Kelly, Davis and Zoe were with me the first week of camp. We hung out at meals with students and while I was in track times with students they tried to make the best of the mostly wet and cool weather we had all week.
After each meal, Davis and I would leave a little early and go outside the dining hall to throw the frisbee together. This is one of Davis' (and his dad's) favorite past times, and for a little guy he's got a pretty amazing throw. In fact, it's pretty much a show-stopper: when people walking by Davis would see this little kid chuck the frisbee as well as he did they would stop and watch in wonder and amazement. Often, it came complete with cheers and clapping.
As the week went on, Davis became more and more tuned in to the crowds thronging around him. He would get the frisbee, look around to see who was watching, and would often hold the frisbee until the crowd grew a little bit larger...especially if it was a crowd of cute girls. He was no longer throwing the frisbee for the love of the game, he was throwing it for the love of the crowd.
I felt like the Lord was showing me a two foot mirror of my own soul. This is my same sickness. I do some things well. I take those things and use them as a tool to manipulate recognition, praise, applause from the people around me--often timing my performance to get maximum shock and awe value. In so doing, I lose the proper reward for the activity I'm engaged in (in Davis' case it's throwing the frisbee; in my own case it's giving a good talk or caring for a student well or thinking strategically about the next step for our fellowship) and instead exchange it for a secondary thing that would not be bad in and of itself were it not for my constant angling for it.
And so I'm learning how to recklessly delight in simply throwing the frisbee well. I'd love to learn to enjoy playing catch with my good Father rather than always being so tuned in to the people around me. I'm grateful to the Lord for showing me another way to understand my battle with this monster that it is my pride. And for even giving me a taste of the Father's sadness as I lost the enjoyment of the simplicity of the game with my son.
Davis and I have got a long way to go in terms of living in a state of humble grace. In the mean time, yesterday he and I were back at it in the driveway, just the two of us, lazily tossing the frisbee on a glorious Spring afternoon--and it was very, very good.
2 comments:
thanks for the post alex. good to have you back...Macon you did a great job. I really appreciate and am blessed by the ways that you are willing to hear the Lord speak to you seem to seek him out in your life. I have been on a journey of listening to the Lord more, and shutting myself up. This is encouraging. tell me, do you usually come to these ideas and conclusions when they actually happen, or when you look back at them and think? thanks!
It was great to see you last week!
thanks for the comment, brandon! great to see you last week.
i feel like the conclusions i come to are occasionally on the spot (this post's reflections certainly were) and more often in retrospect. the trick with the 'retrospective' is to know what's actually worth thinking about later and what's just normal stuff that happens during the day. i think that all of this has come over the course of lots of years of reflecting and tons and tons of journaling.
henri nouwen tells a great story of taking a sabbatical at a monastery where they make muffins with fresh blueberries that they grow on-site. he talks about the painstaking process of cleaning the blueberries after they've been picked. at one point nouwen is cleaning the blueberries and as they're going through the final rinse the supervising monk orders a complete halt: "I hear a rock!" they all stop and pick through hundreds and hundreds of blueberries before finding the offending (very small) pebble. "how'd you know?" nouwen asks. "i listen to the machine," he responds.
i think that learning to listen to and for the Spirit's work in our lives is a lot like that. It takes lots of time and reflection and patience, but we've got to learn to listen to the machine if we're going to learn what the Lord would have us to learn. Even learning to listen to the Holy Spirit plant a flag on an event or conversation in your life to circle back to later to process with Him.
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