Do you ever just want to stop? Stop working, stop thinking, stop worrying, stop going, stop starting, stop stopping.
And just be?
I know I do. My husband and I bought a house five years ago that had fallen into minor disrepair. Since day one, we have been fixing this or that, tearing down or building up, replacing everything from floors to windows to doors—but always going, making it better but never stopping. There always seems to be one… more… thing.
I’m traveling in Italy with my daughter—an unbelievable gift to me from family and close friends. Our greatest mode of transportation from town to town, other than our feet and an occasional taxi, has been by train, so in many ways, even though we’re moving, we’re also being forced to sit still. I guess we could run back and forth from car to car, but besides helping my six-month pregnant daughter, stretch, I don’t think we would accomplish much. But I find myself doing just that—going back and forth and round and round.
My mom, ahead of her time by decades, was practicing conservation probably 40 years before “recycling” came to be. When I was eight years old, in the early 1960s, while my girlfriends were taking baths in two-feet deep bath water, with bubbles, mind you, I was allowed an inch of water, maybe two at most so we could conserve water, so we could take care of this beautiful earth God had given us.
She also made me play outside, by myself, telling me I didn’t constantly need to be entertained, but that I needed to just let my mind think. I remember her sending me outside, as a five-year-old, to go lie in our backyard, a field of weeds and buttercups, to look up at the sky and watch the clouds go by. And do you know, it’s one of my favorite memories—looking up at the sky, crystal blue, dotted with fluffy clouds, surrounded by those lovely buttercups. A far cry from today’s thinking.
Are we missing something?
God says, “Look at the lilies of the field and how they grow. They didn’t work or make their clothing, Yet Solomon in all his glory was not dressed as beautifully as they are. And if God cares so wonderfully for wild flowers that are here today and thrown into the fire tomorrow, He will certainly care for you.” Matthew 6:28-30a (NLT).
Are we missing it?
I’m not saying that we should all quit our jobs and stop doing anything, but that maybe what we hold so dear, so important, doesn’t deserve nearly the attention we give it and maybe, just maybe, we need to remember the lilies… or those beautiful buttercups. God loves us so much.
