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Entering In

 Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. (Matthew 11:28)

          This past weekend, I rediscovered something about myself. Christmas Eve, I found myself thinking about the next day. It would be busy. I had church in the morning, followed by cooking carrots for Christmas dinner, helping with the Christmas dinner, the dinner itself, and writing. The thought that shouted more loudly than the others was that I had “made it” – or nearly so. The next day I could take down the Christmas decorations and get back to normal life.

          Last year at this time, I was reading about resting and reducing my workload for Sundays so I could have a day of rest. Quite often, at least at first, I found myself looking forward to when Sunday would be over, so I could get busy again. With both Christmas and Sunday as a day of rest, I tend to miss the point. I am mis-categorizing the concept.

          There are things that are simply the absence of something else. Darkness is the absence of light. Cold is the absence of heat. But the reverse of those is not true. Light is not the absence of darkness, and heat is not the absence of cold. There are other things that don’t work that way at all. Work is not the absence of rest, nor is rest the absence of work. Good is not the absence of evil, nor is evil the absence of good.

I think of these things in terms of a number line. In between negative numbers and positive numbers is something which is neither. It is zero, nothing, a figurative lack of existence. Making it to the threshold is not the same as entering in. Why do I insist on camping on the front steps? Or on running out to another task rather than entering in? I suspect there are a number of lies to be defeated.

One of my goals for 2022 is to at least start to learn to enter in. In a conversation with God a week or so ago, He talked about my needing to learn to dance with him. That will require that I go beyond the level of “take to steps, stop and pose” to actual dancing. 

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