Autumn Hops and the Hound of Heaven

Con lúpulo a la izquierda y la Catedral de Astorga al fondo.
Hops on the left forefront and the Cathedral, Astorga, at the center.

Lúpulo de Otoño y el Sabueso del Cielo

Noventa y nueve por ciento de todo el lúpulo para la producción de cerveza crece en esta provincia de León. España es el cuarto productor de cerveza en Europa después de Alemania, Reino Unido y Polonia, pero es el mayor productor ya que las compañías alemanas dependen del lúpulo español importado para la mayoría de su producción.

Ninety-nine% of all hops for beer production are grown in our province, León. Spain is the fourth largest beer producer in Europe after Germany, the UK and Poland, but is the biggest grower since German beer companies rely on these Spanish hops imported for the majority of their production.

Estos días de otoño, primero templados, luego fresquines, se extienden hasta los largos meses de invierno, cuando la lectura llega a ser más constante y con mayor intensidad. Una de esas lecturas me recordó una expresión que había oído tanto que pensaba que tenía que ser un versículo bíblico.
Descubrí, sin embargo, que el "sabueso del cielo" es el título de un poema de 182 versos  del irlandés, Francis Thompson, por el que se hizo famoso.
Fotos acompañadas con la interpretación moderna en inglés.  

These fall days, first warm, then chilly, stretch long into the long winter months, when reading becomes more constant and with deeper intensity. One such reading reminded me of a term I'd heard so often that I thought it must be a Bible verse.
I discovered, however, that the "hound of heaven" is from the 182-line poem by the Englishman Francis Thompson, for which he became famous.
Photos and The Hound of Heaven, modern interpretation.

Las plantas trepadoras del lúpulo repletas de flores listas para ser recogidas en septiembre. 

He followed me peacefully and swiftly, yet unhurriedly.

He told me, “all people who betray you, betray Me.” (John 15:18-19

If the world hates you, realize that it hated me first.

If you belonged to the world, the world would love its own;

but because you do not belong to the world, and I have chosen you out of the world, the world hates you.) I kept trying to get away from God.

Though I knew of His love for me,

I feared that if I had Him,

I would have to give up everything else.

I kept running across the ends of the universe.

I wanted to hide from this tremendous Lover.

I even tried to hide in the sky.

I tried to tempt the God’s servants to help me hide from God, but they were on His side.

I realized my own sinfulness next to their faithfulness.

So I tried to find another fast way to flee from God.

I clung to the wind.

But no matter where the wind took me, God continued to follow, peacefully and swiftly, yet unhurriedly.

Las flores verdes del lúpulo que sirven para hacer cerveza.

He said, “Nothing shelters you that will not shelter me.”

I stopped trying to flee from God through adults, and began through children, because they will innocently and naively help me.

It just as they started to help, their guardian angels took them away from me.

So then I turned to the beauty of nature to find my happiness.

I enjoyed sharing my experiences of happiness and sadness and all the other emotions with nature.

But even this experience of nature could not ease my human pain.

Una montaña de trepas en camino a la peladora.

I cried to Heaven but there was a language barrier.

I speak through sound. Heaven speaks through silence.

Nature cannot satisfy my thirst.

I am thirsty still. God continues to follow, peacefully and swiftly, yet unhurriedly.

He said, “Nothing contents you that doesn’t content me.”

I have nothing left that will allow me to exist without God in my life, and I have been driven to my knees. I am at rock bottom. I tried everything.

I wait for the love of God.

Everything else, all other dreams, have failed.

The earth is overloaded with heavy sadness.
God, must you break me down before you can use me for Your glory?
My heart is broken. What is to happen?

Everything is bitter, yet now and then a trumpet sounds.
The trumpet sounds from Heaven, but not before the death and resurrection of Christ.
God, must Your glory come from this rotten death? Now from this long pursuit of happiness comes God.

Las trepas peladas. Las flores han sido retiradas para ser secadas y luego utilizadas.

God says, “You keep running from Me. This is strange.
Why do you run from Me? I love you.
You didn’t do anything to merit My love.
Human love is different from My love.
For human love you need merit.
I love you no matter what you do because I Am Love.
I have prepared a place for you with all of the desires of your heart.
I am what you have been seeking this whole time. Psalm 37:4

Find your delight in the LORD who will give you your heart’s desire. John 14: 1-4
Do not let your hearts be troubled.
You have faith in God; have faith also in me.
In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places.
If there were not, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you?
And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back again and take you to myself, so that where I am you also may be.
Where I am going you know the way.

Psalm 139: 1-15 O LORD, you have probed me, you know me: you know when I sit and stand; you understand my thoughts from afar.
My travels and my rest you mark; with all my ways you are familiar.
Even before a word is on my tongue, LORD, you know it all. Behind and before you encircle me and rest your hand upon me.
Such knowledge is beyond me, far too lofty for me to reach.
Where can I hide from your spirit? From your presence, where can I flee?
If I ascend to the heavens, you are there; if I lie down in Sheol, you are there too.
If I fly with the wings of dawn and alight beyond the sea, Even there your hand will guide me, your right hand hold me fast.

If I say, “Surely darkness shall hide me, and night shall be my light”
Darkness is not dark for you, and night shines as the day.
Darkness and light are but one.
You formed my inmost being; you knit me in my mother’s womb.
I praise you, so wonderfully you made me; wonderful are your works!
My very self you knew; my bones were not hidden from you, When I was being made in secret, fashioned as in the depths of the earth.

“My heart is restless until it rests in You.” -St. Augustine

The Hound of Heaven  original
That His Pursuit of our Souls

May be Swift and Brief

 

 

It is happiness the human soul is ever yearning for. It never stops its quest for happiness. Night and day, year after year, it is grasps after happiness. Our days are long and we are weary. We endure our work to gain the wealth we think may buy rest and happiness. The days we suffer and are in pain (because no one is spared pain in this life) we try to be positive and wait for the agony (loneliness, sickness, death, betrayal...the list is so long) to pass, so we can finally be happy.

We look for happiness in nature; in every creature, in the earth, in the sea, in the air. Our soul asks nature where she finds her happiness. It asks all the creatures and the creation why they are glad and they answer, "God made us." 'We are for Him, for His glory."

So our soul, looking for happiness will not find happiness in the creation. Nature and all these things are not the source. It will find happiness only in God. And yet, instead of seeking happiness in God, we turn away from Him and continue to seek it somewhere, in someone, something; anything that isn't God.

But, God, in His incredible goodness never stops seeking our runaway souls, no matter how much we run away from Him. Wherever we run, we hear the sound of His feet following, and a His voice, stronger than the beat of His feet — But, without hurry, with an even pace; deliberate speed, majestic wisdom. The beat of His footsteps and His Voice calls to us, "All things betray thee, who betrays Me." It's true, all other things are just images of Him. If we love only a reflection we will be betrayed in the end. All the while we are running from Him who loves us true. And this is the image of the greatest love; God's never tiring of us and his relentless pursuing of us even as we run every which way but toward Him.