looking through me

Category: Uncategorized

March 29, 2015

still

Stilllll.

I breathe out the word. A long, slow exhale. I feel my shoulders drop—when did they creep up to my ears?—and my spine elongate.

It’s a powerful word.

In the midst of the frenzy, in the midst of the mundane, be still.

Without realizing it I had lumped be still and all its cousins—do not worry about tomorrow, rejoice always, take my yoke—into the category of Some Day. An aspiration for Some Day when everything aligns and all facets of life hum along in perfect harmony for fifteen consecutive minutes.

But the truths of the Bible weren’t recorded in times of tranquility and ease. The words weren’t given to people who had it all together. They were as shocking and improbable to the original audience as they are to me. The first hearers didn’t have the ability to put them on a future to-attempt list; they had to respond that moment. No response—postponing the decision—was itself a choice, a rejection of the opportunity. The same is true for me.

Imperatives are possible. That’s the beautiful part I’ve been missing.

Be still is not an intellectual riddle or a code to be broken or a fanciful dream. I can be still. It’s a truth I am equipped to embody. Not perfectly. Not through my own strength or ability. But as I go about my day, the word whispers through me: still. A check to see what reality I’m living in as I drive, reply to emails, cuddle my nephew, put sheets on the bed, sit in meetings . . . It’s a reminder to find stillness in the only One who can provide it.

So I repeat the word throughout the day. A silent call to rest in Jesus.

As I hear it, my soul settles. The internal pressure lessens. The deep breath illustrates how shallowly I’ve been breathing, how shallowly I’ve been living.

This moment I will be still.

 

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March 26, 2015

tree rings

Cells haul life from root to crown. Xylem cell upon xylem cell upon xylem cell carry water and minerals from the deepest root to the farthest leaf, a microscopic bucket brigade. And the tree grows year by year: ring upon ring upon ring of cells. The inner rings—the strong, dead core of heartwood—encased by years of expansion unaware how active the new, young layers are. The outer rings—the vital sapwood—unaware how their growth is shaped by the rings from which they spring.

Like family. Generations upon generations are shaped by those before them. I stand because they stood. They support me as I will support those yet to come.

Even in my prime—my generation pulsing with possibility—I’m no longer in the youngest, outermost layer. A new ring rises. Pressed from both sides, confined by the rigid walls of the generations, soon my ring will be entombed deep in the heart of the tree.

And like the xylem cell passing the bucket of sustenance to the next xylem cell—not worried about the rings deeper in the tree—I look out more than I look in. But as the years pass each bucket grows heavier, weighted down with water and nitrogen and potassium and memories. I long to hear the rings falling silent behind me speak again, to tap into their trove of memories.

So I call back into the heartwood and listen. I add as much as I can carry from their worn buckets to my own. I murmur the story of our tree—the generations’ mingled memories—into the sapwood before me that they might carry it from root to crown, xylem cell upon xylem cell upon xylem cell, ring upon ring upon ring.

 

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