Belas Ondas

Thanking God for the Nice Waves

Last evening we drove out along the coast to Estoril. Stopped at Carcavelos beach as the last vestiges of sunset drifted from the night sky. We were going to a prayer meeting in an old house that had been rented for the purpose for a weekend of nonstop prayer.

That evening the prayer was being led by a group of Christian surfers and it was excellent. Good to find a Christianity that is authentic, not trying to fit in to anything it isn’t, not trying to uphold dearly held traditions or maintain jealously guarded denominational lines. Simply trying to get close to Jesus

The guy opening the prayer meeting thanks God for the “belas ondas” - the nice waves. Now I’ve not been to many prayer meetings where the leader starts out by thanking God for the nice waves he had today. But maybe that’s because I don’t hang around surfers that much. But that’s how we should be. Thanking God for the things that matter to us. Recognising that He’s there and that He’s personal, and that He’s bothered about us and wants to be involved with us in our lives – the big things, the ups and downs, but also in all the details. Even catching a good wave. If you’re a surfer.

We had a three day break away last week down in the Algarve. It was the first time we’d managed to travel there since our arrival in Portugal. (And I’m sorry if I don’t get all the hype - the Lisbon coast has everything the Algarve has, and more!). But, sitting on a cliff overlooking the Praia de Falesia near Albufeira, I was amazed. Amazed by the immensity of it all. The blue, glistening with greens and white and silver. The small boats. Scatterings of cloud. An ocean that reaches out to forever. And a restless rush of water at the edge. That’s what waves seem to indicate to me. They’re powerful and they can be scary. But they’re a power at the edge of something that is much greater and much stronger. The waves tell us how strong and mighty the ocean can be. And so the waves of God’s grace on our lives, His goodness and the examples of His love washing over us each day, carrying us forward through the week. They’re all small indicators of something much deeper, more immense and much stronger.

O the deep, deep love of Jesus,

vast, unmeasured, boundless, free!

Rolling as a mighty ocean

in its fullness over me!

Thank you God for the nice waves today!

photos: colin crawford catching a wave last easter at costa caparica

Thirty Years On

An Imaginary Return to Iran

This week in Iran they are celebrating thirty years of the Islamic Revolution. Thirty years since the overthrow of the Shah and the return of Ayatollah Khomeini from exile in Paris. And so it must be thirty one years since I travelled the length and breadth of that amazing land. Young, single and fancy free at the time, I suppose, but it was an awesome experience. A time when I learned a lot... about life and God, and believing. Lessons that have stayed with me. The images on the TV news reawaken vignettes of that moment in my life.

..The Fertile slopes and orchards of Amol leading down to the Caspian coast

....The Snows of Damavand ...... the sands of Zahedan.

........Blues tiles of Esfahan ..... lofty minarets of Mashhad.

.....Lines of tankers off the coast at Bandar e Abbas .

................................. .... Lines of trucks at the border crossing near Tabriz.

.... Corridors of Islamic learning and tradition in the mosques of Qom

................................ .....The older Zoroastrian tradition in the awesome towers of silence in Yazd.

.... The depths of history in Queen Esthers’s tomb in Hamadan

............................. ..... and in the Behustan inscription near Kermanshah.

Wow, those were heady days indeed. What an immense privilege to be part of that world and at that time. The realisation that events happen, times passes, seasons change and things are never quite the same again. The period you live in in the moment you have is so utterly unique.

I wonder how it might look if I were ever able to return. What would have changed and what would have remained the same? Ideoligies come and go. Kingdoms rise and fall. But those vast open deserts, clear blue skies, warm welcoming people, rich ancient cultures. Things like that you can’t alter. Nor the God who created and sustained this glowious world of ours. I suppose I might close with a single line from Iran's greatest poet Ferdowsi (935 – 1020) -

“Take not this world in jest, but walk with those whose steps are right;
right as thine end propose If thou wouldst be with men of glorious name”