Living in a Box

Pop!  Goes the Lily

Before you start to worry, no, we have not lost our home.  As I write, I am safe and warm in my office, with heat, electricity, and internet access.  But sometimes I feel like I'm living in a box.  It is so easy to get comfortable with our lives, isn't it?  Things are going along pretty well.  We go to the same places, see the same people, do the same things.  Our pastor has been challenging us lately to get out there and reach others.  My first thought is, "I don't see anyone."  So that's not entirely true.  I take the kids to their sports practices, to AWANA and to the library for storytime.  I sometimes substitute teach in the local schools.  In winter it is a little harder to see neighbors, as everyone is huddled up inside.  But I think this is still an excuse.  I think this feeling of being boxed in comes from my own fears.  I am not allowed to speak of my religion at school, but I can still show the love of Christ in my interactions with the kids and other adults there.  I can get to know the other parents at my kids' events, and forge friendships.  I can check on neighbors to make sure everything is okay during dark days.  In short, I can reach out.

Reaching out is not really in my human nature, but I know that it is in the God-nature within me.  The sermon this week was on submission - submitting to Christ.  Not just some things, but everything.  All those things I have boxed up in the basement and attic and closets of my heart, trying to keep to myself.  That would include my fears and my humanity and my need for comfort.  I need to de-clutter my heart, as well as my home, because until I get some of the junk out, there is no room for the good stuff to come in.

Boxes don't have to be made of paper or wood.  And they don't have to hold physical things.  Our whole society is becoming reduced to tiny little electronic boxes.  TV's, computers, cell phones - we retreat into them until our lives are lived as if we were avatars in some made-up world.  We're tricking ourselves into believing that we are really doing something, while the whole time our bodies are sitting still, and the real world is going on around us, unnoticed.  It's much easier to talk to people when you can shut them off if you want to, and the world looks so much more beautiful on Pinterest.  Information is at our fingertips, but how many times have you spent hours researching something on line just to realize that you don't really need it after all?  And how could those hours have been better spent?

We're only given so much time in this world.  And we really have no idea how much time that is.  I know that I need to get out of my box, and really live.  There are people out there, who matter.  They matter to God, and because of that they should matter to me.  And not just in a superfluous way, but deep down.  The kind of matter that you can't find on Facebook or Twitter or Blogger.  The kind that can't be reduced to text-speak.

So this is my prayer for this year.  That I can learn to live as God wants me to live, in the world, not in my box!