Our visit to Coconut Island ended with a lunch.
Fish, anyone?
About a month ago I started doing my morning Bible readings audibly.
I have read the Bible daily for most of my adult life; some years ago - maybe 20, maybe more - I found a version of "Read through the Bible in a year" programs (in my case, in the MacArthur Bible). The schedule has been very helpful in that it ensures that I read every part of the Bible, just not the ones that I like or prefer (if we are truly honest as Christians, books like Leviticus and Numbers can be tough sledding). And it has ensured that, like it or not, I get "the full Word of God" for over 20 years.
What it does not guarantee, however is that I really pay attention to it.
Part of that is simply a problem with the the way I read: as I quick reader, I tend to scan portions of text rather than fully read them, especially with text that I have read before in the past. It means I can get through things pretty quickly but it also means that I do not always "get" what I am reading.
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Reading the Holy Scriptures is, for some reason that I recall, something of a modern invention. I have no idea why I recall this, but I have a strong memory of reading that at one time Scripture was almost always read out loud and slowly. Part of this, I would suspect, was due to the fact that not everyone read and thus a reader was not just reading for themselves, but for others. Another aspect may have been the language itself: there is a suggestion that texts in Old English, for example, almost had to be read slowly given the structure of the language itself.
It was so unusual that Augustine of Hippo commented that Ambrose of Milan, his teacher and mentor, read the Scriptures silently.
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I am not sure why I decided to try this particular exercise. Maybe it was created by the readings I have done over the previous months on the Orthodox church by Kallistos Ware and Frederica Mathewes-Green. Maybe it was thinking of the monasteries we visited in Greece, where the reading of Scripture at meal times can be a practice.
Maybe I was just bored. No matter how it started, I started reading out loud.
By "out loud" I do not necessarily mean declaiming at the top of my lungs; that is both noisy in the early morning and can be distracting if anyone is about. It can be in an audible voice or even a whisper. But it is at some level audible, and it reading every word.
What a difference it has made.
It might not have been the best place in Scripture to start of course: I was in the latter half of Isiah and am now in Jeremiah and have now spent weeks re-reading about the judgement of God on Israel and Jerusalem. I guess one could say the "palate cleanser" are the epistles of Paul, but even in those there exist warnings that might escape the eye that reads more quickly.
What do I find? The words sink in more deeply. It becomes more of a narrative, rather than something I breeze through in short order. And gives me something to think about after I am finished.
Does it take a little longer in the morning? Certainly - and I have had to make cuts in other morning activities to make it work. But are the results worth it. Absolutely.
Once again, the ancients knew something that we have forgotten: reading out loud makes a world of difference.
One thing I find myself challenged by more and more every year is simply how the world is.
I have written at a little length on the concept that we are living in The Age Of Rage, where so many seem so angry so often. More astute writers than I have noted the fact that we have moved beyond the world of living together in disagreement into the world of purity of belief (or else). This infects almost every corner of our society now, on every side.
Those who are hurt, hurt others - by words (hopefully) or by other means (hopefully much less often) because this is the only way they know to react.
All of us are a recipient of this: We have all been hurt. For me at least, I can both confidently and shamefully say I have hurt in turn. I would like to believe me doing so is unconscious or by accident, but I have to be just as honest to say that it is sometimes by choice.
The challenge - for me, more and more - is to react in the same way that I have been acted on.
Have I faced significant issues like physical abuse or other worse things? No. Have I suffered the words of anger and slights of presence and even passive aggression of those who have no thought about such things? I have.
The concepts of "Break the Chain" or "Break the Cycle" are what some use here, and maybe those words work for some. Not quite for me: like a lot of things, those concepts are used to for specific items which serve other purposes and not on a more general level: We can and should "Break the Cycle" of any number of things. Suggesting someone "Break the Cycle" of unkindness would likely leave some sputtering and suggesting we do not take serious things seriously.
But all such things are serious.
At least for me, I simply need to stop allowing myself to treat others the way I have been treated at times by others (saying "The World" removes responsibility: people treat us wrongly or poorly, not animals, plants, or the elements).
Perhaps, if I think about it, it is not so much "Breaking the Cycle" as it is diffusing it, allowing it to pass through us and cleansed like sand and charcoal filtering water, removing impurities and only allowing clean water to pass through.
When I choose to practice kindness - when I choose the give other than what I have gotten - I demonstrate that there is a better way, that we are not solely driven by how others treat us. It may not change them of course, but perhaps it is not fully about them. In the end we stand by ourselves before God, not with others.
Filter the water of human indifference, rage, and ignorance. Practice kindness.
Bonsai. I have never seen them shed leaves - or grow berries!
One of the tenets of my martial art - and, I suppose, most traditional martial arts - is the concept of practicing and passing the art down as taught.
Over time in training (over 17 years for me now), one picks up slight habits and quirks, ways of doing the techniques which are not the technique as it is demonstrated by the soke, the ultimate arbitrator of the style. They can be incredibly subtle things - for me recently, how I have my body weight balanced, the resetting of my hand as I perform preparation for chiburi and noto ("blood throw" and sheathing), how I grasp my blade and do not hold it down at a 90 degree angle. But over time, these things cause me to veer from kihon (the true form).
Over time - as my soke and my sensei have pointed out in the past (and as recently as last week) - one continues to veer from the path and develops one's own style, not the style that one is training in.
The point is that the martial art is not the possession of the student. It is not something to be adapted per se (although it can be for physical issues) or made unique or individualized. It is to be practiced and in turn handed down by us to the next generation as it was given to us.
"Empty yourself" was the counsel I was given. "Remove you from the equation and practice the art."
I was walking the morning after when I realized the same was true about my Christian walk.
Christianity, at its core, is a long walk of us giving up ourselves - our sinful, flawed selves - for that of God. Through our relationship with the living Christ, we are (in theory if not practice) supposed to "empty ourselves" of everything that is not of God and allow Him to fill us with Himself (which - perhaps differently from my martial art - will manifest itself in unique ways).
What this requires, of course, is us saying "No" to ourselves and "Yes" to Christ. Which sounds incredibly easy in concept, but is very difficult in practice?
Why difficult? Correcting a hand grip or a stance can be done with time and practice and involves no great sense of personal loss in correcting the behavior. But letting go of anger or pride or lust or possessiveness, especially when they seem justifiable? It can feel like we are totally destroying ourselves with no guarantee of success or succor.
But ultimately, that is what Christ and God are asking. I am sure if I had the courage to ask, the answer I would hear would be the same: "It is not your salvation or even your religion, but Mine. Preserve it as it is passed on to you, understanding I may allow great latitude - or none at all. Either way, Come and Follow Me.
Emptying myself of my bad habits for the sake of my style seems doable; emptying myself for the sake of The Kingdom seems endlessly challenging.
Another local activity we got to participate in was a sampan ride.
A sampan is a simple, flat bottom boat that once upon a time was ubiquitous in Asia and is still used in rural southeast Asia. They can be as large as what we in the West would consider a "boat", or small. In this case, it was enough to hold four passengers and our pilot/rower.
In a moment of delight, I was allowed to sit up front. The experience was magical: the quiet of the island, the almost lack of human noise except for the moving of the water. This may have been one of my best experiences on the trip.
