Being

Paper Journal entry from Sept 5/07

I was wasting time this evening looking thru old videotapes and felt like I was wasting time and that I should be praying. I wasn’t enthused about the idea but shut off the TV and went to the living nonetheless. My typical thought was to pray but I couldn’t think of what to say. Bible reading seemed out too. I teared up and I don’t know why. I ended up just sitting. Not making requests or talking about my thoughts or feelings or how my day went. I fingered the cover of my Bible but didn’t open it. I did not let my mind wander and daydream. I just…was.

I have heard it said that we are human beings not human doings. By we live as though we need always to be doing and we bring this in our relationship with God. We talk to Him and make requests, we read our Bibles, we sing, we ponder, and all this has its place. But I got the distinct impression tonight that God just wanted to be with me. Just to be. Just to sit in each other’s presence and focus on each other, without words, without gestures, without volumes of information being exchanged, just to be.

It was kind of hard. I can sit and daydream or consider a problem but to just sit still and focus on something without evaluating or measuring or setting off on some other chain of thoughts – well, that was new and felt a bit odd. Yet I could identify with God’s desire. I have often thought that, should I ever find a mate, I should like very much every so often to just be with him. Not talking or doing something but just sitting and looking and being.

So then God’s desire is not so hard to grasp. I just wonder why He wants to be with me. The thought of being and not producing is foreign but if that’s how I view this relationship, it will never reach the depths of intimacy that I want in it. And I will never understand God’s love nor His grace. Grace is undeserved. The Creator of the universe wanting to do nothing and do it with me. That’s an undeserved privilege.