It’s the rest of the week. What would you like to rest from right now?
How about explanations?
It can get tiring, the pre-thinking every possible angle of a position to ensure an airtight case that stands up to the inevitable objections (starting with our own).
Taking on the task of making sure everyone understands where you’re coming from is not only exhausting, but a surefire shortcut to soul fatigue.
A person can become so absorbed in searching for reasons and collecting facts to bolster their explanation that they never make it to the understanding that comes from experience and from engaging life from actual existence.
How can you simply be when you’re so busy studying your life through a glass dimly—like the observation window of a social science researcher—rather than actually being in it.
Maybe noticing this tendency and choosing curiosity over speaking out our explanations is one practical way to pause and rest.
Sometimes the urge to explain it all right now can feel like trying to fill someone else’s cup with a fire hose—which, of course, is impossible. You’ll knock the cup right out of their hand.
And just try and control a fire hose.
So, I’ll put down the fire hose and invite you to consider the power of experience that is offered when we forgo the explanation and enter into something bigger—as demonstrated by composer/pianist, Robert Schumann, and God.
(Thankyou to Clara Parks, who writes The Daily Respite, for the quote referencing Schumann).
“Once, somebody asked Robert Schumann to explain the meaning of a certain piece of music he had just played on the piano. What Robert Schumann did was sit back down at the piano and play the piece of music again.”
—David Marksonsea
And now the words of God to Job in response to Job’s honest questions and complaints:
Then the Lord spoke to Job out of the storm. He said:
“Who is this that obscures my plans
with words without knowledge?
Brace yourself like a man;
I will question you,
and you shall answer me.
What follows is a series of “where were you” types of questions set in a breathtaking panorama of creation (from singing stars to sea monsters in the ocean depths) that I hope you’ll read for yourself (Job chapters 38 through 41).
Job responds:
“My ears had heard of you
but now my eyes have seen you..”
I can almost hear him exhaling and I sense an invitation to profound rest.
May your rest be sweet.
Alicia