Busyness and Leaves

I’m sitting in the inactivity, trying to let His presence be enough.

And I’m made aware of just how hard that is for me.

I’m feeling the great freedom it brings to just sit and not need to be doing for or saying to Him.  And yet I’m feeling my need to be doing something.

People pass me by and I wonder what they’re thinking of me, if they’re wondering what I’m doing.  I position myself over my journal, in hopes they’ll think that I’m writing or working on something.  To let them think I’m sitting and doing nothing would let them wonder if perhaps I’m not ok.

And I let that worry determine my actions.

I’ve wondered just recently how I seem to inevitably end up giving an impression of being busy.  But as I wonder, I ponder the even more important question: what if I’m not as busy as people think?  Am I willing to let them see me as someone who doesn’t have a lot on their plate?

Often, I find the answer is no.

Busyness brings with it an ability to control.  It allows a drawing of lines around my life; where I’ll let people enter and where I won’t.  It lets me choose when I’ll spend time and just be with people and when I won’t.  It places them in their scheduled time slot and then moves on to do the things I feel are necessary in the other slots.  It doesn’t leave much room for flexibility.

And yet, as unappealing as that sounds, I find there’s safety there.  

And it shows as I look back on my life and see that over and over again I’ve ended up in this place.

As I sit in His presence and try to let that be enough, I’m drawn to the rustling on the leaves of the trees around me.  There’s peace in their soft sound and majesty in their gentle roar as the wind picks up.  

I keep thinking about how the movement of the Spirit is compared to the wind and how the rustling of the leaves is evidence of the wind.  

I want to be a leaf.

I want to be evidence of the presence of God; a display of His gentleness and proof of His majesty.

In front of those rustling trees stand bushes, packed tightly together, leaves all intertwined.  

They’re not moving much.

I see this in myself.  I see how by packing my life so full of things, things that really are good, I’ve not created space that allows for flexibility when God moves. 

But, leaving empty space is scary.  It means potentially having times where I’m not doing anything I see as specifically productive or beneficial.  What if there are people I could be helping or things I could be doing and I’m not?

My eyes wander across the row of trees and fall on something that strikes me as funny in its context: a cluster of fake metal flags raised high.  Surrounded by the swinging limbs and fluttering leaves, they nearly look ridiculous, posed in position as if swept in precise direction by the wind.  

So often this is me.  I so desire to look the part and to appear as though I have it all together, that I position my life so as to facilitate that.  I fill it with good things and good people, in hopes of getting things right.  

But Jesus never desired people who look the part.  In fact, time and time again He called those people out and developed friendships with those who were honest about their problems.

You see, positioning my life in a way that allows God to move means being willing to sometimes look inactive.  If those flags were real, they would sometimes lay limp against their poles.  

But they would be real.

They would began to move as the wind came along: sometimes gently lifting, sometimes waving violently.  

And being real and creating space to let God move as He sees fit means surrendering to whatever that may look like: whether crazy storms or gentle breezes or laying still.

And He’s gentling reminding me that that’s what He desires of me.   He’s reminding me that my life is not about me controlling what I do so that I know for sure I can do good things, but instead about Him moving and bringing me along in what He’s doing.  He doesn’t want lines drawn around my life, but complete control.

And this brings freedom from needing to cram my life full of good things as well as the reminder that He is fully capable of moving without my plans.

I’m beginning to see this as I end up in a class that I wasn’t supposed to have and have a chance for renewed friendship there.  And I’m beginning to see it as I run into a friend at a store I hardly ever go to, and as I head out on a jog and see a friend in her car and come back from that jog and am passed by someone else I know.  And again He reminds me as He creates space to sit and be with someone between commitments with time I didn’t think I would have.

He is a very capable God, fully able to make Himself known without me arranging my schedule in the way I think He needs.  Rather, He first desires that I be with Him and let Him move as He wants, taking the chance that sometimes I may appear to be doing nothing.  In those moments, being a leaf is enough, because it always reflects the action of the wind.