It's a bit of a mad dash sort of feel for these 48 or so hours back in the city. Our cottage time for just the two of us has come to an end for a bit, and by tomorrow morning we will enter into full-on grandparenting status with four of five treasures in tow. The rest of our tribe will arrive Saturday, July 15th.
The center overlap is where preparations for having family up (including food planning with three teens - yikes!), being ready for not one but two ministry pieces on Sunday July 9 (leading the service in the morning and doing a private family ceremony in the afternoon, again - yikes!) and packing for two weeks of life and love and ministry in Thailand (because we will return from the cottage on July 23 and leave for Thailand in the wee hours of the morning July 25, yes, another yikes!) all collide.
[Note, I think that last sentence deserves a yikes! all on its own.]
All the more reason to make a walk around my route a priority this morning. Fresh cool air, a rarity this summer, and the growing field of corn almost made up for not being on the water in my kayak instead. And remembering the kayak, I realize that I am not the person I was when I left.
The corn field especially was fun, because I had taken a picture earlier this season when the plants were just sprouts. Now there is lush green filling in the rows, with promise of a good harvest I think. I'm no farmer, so what do I know. It has been a summer of extremes. Good for corn? I hope so.
The field is a picture of me a little I'm thinking. The state I was in when I left, compared to the state I feel I'm in now, after almost three weeks of not-mad-dash living. Not sure how far I can press the metaphor, except to be reminded again how essential it is to honour Sabbath rests.
Author Anne Lamott reminds us: "Almost everything will work again if you unplug it for a few minutes, including you."
Yes. And I needed more than just a few minutes.
Knowing the needs of our human selves, God built Sabbath rests into the week, and throughout the year, and even in seven year cycles of 'release'. Seven of those cycles was called a "jubilee" with even more emphasis on balancing everything out, even to the forgiving of debts.
Leviticus 25:8-13 is where you can find some of all of that. And here is where I find I get myself into way more than I can chew on for a simple morning's reflection. Leviticus? Oh the intriguing rabbit trails on which this could take us.
But in the immediate, I find it fascinating to again make this connection between what God 'commanded' and how badly we need that. As if He knew all along.
Hope you are finding your own resting rhythms this summer.
If not in a full holiday yet, at least in some sort of regular time set aside to just not dash anywhere.
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