Disruptions

So often when we look back on what seemed to be against what we had planned, we discover that it was a point of growing and learning. God does not only work through the confines of the Church or of our own ideas: it is often when we are forced to do other than we planned that the Great Other works through us. I do not believe in vocation as much as vocations. God does not call us once but again and again and again. Vocation is being open to the situation we are in and listening to what God is saying within it. If our vocation is thwarted at one level it does not mean that God no longer calls us: God calls us wherever we are, we are called to keep ourselves aware.

David Adam (Walking the Edges, p.27).

I love this quote because it's deep stuff. It makes me feel safe and empowered that God calls us wherever we are and that we can be aware of his presence and leading and use our circumstances rightly.

But it makes me feel very nervous too, and slightly sick - that I might have rugs ripped out from under my feet, that I will have to keep saying 'yes' to hard things...the same hard things.

Today I was reading in James 1 how the testing of our faith produces perseverance. And that we can ask for wisdom. But that when we ask we mustn't doubt when we ask.

Rather than getting so scared about possibilities, I must learn to trust the Lord and seek wisdom from him. I much prefer solid ground. In the end though, solid ground isn't a system of beliefs, behaviour, circumstancesor plans; solid ground is a person, and the unchangeableness of his character, and in particular his love. That's who I have to adore.

An extraordinary feeling

For six months now when I’ve been in my room, I’ve either been sitting on the floor, lying on the floor (sleeping on a futon), or standing up. Today I brought a new item into my bedroom – a chair. What an extraordinary feeling! Here I am, sat on it, using my newly acquired desk too. Now, my horizontal gaze falls on at a different part of the wall than before: the middle bit. Suddenly the room has taken on a different perspective. I must say, it feels more like what I’ve been used to elsewhere – in British dining rooms, and classrooms. In fact, suddenly the room looks like a function around me – a space for me to sit and work, an office, to fit around my needs. Before, I had to fit around the room, and multi-function in the room, even if inconvenient. One moment I was sat on the floor eating my dinner, the next I was sleeping on that same part of the floor. However by doing so, I felt like a acquired a new perspective: I had space around me, rather than furniture; I was learning a new way of living, a Japanese way of living. And so, although today’s ‘chair-perspective’ is novel, I think I preferred the new perspective I had acquired before.

Cultural adaptation is all about trying out new ways of doing things, or new ways of thinking about things, that we might never have known existed before. It’s not only doing the choice that before we wouldn’t have naturally chosen – it’s also about doing what previously we wouldn’t have imagined ever was a choice! And sometimes, we discover that the previously unimagined is actually a better thing!