interruption as invitation
Do you ever have days where everything goes wrong? Do you have days that maybe aren’t even traumatic, but on a small and yet still disruptive scale, all seems to not go your way? Like you leave home without your purse and have to forego lunch even though your stomach is growling? Like when you spill something on your shirt when you need to look presentable? Or when you order something and go to pick it up only to realize you’ve gone to the wrong location or are standing in the wrong line? All being First World problems, they can still be frustrating, inefficient, or stand in the way of the agenda for the day. It just seems to be the ol’ case of “ONE THING AFTER ANOTHER.”
I wonder if it causes you to curse, get angry, or demand that all goes your way. As for me, I had one of these days recently and eventually was able to laugh at all the times where I had missed it again, forgotten something, chosen wrong, or realized something far too late. It had become comical by the end of the day and felt like the joke was on me, and maybe there was a hidden camera crew who caught it all on tape. Maybe it would air as a lesson on how NOT to respond to days like this.
I found myself huffily speeding around town, swerving past that slow driver, regretfully using a certain tone with an innocent customer service person, internally tapping my foot as I waited for those around me to get what I needed from them, etc. Later in the afternoon, I had a desire to blame or complain, even though in every scenario that didn’t go my way, I realized that I was the culprit. It would’ve felt better to point the finger at someone else, but on this day it was clear to me that I could only point it at myself. In the words of Taylor Swift, “It was me, hi, I was the problem, it was me.”
I could do nothing but admit and accept and bend to the will of the day. But this caused me to talk with the Lord and pause long enough to hear an invitation from Him. Instead of seeing all of the days’ events as disruption, He whispered loud enough for me to ask Him more. One thing after another had forced me to stop running mindlessly, look up and pay more attention. I can be hypervigilant a lot of the time, so this was different. It was a productive, slower, more curious way of paying attention.
By the end of the day, I was very amused by my absent-mindedness and how I had fumbled through it.
Accepting the invitation was a submissive mindful bow to the Father and what He might want me to see, hear, or think about. It slowed my mind and heart in order to more intentionally pay attention and love whoever came across my path, instead of my eyes just being locked on the next task at hand. It made me hopeful about how the Spirit works and eager to bow to His will in longer seasons of disruption instead of just a day’s timeframe. What if I could see that major disappointment instead as an invitation from the Father? Instead of just being disruptive and upsetting, what if trauma could be seen as an invitation to more? I hope for this. I hope that when life interrupts my path or will, that He can continue to train my heart and eyes to see His good invitation.
