Travel Light

And what do all the great words come to in the end, but that? I love you -- I am at rest with you -- I have come home.  - Dorothy Sayers

It seems to me lately that our days are fluid, shifting winds in God's hands. Our life passes like a breath before his eternal, unchanging nature. Everywhere I see change, more change than I ever dreamed possible in mid-life. Meanwhile, Chris and I are at home as we go forward, as we change, because wherever we are is home. God is in the center, joining us together, making us a home. Coming to each new place is coming home, because God waits for us there.

Here's another lesson I learned this week: healthy boundaries are crucial for upward change.

By God's design, we cannot do everything and keep everything. This is wisdom and goodness. Choosing is part of growing. A life of choices is a life of growth and blessing in the growth. When we limit ourselves to a finite number of activities, we conserve energy for making upward change happen. This requires humility and an open hand. Instead of grasping, we must release things and opportunities, in order to move toward deeper goals. There will always be a life we didn't live; but if we choose well, our selection of one life over another is a meaningful part of our story. 

In our earthly existence, we have been given a stewardship. Upward change requires energy, effort, time, and discipline. Whatever we spend cannot be spent again. This is our agony and our glory -- the glory of created beings under the sovereign rule of an infinite Creator. In upward change, we must lift ourselves up a mountain of growth, along with all our gear. Hikers and mountain climbers are notoriously rigorous about the weight in their packs. Everyone stumbles along the way, aches from strenuous labor, and wonders if they will finish. Everyone realizes in the end that what brought them to the top was not a matter of gear, but a matter of the heart.

At the same time, no one makes it all the way with a heavy pack.  

The last five years have proved this rule: when struggling to move upward, remove something which is non-essential.  

Travel light in order to travel far.