Blog – Page 6 – Faith & Culture Writers Community

March 16, 2014February 8, 2015

Building Temples | 2014 Writing Contest Finalist

By Tresta Payne

This life is for building temples.

There’s a voice that blows like the wind at the back of your mind though, and it tells you that words are wasted, imaginary things and that temples are built with greater offerings – the ones that go on lists and require only sweat and you point to them at the end of the day and proclaim progress.

Not success or satisfaction, but progress at least.

That voice is the critic that never sleeps and is ever “put to shame by an image; For his molded image is falsehood, and there is no breath in them.” (Jer. 10:14)

He doesn’t own his shame though – he gifts it to you who listen. And he tempts you to build profane temples in places you were never meant to stay, where plastic is king and fake is safe and temples house merchandise for profit.

We run in circles to create breathless life. We clone images of our own design and step away from imago dei to manufacture, produce, proliferate. The world is driven by the lust for what we can have. We long for what we can hold. We believe in what we can see.

“Concrete concepts, please, and make them utilitarian. It doesn’t need breath as long as it has good functionality.”

We substitute duty for art and usefulness for slow thoughts. “Practical” rules our day and the windy voice in the recesses of our mind blows harder with each product produced.

We are supposed to be Makers of Great Art, Builders of Temples, Children of the Living God and not slaves of dead duty or chasers of public opinion.

Our art needs a new spokesperson.

We need a better Voice to give decibels to our living and breathing and wrestling and surrender. A better Champion. A hand pressing heavy on our back and feeding courage to us in large chunks of words and small portions of brave, because we are building up a world of living temples.

In the desert, God called the artisans by name. We wonder if He even knows ours. We make our name tags and chase our fame so that maybe God will notice our talents and pick us and confirm our hopes: that we are artisans, too.

We lose sight of His breath in us. We forget – how quickly we forget that God the Creator made us creative in His image and our best work bears His name.

He is calling the artisans and it’s all of us in one way or another. The painter and baker and poetry-maker. The one with music in her head. The one with beauty in his heart. The one with hammer and nail and those who dream in wide swaths of color – purple for the curtains, gold for the fastenings. All the ones who see heaven and feel earth and endeavor with all their breath to write this life as a shadow of things to come, He’s calling.

His voice is softer than the bite-y whisper but louder because we hear it in our hearts, where passion trumps utility and logic. He calls us by names we never dare to call ourselves.

So we write, because we hear words touching earth. We fight the blowhard voice of Practical and Useful with a sword in one hand and a pen in the other.

His hand is a comforting pressure at our back and our very breath – every exhale joining the incense of others – is pushed out and fills the earth with facets of His glory. We breathe deep and our lungs fill with a life lived or dreamed or begging to be written.

We make larger spaces in a world that closes in on us

We are artisans in our own deserts, who build houses for His glory with beauty and craftsmanship. The landscape starves for inspiration and our hearts would dry without beauty, would whither and evaporate right away. So we erect the ebenezers that help us through our own desert and we leave them standing for travelers coming behind, markers on the pilgrimage.

We are the author-artisans whose craft makes your sand-stung eyes weep in the desert of your own isolation. We build tabernacles for your dry places, because life is about building temples, and we are.

In our promised lands we make plans for bigger and better and we write them, sing them, scribble on napkins the way to the Temple. We want desperately to build up edifices of His glory and a place for the worshippers to come.

We see in the greens of spring, and the hope that springs eternal bleeds out of our fingers and we write it. We put it down in permanence, scary and hopeful and open for ridicule.

In the end, all that we’ve written become plans for another generation – words pressed heavy in us that will be a balm in their desert and a plan in their Jerusalem. Our children, our grandchildren, for as long as the Lord may tarry, will read our hearts on screens and pages. Our craft will live longer than our lives because His hand presses heavy and they understand in writing what He whispers in our hearts.

We are all David, handing the plans to our children and trusting the work, not to men, but to Great Inspiration:“All this,” said David, “the LORD made me understand in writing, by His hand upon me, all the works of these plans.” (1 Chron. 28:19)

The LORD makes us understand in writing how these living temples are built and how His Spirit indwells the space we make – comes right in and even pushes against our comfortable boundaries. We make more space with the poetry in our prose, and we tell our posterity the plans He has pressed heavy on us.

“Build the temple,” we say emphatically. Build it now, build it forward, up and ever on. “Do it and do not fear nor be dismayed, for the LORD God – my God – will be with you.” (1 Chron. 28:20)

This life is for building temples.

We are the scribes of everlasting stories and whether we congregate in deserts or meet in Jerusalem, if the Author of a good story lives in us, we have temple building to do.

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Visit Tresta’s website: www.sharppaynes.com

March 16, 2014February 8, 2015

Wandering in Wonder | 2014 Writing Contest Finalist

By Hanna Maxwell

“God has filled us with the Spirit of God, with skill, with intelligence, with knowledge, and with all the craftsmanship, to devise artistic designs…for work in every skilled craft.” Exodus 35:31-33

There is a dentist’s office near my house that I pass every now and then. I’ve been in there twice, and while they are mean and pushy about x-rays, the hygienists are good about making sure they have your favorite flavor of fluoride on hand. They have a reader board, and for the last couple of months, it said, “Wisdom begins in wonder.”

I have been living in a state of wonder for the past year. Perhaps not wonder in the sense Socrates meant when he said to the young philosopher Theaetetus, “For wonder is the feeling of a philosopher, and philosophy begins in wonder”, although I have been wondering about purpose. Why am I here? What is the point? What do I do now? But those are big questions, and often I try not to wonder in that direction for fear of being lost.

The wonder of my life has been awe. My wonder does not express itself in complete thoughts. No I wonder why the sky is blue or I wonder if God exists. It’s more of a wow. It’s an exhale. It is the simple exhalation of too muchness. I feel unqualified for that thing we call wisdom because my wonder is not a series of why questions. It is mostly dumb admiration.

This past year, I graduated from college with a degree in English, took a life-altering trip to Ireland and Scotland, sat at home trying to figure out a purpose, and found a job that offers stability and monotony. And I learned to pay attention. Or rather, started to learn. It’s a process. I began to actually count my blessings. I wrote them down. There are literally one thousand moments of wonder and thanksgiving in the back of my journal. In the long months of uncertainty and confusion, paying attention – in the tradition of the nature poet, Mary Oliver – became a way to pray.

I am disciplining myself to be in a constant state of amazement and live in the most present sense. Foolishly, I thought, This is it. All I have to do is pay attention and live in gratitude. I have found the secret to a happy life at the tender age of nineteen. I have no doubt that these are good things. Very good things. But then there came the nagging sense that this can’t be it. Lists of blessings are not the end. In the words of one of my favorite bands, “It is not enough to be dumbstruck. You must have the words in that head of yours.”

This is where writing comes in. I have words, and it turns out I had forgotten something essential. In her poem “Sometimes,” Mary Oliver says:

“Instructions for living a life:

Pay attention.

Be astonished.

Tell about it.”

There are three steps, and the third is the Great Commission. Go and tell. It is not enough to sit, unmoving and unchanging, even if it is in the delirious presence of the Creator of the Universe. Sooner or later, we have to tell about it. I believe that we, as image bearers of the Alpha and Omega, are all given gifts to reflect and tell of his image. It could be through cooking a meal or holding a conversation or building a house. Or it could be writing.

But is it wise to write? I wonder that a lot. We are all writers and readers here, so the power of words is just a given. Nations are formed and religions are built on simple words. Words. We love them and they connect us. I have never doubted the power of words – spoken, written, overheard, seen, whispered – but I have doubted the wisdom of writing down these holders of meaning and truth.

Let me rephrase: I don’t doubt that other people should write. I do not doubt that we should share ourselves with each other through books and blog posts. What I doubt is me. Should I write? How could that possibly be a good idea? How could sharing all of the crazy, boring, mindless things that go through my head be beneficial for anyone else?

The thing is, the Great Commission does not single out certain people. It is great and universal. We are given the Spirit of the very Creator. Therefore, we are commanded to create. We have to share the awe by whatever way we know how. We are called out of the slavery of self-doubt to build tabernacles, to write, to share.

It is not enough for me to be dumbstruck. I can’t assume that other people are going to find all the words. I too am commanded to pay attention and tell about it. Wisdom may begin in wonder, but it doesn’t end there. You have to follow it through. You have to wander into the deserts and consider all the big questions we’d rather not think about.

To pay attention is step one. To live a life of wonder is the second. And for me, step three – no matter how scary or insignificant it may seem – is to write.

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Visit Hanna’s website:

March 4, 2014January 9, 2015

Blank Pages

by Brooke Perry

One of the sights I dislike the most is that of a blank page of paper. For some writers I’ve heard that this is an exciting sight, an invigorating and inspiring view of possibility; stories to be told and words to be written. For me it makes my throat close up and sweat start accumulating on my brow. I’m intimidated by the blankness. I want to know what’s going to end up there before I create it. I want to have a base to already build on. I’m much better in the building up than I am in the beginning from nothing.

Now some may say that what we are doing as writers is always building on something. I mean, there’s nothing new under the sun right? And yet even with the knowledge that there is always a “building up” process based on our thoughts and ideas and the experiences of life that have led up to these eluding thoughts and ideas, the sorting it all out intimidates me.

I am currently in a very “blank page” state of life, and if there’s anything I may dislike more than a blank page on a screen, it’s the blank page in my own heart, mind and soul. I look out at my life and see everything that I knew now saved into other files or deleted altogether. There are no words, no ideas, no decipherable thoughts. The things I thought were true stories of love, adventure and full life have now been revealed as lies, with one of the biggest deceivers of all being my own heart. I don’t know how to make sense of any truth I once thought I knew. So I get scared and I stop writing altogether.

Once I do start writing something it’s jumbled and fuzzy and ends up being deleted before I’ve even developed the thought. And I have an uncomfortable notion that this is exactly where Jesus wants me right now.

My heart is broken, my soul bruised and my mind blank. I can make it by “going through the motions” for a few hours at a time, but those hours are always followed by the delete button going full force and once again, the canvas is bare.

Why? Why the bareness, why the stark white page staring at me instead of everything that I had built for myself? Before, just a few weeks ago, I had thousands of words, well written words at that, covering page after page of my life.

I didn’t care if the words were wrong or in the wrong order, I only cared that my page was full.

Of course I desperately wanted the words to be filled with Jesus, filled with hope and purpose, but I was willing to let them stay regardless of whether or not Jesus actually did fill the page or not, over the threat of having to delete them altogether. The blankness, the giving over of authority to Jesus like never before wasn’t worth it to me. I didn’t see how deep I had gone with allowing words to cover the pain, deceit and desperation that my heart had fallen into.

But sometimes our Lord loves us enough to take control of the keyboard. Sometimes He loves us enough to call us to the terrifying blank canvas, to allow our entire hearts and souls that had been poured out onto that paper to be completely washed away, leaving us with nothing, nothing but Him.

And with His heart breaking in sync with ours, and His soul reaching out to mend our own, and His mind connecting with ours in only the way His can, we realize that He is bigger than the page, canvas and scope of what we can see of our lives. In the midst of the heartbreak and loneliness, the fear and confusion about what comes next, we realize that He is the true author of the greatest story ever told, and that the deletion of everything we had built for ourselves was the only thing miraculous and loving enough to allow His words of truth, life and, most importantly and confusingly of all, His words of LOVE to finally start to fill the pages of our soul.

So instead of trying to refill my pages in my own messy way, I finally let Him take control of my keyboard, and to my surprise, of all the miraculous secrets and wonders He could start to reveal on my new page of life, He only writes three words.

I CHOOSE YOU

The choice of these words surprised me as I didn’t understand why He had chosen to write those. I had most likely expected Him to write “I love you” instead because that seems to always be what He’s trying to get me to remember. And then He spoke to my heart and reminded me that in order to even believe that He loved me, I first had to believe that He chose to love me. That it wasn’t by default or obligation, however He had chosen me, and chooses me when I have nothing to give back to Him. He only wants my heart.

He led me to a verse I had read a million times and breathed new life into the words in these pages, the most important words we will ever have the gift of reading.

Ephesians 3:12-21

“Because of Christ and our faith in him, we can now come boldly and confidently into God’s presence. So please don’t lose heart because of my trials here. I am suffering for you, so you should feel honored. When I think of all this, I fall to my knees and pray to the Father, the Creator of everything in heaven and on earth. I pray that from his glorious, unlimited resources he will empower you with inner strength through his Spirit. Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him. Your roots will grow down into God’s love and keep you strong. And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God. Now all glory to God, who is able, through his mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think. Glory to him in the church and in Christ Jesus through all generations forever and ever! Amen.”

To live a full life does not mean to have all of the right words, structure or punctuation in our writing of our own lives. To live a full life is only accomplished by fully receiving His love for us, and realizing that that life is the only true thing we will ever fully be able to boast about. All words, desires and dreams flow freely from this love. The forcing of our own lives forward ceases as we rest and lean into His truth. So as I work at allowing Him the control over the words in my life, the words on this very page, I leave you with the question He has so passionately whispered in my ear:

Where do you need to choose to believe His heart for you? What words are you forcing that would flow freely if you gave up the control of your keyboard to the hands that made you?

Peace.

March 3, 2014January 9, 2015

Encounters With Polar Bears, Macaws, and Other Writing Adventures

By Lynn Hare

I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the countries and bring you into your own land.

Ezekiel 36:24, ESV

I threw off the cold rainfall of Portland, Oregon last fall on a plane that touched down on a tarmac lined with palm trees in ninety-two degree Anaheim summer. At the hotel, the pool’s chlorine-laden mist beckoned with tendrils of playful wonder. A boy wearing a coontail hat dashed through the lobby, fists filled with Disneyabilia and Adventureloot.

For years, you and I have traveled many lands, praying for a regenerative spirit over truth-laden stories. Daily we accept the challenge for adventure from the Holy Spirit and transform Christendom—one chapter, one page, one word at a time.

Our passionate words of strength renew readers’ hope. Every time our keyboard hums, we offer a fresh encounter with a Jesus the world has never known. Through our diverse experiences, we explore ways to open hearts and minds to uncharted expanses of revelatory freedom. And as God crafts and shapes our voices, He releases creative ways for others to renew relationship with Him.

Our Pilot has dropped us (sometimes with parachutes and other times without) into the most unlikely terrain. This tribe of writers has braved the North Pole of frosty polar bear attacks in ice storms of rejection. We’ve conquered the parched trek of barren Sahara plains as sand filled our shoes when words would not come. We’ve cupped palms to our mouths and hurled questions at God across raging ravines and His Word has relentlessly echoed back.

We rush forward, drawn to the call of the vibrant-banded macaw in the heart of the Amazon rainforest of lush growth. Then we linger in the virtual aisles of Amazon.com, discovering volumes to devour, one plantain after another. Forerunners of grace, we become atmosphere changers, no matter what surprises the latitudes and longitudes of the future hold.

I pray that you and I forgive each other loudly and often. Let’s joyfully forgive and laugh at our own mistakes—and revel in them. May our readers catch and multiply His grace as it renews hearts, souls, and homes.

And as we peer through the binoculars from this vista, let’s ask, “Holy Spirit, where to next?”

February 27, 2014January 9, 2015

What Leadership Means to Me

By Matthew O’Connell

I once thought events like Faith and Culture stem from one person. That one person alone makes all the plans and other people help execute it. My first meeting with the Faith & Culture Writers Conference leadership team quickly changed the view that I was inculcated with.

I attended the Faith & Culture Writers Conference last year. A friend heard that I enjoyed writing and asked if I wanted to go with her. I signed up only minutes after she told me, having no idea what to expect. I remember the anxious anticipation days before Faith and Culture. The event started with worship and I turned to my friend saying, “I thought this was a writing conference?” It appeared more like church than what I envisioned a writing conference would look like. “When are we going to get to the good stuff?” I wondered.

But, I quickly found that writing is a form of worship, and God is the only good stuff one needs.

As William Young, the Friday night keynote speaker, began his talk, my posture changed from relaxed to sitting at the edge with my hands on my chin. I don’t remember blinking for the next 45 minutes. One thing he said stuck with me, something I will always remember: “I will never again ask God to bless what I am doing, but ask to be apart of what He is doing.”

After the first night concluded, I felt like Moses coming down from Mt. Sinai. My friend and I talked the entire ride home about the experience we just had. The next day I attended the breakout sessions, absorbing every piece of information I could. This is the first time I ever saw an agent in person. I heard of them vaguely, like some mythical sea creature that didn’t exist. A whole underworld of supportive writers, agents, mentors, and publishers were at my fingertips. I sat in the front row at every workshop so I can ask more questions.

I left the conference with a new appreciation, enthusiasm, and revival in my writing. I began writing everyday and have been ever since. I am currently on my third re-write of my memoir, and actively making posts on my blog. I stayed in contact with Cornelia, the conference director, and attended one of the monthly Writers Connection meetings she leads.

At one of those meetings, I came a half hour early and saw Cornelia and remembered her. Her enthusiasm and warmness makes it impossible to forget. I began talking about a writing contest I entered and how I think they are amazing. Interestingly, she told me, “We just discussed at our last leadership meeting how great it would be to have a writing competition this year at our conference. Would you want to help organize it?”

A week went by and I was unsure how serious her request was. None-the-less I was filled with ideas. I sent her a long message of all my ideas for the contest. She asked if I could attend the planning meeting the following evening. Luckily I wasn’t working and was able to join the leadership team.

As people began trickling in they didn’t even question my presence. We opened up in prayer and fellow team member Veylnn gave a short devotional on what the words Faith and Culture mean. The night before, Cornelia had sent us the itinerary for the meeting. I thought it was just for our reference and that we weren’t going to hit every point. Nope, we were going over every last detail. I had prepared a few vague ideas regarding the proposed writing contest.

We started discussing which people were speaking. As one idea was brought up, another person would give an idea. Slowly the conference began building one piece at a time, becoming its own separate entity from anything we imagined. No idea came from one person, but everything was constructed entirely as a collective effort. Each new idea was spoken louder, with more enthusiasm than the last. We were almost jumping out of our seats; “What if we had a panel of blogger mentors?” and so on. Slowly the conference was falling into place.

This conference no longer belonged to us. It was God’s. We were just the vehicles he chose to deliver his message. Cornelia at one point said, “I don’t know how this is going to work, I am just trusting God He will provide.” I couldn’t count the number of times she and everyone in the group said this. Trusting God’s plan for this conference was a huge a theme through every step of the process.

Each time we met as a leadership planning team, I became closer with the other members, more than I thought I could in such a short amount of time. I learned that leadership isn’t about any isolated person, or idea, it is the collective effort of every person. A machine with God at the heart of it.

I reflected on when Paul Young talked about only being a part of God’s plan. Throughout this whole process we utterly depended on God and only wanted His will to be done, that He would invite us into his grace. God delivered far more than I deserve. It was clear from the very beginning God has had (and is having) His hands on every stage of the process for this conference.

When we get to together for leadership meetings it gets progressively longer as we share our hearts with each other. I am so thankful to be surrounded by so many God-loving writers and friends. I wake up every morning thankful that God has placed so many amazing, supportive, loving people in my life.

February 25, 2014January 9, 2015

The Invitation: My Faith and Culture Story

by Velynn Brown

I know faith. I accepted Jesus into my little heart at the tender age of eight. Grew up on turquoise pews, and church potlucks. I even bore the title “PK” (pastor’s kid).

I know culture. I’m African-American through and through. This is the wrapping God chose for housing my spirit.

But sometimes, my faith and my culture clash. At least that’s how it feels when I’m the only brown-skinned believer in the room.

Our doctrines say we are all Christians—that we all come from the same family. It’s true. We all have the same Heavenly Father. But do our pews, our platforms, and our publications reflect all God’s children?

No. Unfortunately we missed some folks when we snapped the “family of God” photo. I’ve got a problem with that. And to my surprise, I’m not the only one.

My girlfriend Ashley Larkin and I had been coffee-meeting, text-praying and blog-inspiring for several months before she extended an invitation to me. I was apprehensive about going to Writers Connection meetings she kept encouraging me to go to during our soul-sister-sharing times together. I didn’t want to tell her that I knew I’d be the only chocolate chip in the room. Or that even though it was a “Christian” event, my faith experiences and religious palette would not be understood or met. I would be alone.

She agreed that I could very well be the only person of my skin complexion there. But she disagreed that I’d be alone. She said she’d be right by my side. She wanted me to share my journey and my story. Had Ashley not first shown she could be trusted by bravely attending my predominantly African-American congregated church first, I would have kept her invitation at a distance.

Ashley placed herself in my world, embracing the opportunity to hold and carry out publicly what we had been talking about privately: to become the change we needed to see in our own Christian worlds. Now it was time to share in this exchange of life, story, and depth of relationship in one another’s lives.

I was a little embarrassed that at forty-one, I was still struggling with a color complex. I should be over the shock of the lack of diversity in Portland, Oregon, right? My people only make up six percent of the population in the city. So why was this invitation bothering me so much? Being a native Oregonian, I knew the hand we’d been dealt.

Truth was, I was not excited about crossing the bridge to Lake Oswego and I wasn’t thrilled about being the “bridge” again.

“Why me, Lord? Why do I have to go and be the only sistah in the room?”

It took a while for me to pinpoint my struggle. This was a “see the speck in your own eye first” confession, but eventually I got to it. We don’t get to chose the family we are born into, but it’s are still our family. As a member of the extended body of Christ, I’ve often felt adopted into, not tied-to-blood-related. It’s subtle. Christian radio, bookstores and platforms represent majority white Christian culture all the time.

Why aren’t we representing the entire family of God?

We all speak the same God-language, but our translations are as different as King James and The Message versions of the Bible. Yet this diversity of parallel texts brings out a more vivid, 3D-panoramic view of our lives and the God we serve, if we let it.

I think it’s because I want God’s people to act different, be different, and to look different. I want the world to stop and take notice of how we include and not exclude one another. I’d like them to see how Christians freely share our resources, our privileges, and our pews with each other on both sides of the rainbow and everything in between. But the truth is we don’t.

In my journey as a writer, I was told by a well-respected and profitable publishing house that my voice as an African-American writer was needed and desirable, but it probably wouldn’t sell well in mainstream Christian market because of my color.

So why go? Why keep putting myself out there only to be rejected by my “Christian family”?

Sarah Thebarge was the guest author the first night I attended the Writers Connection. I’d never met her before, but when she opened up her mouth to share her story, we had several things instantly in common: cancer and embracing others’ lives, stories, and cultures.

One of my best friends was right smack in the middle of battling cancer and I needed a tangible testimony of hope to pass on to her. Sarah was a cancer survivor, so I bought her book. And although I was the only chocolate-skinned Christian in the audience that night, when she began to share the story of her spiritually adopted Somalian family, I began to feel at home—right there, in Tualatin, Oregon.

God met me that night on the outside with what I was wrestling with on the inside. I needed a tangible story of culture, and the acceptance of being woven in, right where I was, in the color that I’m in. I needed to know I truly wasn’t alone and that where I’m from matters dearly to the Lord.

Cornelia Seigneur, the monthly Writers Connection leader, whom I also met for the first time that night, asked me to meet her for coffee a few weeks later. She shared with me the vision for the annual Faith & Culture Writers Conference and would soon extend to me a second invitation to serve on the conference leadership team, a position I have been humbly honored to hold. She asked me to be a part of constructing this year’s conference.

At this table of the conference leadership team, I am seen as an equal, as sister in my chocolate covering. I am embraced with a shared faith in our God who is committed to diversity, culture and community.

I extend the same invitation to you:

Come . . . have the courage to be yourself.

Come . . . share the story God is crafting in your life.

No matter what shade of the kingdom-rainbow you are wrapped in, come meet the rest of your family. Let your soul, your God-given creativity, and your unique purpose find a little bit of home.

Come join us at the Faith and Culture Writers Conference.

See you there!

I pray that you may be active in sharing your faith, so that you have a full understanding of every good thing we have in Christ. (Philemon 1:6- NIV)

February 13, 2014December 9, 2014

In the Beginning was the Word

By Phil Long

As a poet, I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about how to say common things creatively. I also think about saying creative things commonly. I love the struggle to capture the universal in a tiny particular or manufacturer fresh insight through surprising combinations of language that trigger fresh synaptic connections. I feel like an alchemist wielding a magical formula transforming familiar things into wonderful things. I wonder how difficult things might be said more plainly and I wonder if impossible things can truly be said at all. I think about how truth that is really understood might be too hard to express and whether truth that is too hard to understand might be found in new expressions. I wonder where things come from and how they exist. I wonder. Cosmology. Ontology. Philosophy. I think about the uncanny power of words and ideas. I enjoy gleefully exceeding the comfortable boundaries of language to unleash the unexpected – the unintended. I wonder if it’s working. I wonder if it’s worth it. I wonder if the conceptual grammar required for a greater understanding of the mystery that is reality could ever be found in the winsome wanderings of a willing wordsmith; if a poet in a staircase might somehow connect the dots or generate a flash of light.

And lately, I’ve been thinking,

what if its all poetry?

Since science can only concern itself

with the physical emanations of Ultimate Reality,

What if the most fundamental particles

are really verbs and nouns?

adjectives and adverbs, the stuff of worlds

cuplets and rhymes, the elements

sonnets and ballads, minerals

and the light… it comes from a person?

What if it’s all poetry?

What if matter is actually made of what really matters;

our perception of meaning,

an electron-scanning microscope

looking closer at the smallest patterns of existence?

What if atoms are iambs

and rocks are merely metaphors?

What if it’s all poetry?

What if relationship is a star

exploding with the source of ultimate meaning

and conscious awareness is the fuel?

What if fools are pollution

and broken hearts the black-holes

of fundamental reality;

Selfishness and greed, genetically altered absurdities

propagated by brokenness and hurt?

What if love is the source, and the goal

and there have been too many mutations?

What if it’s all poetry?

What if we thoughtful sparks

slipping through the biochemical cracks

of bio-logical creatures

are composed of material… innuendo

as real as we feel

as important as we hope

as loved as we want to be

And the stuff that makes us,

dependent upon the words of a Lover?

What if it’s all poetry?

What if ancient wisdom had it right all along

and modern science is only catching up?

What if Higgs is a field, of dreams,

giving weight to God’s ambition;

forming particles from echoes

of His kindness and patience?

If 96 % of the physical world

seems to be dark energy and matter

maybe it’s because we’re still living in the dark – ages

and what matters most is moral and wise

and we are only making matter worse – by inversion.

What if the extra dimensions we find in our math

are the places we should have gone to

And the infinite universes birthing infinite possibilities

are infinite poetry

flowing from an infinite Poet?

What if it’s all poetry?

What if the Large Hadron Collider is telling the truth?

And everything that is comes from nothing

but ideas?

What if we are words – generating fields

that give rise to particles – shaped by laws

that are molded and connected – by ele-mental attractions

being used as ink on this cosmic page

for the poetry?

In the language of life;

with words, that are personal?

Us, written in dust

with care and precision

and a vision for the future that ages of edits

– mutations of circumstance and egotistical intent –

have only managed to alter the reflection of perfection

still finding the Author’s intention?

What if it’s all poetry?

And we find ourselves reading in wonder

as our science plunders the pages

denying the Poet,

insisting on chance

Meter and rhyme unfolding in intricate geology

Language and story in physics, and biology

The weight of scribbled matter, psychology

The search for reason in unreasonable space

The search for purpose

in meaningless traces of eternity,

Just chance.?

What if it’s all poetry?

What if spirit is deeper than flesh?

What if what matters is what makes up matter

what makes us matter

and all that matter

is now holding this tale like a book?

Look,

What if it’s all a poem spoken to become us;

broken lines with an ultimate purpose?

It’s the only way a Poet would create us

or know us.

CosmoLyrical.com

Phil Long is our conference Spoken Word contributor and Breakout Session Leader.

February 10, 2014December 12, 2014

Widening our View is the Essence of Faith & Culture Writers Conference

Cornelia Becker Seigneur

“Most people come to know only one corner of their room, one spot near the window, one narrow strip on which they keep walking back and forth.”-Rilke

About a month before the start of the 2013 Faith & Culture Writers Conference at Multnomah University, I received an email from a pastor at a local church.

He asked why I would let William Paul Young, the author of The Shack, speak at our conference. After all, the pastor said to me, how could an event that was being held at a reputable Christian university “invite a ‘heretic’ like Young onto the campus?” as he worded it.

The pastor went on to inform me that he would not promote our conference nor would he tell others at his church about it. At the time of the event, I was an adjunct professor at Multnomah, where I served as the faculty advisor for MUSE, the student publication I founded at the school.

My first response to the pastor was to ask him if he had read the book.

“No, I have not,” he confessed.

I offered, “I know there has been controversy surrounding Paul’s work over the years, especially regarding his (fictional) portrayal of the triune God, but we are a faith and culture conference, and if nothing else, whether you agree or disagree with the way Young portrays God, we must admit that the words and story Paul created has affected culture in a big way: 20 million books sold.

May we ask the hard questions? Can we start a conversation on topics where we have differing views? Can we question the way we have done things over the years? Are we able to sit in the same room with others who have a different creative way to express their story?

That is the essence of what the Faith & Culture Writers Conference is about.

On the top of my website, I have a tagline “Live the Questions,” which is a quote by the German poet Rilke. This is my mantra. And perhaps the mantra of the conference. We should not be afraid of hard questions. We should not be threatened with differing view points, with people stretching our worlds; we should not fear discussion around a subject we feel uncomfortable with, but rather embrace the difference and see life from someone else’s world. To get beyond that one spot near the window, as Rilke notes.

I say, let’s talk.

This year as the Faith & Culture Writers Conference moves to George Fox University, we once again have invited some speakers and authors whose views and takes on issues not all attendees may agree with. Heck, not everyone is a C.S. Lewis fan. He did have witches in his books and he prefers in infant baptism, to which some object.

Our speakers are thoughtfully sparking dialogue in their work, musing over long-held practices, pushing boundaries and borders, and asking questions that open up fresh perspectives, challenge presumptions, and stretch views.

Take Sarah Bessey, as an example. In November 2013, she released her first book, Jesus Feminist, the title itself stopping people from giving her a voice. Yet, if you can get beyond stereotypes and open up the pages of Bessey’s book, you’ll find the mother of three captivated by Christ while at the same time challenging the church to reconsider gender-based restrictions on women in ministry.

We welcome speakers — who are at once authors, professors, theologians, bloggers, journalists, movement starters, activists, editors — at the Faith & Culture Writers Conference to open up the doors to dialogue on issues in our current culture and we trust they will do so with grace, humility, vulnerability and the Spirit leading them. Can we bathe in discussions with differing views, and allow ourselves to listen rather than immediately criticize, and engage without feeling threatened? Instead of judging, let’s perhaps ask, “Hmm, I wonder what they mean by that? Let me find out.”

Other speakers this year — Tony Kriz, Paul Louis Metzger, Randy Woodley, Micah J. Murray, Natalie Trust, Emily Maynard — have also written and spoken on topics that might have made some people uncomfortable. That’s okay.

We’re about engaging culture, starting conversations, expanding our worlds.

And, maybe make new friends along the way.

Which makes me think about a story I read in Christianity Today about how, after writer Tim Challies calls into question Ann Voskamp’s theology, calling her popular book One Thousand Gifts “dangerous.”

And, how did Ann respond? Why invite him and his family to dinner, of course.

He accepted and during their time together, he apologized to her. In our online world, it’s easy to criticize someone we cannot see face to face. It’s a click of a button to publish judgment. But, when you are face to face with someone, it’s a whole different ball game. Being present matters.

Now, I realize of course things don’t always have a happy ending like this, but it illustrates that we can at least be in the same room together, maybe even share a dinner. Or coffee. We can extend grace and mercy and humility toward others and not be defensive.

And maybe, just maybe we can do just as Rilke said:

“I live my life in widening circles that reach out across the world.” Rilke

www.corneliaseigneur.com

December 9, 2013December 9, 2014

We Cannot Do This Alone

By Cornelia Becker Seigneur

When the leadership team for the 2013 Faith & Culture Writers Conference had our celebration dinner last June, we reminisced over wine and salmon and salad, discussing the big event. I am so grateful for the service these wonderful ladies gave: Bethany, our executive administrative assistant, Kari Patterson, our communications director, Ashley our agent and mentor coordinator, and Ana, our marketing specialist.

They sacrificed countless hours to put on what turned out to be a fabulous conference last April at Multnomah University. When you serve with people on a team to put on such a large event, you bond over late night brain storming sessions, sipping tea and wine and agonizing over speakers and schedules and wanting every detail to be perfect and lots and lots of prayer. I got teary eyed at the end of the conference saying our goodbyes. We are all dear friends now, and I will always be thankful these four ladies that said yes. ,

And, during that final meeting last June at the downtown waterfront restaurant, the subject of the next conference eventually came up. Kari — who came to our 2011 inaugural conference at Western Seminary who had introduced herself to me after my talk, and then returned in 2013 to serve on the planning team — said she needed a year off to breathe and that she actually thought we should keep our conference an every other year event, and wait until 2015 again. And Ashley said she needed a year off as well. And, my right hand, Bethany, though she didn’t tell me that night, later shared with me that family and health issues required her immediate attention this next year.

A month or so later, Bethany called me up to meet. She brought flowers. I should be giving HER flowers! She had tears in her eyes and said, “Cornelia, God has given you a vision and you need to keep this vision alive no matter who comes alongside you. God will provide.” She said to trust and believe and move forward and to give it to God. She said people would come forward, new people, and I need to have faith. We both cried and prayed and I said I would listen to her.

I started calling and emailed people about the conference, and I asked for people to be on the advisory board and I met with others who had experience with events envisioning businesses and non-profits, like Ken Wytsma and Don Jacobson and my good friend Paul Louis Metzger, whose been a supporter of our conference from Day 1.

In discussing this event with these friends, the consensus seemed clear: have the event yearly.

But, then there is reality. I cannot plan this conference alone. I know it is God’s vision, yes, but I told God, I cannot do this alone.

I began to pray, that if it is meant to be, people would come forward.

I love how God works. I got a phone call from Christal, a speaker last year. And a text message from Ana. Separately mind you. Both messages were clear- “Cornelia, what date in 2014 is the next Faith & Culture Writers Conference? I think you need to have it next year, and not wait a year.”

Then, I got an email from Melanie, a professor of English at George Fox, with whom I’ve been connected off after teaching a course at Fox a while back. We have a mutual friend in Pam, who spoke at our 2013 conference. Melanie wanted to meet to talk writing and life. When we met, the subject of the conference came up. And, after I noted my vision is to move the Faith & Culture Writers Conference to different campus each year, and I’d love to be at Fox sometime, she said, “Well, George Fox is looking to host more events on campus.”

I love how God works!

I’d see certain people at my monthly Writers Connection and think, hmm, they would be great on the leadership team. And, I was reminded of names I had written down after the last event, who had said that if there is a need for help, to please contact them.

So, I met for coffee with people and we prayed and dreamed and looked at calendars and talked and here we are. It’s a go.

And, this planning team is fabulous.

Starting with the only returning member, Ana, whose digital and social media expertise is amazing. Then there’s Velynn, our executive administrative assistant, who is such a passionate, driven, dynamic person, whom Ashley brought to one of our monthly Writers Connection meetings.

And, Taylor, our new communications director, is such a sweet, kind, deep soul who happens to work at The Oregonian, where I freelance. Grateful to Michelle Watson for introducting Taylor to FCWC and me last spring.

And, Brooke, our new agents and mentor coordinator who attended the last conference, wrote a note to me after the last conference offering to help. Wow, she has energy and many talents she is bringing to the table. Nicole introduced Brooke to our event last spring.

Melanie is our GFU laision. It is so good to get to know her better. She’s an excellent writer and thinker and we both have boys the same age!

And, Lynn is our new prayer coordinator and scribe, whom I met at the Oregon Christian Writers Conference last summer where I served as a mentor, and Lynn’s been a faithful Writers Connection attendee ever since. And, finally there’s Matthew, our writing contest coordinator who attended our 2013 FCWC and has been reaching out the past couple of months on Facebook. When we met a couple of weeks ago at my Writers Connection at Rolling Hills, we touched on the next conference. The subject of writing contests came up, which is wild because Velynn had suggested that idea during our first brainstorming meeting in the Pearl District. Yet, excitement is one thing, feet to pavement is another. I know how much time and work it takes, and again I say, I cannot do it alone. But, I love affirming others in their enthusiasm, so with Matthew’s excitement about the writing contest I suggested he help organize it. I figured he’d say no or ignore the question. He did neither, but instead tossed so many great ideas my way. I chuckled that he could organize the event. And, again, I did not really think he’d be serious about it as I made the suggestion in a light-hearted manner. But, he surprised me once again.

After a few days and many emails later, I invited Matthew to our first large get-it-done planning meeting last week. Matthew arrived before me with his trademark positive spirit and enthusiasm. Okay, I tell God, I get this. I don’t have to go it alone.

And, there are so many others who have affirmed the conference, helping with direction and connections and ideas. Aaron Smith, aka the cultural savage, for one. He showed up at our first larger FCWC brainstorming meeting in November. We happened to be meeting for coffee that day anyway, so I just said, hey come at the tail end of the meeting. Aaron is on our advisory board and we are grateful for his insight and belief in our event.

So, for that first meeting with all these official positions in place, we opened the meeting with prayer. For God’s guidance and direction. There was so much positive energy and passion and drive, and the ideas were flowing and moving and being shaped.

And, there was a lot to do after leaving that meeting. Yet, there are enough people to make it happen.

I love our theme verse, which we chose during our first brainstorming session in the Pearl: “And God has filled us with the Spirit, with skill, with intelligence, with knowledge, and with all craftsmanship for work in every skilled craft.” Exodus 35: 31-33. And our five theme words this year: diverse, fresh, craftsmanship, voice, and wisdom. The words that our amazing designer Martin French will weave into our new logo!

I am incredibly grateful to the 2014 FCWC leadership planning team, for our advisory board and others who have believed in this event, and to George Fox this year for being our sponsoring host.

And I’m ultimately grateful to our creative God, who fills us with His Spirit to guide us with craftsmanship and creativity and voice and wisdom. The God who continually reminds me, through His Spirit and through others, this is His event. He is with us. Just as in life, He is with us. We don’t have to walk through life alone. I am desperate for Him to show up. That’s a good place to be.

And, for this specific event — and in life in general — I am desperate for Him, and He is making Himself known, providing so many others to walk alongside, so many wonderful people to share the load, so many others who are excited to see this conference return in 2014. Indeed, we don’t have to go it alone.

CORNELIA BECKER SEIGNEUR