Rock-sitting, veil-tearing, and learning to shut up.

“And then there is time in which to be, simply to be, that time in which God quietly tells us who we are and who he wants us to be.  It is then that God can take our emptiness and fill it up with what he wants, and drains away the business with which we inevitably get involved in the dailiness of human living.”  ~Madeleine L’Engle, Walking on Water

I know we are called to movement. To change. To growth. But sometimes I feel like that's not possible until I sit myself down and get comfortable in an uncomfortable sort of way. Comfortable like sitting on a rock is comfortable.

I mean, this learning to be business is harder than change. It takes patience. Letting go of control (it's an illusion anyway). It takes focus to be still and listen. And I'm not talking about being physically still, because that is way too easy for me these days.

No, I'm talking about stilling my heart.

Mind.

Spirit.

In a culture that idolizes the race toward success, this s-l-o-w-i-n-g  d-o-w-n makes us feel restless, even lazy. But that's hardly the case.

"Be still," God whispers.  "Know that I am God." 

Be still. Not static, but still. Lean in a bit closer. Now listen.

I'm not one to expect God's voice to be audible. I'm sure it happens. Not to me. 

I don't expect writing in the clouds. Not anymore. (yes, there's a story behind that)

I don't need a lightning bolt to tell me where to go next.

I need God.

That is all. It is enough. Just knowing, remembering, that I am God's. I belong. I exist because of Love. That makes me loved unconditionally. And not just this, as if it weren't enough, but I get to be with him! There's that word- with- it keeps popping up everywhere now that I'm looking for it. I get to be with God, in relationship with him, I get to bear the image of my Creator. I have complete access to something divine because 'the veil of the temple was torn in two'. Top to bottom. It was rendered useless, meaningless, nonexistent.

What does that mean for me, sitting on this rock, in this hard place, trying to just be?

I'm not entirely sure yet. I do know that back then there was a boundary, a barrier between the holy and the profane. The sacred and the mundane were separated.

But then something provocative happened. Jesus showed up. As a baby of an underprivileged and unwed (impure) family. His life becomes a story of reconciliation, one where all the rules are turned upside-down. A rescuer, he was, but not in the typical sense. God became flesh and came to dwell with us. With us.

Jesus essentially tore back the curtain that separated us, the creation, from being with our Maker.

So I get to sit here and take it in. I get to stop trying to do good things for God and just be with him instead.

Stunning.

* * * * * * * * * 

Be-ing is an odd thing. But it is what we were created to do. After all, when asked what God wanted to be called, what his name is, God answered "I AM". There it is again. God is. And that isn't just enough, it is everything.

So this place I'm in, this rock that I sit on, uncomfortable and quiet as it may be, is the very best place for me to lean in and hear my Maker whisper these truths back in the wind, in the rustling oak trees, in the bubbling stream...that I am loved just because he loves. Because all is sacred. Because of Jesus.

Because I AM, too.