This past Tuesday morning I came down with some kind of ailment. Didn’t know at the time if it was the dreaded “H1N1” virus (it wasn’t) but honestly I didn’t feel bad enough to really care. I didn’t feel terrible, but my terrible cough and the fear of what the sickness could probably have been and whether it was contagious or not made me wary enough to work from home. I didn’t get better over the next couple days and ended up just staying home. I watched some tv, answered some e-mails, slept a ton, drank copious amounts of water…and happy to announce that I’m on the mend.
It’s interesting though, if I had taken a few days of vacation there’s no doubt that I would have thrown myself hard into times of growth, times with the Lord, study, creative brainstorming (if that were possible, stress seems to rob me of any creative power). But since I was officially “sick”, I found myself without any obligation to be productive. Weird.
It’s amazing how times when I’m supposed to Sabbath or rest are the times I work the hardest socially, emotionally even spiritually sometimes. I hit a breaking point this week, I told God I was done talking.
I’m done taking every opportunity with the Lord to air my laundry list of prayers or formulating noble excuses for God’s silence because my 4-second attention span doesn’t yield instantaneous answers, comprehension or action plans. It can so easily become legalistic in a way to feel good about going through the motions, a satisfaction that I have done good on a certain day.
But I was done. I don’t want my relationship with God to be one-sided or to become a list of habits. I want to just be in the presence of God (thanks Tom Sipling) and let that be enough. These past few days I’ve just been. I haven’t gone head deep into disciplines or habits, I’ve not scheduled time in or felt obligated to do anything.
And it’s been the most refreshing few days I’ve had in a long while. I need to get sick more often apparently…
