The Reflection in the Cross

Today I stopped.  

Exhaled.

And for a few stolen moments I allowed myself to walk through a nature park.  

In doing this, taking this time, I realized how much I push this to the back of my list even though I know I desperately need it.  I need that time alone to hear from God.  Somehow I convinced myself over the past few weeks that because I was at home with no one around that I should have been getting my soul fed by solitude.  However, there is something that I have discovered in the past few years about time alone in nature that draws me closer to God and irrevocably changes me.

Today, as I started my walk my head was full of white noise.  The what if's and what should I do's of life that clamor so loudly for my attention.  As I moved into the park I was greeted by the waterfall that has been created by the run off from the lake into a little creek.  While it was the sound of water moving through it's natural environment it had a loud sound that mimicked the sound of the white noise I had brought into the park with me.  

As I followed the path I had started on the loud sounds of the waterfall, moved to a gentler sound of the babble of the creek that ran to my left.  Less noisy, but still a busy sound that while quieter than the rush of the white noise and falls, it still carried a busyness with it.

As I moved a little further down the path, I arrived at the edge of the lake that creates a centerpiece for this little nature preserve.  It had a stillness, a quietness that was so beautiful it demanded emotion.  As I just listened though, I heard the slightest lapping of the water as the breeze skimmed across the otherwise still surface in front of me.  

As I stood there I recognized the need that my soul had been begging for the moment to experience the gentle brush of the breeze that is God's presence.  It has been begging me to move away from the waterfall of white noise and even the distraction of the babbling creek of activity and just be still.  

Introvert or extrovert, I am completely convinced that there moments when we can only truly connect to God in moments of stillness.  When we find those moments to stop the busyness that we choose to engage in that we fill our lives with and just let God show us how he sees us.  

When we run through life from one thing to the next, we fill our seconds, minutes, days, weeks, months and even years with the white noise that sends us to look to others for our reflection.  When our life is the rushing waterfall or the babbling creek it is impossible for us to see our reflection as God intended us to see it.  We will always see a distorted version of ourselves that leaves us believing we are less than who we were created to be.  

We have entered the season of Lent.  

The time we remember the events leading up to Christ death on the cross.  

Have you ever stopped to reflect on the fact that Jesus, the Son of God, went away in solitude prior to the events we remember on Good Friday and Easter?  

Even Jesus needed a moment of silence, some relief from the white noise, an opportunity for whitespace before he could assume the burden of the cross.  

Today, on my walk I was struck by all of the burdens we take on ourselves.  The crosses we take on and carry.  Church work, children's activities, charity commitments, small groups and the list goes on.  Activities that are well intentioned, but do we actually stop to ask if they are the crosses God wants us to carry?  

Jesus went to Calvary with one specific cross.  It was the cross that God had planned for him from the beginning of time.   Even with that one cross, Jesus needed someone to help him with that particular burden.  God had also planned the exact person, who would help him carry that particular cross.

It makes me ask of myself, how many crosses have I tried to carry that were not mine to pick up?  Was I less than successful because they were never mine in the first place so that one person who I needed to help me with them was not there?  It makes me think that sometimes the moments we experience failure can be because we have picked up something we were never meant to pick up and it is impossible to find the reflection of what God sees in us through that cross.  Since God never intended it for us, there is no reflection of who he is molding us into represented there.  When we fail to find that we look to others for the reflection we hope to find and then we begin to become distracted by the babble of the creek.  When we carry the cross we were not intended to long enough, the babble turns into a waterfall of white noise and we then exhaust ourselves trying to find the reflection that can only be found in the stillness of the lake where God's breath can be felt.

Is there a cross that you are carrying that you might not have been intended to carry?  Are you in a place where you are overwhelmed by the waterfall of white noise?  What steps do you need to take to introduce the stillness of the lake where you can feel the breath of God so that you carry only the cross meant for you?