God's Arms

As I sat in my favorite chair by the window trying to come up with a clever meditation for my weekly blog, I heard them coming. After several days of rain, the sound of children was balm to my cloudy spirit. I stopped typing and looked out the window to see a large family riding bikes on a Sunday morning. Three capable riders surrounded their parents, while the fourth, the youngest, was riding a bike that was attached to his father’s with a strange bungie-chord contraption. I suppose it was there to help when they climbed hills, but right in front of my window the child fell. Tears followed, and within seconds his mother was reaching down to pick him up and comfort him.

More than anything I was writing before, the moment spoke to me at a very deep and personal level, particularly as I prepare for the season of Lent, which begins on Wednesday. 

Several years ago, I made a decision to head down a specific path. It was a path that had been calling me most of my life and I felt as much relief as I did apprehension when I chose to go to seminary. In many ways, I was attaching my bike to my father’s, if you will, and I looked forward to a life with such connection, particularly when I came upon steep hills. There were times when I felt I no longer needed the chord to pull or guide me, and, without fail, those were the times my bike wobbled and I fell on the road once again.

Watching the mother arrive swiftly to cradle her son made me jealous. I feel like I was always left to pick myself up, to brush away the gravel and dirt on my own and get on the bike again. Only in retrospect, can I see that was not the case.

Lent is so often billed as a time to give things up, to get one’s spiritual act together, but I wonder if it isn’t also a time to admit that we’ve fallen and let God come and cradle us for a while. Instead of doing spiritual aerobics, or peddling our bikes even faster, maybe it’s time to rest in the arms of God – daily, often, without ceasing. 

I have no doubt that such time will make it easier to get back on the bike again when Easter comes around.