvious, past the familiar just because it's not completely new to me, I need to treat it like it is; "living and active".  Sometimes like a code to be cracked.

The primary way I try to listen for new things in a verse or passage, is to read it about three or four times in a row, and usually out loud at least once.  Trying to actively read it with different emphasis on different words and phrases each time. ...Like you might see in one of those random sentences in something about English grammar, where putting the emphasis on each word in turn changes the meaning of the sentence greatly, like:

She told him only that she loved him.

She told him only that...

She told him only that...

She told him only that...

And so on.  But with Scripture, I'm trying to actually spend some time on it; to see what I'm missing by reading it exactly the same way every time.  This is where reading it aloud (or at a whisper to yourself, even) is really impactful.  Because hearing something in your head and hearing it aloud (or a-whisper, if you like) are not at all the same thing.  When you hear it spoken (and really try to be listening and thinking), different things stand out that you hadn't noticed before.  Go figure; there's a reason so many writers read their own work aloud at some point -- to hear with the ear what the eye picks up in an entirely separate way.

Another way that works wonderfully, is memorizing a passage and spending multiple days re-reading, re-saying, and concentrating on the same portion of Scripture to hear new things.  It's like letting the words maradade in your mind for a long time, and then realizing that you've been missing something important and powerful all along.  Like when you drive down that one street you travel all the time, but notice some random detail and spend the rest of the day wondering if it's always been there and you just never took note of it, or if somebody just put it there overnight.

And a third way I try to do this (the one I was getting to with this post), is trying to re-word and expand the passage in my own phrasing, on paper or out loud, while working very hard to not change any intent of the original wording, but just expound on what's written there to help me better soak it in.

 This one isn't easy, and I don't really do it unless I've done one of the other things above at least a few times with the same section.  I'm not at all wanting to re-interpret what's there, and I'm not wanting to push any of what I might want the passage to say into my exposition; I'm just trying to spread out all the details, and take away familiar words and phrasing that my mind is glazing over, and replace them with the same thing in different words, so the weight of the sentences can get to me again.

I've been doing this with Psalm 23 a couple times recently, and wanted to share it in case it can get you thinking.  I was trying to say it differently this time than the previous attempt I made.  See what stands out to you between the two; the actual Scripture, and my prose-version.

Psalm 23  (ESV)

The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. 

 

He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. 

He restores my soul.

He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake.  

Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me. 

 

You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; you anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. 

 

Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the LORD forever.

—Expounded Psalm 23—

  The Lord is my Shepherd, the Keeper of my life — I will not be left wanting for what I need.  He brings me to good, green places where I can lie down safely, He leads me along cool waters to quench my thirst.  He revives my soul within me when I am weary. 

He leads me in the right paths because He cares for me and upholds His promises.  Yes, even when I walk through the valley thick with death on every side, I will fear nothing, for He will be right beside me; with His rod and staff to guide me and protect me, I am comforted in His care. 

He lays out a banquet table before me even there, in the presence of any who would be my enemies. He anoints my head with precious oil to signify His call on my life before their eyes.  My cup pours over its brim with all the blessing He gives. 

I see that surely I will have His goodness and unending mercy rising up behind me every day of my life, and now and forevermore I will dwell safely in the house of the Lord Himself, through into eternity.

What do you use to try to see familiar Scripture or familiar Bible stories in new light?  Did anything jump out at you or slow you down to listen to something more closely?

I hope this is encouraging or helpful in some way -- I know I wish I'd learned these things long before my teen years, so I wouldn't have felt like I didn't know how to do my own personal Bible study until I was well into my twenties.  But I'm thankful to know it now.  And to keep finding new treasures when I'm digging deep into places that might otherwise seem so ordinary to my distracted eyes.

(Pictures and thoughts are my own.  Please do not use without permission.)

Book review — ‘The Nature of A Lady’

  I always love a good mystery...  And this new release, 'The Nature of A Lady' from fantastic Roseanna M. White, is chock FULL of them!  I had no idea when I first heard the synopsis how fascinating and full-of-adventurous-situations this would be!  (...And as a bonus, I mean, just LOOK at that gorgeous cover art!!)  As this is the first in The Secrets of the Isles series, I look forward to seeing what other lovely covers and surprises await in future books.

  What I was expecting was Roseanna’s signature lovely, unhindered, bright writing style, her fully human, varied and interesting characters, her ever-twisting plot, and the skill with which she deftly drops little hints and clues and details that you'll hardly notice until you need them.  And I was not disappointed in the least!  She handles mysterious circumstances with such skill, and I hope this exceptionally layered mystery is the first of many more mystery-heavy novels from Roseanna.  I for one will eat them all up in a moment, right alongside any of her other stellar historical tales.  (...pardon how many times the word 'mystery' came up in that last paragraph... It's truly the best word for the situation!)

  The locations in this one in particular are really vivid and memorable.  It beautifully fits in with the way the islands act almost like their own characters in this story, and adds a wild element that magnified all the strange circumstances and events that pepper throughout the story.  Matched with her always well-established sense of the time in yesteryear when her tale is set, these are some of the biggest reasons I come back to Roseanna time and time again, eager to immerse myself in another place in another era.

  Another thing I love about Roseanna’s books is seeing clearly through the eyes of people who are completely different from myself.  Often, these people are villains or anti-villains, hiding in the shadows, giving the reader an uneasy feeling of what’s impending; you are seeing events from both sides, but often  unsure how close the protagonists are to this hidden danger.  And sometimes, as in ‘Number of Love’, you’re seeing through the eyes of a mathematical genius like Margot, or in this book, a heavily scientific natural mind that thinks in Latin definitions and ways of cataloging like  Libby.  I’m not even partly similar to Libby in...almost any way, but Roseanna makes a clear path into her style of thinking and understanding that is both fascinating and still understandable to any of us who don't think that way.

  Melbenna in this story was another fascinating character; with her stubborn streak, her free-roaming island ways, and her determination to stick with what she’s decided is best and not allow herself to examine uncomfortable things too closely.  Hers and Libby’s growth really parallel each other’s, while being completely unique and seeming opposite at the same time.  It makes for really stand-out interactions and intertwining plotlines.

  All that, backed with an overarching mystery that has more loose ends than...something with a ton of loose ends...!...makes for a compelling constant build of all the things that need to be answered, and left me with several anxious moments where I was certain there just weren’t enough pages to resolve it all!  But as she does so well, Roseanna tied up just what was needed, when it was needed, and not a moment sooner.  And with her usual delivery of a satisfying explanation, but not often in the ways we expect.

   And as a final note, I always appreciate that any romances she writes will be sweet and clean in content, but never without difficulties that differentiate them from simple (and so often glorified) shallow infatuation.  So you can actually be happy for the couple at the end, instead of wishing they’d look just a little past the emotion of a moment.

  With an effort to keep avoiding spoilers, here is where I will just encourage you to pick up ‘The Nature of A Lady’ and embark on a fantastic adventure in the year 1906, of lost people and things, mysterious happenings and findings, rumors of pirates and dangerous treasures seekers-- all on a wild and lovely set of islands just off England’s shores.

(...And you’re gonna want a kitten aftwards, fair warning...)

  A great place to find yourself a copy ------>  The Nature of a Lady -- landing page 

Disclaimer:

  I received a complimentary copy of this title from the publishers, and was not required to leave a positive review.  All views expressed are mine and mine alone. 

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About the Book

The Nature of a Lady

1906 Lady Elizabeth "Libby" Sinclair, with her love of microscopes and nature, isn't favored in society. She flees to the beautiful Isles of Scilly for the summer and stumbles into the dangerous secrets left behind by her holiday cottage's former occupant, also named Elizabeth, who mysteriously vanished.   Oliver Tremayne--gentleman and clergyman--is determined to discover what happened to his sister, and he's happy to accept the help of the girl now living in what should have been Beth's summer cottage . . . especially when he realizes it's the curious young lady he met briefly two years ago, who shares his love of botany and biology. But the hunt for his sister involves far more than nature walks, and he can't quite believe all the secrets Beth had been keeping from him.   As Libby and Oliver work together, they find ancient legends, pirate wrecks, betrayal, and the most mysterious phenomenon of all: love.

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About the Author

Roseanna M. White is a bestselling, Christy Award nominated author who has long claimed that words are the air she breathes. When not writing fiction, she’s homeschooling her two kids, editing, designing book covers, and pretending her house will clean itself. Roseanna is the author of a slew of historical novels that span several continents and thousands of years. Spies and war and mayhem always seem to find their way into her books…to offset her real life, which is blessedly ordinary. You can learn more about her and her stories at www.RoseannaMWhite.com.

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‘The Chosen’ Season 2 begins

   Well wow, ‘The Chosen’ has seriously hit the ground running, releasing several episodes from Season 2 just weeks after wrapping filming in January(!!).  Incredible (and incredibly unheard of) speed!

  I honestly don’t want to say too terribly much, seeing how quick people already are to enormously over-analyze every last little thing in this show...  (which, ahem, they’d never do with another show... so, umm, stop that. :P)  But I thought I’d just highlight a few things I’ve really appreciated/loved/am excited about/etc.

  First off, that Dallas Jenkins and his co-writers haven’t hesitated in giving the audience what we need to see, not just exactly what we expect or think we want.

  #GetUsedToDifferent is exactly right; be prepared to hold your presuppositions loosely, and to reread the Gospels (and all of Scripture) over and over again, as we already should have been doing all along.  Things you would have sworn were one way or were said this or that way, actually weren’t, and incredible things you may not remember, or missed when they were said as an aside to a bigger event, actually WERE there, not even made up for the show.  Beautiful.

  Now yes, it is absolutely ture that things have been expanded, and backstories we don’t get to see in Scripture have been created, but they have been built, as Dallas has stated numerous times, out of what IS plausible, not out of thin air.
  Which is absolutely the best way to retell history: truthfully and honestly retell what IS there, and when adding anything, be sure it’s plausible, consistent, and doesn’t undermine what is actual history, while enriching what we’ve heard before and become jaded to.


  That brings me to a second thing I appreciate more than I know how to say.  Going with what’s consistent and probable and grounded in the grit of history, not keeping everything behind stained-glass and hung up high, out of reach, in the dimly-lit rafters, in an effort to somehow “preserve” what God has done in a way that feels unsoiled and “holy enough” to us.

  Our God is great enough to take care of that for Himself.  And He proved that He is unthreatened by our dirt, in exactly what The Chosen is about; God becoming Man, to “wrap our injured flesh around [Him], breathe our air and walk our dust”, as the familiar Christmas carol says it.  His becoming a Man, a man who got hungry, got tired, had sore muscles and injuries before the Cross ever happened, and living among broken, rough-around-the-edges disciples, from every background and trade, with all kinds of shortcomings and struggles...  None of that was clean, or necessarily seemed holy or great, or would sadly even be “good enough” to belong in most of our churches today.
  It was all very unceremonious.  All very dusty.  All fairly clumsy and ugly for our human sensibilities — but in reality, more beautiful and humble than we can fully grasp.

  This is is where I see really strange reactions to ‘The Chosen’ all over the place from people.  Lots of “Jesus wouldn’t do/say that”, or “you shouldn’t have the disciples act like this or that”, etc. etc.

  Yes, of course if what someone is objecting to goes against what is really in Scripture (not just what they learned from tradition or what they personally like to think), then well and good.  That should be corrected.  But I have yet to see even ONE of these comments that falls into that vein.
  Those objections appear out of people reacting to what doesn’t sit right with their preconceived ideas or understandings, or doesn’t feel “holy enough” for them.  How sad this is!  And what a misunderstanding of holiness.  If we insist on things looking and feeling clean and properly covered in hallowed stained-glass, and out of reach of grimy human hands, we miss out on so much of the shocking grandeur of what our truly Holy and perfect God actually did.  Stooping down to meet us on our level, and pulling us “out of the miry pit” the Psalmest described.  Walking the dirt in the hot sun, because He loves us.


  Well, ‘The Chosen’ is paying close attention to that, and showing clearly the state Jesus finds us in without the rose-colored glasses.

  It’s marvelous, respectful of Scripture, and honest.  And some people are certainly finding it difficult to see, which isn’t directly a bad thing — very like the Pharisees of Jesus’s day.  Some of them just couldn’t stand to think that God would “soil his hands” with the likes of this broken soul or that one.  But some, like Nicodemus, wrestled with what they saw and heard, and believed God was who He said, and then the scales fell off so they could see Him in the flesh.
  I definitely believe ‘The Chosen’ is helping us to see Him like that more clearly.  It’s been interesting to see how few people have ever thought about things like Jesus getting tired in His human body just like we do...but by the reactions from so many on the end of Se.2 Episode 3, it’s clearly a new concept for the majority of Christians, at least in America.  That has been somewhat of a surprise.  Books like John Eldridge’s ‘Beautiful Outlaw’ also speak to this topic beautifully.

  The third thing I’m really loving about ‘The Chosen’ is the fact that in using great storytelling and withholding some information until the last moment, till you actually need to know it, they are actively retraining us as the audience to think for ourselves, to be patient as things unfold, and not to expect things to be handed to us on a silver platter, with the explanation highlighted in red and spelled out for us.  We’ve lost so much critical thinking skill, so much imagination in the last many years; this retraining is so fantastic for entertainment as a whole.

  But it's also important for our understanding of events and people and struggles in Scripture itself.   It’s far too easy at this point to just be frustrated or confused with, or even disparaging of, the people we read about in in the pages of the Bible (or even general world history), because we have so much more finished Scripture than they ever had.  We know how Jesus’s time on earth would play out.  We know the ending and the Resurrection.  The Disciples had no idea.  When Jesus taught, and walked and lived life with them, they had to dig deep and really chew on the things Jesus said; no one had ever (or has ever since) spoken the way He did.
  So we get to experience it at the speed through which the disciples are living it; wondering what on earth Jesus could possibly be up to.  What an incredible perspective, an incredible view to get a peek from.  One of our pastors said the same kind of thing this past Sunday:

“Think about it — you know more about God’s character today

than Abraham ever knew. And yet, he believed God,

and so it was credited to his as righteousness.”

  That really reminds me of this quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson,

‘All that I have seen teaches me to trust the Creator

for all I have not seen.’

  And lastly for now, a brief appreciation gush for Season 2’s Episode 2.

  Oh. my. goodness. me.  I needed this episode, and all the cool water it brought to my soul.  This quickly became my favorite episode, and some of the deepest encouragement I’ve heard...I think ever.  So much happened in this episode.  So much was hilarious, so much was weighty food for thought, and so much was said, unsaid, and shown about trusting God’s heart.  I’m afraid to give anything away by saying too much...but it was my favorite. I needed it. And I’m so thankful for it.

  So wrapping up for now...  If you haven’t yet gotten in ‘The Chosen’ boat, what are you waiting for??  #ComeAndSee  #TheChosenSeason2

'Grant Me Peace'

  It has been one looooong chunk of time since I've shared one of these.  This (very freeform) poem, heavily inspired by Scripture, came out of all the insanity, uncertainty, and anxiety we have all been dealing with this past year.  My heart was heavy and anxiously needing joy when I started it, and much, much more hopeful and...maybe quiet... when I was finishing it.

  As per usual with this for me, I feel like I'll probably do some adjusting and smoothing on it in the future, but I'm just going to share it now as it is.

'Grant Me Peace'

Bree M. M. -- written 12/2/20, 1/3/21, 3/31/21

  Restorer of my soul,

O Lord, grant me peace,

that I may shelter in You.

O Lord, grant me joy,

that I made dance up on the mountains.

  I will not be afraid, though I find

that I am fearful… But I know the One in Whom I have trusted.

  I am anxious—

Hide me under Your wings,

oh my only steadfast Safety!

Grant for me that peace You promise 

to those You love.

  In Your walls, I cannot 

be shaken;

and will never want for hope. 

You are not surprised

or made anxious. 

  You treasure my every moment,

and fill me with Your own Spirit. 

and with life. 

  Be my Fount of every blessing,

O Healer 

of my heart.  You have never 

been far from me, O my Comfort,

the Voice of my song in the night. 

  What shall you fear, O my soul,

walking beside Him

who sees the end from the beginning?

  My trust, my hope

shall be in Him,

who alone is my Deliverer. 

  And He who watches over Israel

-and over me-

neither slumbers, nor sleeps. 

~     ~     ~

The Lord is my light and my salvation-- whom shall I fear?

The Lord is the stronghold of my life-- of whom shall I be afraid?

...Hear my voice when I call, Lord; be merciful to me

and answer me.  My heart says of You, "Seek His face!"

Your face, Lord, I will seek.

Psalm 27:1,7-8

(Poem, picture, and thoughts are my own -- please do not share without permission.)