“Spirituality is not to be learned by flight from the world, or by running away from things, or by turning solitary and going apart from the world. Rather, we must learn an inner solitude wherever or with whomsoever we may be. We must learn to penetrate things and find God there.”
― Meister Eckhart
ISAIAH 10-12
JOURNAL
Yesterday I went fishing, and at one point I stopped, found a place in the water, and simply sat down. I had my waders on, so I was perfectly comfortable sitting there among the rocks, listening to the water rush around me and spill over stones that had been there for millions of years. I wasn't trying to catch anything. I wasn't trying to accomplish anything. I wasn't thinking about what needed to happen next. I just sat there and absorbed it. The water, the rocks, the trees, the sound, the cool air, and the incredible beauty of a place that had been slowly carved into existence long before I ever arrived.
Eckhart's words make more sense to me after a moment like that. Finding God doesn't require escaping life. In fact, maybe it is exactly the opposite. It is learning to become present enough to penetrate the ordinary things of life and discover God already there. Yesterday God was there in the water moving across those ancient rocks. He was there in the quiet. He was there in my ability to see it, hear it, and experience it. I didn't have to manufacture some spiritual experience. I simply had to stop long enough to recognize the sacredness of what was already happening.
There is something beautiful about Isaiah writing, “With joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation.” Sitting in that water yesterday, I realized again that so much of my life is determined by what I am drawing from. My mind, emotions, and habits have been shaped by years of experiences, fears, successes, failures, wounds, ambitions, and expectations. If I continually draw from those things alone, then they will determine how I experience the world. But God's Spirit gives me another place from which to draw. I can pause. I can become quiet. I can recognize that my first thought isn't necessarily truth, my first emotion doesn't have to control my next action, and my circumstances don't get to determine the condition of my spirit.
Maybe that is what it means to “keep in step with the Spirit.” It isn't escaping the world. It is learning to walk through the world differently. It is being able to stand in the middle of pressure, disappointment, conflict, responsibility, uncertainty, and even fear while drawing from something deeper. Love. Joy. Peace. Patience. Kindness. Goodness. Faithfulness. Gentleness. Self-control. These aren't the fruits of a life where everything goes my way. They are the fruits of a life increasingly in tune with God.
Yesterday the water was constantly moving, but the rocks remained. Water had rushed over them through countless storms, floods, droughts, winters, and summers. The conditions surrounding them were always changing, yet there they were. It reminded me of the image I keep returning to of the blue sky behind the storm. Clouds come and go. Wind comes and goes. Rain comes and goes. But beyond all of it, the blue sky remains. My emotions are weather. My circumstances are weather. Fear is weather. Success and failure are weather. None of them are permanent. God is the constant.
The goal, then, isn't to arrange my life so that there are never storms. It is to become so in tune with God that I can experience His peace in the middle of them. To sit in the moving water and recognize what remains. To stop fighting every current and realize that beneath all the movement there is something solid.
Yesterday I went fishing. But for a few minutes, sitting quietly in that water, I think I understood a little more clearly what I am actually seeking. I don't want to escape the world to find God. I want to become so present, so surrendered, and so in tune with Him that I find Him everywhere. And then carry that presence with me when I get out of the water and go back into the world.
2 TIMOTHY 1:7
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