one whole day a week?

     A long time ago, a much-older friend tried to convince me to set aside one whole day a week as a no-work day (and he saw ‘work’ as anything that would give me a head start in Monday’s rat race). It would be a day for breathing easy and enjoying people and delighting and celebrating and being refreshed. It would be a day of rest.

     I had three small children and a job and a lot of other reasons for not listening to him. I couldn’t afford to have a day of rest. I figured I would start later.

     That was thirty years (and about 1,500 weeks) ago. Now I’m the (probably) much-older friend trying to convince you.

“We mostly spend [our] lives conjugating three verbs: to Want, to Have, and to Do. Craving, clutching, and fussing, . . . we are kept in perpetual unrest.” Evelyn Underhill

“You shall work six days, but on the seventh day you shall rest. Even during plowing time and harvest, you shall rest.” Exodus 34:21 

if-onlys

     A few days ago, I had dinner with close friends, and we did something unusual. We told each other about our if-onlys.

     You probably have your own collection--if only I had chosen a different career or grabbed that one-time business opportunity or gone to a different school or gotten married or whatever. The older you get, the more if-onlys you have.

     If-onlys make you feel awful. They say, “It’s too late now. That ship has sailed. You had a chance to lead a full and satisfying life, but you blew it. You should be ashamed.” They convince you that, if only you had made different choices, you wouldn’t feel the gnawing emptiness you feel.

     But they lie. Only one thing can fill our emptiness.

“Only holy time, in which we experience the presence of God, can fill our emptiness.” Marva Dawn

“In Your presence there is fullness of joy.” Psalm 16:11

from stuffy to spacious

     I made a decision this morning. I decided to spend the day counting gifts. I decided to look for gifts everywhere and say thank-you for them and write down as many as I can. A friend is doing it with me, which will make it easier to stay on track when I feel more like complaining than counting. I won’t do it perfectly, but that’s okay. Every gift I count today will be one small step from stuffy to spacious.

“[A] spacious land that God has given. . . .” Judges 18:10

“She was a kind of abacus of thanksgiving in flesh and blood.” Mark Buchanan (of a woman in her eighties who spent her days counting gifts) 

invitations

     Sometimes I get stuck. I want to change a habit or start again to do that one thing I love to do, but I’m pulled in too many directions. There are too many voices competing for my attention (including my own you-should and you-never and you-couldn’t voices). I get overwhelmed, so I don’t move.

     That changes when I allow myself to be quiet, because sometimes in the quiet I hear very gentle invitations. They aren’t extraordinary or earth-shattering. Usually they are plain and simple invitations to take one small step, like a child learning to walk. When I say yes, the next step is a lot easier. Before I know it, I’m unstuck. It almost always happens one gentle invitation at a time.

“The voice of God is very gentle; we cannot hear it if we let other voices compete.” Evelyn Underhill 

“[O]verwhelmed with worries about all the things they have to do and all the things they want to get.” Mark 4:19

wide, too

sometimes

i am free

(because

Your arms

are opened

wide

to me)

to open

my arms

wide, too--

happy pauper

arms wide open

hands empty

bringing

nothing

(except

yes)

“For a child has been born . . . Prince of Wholeness . . .

and there’ll be no limits to the wholeness he brings.”

Isaiah 9:6-7

the parade

     I woke up last night and couldn’t get back to sleep because so many thoughts were knocking at my door. Normally I let them in and entertain them, but last night I decided to do something different. I let them in, but, instead of entertaining them, I just watched them parade across my mind and out the back door.

There were thoughts of every size and description. After a while, I noticed that they had one surprising thing in common. Each thought was saying some version of “you should be ashamed” (for not trying hard enough or being good enough or whatever). I kept watching the parade, and then something strange and wonderful happened: I began to realize that I didn’t have to believe them.

“Let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think.” Romans 12:2

“To be human is to be infected with this phenomenon we call shame.” Dr. Curt Thompson