It’s late.
Seriously it’s almost 1 in the morning, but I’ve been in restaurants for the last 6 years and my body clock is, how you say, unusual.
At night I find that in the same way a dog circles it’s bed a few times before settling, my mind needs to circle my room much like the ghost of Christmas past before resting itself on my thin pillow.
Tonight as my mind circles the couch I’m writing on, I ask myself why it is that I simply cannot seem to surrender.
Don’t get me wrong, I’ve been to church, I’ve been a musician for the last couple of years for goodness sakes.
I know how to live with less.
But this evening it’s occurring to my wandering mind that the less I’ve learned to live on and the small concessions I’ve made in my surrender to God’s control have become tethers.
Chains I wrap around myself.
You see, surrender brings peace. No pun intended.
Yesterday I sat next to a pond and watched the unintelligent squirrels and chipmunks scavenge for their food for the day, and disappear in to crackly shrubbery.
Idiots.
No google calendar, no financial advisor, and no Wal-Mart pickup order arriving in a matter of hours.
How do they even survive? Do you think they count their instagram followers?
I am of course being facetious, although it pains me to say that I would most likely subscribe to a squirrel YouTube account as they have my same attention span.
But there is a beauty in the way they rely on the Creator.
A beauty in the fact that they don’t need calendars.
We who know all things need control. We need to know what’s around the corner.
I need to know what’s around the corner.
So what’s the moral of this brief fable? To envy the Lillies of the field and the birds of the air?
Yes. A thousand times yes.
I envy the Lillies because they know they will be provided for, and their sense of self and identity is not wrapped up in their performance or list of achievements during the day,
I envy the lilies because they grow as generously as they can during the day, and at night rest in the peace that their Creator will bring that same sun out the next day, and the minute they feel parched they smell rain.
I envy the lilies.
And as I sit on my couch and write this brief reflection on how little I do know of my future, I who know all things, I muse on what simplicity my Creator has woven into the fabric of his earth and what this simplicity could do for me.