trainspotting June 30, 2009

In the detail there is the connection, sometimes paper thin like the outside of a returning space shuttle, other moments frozen like the polar ice caps of Mars.

In the connection there is detail. Sometimes in the tumbledown bridges I build to Him and sometimes in the acceleration of life, shade and sunshine that He calls into being.

Amos writes of plumb lines, he writes of His standard. Often regarded as a measure to live our lives by. How can anyone live judged by the vertical precision of an unswerving line? A twisted humanity measured against a linear rule.

Seeking the straight but finding only the coiled and the zig zag. With Him however mercy seems to be greater than gravity. His plumb lines are used after the event not before. His plumb lines make a serpentine structure as straight as an arrow.

Maybe there is more, maybe the compression of life from distortion to gem stone is living, tethered to hope with the gravity of mercy. Am I twine, thread that is taught, learning to be stretched not twisted? My concern is not to BE righteous or holy, my concern to rest, wait for His gravity to settle, trust Him to make me a datum point for today. Trust him to align me for today. Trust Him to give me a linear measure.

Trust Him for the revolution.  An Iranian revolution. Not like the revolution of ‘78 when the clowns came into power, hanging the politicians of the former regime and silencing their opponents by death. Not like in ‘09 where the clowns are in control, silencing their opponents by censorship, imprisonment, torture and death. No, I am talking about the revolution of 2008. This Iranian revolution advances with His love upon my heart.

Life will always shake me well before use.

I know that the contents of my actions and reactions will indicate who I really am. Poured out, I will either give life or diminish it. Nothing I say or write will ever matter unless it penetrates my life and deeds. Jonah said the right things until life revealed a blackness in his heart.  He was unwilling to acknowledge the fear, hatred and desire for popularity that consumed him.

I must not forget, where I have come from and where I am going. A circular journey. From Him to Him via life. My compression from distortion to gem stone. I must not forget to choose this journey every day. Life is fragile. To forget the choice, leads me onto another platform, following another, not Him. Compression halted, rewound. Becoming more twisted, not less.

My train hauls itself out of the station. I stare out of window, my reflection superimposed on the outside world. My destination secured, for today. Tomorrow is another set of choices.

What was an impossible life, has become a possible one.

A new way to love. A new way of being loved.

new way June 29, 2009

Micah writes of Him teaching us how to live. A new place to meet, a new way of being human again. A new way of living, a new way for nations to interact with one another.

The early days of the marriage were difficult, turbulent, Israel didn’t  honour Him. The old ways have been superseded now. The old temple isn’t big enough, the law not re-written but the fulfilment of it shifted from the individual to Him.

The early days of the marriage were unequally yoked. Yet later on  parity was restored, there was equality between Him and us.

What was an impossible life, has become a possible one.

A new way to love. A new way of being loved.

eye doll June 28, 2009

Travelling from one station to another, my suitcase knocks against my knees. Set down at the prodigious information board, I wait. I stare at the flickering display. A breeze drifts in from the south exit, sailing between the islands of commuters. My suitcase address tags dance a tethered dance, just for a few seconds. The labels read; “DO NOT FORGET”, that is my constant, my silent chaperone.

The sound of a million dominoes setting each other off as the widescreen board {click here} changes content. Platform numbers exchanged, destinations erased, then brought back to life again somewhere else.

The overarching criteria is time. Time, yes, the metronome of the stations. Without the accurate adherence to time, by all the networked stations, chaos would ensue. A central station is required to be a lynchpin. A standard. An example in its design, efficiency and timekeeping.

I pick up my case and join the slow moving mass, like a bubble of honey we drip through the barriers and onto the platform, only then thinning out as carriage doors are opened and slammed. Clocks everywhere, reminding me of the time.

I must not forget, where I have come from and where I am going. A circular journey. From Him to Him via life. My compression from distortion to gem stone. I must not forget to choose this journey every day. Life is fragile. To forget the choice, leads me onto another platform, following another, not Him. Compression halted, rewound. Becoming more twisted, not less.

My train hauls itself out of the station. I stare out of window, my reflection superimposed on the outside world. My destination secured, for today. Tomorrow is another set of choices.

re:lax June 27, 2009

I used to be able to swing into a mood rather easily. Sulking was an ever present in my life, although I rarely acknowledged this at the time. My silent sulks would demonstrate great petulance, arrogance and an obtuse heart.

My heart is only as strong as its weakest chamber only as bright as its darkest room.

When I read of Jonah being so vexed by a plant, I recall some of the more ridiculous topics that have nettled me or worse still the inconsequential items that birth quarrels.

What strikes me about reading the final chapters of this book is His desire to demonstrate reasoning, hope and understanding to Jonah. His desire to express His heart for humanity.

While I can only summon flip charts and pie charts to illustrate a point, He accelerates life, provides shade and then takes it away.

In the detail there is the connection, sometimes paper thin like the outside of a returning space shuttle, other moments frozen like the polar ice caps of Mars.

In the connection there is detail. Sometimes in the tumbledown bridges I build to Him and sometimes in the acceleration of life, shade and sunshine that He calls into being.

Sofreh, An Indoor Picnic Part Two June 27, 2009

Family Album

I was born in Tehran, on the 19^th Khordad in the year 1349 or 9^th June 1970. My parents owned a fourth floor, three bedroom, apartment on Bahar Street located in central Tehran. Married in the ‘Summer of Love’, theirs was not a love marriage, nor was it ‘arranged’ in the traditional sense. My Father caught sight of my mother on a beach by the Caspian Sea; he then instinctively pursued her – parents. The marriage had considerable opposition. My fathers’ parents wanted their Muslim son to enter an alliance with a Muslim girl that they would cherry pick, preferably from a wealthy family. They struggled with my mother being raised in a Baha’i family. The open promiscuity of the sixties had barely kissed Iran; the thought of a multi-faith marriage was enough for family members to threaten excommunication. In spite of the complications they did consent to the marriage, the higher class status of the my mothers family and the unswerving adamant stance my father was taking on choosing his bride left his parents with little option. My mother had little choice. The following year, they were married. The trademarks of an arranged marriage were evident in deeds if not by name. Consequently parity in their relationship would never be realised. My Mothers’ deep-rooted resentment of being forced into marriage manifested in her a capricious and truculent spirit, which in turn coerced my father into striving for appeasement. He was not what he had promised to be. For her part, she assumed authority in the relationship, a control and choice that she had been denied when her parents gave her away. My Father hoped that she would grow to love him and that time would deliver a sense of acquiescence to their marriage. It did not. She did not grow to love him. Shortly after I was born my Mother left home – this was not the life she dreamt of, to be married to someone she didn’t love and to have a child she didn’t want. My father embarked on a life long journey of alcohol and depression. Their relationship was a Hollywood set waiting to be destroyed. In a bid to win her back, my father suggested relocating to Europe, knowing this had been her only caveat of marriage.

Sofreh, An Indoor Picnic Part One June 26, 2009

Polaroids

1979

Arsenal beat Manchester United in the F.A. Cup Final and the late Michael Jackson releases ‘Off The Wall’. The Shah of Iran relinquishes Iranian soil as the Ayatollah Khomeini returns to Tehran after fourteen years of exile. Later that year three-thousand students invade the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, seize ninety hostages and demand that American President, Jimmy Carter, sends back the Shah to stand trial. Ayatollah KhalKhali executes Hoveida, the last Prime Minster to serve under Iranian monarchy. London Underground inaugurates the Jubilee Line. My parents move from one side of a West London suburb to the other. My life will never be the same again. I am 9 years old.

1963

Manchester United beat Leicester City in the F.A. Cup Final and The Beatles release their first album ‘Please Please Me’. John F. Kennedy. is assassinated in Dallas, Texas. In response to the Shah’s ‘White Revolution’, the Ayatollah Khomeini denounces the Iranian leader calling him a “wretched and miserable man”. Khomeini warns the Shah to change his ways, or the day will come when they would force him out of Iran. Khomeini is subsequently exiled. My father is a successful Bank Manager in Tehran. Single and affluent, his life sparkles, like the Caspian Sea before him and it is on these very shores that he catches a glimpse of the woman he will marry. She is barely twelve. I am yet to exist.

1980

John Lennon dies in New York. Terrorists seize the Iranian Embassy in London, taking twenty-six hostages. Khomeini names Banisadr as the new President of Iran. The Iran-Iraq war begins and will last for eight long years. The exiled Shah dies in Cairo. My parents attend my first Open Evening at my junior school. I am ten years old.

2006

Manchester United beat Wigan in the League Cup Final and The Beatles release ‘Love’. President of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, confirms that Iran has successfully produced a few grams of low-grade Enriched Uranium. My father is seventy years old. My Mother’s second husband dies unexpectedly of a heart attack. A whale is discovered in the River Thames. I am detained for over three hours at Phoenix Airport, U.S.A., brutally highlighting that my birthplace is considered within “the Axis of Evil”. I have been given a Special Registrant Number {6745532789}. I am thirty-six years old.

1991

Manchester United beat Barcelona in the European Cup Winners Cup and Nirvana release ‘Nevermind’. The Russian Federation forms a joint research organization with Iran called ‘Persepolis’, which provides Iran with Russian nuclear experts. The Ayatollah Khomeini died two years ago. The hostage, John McCarthy, is freed after being held for five years in Lebanon. My Mother has remarried and lives in Israel. My Father returns home from a trip to Iran and to my surprise, accompanied by a new wife, despite their age, it was an arranged marriage. I commence my Bachelor of Arts degree at Central St. Martin’s College of Art and Design in Central London. I am twenty-one years old.

1978

Iran draw 1:1 with Scotland in the World Cup in Argentina and Paul McCartney spends five weeks at number one with ‘Mull of Kintyre’. The students of the University of Tehran riot in Tabriz and the Iranian Army uses force to silence them. Islamic militants set fire to the Cinema Rex in Abadan killing over four hundred moviegoers. Later that year Iranian troops open fire on rioters in Tehran, 122 dead and four thousand wounded. In December two million Iranians demonstrate against the Shah in Tehran. The British Embassy in Tehran is set on fire. Our summer holiday in Iran comes to an abrupt end as my father is flown to Moorfields Eye Hospital – a cactus needle piercing his cornea. We leave without saying goodbye to family and friends.  I will never return. I am eight years old.

2008

Manchester United win the Premier League and European Cup. Radiohead release ‘In Rainbows.’ Iran receives its first delivery of Enriched Uranium from a Russian contractor. The Iranian nuclear programme is set to continue despite the threat of more U.N. sanctions. Amnesty International: “…a total of 12 people…are currently at risk of being stoned to death in Iran”. This is me. Sorry, who? Who? Who the hell…am I?

I need professional help. I am thirty-eight years old.

fear and hate, shake well, before use June 26, 2009

After Yesterday’s thoughts it seems more than a coincidence that the next piece of literature I read is a book called Jonah.

A popular preacher who was asked one day to preach an unpopular message, to a people group that he didn’t like and whom he was probably afraid of. In effect he quits his job and runs away, in the opposite direction.

If the purpose was purely to deliver a message to Nineveh then God would have chosen Amos or even Hosea by now, both of whom were comfortable in delivering the unpopular. However there is more to Jonah.

Jonah represents a stop sign for me. Like the disciples, Jonah served God, yet when the environment changed it became apparent that he never really knew Him.

God breathes out. Jesus weeps. We collapse. Why do we hurt one another? The pain of realising that the person that hurt you so deeply, never really knew you is a bitter tasting herb.

I do not want to pursue Him with fear and hatred eating my heart. The prodigal son spent some time in the underbelly of life, before he returned broken and contrite. Jonah’s time in the belly of a whale brought him to the place of obedience, although he still harboured a negativity for the people he was ministering too.

I can’t say that I have never run away from Him. I can’t say that I have never been afraid or have had hatred in my heart. I can’t even say that I am always at peace delivering unpopular messages. I can’t say that I have never deeply hurt someone. However, I know that to follow Him is to change. It is to compress from distortion to gem stone, and within this comes the transformation that I desperately seek. Jonah’s heart didn’t need another popular message to be delivered, he needed to deliver an unpopular one. That is where it begins. Wherever there is fear, hatred and confusion. There is no point starting beyond these.

Life will always shake me well before use.

I know that the contents of my actions and reactions will indicate who I really am. Poured out, I will either give life or diminish it. Nothing I say or write will ever matter unless it penetrates my life and deeds. Jonah said the right things until life revealed a blackness in his heart that he was unwilling to acknowledge.

Capable of great hurt, fear and hatred I live in the antithesis today. I choose life every morning when I wake. I choose life for my soul before I choose sustenance for my body. I choose to give life.

An Iranian Revolution June 25, 2009

It’s a little after 4am, I decided to wake earlier than usual this morning. I read a portion from Obadiah and saw the synergy in God calling everyone to think differently. I thought of Iran, I became disturbed by how a country claiming to be so religious can be so oppressive. I read many chapters of the Koran looking for a bridge across to Iran. I found many bridges, none of them brought me any hope.

If anyone attacks you, attack him as he attacked you.

The Cow, Chapter Two, Verse 194. The Koran.

Love your enemies. This is strange no? It’s Different to what feels normal, or what has become accepted as normal. There is something beautifully clear about Christ’s way. It is uncomplicated.

My wardrobe is clear and uncomplicated. I have peace every time I open its doors and see the small selection of clothes that greet me. My life is becoming clear and uncomplicated.

Everyday I can relinquish control of my life or I can snatch it.

I still have a bitter taste of the latter. There is no peace for my heart in following that route. A spiritual land fill. Almost burying my morality and hope, leaving a portion unearthed, soothing my twenty first century conscience.

No more. I choose clarity and simplicity. I choose to live differently. I choose to love my enemies and not go to war with them.

An Iranian revolution. Not like the revolution of ‘78 when the clowns came into power, hanging the politicians of the former regime and silencing their opponents by death. Not like in ‘09 where the clowns are in control, silencing their opponents by censorship, imprisonment, torture and death. No, I am talking about the revolution of 2008. This Iranian revolution advances with His love upon my heart.

Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

1 Corinthians 13, verse six. The Bible.

A line of always June 24, 2009

An instrument used since the time of the ancient Egyptians to ensure constructions were built perfectly upright. A weight, gravity and string. The reference point, the datum. Skyscrapers and Spires built with the measure of ancient instruments, built with plumb lines.

Amos writes of plumb lines, he writes of His standard. Often regarded as a measure to live our lives by. How can anyone live judged by the vertical precision of an unswerving line? A twisted humanity measured against a linear rule.

Seeking the straight but finding only the coiled and the zig zag. With Him however mercy seems to be greater than gravity. His plumb lines are used after the event not before. His plumb lines make a serpentine structure as straight as an arrow.

Maybe there is more, maybe the compression of life from distortion to gem stone is living, tethered to hope with the gravity of mercy. Am I twine, thread that is taught, learning to be stretched not twisted? My concern is not to BE righteous or holy, my concern to rest, wait for His gravity to settle, trust Him to make me a datum point for today. Trust him to align me for today. Trust Him to give me a linear measure.

My only concern is to choose life, breathe Him, rotate, selah, and view this daily coronation in my heart.

trainspotting June 23, 2009

He cannot be affected by human caprices. He cannot be twisted like propaganda or curtailed by the censorship of an agitated regime.

His light: bright like a star over a stable,

illuminating my heart, like an oil lamp held outside a strangers door,

dark like a moment on golgotha’s hill,

faint like dawn in June in our back garden.

He is Secure.

A granite safe house shelters my soul. A place to rest. My spiritual holiday from the world.  A granite safe house protects me when I sleep, when I breathe deeply. A granite safe house where I return daily after compression. Distorting less, shining more. Less twisted more gem like.

A granite safe house, with a stone floor, like the cool floor that mephibosheth dragged his twisted body across, face down, to receive grace.

A granite safe house that Joel writes of in chapter three, one that He has built for me.

The world spits and hisses, strikes and screams. My weather beaten, world beaten soul can withstand it all, because I retreat to a granite safe house, built for me.

I choose to return daily, I choose to remember my safe house when I am away from it. I choose to acknowledge my  spiritual debt and the national spiritual debt. In my safe house, where I am safe.

And what of Him? Nothing can contain Him. Nowhere is hidden. Nothing can separate me from His brand of justice, one that is jam packed so full of mercy that it outweighs my circumstance. To restore is to return.