Learning Along The Way

What is Enough?

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The sun is just up over the horizon, the house is quiet, the only noise the hum of the refrigerator. Outside is a different thing.

Birds of countless varieties are moving and chattering; calling out their finds of bugs, worms, seeds.

Beads of dew on blades of grass catching new light as if a thousand diamonds grace the ground.

All is quiet for a moment; a hush of new day awareness.

A mockingbird begins its litany of imitations with the loudest voice in the yard and the chorus begins anew.

A hummingbird swoops into view, hovers near the lemon tree where the fragrance of the tree draws in search of a blossom to dip into to.

This moment is enough.

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What does that even mean?

In a culture that looks for the next best thing, seeks more than what is and uses “never” to pair with enough, it’s hard to imagine that something that simple and quiet can be called enough.

And yet, it’s moments like this our soul finds satisfaction.

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How can we capture moments? How do we learn to see them in the first place?

Practice. It’s possible to learn to see, learn to hear. Jesus said let them who have eyes to see, see. Let them who have ears to hear, hear.  That seems to me to be an invitation to ask for that to be true for me. For each of us.

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Some call it mindfulness. Some use the phrase living with intention.

I call it Living in Tandem.

Living in Tandem with the One who offers the gift of each moment. It’s learning to live aware. Aware of subtlety. Aware of the expanse hidden in a seed.

Aware of His abiding Presence.

One of the greatest tools I have come across for developing this awareness of God’s Presence is the little book Practicing the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence.

Brother Lawrence was a Carmelite monk in 17th century Paris. Before he joined the monastery he served in the army because he was so poor he knew he would be fed and clothed in turn for his serving. While in the army in the dead of winter, he saw a tree which was of course without leaves or fruit. He realized the tree as a symbol of hope for new life. It was at that moment “first flashed in upon my soul the fact of God”. This point of conversion led him to eventually join the Carmelite monastery in Paris.

Brother Lawrence was a simple man without advanced learning yet his simple awareness of God’s abiding Presence was noticed by all who encountered him.  We have Abbe de Beaufort to thank for having conversations with Brother Lawrence and writing them down for us to be able to glean for our own spiritual growth.  If you have not yet read this thin book I highly recommend you do.

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Developing awareness of God is a life long practice. And yet God wants to be found by us, to have our hearts turned toward Him, to learn to trust Him.

What is enough? You are. As you are. Because if you love Christ and are on the journey with Him, He lives in you. See? You actually are MORE than enough.

30 Days of Giving #20: Rhythm

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Gloucester Cathedral doorAs a little girl it took me a long time to spell this word correctly. In the logic side of my brain there are no vowels in the word rhythm. Unless you learned the “and sometimes y” rule of spelling.

It’s a great word really: rhythm; not a new word to our language at all.  If you know your ancient languages, Greek precedes Latin in history and both languages have definitions that English has absorbed.  The Greek language gave us the word rhythm from their word rhythmos which means measured flow or movement; Latin said rhythmus meant “movement in time”.

Think music. As I write this my percussionist hubster is packing his drumstick bag into our suitcase in the next room.  We fly to Florida tomorrow where he is attending his alma mater’s marching band reunion for the first time since he graduated from UF (in the previous century).

He is all about rhythm.  Tapping foot, thumping fingers, trilling tongue; rhythm is always happening.  I think his mother must have the patience of Job because both Colin and his next younger brother are percussionists so drumming and banging went on in their home all the time.  Thankfully for her, they are both gifted musically, so they actually made music not just noise.

The Greek word rhythmos doesn’t stop at music.  Listen to these further definitions: arrangement, order, form, shape.

Think seasons. There is an arrangement, an order to the seasons; spring: full of anticipation of new growth; summer: showing off signs full fruit & flower; fall: arms full of abundance and colors change while temperatures cool; winter: blanketed with gray or white to rest from growing.

We expect seasons.  We need the order of seasons.  We look for and live by the rhythm of the seasons.  How many times have you heard someone comment on the out of sync display of Christmas merchandise in mid-October?  This jars the rhythm that we have come to expect and need.

But the Greeks didn’t stop with music or seasons in their definition of rhythmos: they also used the word to identify “soul disposition”.  Now here is a definition of rhythm that can use some exploring!

What is the disposition of a soul?  How does a soul demonstrate rhythm? How does one practice soul rhythms?

I, by no means, have this thought through all the way or clearly understood or even developed within me, but there are lots of people who have gone before us who’ve pondered and shared what they learned as they practiced soul rhythms.  I have gone through seasons of reading books by authors who lived hundreds of years ago, gleaning what I could from their experiences.

My #1 all time favorite read of this nature is Practicing the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence. In the thin book, a collection of letters compiled by a friend, Brother Lawrence told of his deepening journey of faith through the rhythms of his daily life.

What are your current rhythms of daily life?  Do they bring you through awareness of your need for rest, re-creation, growth, giving out, work, renewal?  Is your soul full or starved? Do you feel abundance or stretched thin over too many responsibilities?

spiritual disciplinesThese two are on my shortlist to read. They each have wisdom to offer to help with my soul rhythm.  I want to get in sync with what God is doing and not miss a beat.

How about you?

Learning to Listen

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This lovely sunflower is a volunteer in my garden.  That means I didn’t plant it.  Sometimes volunteers come from the naturalizing of plants.  Sometimes they come from birds.  And sometimes a volunteer shows up from long dormant seeds that have finally received enough water to sprout the life hidden within.

How seeds come to life in unlikely places is such a mystery!  All the conditions for growth have to be there for the seed to be successful.   Sometimes the conditions look lush and it makes perfect sense a plant would sprout. Sometimes the conditions look harsh and it’s amazing a seed would even sprout not to mention take root and flourish!  I do some preparation for my garden but really I am a neglectful gardener.  When I see a volunteer thriving in my yard I’m thrilled!  That new life in an unlikely place makes me think of a picture from my  life.

My adult life looked pretty straightforward: finish college, earn a teaching credential, start teaching, get married, start a family.  Pretty standard stuff.  But the path wasn’t  straight and easy.  I came around a bend and a Big Boulder blocked my path.  There was no where to go!  I sat down, overwhelmed by this roadblock in my otherwise perfect life.  I sank into despair.  As an untrained listener, I thought whatever happened next was on me to figure out.

I spent a lot of time trying to see how to get over this Boulder right in front of me.  I tried the climbing technique of “bouldering”: finding hand holds and foot holds to scale the side of it; I tried working my way around it; I even tried chipping away at it, all in hopes of breaking it down to continue on the path I thought my life should be on.  I made some headway and climbed up almost to the top ready to jump over onto the other side when my foot slipped and I slid down a different side, crashing to the bottom, ending not on the path, but off in the weeds!  I was a mess!  Trying to make something happen on my own without seeking help landed me in a heap and back into despair!

It was after this second detour that I finally caught a clue; I can’t navigate the path of my life without guidance.  I needed to seek  wisdom, learn to listen and apply wisdom to my life.  I submitted myself to the One who transplanted the seed of my life and began in me the process of sprouting, growing and bringing forth new life.

Learning to listen to the Voice is a process.  I thought there was a to do list to work through that would equal great growth;  “I’ve done my chores now bless me Father” kind of relationship.  It was a starting place for sure.  But God calls us forth to so much more from so much less.  He wants each of us to simply be with Him.  Learning to listen to His voice whisper in the wind, speak in the hush of snowfall, or call over the ocean waves crashing on the shore has taken lots of practice.  Other than the Word, the most powerful little book that has been a tool of listening for me is Practicing the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence.  Learning to listen to and be with God was Brother Lawrence’s greatest aim.  Whether peeling potatoes in the kitchen or doing daily chores or in times of prayer with the brethren, Brother Lawrence developed the habit of listening to the One Who is always present.

We can too.  There are so many challenges to listening in our information saturated culture with the “entertain me now” mindset; the challenge to push back against the noise to find even a moment of silence and solitude can be more of a battle than a challenge!  If you are in this process of learning to listen, I’d love to share in this challenge with you. We need to be in community with others who, like Brother Lawrence, desire to be “present to the Presence”.

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