Poor Visibility
Today I was driving home from a retreat. It was very sunny and not all that cold but the wind created treacherous conditions. Snow drifted across the road and collected there. Parts of the highway were quite slippery where the snow had partially melted and frozen again. The worst part was the visibility. There were some points it was very hard to see. At one particular section I ended up slowing down to about 50 km/hr in order to even stay on the road.
As I thought about that experience I reflected on the earlier part of the day and even the rest of the weekend. A retreat is really about slowing down isn’t it? As the retreat went on I felt a growing sense of unease and a vague sense of sadness though. I couldn’t understand what was going on. The interesting thing is that I was surrounded with people who would listen to me if I could articulate what was going on. But I just didn’t understand where my emotions were coming from.
We did an activity where we were asked to find a sacred space with Jesus in our minds. We could imagine being anywhere we wanted that seemed right to us. There were more instructions after that but I didn’t hear them. I was too busy crying. As soon as this person invited me to go to that sacred space I was there. Jesus had a lot to say to me.
There wasn’t anything huge going on. I have been really excited about my life lately. Yet underneath that has come this awareness that I am a little bit scared. I don’t know what life will bring for me in these coming weeks and months. I just have a sense that God has used the past 14 months to prepare me to move.
I found comfort in Jesus’ arms. I also found that I had strength in Him. It wasn’t a huge thing that I needed clarity on. I was just feeling vulnerable and I needed some support. Like on the snow covered highway I needed to slow down to be able to see. In terms of my spiritual life, visibility was poor. But when I slowed down to spend time with Jesus I was able to see a little bit better (but not perfectly.) So the next storm that comes my way, even the little ones that are really not storms but just high winds, my prayer is that I remember to slow down.
As I thought about that experience I reflected on the earlier part of the day and even the rest of the weekend. A retreat is really about slowing down isn’t it? As the retreat went on I felt a growing sense of unease and a vague sense of sadness though. I couldn’t understand what was going on. The interesting thing is that I was surrounded with people who would listen to me if I could articulate what was going on. But I just didn’t understand where my emotions were coming from.
We did an activity where we were asked to find a sacred space with Jesus in our minds. We could imagine being anywhere we wanted that seemed right to us. There were more instructions after that but I didn’t hear them. I was too busy crying. As soon as this person invited me to go to that sacred space I was there. Jesus had a lot to say to me.
There wasn’t anything huge going on. I have been really excited about my life lately. Yet underneath that has come this awareness that I am a little bit scared. I don’t know what life will bring for me in these coming weeks and months. I just have a sense that God has used the past 14 months to prepare me to move.
I found comfort in Jesus’ arms. I also found that I had strength in Him. It wasn’t a huge thing that I needed clarity on. I was just feeling vulnerable and I needed some support. Like on the snow covered highway I needed to slow down to be able to see. In terms of my spiritual life, visibility was poor. But when I slowed down to spend time with Jesus I was able to see a little bit better (but not perfectly.) So the next storm that comes my way, even the little ones that are really not storms but just high winds, my prayer is that I remember to slow down.
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