New directions (how the shift is playing out, part 2)

Just over three months ago, this sabbatical time between homeschooling and starting my graduate program began.  In one short week, I found that I had more free time than I'd had in the previous 7 1/2 years   maybe ever?  To be honest, it scared me a little bit.  Would I come to the end of it in a better place than where I began?  Would I squander vast portions of the day on things that really didn't matter?  The temptation to start writing HUGE lists of all the things that I thought that I *should* do was very strong.

But somehow, I found myself choosing a different path, prompted in part by a book that I was reading, Learning a New Routine: Reading the Sermon on the Mount by Jon Swanson.  He wrote:

Here's the new routine:  Ask God what part of His kingdom He wants you to seek right now.  And seek it.  And ask.  And seek.  And ask.  And seek.

That became my daily prayer as I made a sort of "spine" list for my day that included only the absolute necessities, and I would give space for God to show me how He would choose to use me in those spaces.

At first, much of the time was spent in my own transition of grieving the stage that was past, intense prayer for all of us, reading intently, working through many things in conversation with God.  As time went on, He began to use me in reaching out to others.  Through the wonderful promptings of His Spirit, there would be a nudge to send a card, to share a quote, or to give a quick call to ask how someone was doing.  There was time to begin a prayer ministry that I had wanted to begin for a long time, praying for people on Facebook.  He had me lead a women's study at our church, Unglued by Lysa Terkeurst, that has helped give us tools to make imperfect progress with our emotional reactions.  In these experiences, God's timing has been confirmed over and over, deepening my trust in Him and His plan. 

Then it felt like God led me into school (completely separate from the one class that I was taking).  In a matter of weeks, I found myself being dropped into several different group experiences - one for women leading women by that involved leadership coaching, another for fitness, and one for business.  None of them were sought out specifically, but God engineered ways to place me where I needed to be.  Each one seemed to fit so neatly with the others in taking me through a process of moving beyond the inner critic to find the skills, strengths, and calling that God is using me for in this season.

As the sabbatical draws to a close, I'm finding myself ready to be embarking on this new stage of the journey.  I'll be training to become a life coach and spiritual director, working from a Christian perspective, potentially with a focus on working with those who are dealing with grief.  The more I learn about these related yet distinctly different paths, the more it feels like this is what I have been created to do.  The random experiences and personality quirks that didn't make much sense before combine in an amazing way when looking at what is needed for this new part of the journey.  God's hand has been incredibly evident as I go throughout this learning time, and I'm prayerfully excited to see what He has in store in this not-yet-time-for-Abigail-to-be-joining-us time!

He has given me a new song to sing, a hymn of praise to our God.  Many will see what He has done and be amazed.  They will put their trust in the LORD.  Psalm 40:3 NLT

Sabbatical

A friend referred to these days I am in as a sabbatical, and I immediately latched on to the term.  In the academic world, it is a year to be spend renewing and refreshing through travel, study, and rest, taken roughly every seven years.  In the trenches of motherhood, it is an unknown concept.  In the busy-ness of our American culture, even a weekly Sabbath rest is hard to carve out.

We sometimes picture God brushing the dust off his hands in the Genesis account of creation, then settling back in a recliner for a well earned rest, his work done.  Then we compare that to our own lives and bolster our decision to work straight through every day of every week of every month with a  "I'd love to rest, but there's just too much work to do.  Maybe someday when it's done."  A line in Wonderstruck has stayed with me this week:  "Sometimes it's easy to read the story of creation and think that on the seventh day God's work was done, but really God's work had only just begun.  Yet God chose to rest anyway."

This is a challenge for the side of me that loves to check things off lists, and that always has a much bigger list in my head than I could ever complete in several lifetimes.  Choosing to rest anyway.  The overachiever in the back of my mind is raising her hand, ready to denounce the laziness. 

I read further, and ponder along with the author that the two longest commandments are worshiping only God and not idols, and observing the Sabbath.  Even the overachiever is forced to put her hand down when confronted by this thought:

Apart from developing a healthy rhythm of rest, we succumb to idols and their constant demands.  The Sabbath provides the space we need to recognize the false gods that slip into our lives when we are distracted.  This holy day gives us the opportunity to remove them and recalibrate our lives to God.

Gulp.  My idols.  In this sabbatical time, God is revealing them for what they are, and they sometimes show up in unlikely places.  They have snuck in to my life, with their promises that by following them, everything else will be good.  By carefully adhering to each item on their lists, I'll have nothing to worry about.  And worst of all, I realize that many of them crept in by disguising themselves as God's will.  At first a well-intentioned way of following God, they had shifted and grown so much that trust began to be placed on them instead.  News reports have a way of revealing them lately.  I'll hear something and begin to think, "Oh, but I don't have to worry about that, because we . . . .  oh wait, we don't.  Aggghhhh!  What will we do, we're not safe anymore?!?"  And just like that, an idol is revealed for what it had started to become, something sneaking in place of God.

This sabbatical time is reminding me that our true safety and rest only come from the One whom we follow, not on our actions or those of others.  And that in the end, God is bigger than even the worst nightmare that we can imagine, and is capable of redeeming it into something beautiful, for His glory.  So if you catch me with my feet up for a bit, pull up a chair and join me?  The lists will still be there, the laundry isn't going to run off, and as long as the kids are in a secure location, they can entertain themselves for a few minutes.  We'll take a few minutes to rest and seek God, and remember that the world really won't stop turning if we pause.