Going in Depths to find a Panther

I sit every day and ponder so much.

I really try to find ways for me to escape myself.

People are such funny creatures, I sometimes get so easily aggravated by them that half the time I spend thinking I am concerned and angry at them for their own oblivious thoughts and actions.

I know who I am, I honestly can say that I do, there are many levels and layers to me, I put up many guards and barriers for a number of reasons yet I still know who I am.

Do you?

Many people if they were being honest would say no, they don't, probably wouldn't know where to start, that doesn't mean that they are unsure of their current life path, or that they are constantly battling with the concept within themselves, they could quite happily be living their lives, with things that make them happy, but this could still leave them to be undecided and unsure of who they truly are. Yet ultimately living in the now, the moment.

People often assume so much when it comes to me, assume that because I act a certain way, talk a certain way, my walking, my health my faith and my religion that they can make such big assumptions. They think that it is right that they should act and treat me a certain way. Why do we do this? Why don't we just sit and learn about the person that is in front of us rather than being a society that relies on first impressions, which ultimately annoy us and to top it off we are brought up against such things with phrases such as "Don't judge a book by its cover".

I know I have harped on so many times about knowing people that are in front of you, I know that I talk about the one to one relationships, but I know for me that these relationships are what keep me alive, literally sometimes. Do we assume that we know a famous artist because we have stared at his painting for half an hour, or do we admire the work that has been set before us, only hoping for a brief glance at a moment in this artists life.

I hear the sentence "I can never imagine what you go through with your health Martyn" an awful lot, yet this sentence will often follow with " But I have a....." and I will find that there is a related story, aliment, illness that this person is trying to help build a connective bridge to me with. I love that they do this, they are trying, trying to build an opening to me, to share, but at exactly the same time this sentence gets my back straight up and defencive, I would love to scream at times "NO! No you can never imagine what it is like", but I don't, I sit and smile at the attempt at relating. But is that right? I wonder what other scenarios would play out like, a man and women; man " yeah I understand what childbirth is like, I once had this splinter that had to be extracted!" How would that be taken? Or to a member of a different race: "I once went to school with someone like you and they were really funny because.." Would that go down well? We don't do this because it is wrong. We shouldn't list a mountain of reasons to find a connective rather than actually create one itself by learning about the person not by just assuming you know them. Bea blank page,and just talk and learn.

No one can really tell me what my life is like, what makes me so openly depressed and suicidal, or what makes my so happy and excited, because of the truth be known no one apart from me and God truly knows who I am. People have come close, some know the next words, thoughts and actions and enjoy the intense relationship that truly knowing a person can be like. Some people will truly love me and see the strength inside me and want to attach themselves to it, making the relationship so strong but in the balance so vulnerable to the opposing person. It is people like this that I try and strive to have in my life, people who I would go to the depths of hell for and they would do the same, your personal saints and angels always looking after you.

If you want to know me ask, but the truth is I can tell you right now. I am trapped within myself, trapped within a body that doesn't work, however much I pick myself up and dust myself off and get "on" with life. My mind being frustrated at the continual loss that I suffer.

People who know loss, who have lost someone will know the feeling, the incapable feeling that they can't seem to do what they want because for some strange moment they seem restricted because of a thought, trapped within loss. And the people who don't know this feeling, it isn't your fault because it only occurs when you realise that you love something more than you love yourself. I love the fact that God gave me life, I love my boys and the life that I have with them. But yet I sit everyday fighting the battle where some ground of mine is lost, mentally or physically.

People may look at me and see a confident disabled man, who gets on with his life, who greets you with a smile, who laughs and makes light of the things in his life. Who will run around for everyone else, trying to make them realise that he is "normal" and making them realise that they are loved. When in truth, I feel trapped and scared, childlike and incredibly lonely. Yet people who do see this side, suddenly become scared and confused themselves and this is where the above mentioned vulnerability comes in. It is an horrendous feeling, because this person is a person with a certain amount of connective love and power over and for you. This is a person who looks directly at you and can rip your entire world apart. It can be hard to cope with that responsibility. But I am willing to take that risk, for someone, for lots to come in and take that risk with me. I always feel that my life is like the poem by Rainer M. Rilke, The Panther. Caught and trapped, a daily battle and only ever having people come in and out of my life, some that touch my heart, but often when they do they are then gone:

His vision, from the constantly passing bars,
has grown so weary that it cannot hold
anything else. It seems to him there are
a thousand bars; and behind the bars, no world.

As he paces in cramped circles, over and over,
the movement of his powerful soft strides
is like a ritual dance around a center
in which a mighty will stands paralyzed.

Only at times, the curtain of the pupils
lifts, quietly--. An image enters in,
rushes down through the tensed, arrested muscles,
plunges into the heart and is gone.

How many others feel like I feel? Either let yourself open up or try and build the close relationship and bond with the people around you. Don't become a  fleeting image that touches someones heart and is later gone. Help maintain your friends.

Would you wipe my feet?

I have had a strange few weeks, but I have been really grateful the people around me, my friends and my family.

I was sitting in church this morning and listening to a talk which was combined with Mothering Sunday and the story of Mary washing Jesus' feet with perfume.

How strange this concept now would be.

I struggle thinking of this scene. Jesus at this point was "collecting" a following, this was one of the reasons why Jesus knew of Mary, Martha and Lazarus, as we only see earlier in the book that he raised Lazarus from the dead. This family would obviously have been thankful and would have felt that they owed something to Jesus.

A few things stand out for me: First of all we read in John 12:1-8 that Lazarus, the man who was saved by Jesus is actually reclining at the table relaxing with Jesus disciples. Secondly, it was these women that asked, witnessed and then thanked Jesus for the kindness of raising Lazarus, this would have formed a greater boned, a greater understanding and a greater love towards Jesus.

It is amazing that this looks at the one to one relationship, it must have been strong for Mary to feel that she could exhibit that closeness through her actions. Would you comfortably wash someones feet? In your saved funeral perfume, that would help "cleanse" your body? something that would cost a years salary, as Judas kindly points out, would you after such a giving bend down and wipe someones feet?

I only struggle with this because this is such a loving gesture that is coupled quite happily with trust that it makes me question if 1: Would I do this for someone? 2: would someone do this for me?

This clearly would have been a BIG thing for them to do so how often do we just think about the little things that could cheer someones day up? Sometimes for me it is the smallest moments of interaction that shows that I have been in someones thoughts, or even at that very moment that they are concentrating on just being so welcoming around others.

Have you ever seen that person at a party, or even in a crowd, that when they are there, it is a "HERE I AM" type of person? or How often do you start telling the person in front of you a story about something that has happened to you, to then hear the person to jump in the middle of your conversation and go " Yes, I know exactly what you are talking about, this one time with me" Your friend has a story that relates to yours and the topic of your event suddenly gets dropped and is now focused on the event of your friends! We have all been in that scenario, we have all probably been that friend. I know I do it, I do it all the time! I hate when I catch myself doing it too! Does it bother you as much as it bothers me?

Of course it does, we are a society where we are now finding it more and more uncomfortable to talk to others and to relate to them. We are brought up to find mutual ground, to find some connective with the person in front of us to put us to ease in this on going distant techno - relationships world.

Facebook, however great it is, is not helping us truly step forward to the oncoming years for Evangelism. Lets have a look at the stories in the Bible: every one of key significance was a gathering. When Jesus appeared to the disciples on the beach, where they sat around a fire and ate fish, what would be the relevance of that now? Jesus signed on to Facebook, where he put twelve of his friends under chat and said 'hi guys I am back!'? Or that he created a social event called 'fish supper at the sea'?

I know this is just an extreme way of looking at it, but I always found that the beauty of Jesus and the twelve disciples was the fact that they sat and spoke to one another, they had that personal relationship, and it was this relationship that inspired others to follow. I can just imagine the disciples going off to tell the world of their friend, and the love that is in their eyes for that relationship.

I know I have told this story before but fell over at home once (it was horrible): I had gotten up really well and was planning on going into the kitchen to get a drink. But my legs twitched and I buckled over, tried to support myself with my arms, which also twitched and then headbutted the floor. Laying there with my arms trapped underneath me, not being able to move, I saw out of the corner of my eye my phone on the arm of the chair. That will be the point of my rescue. If I lay here long enough I can rest, pray to the Lord for recovery, and he will bring me peace in that time, and then when ready I could try to get my phone and call for help. Although the next thing to happen, happened with no contact at all, no technology. My brother randomly walks around to the back door, lets himself in, which from this point of view must have been a very strange thing as he see me laying locked on the floor. He grabs under my arms and by my belt, flings me up in the air to standing, calls me a fat so-and-so and then says 'sorry, I was just down the road working and I needed the loo' at which he runs up stairs to the toilet. He then comes down, shouts bye and off he went back to work.

No questioning-no worry. He had that relationship with me that he didn't call first to check that it was ok, he just knew he could let himself into my house and go to the toilet.

The more and more I thought about this, the more I realised that not only was God present right there in that moment, but that it wasn't the technology that helped. It was Him. I have been told over and over that Facebook has allowed relationships to regrow by connecting people over distances, but isn't this techno relationship a poor substitute for their actual company? A picture of your sisters newborn the same as holding them for the first time? If i had my phone it would have probably been my brother that I had rung, but the feeling between us wouldn't have been the same-the nature of phones being what they are, it would have been punctuated with small talk, but our relationship is so much deeper than that.

I was very lucky and blessed that day because of the specific relationship I have with my brother. Was that relationship created through us being facebook friends? Or because we shared a bedroom and played together for most of the childhood, we lived, played, ate and laughed together? The same way Jesus did with his disciples and the life that they had with each other.

I am not saying cut the technology out either, I am well aware that this technology is here to aid us. If it means people can read the bible on the move, or connect with long lost relatives from around the world at a cheaper more accessible way. Then great.

In that social interaction choose who you want to be with them. Choose how you want to treat this person that is in front of you. Encourage them.

Encouragement of doing something right . This is the best way to attack and fight back against the attack of accusation and temptation, especially in the time of Lent for those who took it, but also in life in general, where we get so much just thrown in our direction. Christian or not, how often do you see a smile come on to people's faces when you encourage them and say something nice to them. You often here that if you say good morning or smile at someone first thing in the morning that they continue to smile or are polite to others throughout the day. Spreading the love. At what cost was it to you that you encouraged someone, saying something nice doesn't cost you a thing, and you never know that you saying a word of encouragement might tip the internal war and fight that the person is going through.

Jesus would have been a wonderful guest, fully present and 100% into that one person, the individual in front of him. He would have asked him the question " Tell me more" and as Jesus would, He would have seen him, like he saw him up the tree.

How often have you allowed someone to talk about something you have enquired about, they often feel happy and will have a smile on there face. Tell me more.

God is interested in all of us, all of us on an individual level, we too should be this interested in others, be open to all because God is in all of us and He loves us all. Show the world this and ask the question and make a statement. Tell me more.
So finally, encourage your friends, show them love, be willing to wipe their feet, and instead of being a person who keeps the conversation on to themselves, try to be a "There you are" person and ask a simple question when talking with a friend....."Tell me more!" I still stand by my statement from last year and say that these three words could change the world.