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LECTIONARY

LECTIONARY
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Showing posts with label Gardening. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Gardening. Show all posts

Wednesday, March 06, 2013

Seasons - of life, of body, of soul, of spirit.

Amplify


How important are the Seasons and how important it is to be aware of them.  

Within our spiritual walk, we greet the seasons.  However, for those of us living in the Southern Hemisphere, it can be very difficult to draw every bit of spiritual juice from a season when its heritage is located firmly and historically in the Northern Hemisphere.  In fact, some of my favourite feasts could benefit from a rethinking in a southern or country specific context.

As well as the spiritual calendar, we have the dominant calendar.  This can be regarded as scientific or as a legacy of a dominant European empire.  

Then, as many of us know, but not all of us realise there are the indigenous, place specific seasons.  

The picture above relates to The Gooniyandi Seasons Calendar.  Please follow the link to find out more.

It should be emphasised that this calendar relates to a specific place or country.  This cannot be applied in every part of Australia - or even every part of tropical Australia.  I think those of us who are gardeners, particularly those who garden for food, realise that even suburb to suburb a few kilometres apart in a city can have different micro-climates.  When frost ceases, when winds come, when vegetables mature. 

As we draw close to the awareness and practicum of the seasons, we are enabled and encouraged to draw closer to our Creator, the Designer of our world.  We can partner with this aspect of Creation to our own benefit.  Let us learn from our Creator, from the original inhabitants, let us listen to the experience of the old hands. 

As much of the world evidences changes in established climate patterns, we still need to learn from the past as new avenues of learning come upon us.  Isn't that like our spiritual journey? We learn, we change, we learn again. Through this we expand our knowledge of ourselves and others.  We learn more of the Creator we worship and the personality who designed all this with us - and other species - in mind.  We experience the seasons of our lives.



Photobucket

Wednesday, January 05, 2011

Thursday, March 22, 2007

Season of the Soul: Discipline


DISCIPLINE

Throw away your rod,
Throw away your wrath:
O my God,
Take the gentle path.

For my heart’s desire
Unto yours is bent:
I aspire
To a full consent.

Not a word or look
I affect to own,
But by book,
And your book alone.

Though I fail, I weep:
Though I halt in pace,
Yet I creep
To the throne of grace.

Then let wrath remove;
Love will do the deed:
For with love
Stony hearts will bleed.

Love is swift of foot;
Love's a man of war,
And can shoot,
And can hit from far.

Who can 'scape his bow?
That which wrought on thee,
Brought you low,
Needs must work on me.

Throw away your rod;
Though man frailties hath,
You are God:
Throw away your wrath.

George Herbert