“Poetry often enters through the windows of irrelevance”
- M.C. Richards
Sometimes observing the smallest details helps me comprehend the greatest truths. That feeling of looking into microscope only to realize I am looking in a telescope all at the same time—understanding the greater picture through noticing the minute, the peculiar, and occasionally the surprising.
A few weeks ago I ruminated over what seemed to be a spiritual truth found in a brief observation on the routine drive to work along Barbur Boulevard.
As my car stalled at a stoplight, I couldn’t help but notice the green Taurus pulled over just to the right of me—the mass of car mostly covering a mother hunched over her son who was red in the face from repetitive vomiting. A moment of repulse was quickly intercepted by compassion. He couldn’t have been more than six years old. He was having one of those “crying so hard you can’t catch your breath” moments that seem so overwhelming when you are young. He had drool all over his face and was fully relying on the comfort of his mom’s hand gently rubbing his back in little circles without regard to the line of cars filled with staring onlookers. I couldn’t hear what she was saying, but I imagine she was consoling him with gentle words—stopping her life for a few minutes on the highway to stay close to her son. At the same time, she was probably cheering him on—coaching him until his painful little trial had passed.
After the light changed to green, I kept driving—hurting for that little boy, thinking about what a painful, exhausting experience vomiting can be. I can think of few worse feelings than the incessant stirring of something within that must come out. The more I thought about it, I myself began to feel nauseated and suddenly had one of those spiritual epiphanies that “enter through the windows of irrelevance”. God started speaking to me about my sin and its paralleled nauseating nature. God wasn’t blasting a profound word through a megaphone within inches of my ear, either. It more like he was that mother on the side of the road, rubbing circles on my back, coaching me to get rid of all that was stirring inside of me—convincing me that even though I didn’t feel like “throwing up” my sin, that I would feel much better, far more relieved, if I did. There is such a liberation that comes with the upheaval of sin that is otherwise holding us back from pursuing abundant life in Christ. I so often “let the moment pass”...waiting to see if my spiritual sickness will just go away…rather than confronting it. Who wants to commit to something that they know will be physically exerting? Yet, to leave it there means even greater discomfort.
Sometimes observing the smallest details helps me comprehend the greatest truths. That feeling of looking into microscope only to realize I am looking in a telescope all at the same time—understanding the greater picture through noticing the minute, the peculiar, and occasionally the surprising.
A few weeks ago I ruminated over what seemed to be a spiritual truth found in a brief observation on the routine drive to work along Barbur Boulevard.
As my car stalled at a stoplight, I couldn’t help but notice the green Taurus pulled over just to the right of me—the mass of car mostly covering a mother hunched over her son who was red in the face from repetitive vomiting. A moment of repulse was quickly intercepted by compassion. He couldn’t have been more than six years old. He was having one of those “crying so hard you can’t catch your breath” moments that seem so overwhelming when you are young. He had drool all over his face and was fully relying on the comfort of his mom’s hand gently rubbing his back in little circles without regard to the line of cars filled with staring onlookers. I couldn’t hear what she was saying, but I imagine she was consoling him with gentle words—stopping her life for a few minutes on the highway to stay close to her son. At the same time, she was probably cheering him on—coaching him until his painful little trial had passed.
After the light changed to green, I kept driving—hurting for that little boy, thinking about what a painful, exhausting experience vomiting can be. I can think of few worse feelings than the incessant stirring of something within that must come out. The more I thought about it, I myself began to feel nauseated and suddenly had one of those spiritual epiphanies that “enter through the windows of irrelevance”. God started speaking to me about my sin and its paralleled nauseating nature. God wasn’t blasting a profound word through a megaphone within inches of my ear, either. It more like he was that mother on the side of the road, rubbing circles on my back, coaching me to get rid of all that was stirring inside of me—convincing me that even though I didn’t feel like “throwing up” my sin, that I would feel much better, far more relieved, if I did. There is such a liberation that comes with the upheaval of sin that is otherwise holding us back from pursuing abundant life in Christ. I so often “let the moment pass”...waiting to see if my spiritual sickness will just go away…rather than confronting it. Who wants to commit to something that they know will be physically exerting? Yet, to leave it there means even greater discomfort.
Ephesians 5:8-14
“For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light (for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth) and find out what pleases the Lord. Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them. For it is shameful even to mention what the disobedient do in secret. But everything exposed by the light becomes visible, for it is light that makes everything visible. This is why it is said:‘Wake up, O sleeper,rise from the dead,and Christ will shine on you’.”
All I gotta say is I am lovin' my browser and the new RSS reader feature I discovered yesterday! It notifies me whenever my peeps post to their blogs!
ReplyDeleteWell, that's not I all I have to say. Beautiful thoughts, friend. What a heart-engaging allegory about the truth of God's fatherly love and the ontological reality of sin. I continue to grow in amazement of the despairity between just how terrible the state of the world is and God's incredible, patient, redeeming love in spite of, and even for, it.
I also deeply resonate with finding the most profound truth in the simplest places. I've been meditating these past several months on how an eternal God chooses to be fully present at any given time. It seems to me that there must be untold beauty and truth in every moment, in every place. Sometimes I park my car and just walk around my neighborhood or on the beach. I find myself spending unusual amounts of time considering the beauty of plants growing between cracks in the pavement or what a leaf has to say about God's faithfulness and creative love.
In case you were wondering, it's ok to make fun of me for that, lol.
Any way, thank you for sharing such inspiring truth! It's awesome :-)