Until I Sit

It’s when I take time to sit that I know how to stand.

Sometimes I find the creativity just flows off the page as I write, but other seasons it seems I feel I have nothing to say.  Yet, there are other times, which I find is most times, that it’s not until I sit down to write that I realize there are words there waiting behind the noise of the day.  I’m reminded in these places how much I’m missing because I’m not sitting.  Well it’s more than the sitting but the stillness that comes when I stop.  If I go too long without sitting I find I can no longer stand.  It’s the sitting that gives me space to realign myself with all that I desire to stand for and the ways I want to live.  I have to find some stillness or I get misdirected by the waves of busyness.  I have to remember what’s important or else it’s decided for me by the demands of the day.  Until I sit I forget how to stand.  

“…Mary, who sat at the Lord's feet and listened to his teaching…but one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her.”

Luke 10:39,42 ESV

Luke tells the story of the sisters Mary and Martha.  I love the picture of how Mary sits with Jesus.  I don’t want to get into Mary versus Martha but I want to look at how Jesus affirms Mary’s time sitting with Him.  He says it will not be taken away from her.  Sometimes we can see being still as a waste of time or be more inclined to be doing something that seems more productive.  Yet, in the words of Jesus this time that Mary sat with Him is the good portion.  It’s good to sit with Jesus.  When we take time to sit with Him we can hear His voice teaching us in the way we should go.  Jesus says to Martha in the midst of her troubling about many things that this one thing is necessary.  The one thing is to sit with Him.  How can we stand for Him if we don’t first sit with Him?!  

In the shadows

“Where life brings you shadows remember that means there is light.”

I recently did some off-roading in search of the yellow aspens of Colorado.  As much as I love shade on a hot day I found the shadows to be the hardest roads to navigate because they were the hardest to see what the road conditions were like.  It was those shadowed spots that required slower speeds and lots of trust for the unknown of what the tires might find beneath the shadows.  It’s interesting that something so refreshing in other circumstances can also be the most unsettling and blinding.  So many things in life feel shadowed and unknown.  They require slower speeds and more trust.  While the road I drove was hard to see at spots I had seen other cars coming and going and so I knew that I could trust the road.  Whatever shadows life brings we can trust the road is taking us somewhere for behind every shadow there is light.  Slow down, trust the light, and enjoy the ride.  

“Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow.”

James 1:17 NASB

Even in scripture shadows have conflicting representation.  While we can find rest in the shadows it is also the shadows that bring deception and trials.  James is encouraging believers to persevere in trials knowing the goodness of our God.  He is the Father of light, except in His Light there is no shifting shadow.  He won’t deceive us.  He is constant and true in His goodness.  So then no matter what shadows we walk through, no matter how many pot holes lie unseen in the shadows we can trust His goodness to see us through.  We can trust Him to show us the way through every shadowed road knowing He is a good God, giving good gifts to His children.  If you can’t see any gifts remember that behind the shadow there is light, His light there to guide you through every shadow.    

Check out this song, Hidden by United Pursuit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cqa8O1ktxk8

“Now I am hidden, in the safety of Your love

I trust Your heart and Your intentions

Trust You completely, I’m listening intently

You’ll guide me through these many shadows”