recommended read

A friend recommended that I read Too Late the Phalarope this past summer, as I praised Paton's better-known novel, Cry, The Beloved Country, which I had just finished.  Too Late the Phalarope is no less lovely.  Both books are set in South Africa around 1950; both treat the black and white of the human soul.  As I see it, Cry focuses a bit more on the tragedies of the historical apartheid, Too Late on the tragedies of apartheid within one's heart. It is a novel that might touch married persons most, but it speaks to anyone who experiences the great battle between the old man and the new, who knows of pride and penance, fear and forgiveness.  Paton's prose is among the most beautiful that I have ever read.  One of my top books - and authors - of all time.

two poems

Well, last week's summary-in-verse may have been a bit of a flop...my husband opened the post and (before reading it) said, "Neat!  A seal?"  So while I might go back sometime and try to make my dove look a little less seal-ish, today I'm going to post my summary of chapter four of Overcoming Sin and Temptation: The Life, Vigor, and Comfort of Our Spiritual Life Depend Much on Our Mortification of Sin.  (Whew!  Don't let the length of the titles deceive you - the chapters in this book are short, comparatively speaking.)  And as for the seal, what's a spouse for but to keep one humble?  ;-)

Two images in this chapter caught my fancy, both are common in Scripture: that of a garden, and that of adoption.  And here is another quote for good measure:  “Thoughts are the great purveyors of the soul to bring in provision to satisfy its affections; and if sin remain unmortified in the heart, they must ever and anon be making provision for the flesh, to fulfill the lusts thereof. They must glaze, adorn, and dress the objects of the flesh, and bring them home to give satisfaction; and this they are able to do, in the service of a defiled imagination, beyond all expression.”

God’s Garden

God bought a garden with His son’s blood,

prepared the soil, and then He sowed

the seeds of His own graces good –

faith, love, and zeal that plot now dress.

And yet within this earth still sprung

weeds that would those plants undone,

lusts soon left the shoots begun

lacking life and vigorousness.

But God does not leave His claim ignored,

Gardener’s tools He does afford:

prayer and fasting, the watered Word,

and weeds pulled out by sin confessed.

So tend the garden of your heart,

be swift to cast the those lusts apart,

make mortification your own art

if you would thrive in holiness.

- Sarah Mowery 

House of Two Fathers

The birth father?

Fathers lusts

and lies,

schemes

and deceives,

beats his own children

without reprieve.

The adoptive Father?

Gives each child

a name that’s new,

a heavenly home

and eternal view.

He lovingly chastens

and bestows

in full measure

the inheritance

to each of His treasures.

And – wonder of wonders! –

His takes every one

and makes them look like Him,

Jehovah-Shalom.

- Sarah Mowery

(Credit: the last two gifts mentioned in this poem were so memorably put by our pastor in a sermon several months ago.)

How do I mortify indwelling sin?

My response to Chapter 3 of Overcoming Sin and Temptation, which is entitled "The Holy Spirit is the Great Sovereign Cause of the Mortification of Indwelling Sin."  One of my favorite quotations from this chapter is this one:  "In a word, they [Roman Catholics - or any of us, by nature!] have sundry means to mortify the natural man, as to the natural life here we lead; none to mortify lust or corruption.  Search their ways and principles to the bottom, and you will find that it had no other root but this mistake, namely, that attempting rigid mortification, they fell upon the natural man instead of the corrupt old man—upon the body wherein we live instead of the body of death."

The Match

My response to Chapter 2 of Overcoming Sin and Temptation by John Owen.  I have always appreciated the metaphors that Paul uses in 1 Corinthians 9:26-27, a text to which Owen refers in this chapter.  I was moved by Owen's assertion that sin, like the grave, is never satisfied:  “Sin aims always at the utmost, every time it rises up to tempt or entice, might it have its own course, it would go out to the utmost sin in that kind.  Every unclean thought or glance would be adultery if it could; every covetous desire would be oppression, every thought of unbelief would be atheism, might it grow to its head.”

The Match

The horseleech has two daughters that are never satisfied:

Like them, the sin within your heart will no way be denied.

Every idle word you say would be a blazing fire,

Every envious glance you cast would murder to acquire.

Every lustful thought you think would crawl into one’s bed,

The hate you hide within your heart would have your neighbor dead.

The clenching of your stubborn jaw would be a bloody coup,

Your thoughtless use of God’s own name would pierce the Savior through.

Your fixation – with this or that – wants you before it prone.

Every “little” sin, at heart, puts you on Yahweh’s throne.

And until your body breathes its last, sin will seek your death.

So you must jab this challenger with every single breath.

Do not beat at empty air if you desire to live –

Aim each blow right at your foe, who’s crying, “Give, give, give!”

- Sarah Mowery

At War

I'm taking author/blogger Tim Challies up on his invitation to "read a Christian classic together." That's a commitment to read one chapter of John Owen's Overcoming Sin and Temptation per week for the next fourteen weeks.  I'm going to try to summarize my notes/reflections from each week in verse.  Here's my response to Chapter 1, which we read last week.

At War

Within each one of God’s elect

A fearsome war doth rage.

There is a side who seeks for God:

The other would that love assuage.

The man who drives this earthly side

Is bloodied, ugly, dead.

For he was crucified with Christ –

Yet he rears his mangled head.

The mightiest weapon this man yields

Is called complacency.

For he conspires to make his foe

Leave off intensity.

The other man is clothed in white –

The garments aren’t his own.

They were bought with the shed blood

Of Him who for sin atoned.

The sword that this man bears

Is a sword that dwells within.

It is the Holy Spirit of God

Who can only conquer sin.

He empowers this new man

To fight his mortal foe;

A brief cessation from the fight

Brings only bitter woe. 

I know the sorrow of this war –

It rages within me.

For fighting to possess my soul

Are Friend and Enemy.

I do not fear the battle’s end:

The outcome is secure.

Yet I know the peace of heavenly life

Only when I endure.

The sin that lives within my heart

I must mortify.

For only as I combat self

Do I God glorify.

- Sarah Mowery