Discovering Rhythms
Blessed are those whose ways are blameless, who walk according to the law of the Lord. Blessed are those who keep his statutes and seek him with all their heart - they do no wrong but follow his ways. - Psalm 119:1-3
Most of my life I have had an allergy to religion. I use “religion” with a pejorative sense, the meaningless repetition of forms, actions, and symbols that are disconnected from the heart, or God and that are motivated by fear, laziness, or the inherited momentum of previous generations coupled with an unexamined life. I grew up Catholic, but the place my faith first came alive was in a Vineyard Church. That season, the season of my conversion, felt like a romance. Everything was so new and visceral, my heart and head and soul felt integrated, it was easy to want to pray, and read the bible, to have fellowship with people, and to worship.
But as I walked longer in the faith things became more difficult. My natural or native passion for God seemed cool. This was something that alarmed me. The longer I live though, I realize that our relationship with God not so different than any other relationship we have. When I first met my wife, while we were dating, we spent almost every waking minute together. There was this energy, the newness of it, our youth, the lack of burdens and responsibilities that made deepening of our love almost effortless. But as we have progressed in our relationship, we have become invested in our world. We have children and careers that keep us constantly busy. During our dating life we could take our connection almost for granted, but now we have to fight for it. Our date nights are a discipline, they are like a muscle we flex, or like a musician’s practice. And we find that when we put in the work of connecting, when we commit to finding time for our relationship, the feelings of love are protected, maintained, and deepened.
With God it is the same. Our relationship with God is like a muscle that can atrophy from lack of use or a garden that can wither from lack of care. Without setting aside time to be with God we will inevitably drift away from him. In Psalm 119, the author uses the action words to describe their relationship with God and his word. It uses words like “walk”, “keep” and “seek”. The truth is that God is always coming towards us, always loving, always pursuing, but even so, we have a role to play in that relationship, in nurturing it and keeping it alive. The things that I identified in my early faith as religious, that I saw as negative or mindless or repetitive are now the touch points for me, places of connection and reconnection. Spending time in God’s word, attending worship on Sundays, praying alone or with others, have become essential places for me to nurture my life with God.
The trick or challenge in this is that many of us have grown up thinking about these things as work or obligations. We may never say this out loud, or even think it, but there is some sense that we feel like God’s love is contingent on our attention or on our spiritual efforts. We feel guilty for not doing quiet times, or for reading the Bible. But the truth is that God is calling us to rest with him, to remember with him, to be filled up by his love and promises. Our relationship with God is this great adventure and everyone’s relationship, like a marriage, will look differently based on our personalities, our capacities or our stages of life. Some of you might love doing the Daily Office out of the Book of Common Prayer, others would connect with the daily examine, or the devotional reader like “My Upmost for His Highest”. Some feel closer to God when praying on a solitary hike or when they read a book about a saint.
Regardless of rhythm you adopt, the truth is that your relationship with God requires time and attention to grow. God is inviting you into an eternal journey, something transformative and life giving. But this will involve sacrifice as well, an exchange, where we might have to give up other good things in order make room for our life with God (which is what we are made for). I am excited this week to explore ways in which we can grow in our knowledge of and love for God.