How Slowing Sees the Sacred

{This post is part of the five minute friday with Kate MotaungA community of writers who write for five minutes on the word of choice. Today's word: slow.}

They always seem to run rampant.

Through the house at the earliest of hours once those tiny toes hit the floor and the sun has peeked its softest light, it's all a rush.

And I, I wonder what all the excitement is all about. 

How they can get up each morning after morning never slow and always with a momentum that gains as the hours tick and the suns fade even though the days can seem the same.

To begin each day on fire is to live each breath as blessed. 

They rush until the hand is grabbed and they wish to be stilled with you and you wish only for them to once again rush, maybe rush right away.


But I've learned to slow.
Maybe it's only in the slowness that we can see the sacred.






I watch him come home from working with wood his gauntly arms limp at his sides, his face rugged and worn from early morning rises and hard labor and little time to shut the eyes and to dream.

He's grateful for the slow.

Huddled over his bowl of steaming beans, he slurps and dips his toasted bread into the flavorless juices and smiles, content. 

He disappears and I find him later with head bent back, eyes closed, seated against the couch while children rush and he slows and I dare to question it.

Life moves past fast.

Slow to see the moments for what they really are, sacred.
Slow to see the gift in the still.

And when we do it's worth it all.

For what is to be will be and what God has planned will stand and nothing will hold it back not even the slow.
  

An Always Present Enemy

Back in the day, years ago, in the hot smothering town of Tuscaloosa, Alabama, storms were known to rip through the town heralding lightning, uncontrollable winds, and rains that beat down in torrents leaving the eyes seeing little and the mind thinking the worst.

In one such storm, outside of a bowling alley, me and my sister sat huddled together wet and sticky legged inside a red beetle van with red and white gingham curtains covering the windows that my mom had sewn together with needle and thread. 

Winds shook the sides of the van and the rain pelted the windows and I remember how quiet it was inside that raggedy van as we sat and waited out the storm with bated breath. It was the first time that I could remember where I didn't feel safe. Scared, yes. Afraid of dying? Surprisingly, no.

There were probably casualties, but I was too young to recall.

I guess you could say that storm was the enemy that day.










Back to the present, the minds reminded of what's happening around the world and how I feel as if there's so much that's not known. There's missing information and misaligned facts and rights and lefts and everyone in between are at each others throats and it seems as if no one is listening to the cries that are echoed across the world and in the Word. There's accusations and questioning of faiths and its torment and fear itself at the highest level and wisdom's maybe pushed aside for well wishes and timid humble pies.

Maybe in this world it's hard to believe that anyone could be anyone's enemy. Somehow we like to believe and think the opposite that we're all safe and that simple acts of kindness can cure every evil and ill will.  I'd like to think that, but then those rivers and roads that ran red years and years ago from the blood of fallen victors would be in vain. 

We have enemies. 
America has enemies. 
The Bible has enemies. 

Adam and Eve had the serpent, David had Goliath and King Solomon's soldiers, Moses had Pharaoh, Esther and the Jews had Haman, Samson had the Philistines, and the disciples, for preaching the name of Jesus, had enemies and Jesus has Satan, the always present enemy of all believers until the end.

Safety is something that's only found in the Savior who saves us from so much more than earthly destruction but from an eternal peril as well. That is Christ compassion and maybe that should be the greatest kindness offered to a hurting, fearful, unsafe world and with that the storms will come.


{This post is part of the five minute friday with Kate Motaung. Today's word of choice: safe}