A first impression

School has started. I am for real a student again. I no longer have to lie to get a student discount, showing my otherwise useless student ID card (which is actually a huge moral relief for me). So, here are my feelings on school so far after one full week:

It is exciting. Being in class, reading for a purpose, writing academically (yes, I have already had one written assignment), looking around a classroom at my peers and letting the joyful awe settle in my heart – awe based on the tremendous intelligence and wisdom (and faith) that emerges from our collective devotion – are even more refreshing and life giving than I expected.

It hurts. My hand, my legs, my rear, my brain (although I learned in psychology that brains cannot feel pain properly, nevertheless they do make sense of it). I am retraining muscles that too quickly went out of use. I don't remember taking notes to be as hard as it was this past Monday in my first class. I don't remember my legs being this exhausted from traveling to school (although I blame that more on the terrain than my ability). I don't remember sitting for several hours at a time to be so uncomfortable. I don't remember waking up early to be so tiring.

It is beautiful. I rode to campus on Tuesday as the sun was rising. I am typically more of a sunset fan, but what I saw on that ride blew me away. It was potentially the most beautiful I have ever seen the sky -colors streaming over trees from a bright blue origin to proclaim and announce and trumpet the arrival of a new day. I marched around a 'lab' while singing a sort of chant and peered into the eyes and hearts of my colleagues and saw the beauty of the divine spark burning in us all.

It is comforting. I mean this in the traditional understanding of the word – 'giving strength to'. I learned in my first class that the Bayeux tapestry elucidates the full meaning of this word. A section of this tapestry shows William marching behind his troops prodding them with his sword. The caption reads: "King William comforteth his soldiers". (I searched hard but could not find a picture of this section online.) I feel this is the best summation of what I perceive this time to be. I do not feel overwhelmed at the course work or load, but rather that it is truly going to give strength to my spiritual life as both a follower of God and a minister to others. And this comforting is not restricted to the classroom alone. I have made and deepened many new friendships already, which I graciously value.

So, ultimately it is like a Snuggie. The electrifying experience of putting it on and feeling the soft fleece caress your skin (that is not merely due to static electricity), the overwhelming warmth that you just have to push through or sweat out so that you can keep wearing it all the time, the graceful design that really crafts the body into a whole new form of beauty, it's ability to soothe you softly to sleep...

And when in it, the ladies can't resist you.

Velocity

'Every body will persist in its state of rest or of uniform motion (constant velocity) in a straight line unless it is compelled to change that state by forces impressed on it' - otherwise known as Newton's First Law of Motion.

I had to teach this to the kids I worked with this summer while discussing gravity, air resistance, and Newton's laws of motion. We of course talked about dropping things, especially small coins from great heights. And I learned something new: that everything has a terminal velocity. The penny being dropped from the tallest building will reach a max speed.

I kind of don't believe this, but I have talked to several people who I trust know their physics and they all agreed. I must have slept through that day in science.

But then again, as I think about everyday life, Newton's laws and my knowledge of velocity seem to make more and more sense.

I have had to drive in Dallas traffic a lot more than I ever have before, and at peak times. In going to work and coming back from work I have begun to notice certain trends in this traffic. One is that people really don't like to change speed. This includes speeding up or slowing down. I'd say that most people can be completely surrounded by cars, and as long as they are all going a steady speed that is the desired speed of that person, he or she will be happy. People only get mad when they are forced to slow down or speed up.

Newton's fist law is commonly put: an object in motion will stay in motion and an object at rest will stay at rest unless acted upon by an outside, unbalanced force. And once that occurs, the object will be angry.

People don't like to change their velocity. It does require energy to speed up or slow down, and we often meet some sort of resistance. Maybe we all have a natural rhythm, or maybe it is just our expectations of the way things should work. But when this attitude bleeds over into other parts of our lives, it often results in problems. I don't claim to be an expert, but from what I've seen, coasting typically is not a good option in any type of work, for any personal benefit, and especially for any type of relationship (be it friendship, romantic, or religious).

Besides, things are always more exciting when you change velocity. You either get to slow down and see more and take in more. Or you could speed up and experience the thrill and excitement of the moment.

I went to Six Flags yesterday. There are no rides that maintain the same speed the entire time, because that would be boring. A roller coaster is an attraction because it breaks from the velocity of everyday normal living with slow, building, suspenseful moments and fast, crazy, wild moments.

Sure, discipline and ritual are good, and I believe they work wonders in our lives. But so does a willingness to change velocity. Otherwise we become just like angry Dallas drivers, only in all aspects of our lives.

Goes well with this post:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TahH7B_aUZc&playnext=1&videos=0CledNXSvg8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fX7iwwB9zQ4

Ordinariness

I recently remembered how exciting my England trip was last summer.  I would come into a town and have no clue where anything was or how to get anywhere.  It was a thrill to figure out how to orient myself, get a little lost, and then reorient myself the right way.  I was constantly on the move, finding buses or trains, making plans on the go, and living in a completely strange place.

My situation now is much different.  The past month I have been living in a very familiar place with nothing pressing to do.  No job, no school, no urgent obligations to fill. My days typically consist of reading, writing a little, hanging out, and sometimes watching tv.  Compared to my previous summer, my life now is very ordinary.

Not bad, not easy, not hard.  Just ordinary.

These feelings are compounded as I watch many Olympic athletes who are living truly extraordinary lives right now.  My life is not half as exciting as any of their lives.

While I think there is value in both slow and fast-paced living, I have found myself struggling with making this ordinariness very meaningful.  And given our fast paced world, I would bet that I am not the only one that struggles with moments of pause.

But my concern is not merely one of restlessness.

Shouldn’t a life lived with the Creator of the universe be filled with unceasing wonder? 

Shouldn’t a life lived with the Almighty protector and redeemer of Israel be exciting, challenging, and even a little fear inspiring? 

Shouldn’t a life lived with the Savior of the world be filled with self-sacrifice and constant helping of others? 

So, where is that cutting edge excitement that is an essential characteristic to the nature of the God who fills my heart?  Where are all the life changing experiences?  Where is the busy life of nonstop pursuit of God that I have experienced so often?

And what value is there in this ordinary life?

The first I have found is identity.  I can no longer define myself by what I do, because I do nothing.  I am not a student, tutor, youth minister or whatever else I might at some point in my life by able to identify myself as.  Instead I have been forced to find identity within myself, who I really am – a loved child of God.  That leads me to consider more organically what I should do.  I am not doing things for myself, to fulfill some missing piece of me, but rather I am working and doing stuff because the God who loves me opens up opportunities around me though which I can share His love.  This makes the focus less on me and more on God.  

And this God with whom I can identify is the Creator of the universe – how much more wonderful could life get?

Second, it has helped me cope with the debilitating restlessness of typical American life.  I feel much more comfortable now at home with nothing to do.  I don’t feel as driven to be constantly working or doing something.  There is an issue here between complacency and contentedness.  It is tempting to become complacent and too comfortable doing nothing.  Complacency implies not only a lack of growth, but also apathy that there is no growth.  It is challenging to not fall into this mode of being.  Being content, on the other hand, allows you to appreciate whatever is going on in your life at the moment, and to find ways to grow even in ordinary times.  I have learned to be content with what God has given me and what He is doing in my life. 

As my actions have become less exciting, the God I am coming to know and serve and the ways in which He is intervening in my life have become even more exciting.

My contentedness has deepened in knowing that my soul can be full and I can be growing ever closer to God even when life is not flashing before me.  I have learned that changing the world can look pretty ordinary.  I don’t have to be solving world issues in order to show love to others and to better know God’s presence around me.  I in no way intend to imply that I have been perfect in this, but I have come to realize that the small things we do (listening to someone over tea, being present to offer encouragement, laughing and eating with people), these ordinary things can be truly extraordinary ways of engaging in the world around us. 

I have found that self sacrifice can come in the simplest of expressions.

Our lives are not action packed; in fact, probably more ordinary than not.  And even Olympians live such fast paced lives only periodically throughout the years.  So, I have found it important to be ever wondering: How do we make all our time meaningful?  How do we live a good ordinary life?

Through an embrace of the ordinariness of my life I have begun to find the consistent, subtle wonder, excitement, fear, and self sacrifice that lies at the heart of following God daily.