Monday, December 19, 2011

Mary

Throughout my spiritual journey
I notice "Themes" God takes me through.
My current focus seems to be learning from Mary
and her relationship with Him.

Themes are not coincidences!
Not only am I due to give birth (again)
during Christmas season...
Not only am I teaching at a Catholic School
where there is much more talk about Mary...
Not only am I going to Mass every week
where many of the scripture readings deal with Mary...
Not only was it the Feast of the Immaculate Conception
just two weeks ago,
which focuses it's celebration on Mary...
Not only am I reading through the beginnings
of the gospel of Luke right now
due to our Pastor's current series on Luke...
Themes!

When I was at Biola we were required to take a comm class
so I enrolled in "Oral Interpretation"!
It sounded perfect for me, as it meant I could do the performance part
but wouldn't have to write my own speeches or
face the pressure of debating someone more quick-witted than I.

Oral Interpretation is where the performer
takes an excerpt of either a book, scripture or a script
and READS it, while engaging the audience
through frequent eye contact, dramatic voice,
and true "oral interpretation" of the meaning of the text.
(I personally think it should have to be
the required comm class for all education majors!)

The semester after I took that class
I was reading through Phillip Yancey's The Jesus I Never Knew
and I was drawn to underline several excerpts
as I could not help but envision
a Christmas season oral interpretation of these sections!

Fast forward 8 years...
to a few weeks ago,
when I heard we were starting to study Luke at church
and I got pretty excited.
Then I was cleaning out our bookshelves
(yes- I was NESTING!)
and happened upon all these underlined passages
in Yancey's book, and reread that whole section.
Then I was sitting in the pew
listening and learning about Zechariah and Elizabeth
and looking forward to the next section of Luke
when I saw it would directly correlate with
the underlined texts I had just been reading at home that week!

It seemed to all come together for me
and I felt a tug at my spirit, to ask Kirk if he thought there'd be room
in next week's sermon for me to do an oral interpretation.

Well, long story a lil' shorter,
I did do it,
and I got some feedback that it helped some people
internalize and really picture what some of Mary's circumstances
may have been like at that time.

So I wanted to share it with you.
FYI: The video takes a little while to load,
so open the webpage and let it sit for a few minutes...
It's six and a half minutes long.



Remember to view the video
you m ay need to visit the blog site
www.hickles.blogspot.com

I encourage you,
if you haven't ever or haven't for a long time,
to read The Jesus I Never Knew by Phillip Yancey!
I would like to reread it.
We'll see if this new season of parenting TWO allows for it.
ha!
Merry Christmas!

1 comment:

  1. i haven't read anything longer than a "status update" in 5 years.

    ReplyDelete

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