Slow, slow, quick, quick, slow…. The Art of Slowing
Continuing to read a book by John
Ortberg “The Life you’ve always wanted” and in it he basically says if you are
going to follow Jesus you need to get rid of the hurry from your life as you
cannot be moving faster than the one you seek to follow.
So how do I practice the art of
slowing, he gives me lots of examples like not wearing a watch (I don’t wear a
watch), eating very slowly (I do), trying not to worry about the length of the queue
you are in or the traffic lights being red (not so easy). There were lots more
ideas and off I went to “slowly think”. My first thoughts were; How do I do that,
when I live in a fast paced highly technological world, live in a city that never
sleeps, work in a school currently undergoing an Ofsted inspection, live in a
house with two teenagers both study for important exams and the cherry on the
cake being the wife of a Baptist
Minister. I don’t stand a chance.
So there I was exasperated but
reminded of Psalm 46 “Be still and know that I am God” and Psalm 24 “The Lord
is my shepherd I have all that I need. He lets me rest in green meadows; he
leads me beside peaceful streams. He renews my strength.” Good verses and very
true. Contemplating these Psalms I was suddenly catapulted into a my newly
acquired role of photographic assistant (a role I have been called upon to
assume many times in the last two years). I found myself sitting on the kitchen
floor with a bottle or two of different coloured paints, I squeezed the bottle
and the paint shot down into the bowl of clear water, dispersing and creating
beautiful coloured streaks in the still water. My son snapped away getting
beautiful images of the paint rippling through the water. I was having a great
time sitting still watching the dancing colours.
Now I thought, I am that bowl of
colourless pure water, sitting still until the first burst of paint lands and
ripples down and through my life, pale colours, bright colours, dark colours,
an amazing symphony that makes me who I am meant to be. However, the colour took
on a whole new image at 4 am the next morning, and as the still bowl resting
was suddenly woken and the worries of the world poured in, the paint molecules
bouncing around the water suddenly became chaos, giving me nightmares and
disturbing my rest. “Give me stillness and slowing I cried out.”
Exhausted and not really in the
mood to go to work, I thought, If I don’t slow down and sit still I might
actually miss some of “the things”, the colours God is threading through my
life. How sad to be in such a hurry that you do not appreciate the Life you are
Living.
Praise be to the Lord who has
given rest to his people Israel
