sars-cov-2 | Captured in the Moment

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Do you ever think about all the things that never meet your expectations? Not enough rain; too much rain. Too hot; too cold. All the Charmin is sold out, and I have to buy the generic toilet paper. I have to cook when I’d rather go out.

The strangest things pop into my head when I’m out in the yard looking for the treasure that I know God’s left me to find. Today it happened as I was looking at the droplets of water clinging to my Gerbera daisies.

It wasn’t supposed to rain last night or today, yet it has again. We’ve had so much precipitation here in Dallas-Fort Worth over the last few weeks. That, along with the measures I’ve imposed to protect myself and others from exposure to the Coronavirus, have me feeling a bit cabin-feverish. For a half second, I felt myself feeling deprived of the ability to make a run out on a trail, or to take a drive to scope out wildflowers and snap some photographs.

On the heels of my disappointment, I felt prompted to shift my perspective. I think God does that to me a lot these days, and he leads me to a more positive space where I can stand on higher ground and at a enough of distance away from myself to understand that what I want isn’t always what is best for me. What if the rain, running late to a meeting, or having to cancel a trip is somehow protection in another way? What if it frees up time that I’m frittering away for something that’s more important?

I’m wanting so much to stand in the moment these days – to stop looking into the future for joy or happiness. I cry out so often to be able to step off the merry-go-round for just a little while, and now I have the opportunity. I need it to be enough. It may not look the way I expected it to look, but in a way, this isolation is an answer to a prayer. I’ve already wasted parts of this last week lamenting what’s not here. Perhaps I need to look at what is here, embrace whatever time is left, and enjoy it with wild abandon.

“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord. “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, my thoughts higher than your thoughts.” Isaiah 55:8-9

He says, “Be still, and know I am God.” Psalm 46:10

You will keep in perfect peace those whose minds are steadfast because they trust in you. Isaiah 26:3

Photo Credit: Christina Bynum-Breaux, Simply Black and White Photography, Keller, Texas

When my boys were little, I worked hard to teach them how to resolve their differences without hitting one another or seeking out parental support for their cause against the other. If they fought, I would place them both in time out and ask them to think about a solution to their issue that could make them both happy. My goal was to forge a stronger relationship between the two of them and to teach them positive resolution skills.

I think of this today as all of humanity is facing the single biggest threat to our lives, both literally and figuratively. This COVID-19 virus is pulling the rug out from under every foundation that has held us up, and we are quickly finding that those foundations have been built on sand. Our jobs have disappeared overnight. Our health is threatened by sharing the air we breathe with the person standing next to us. We are fighting among ourselves for food, toilet tissue, sanitizers, and more.

Like my boys when they tussled, we have a choice to continue divided or to find common ground. At this moment in time, we’re all in time out together – rich and poor, Republican and Democrat, black, white, or brown. Whether we want to accept it or not yet, we are on the same team. And teams don’t successfully make their way down the court or the field without a unified effort. Our very survival depends more upon our ability to support one another and work out solutions than on winning or losing as individuals.

Our world and the human beings that inhabit it have become so broken, and I can’t help but wonder if a crisis like this isn’t nature’s way of correcting our path – of shining a light on the fact that our selfishness and the divisions we’ve created with our unyielding stances are killing our bodies, our souls, and our planet. We have to stop waiting on someone else to fix it and take responsibility for making a conscious contribution to healing by taking the small step, every time we are faced with a me versus you choice, to choose us.

My children, our love should not be just words and talk; it must be true love, which shows itself in action. 1 John 3:18

Be always humble, gentle, and patient. Show your love by being tolerant with one another. Do your best to preserve the unity which the Spirit gives you by means of the peace that binds you together. Ephesians 4:2-3