Lost (Ordinary Time - Day 3)

Black Mustard Seeds

2 Corinthians 6:3-7:1

People are watching us when we're . . . alert, unswerving, in hard times, in tough times, in bad times, beaten up, jailed, mobbed, working hard, working late, working without eating, pure hearted, clear headed, steady handed, gentle, holy, loving honestly, telling the truth, allowing God to show power, doing our best to set things right, praised, blamed, slandered, honored, true to our word, distrusted, terrifically alive, rumored to be dead, refusing to die, filled with deep joy, living on handouts, enriching others, living with nothing, and living with everything.

If five of our closest friends were interviewed, what would they say about us?

Would they say that we've entered a wide-open and spacious life? Would they say we're living openly and expansively? 

Or

Would they say we're living small?

As human beings, we have this one unique thing that separates us from the animal and plant kingdoms . . . passion.

We have the ability to be good at something, to thrive at something, and to open ourselves up to lives that are so free and wide open that the people around us want what we have. 

I play harmonica every once in awhile at my church. Because I love playing the harmonica and singing, I get up on the stage and get lost in a dimension that I can't experience unless I'm playing the harmonica and singing. 

When I wake up in the morning to write, no matter how much I've slept (last night I got 4.5 hours), I get lost in a world that can't be experienced unless I wake up.

When I write or play harmonica, I'm connecting with a source of life inside of me that catapults me into an existence that I can't experience any other way. 

But then, there's this problem. Purpose. Sometimes, or most of the time, we think our purposes can't possibly have anything to do with our passions. We go to school, study for courses that we're not passionate about, get jobs that don't match our ambitions, hang out with people who settle for smallness. Yet, the voice inside keeps insisting that somewhere back there, we missed something. We stopped listening. We stopped thriving. We stopped playing.

We start listening instead to the narrative of smallness. We start out with huge, ambitious ideas that money will make up for the absence of passion. We put our dreams and our creative energies aside, saying to ourselves, "I'll just get myself situated first."

The more we stay away from our passions and the things that bring us life, the more we start hearing a different narrative, a narrative that seems to sweep people away without their even noticing. Perhaps you've heard the narrative and you're already falling in line. It says, "You won't make any money doing that . . . you can't make a living doing that . . . you need to go to school . . . you need to build your resume if you want to be successful."

Perhaps we've listened and become convinced that this narrative leads to life and fulfillment, but months and years later we're banging our heads against the wall wondering, What happened?

Back to the part earlier about our uniqueness from the animal and plant kingdoms. We have the opportunity to follow our passions with unlimited zeal and drive. The only thing stopping us is . . . us. When we connect with the voice that keeps reminding us of what gives us life, and listen to it, and start doing it, we connect with God. Because, following God and following the voice inside that leads us to life-giving adventures and endeavors are synonymous with each other. They are one and the same. 

We've already been given all the clues we need to finding God, because we need look no further than what we love to do - what brings us life, what makes us get lost in another dimension. We have the opportunity to build our lives around this, to sink our teeth into it, to lose ourselves in this journey. God is calling. Are we listening or are we settling for smallness?

Today's Action: Write down two things that - when we do them - we get lost in another dimension. Then, write down where we would like to go with these two things. How far are we willing to go? Then, make a list of what we're going to do to get there. Then, start with the first thing today, taking one step at a time.