2013, boxes, and revelry.

My good friend Ceci recently flew through town and we got to eat Chinese takeout, drink wine, and talk about all the ways we want to make sure we keep God out of a box as we continue to grow up. It’s too small of a place for a giant God to exist. Besides, after good ole Justin Timberlake put his dick in a box and made a completely catchy tune out of it, I have a hard time putting anything in boxes. Even things that belong there like donuts or matches. You never know what may end up having to share the stage with JT’s no no zone, so I like to remove the possibility altogether. Ugh, the nightmares.

Those visuals alone are enough to keep God out in the great wide open, except in wish I would remember such things all the time. Because it’s great fun to imagine God large and free and very unboxed until I find myself hanging onto a piece of information about him too tightly. Then things get confusing really fast.

The end of 2012 was confusing…I guess…I’m confused about it, so I can’t really tell you. I could try to blame it on the impending apocalypse, but in reality I was thinking too much and feeling nothing. I was, not shockingly, thinking to hard. Gets in the way of doing. So I chose My One Word for 2013 to be revelry. (Long story, word a year, New Year’s Resolutions are too mainstream, ask me later) Somewhere in the beginning of Brennan Manning’s Ragamuffin Gospel is a story about an old priest or old man and when asked about his prayer life he said he only prayed for wonder, and God gave it to him.

I wanted that. I missed it. That excitement, the life, the wonder. I was thinking myself in circles. Most of the time thinking is great, I can’t stand folks putting their brains in boxes with JT’s junk for fear intelligence may be the 8th deadly sin. Except I was stuck, using my brain to dig a hole to the center of the earth, not enlightening, unless rocks are your thing. I wanted wonder, not dirt.

And wondrous it has been. Revelry was, not with the least bit of surprise, the exact word for 2013.

Fast forward 9 months to the part where I move across the country with no plan. None. Seemed like a great idea, needed some adventure, shake things up a bit. It has been delightful, no regrets.

For the first time since kindergarten I had absolutely no idea what was going to happen. Not a clue. The last ‘few’ years had been pretty planned out with the whole school/summer cycle. Provision always looked the same, I was always relatively aware of what I needed and uncertainty was always limited. I mean, how many Augusts can pass by before I stop being surprised that the answer to, ‘what shall I do with life’ is go back to school. Duh.
No great unknowns.

And then it was all unknown.

It was glorious. I love to fly by the seat of my pants with the best of them, and this fall was like one of those moments right after you bungee jump, and you don’t know if the cord is going to catch you but you don’t really care because it’s so exhilarating. Maybe. I’ve never bungee jumped so I have no idea what I’m talking about.

God couldn’t be in a box, everything was a great unknown, everything was exciting, and I don’t think the UHaul could have fit another one anyway. ‘God as a provider’ took on a different meaning, one that I’m still figuring out. I don’t know what I need, I don’t know where I’m going, and that’s ok. It has blown my expectations of God wide open, since in relation to the future I no longer had anything to pray about other than, ‘heyyyy, got any ideas?’ (And that prayer is prayed many, many times a day.)

Prayer itself changed a lot. I started to pray into God character. Yeah, I don’t fully know what that means either, but it has been beautiful to be less focused around events, opportunities, and circumstances and just sit with the God I know and figure him out more.

There are endless quotes by beautiful writers that bring to our attention how it is impossible to fully know and understand God because then he would be a creation of our minds. We read these quotes, we find them moving, then we get to work immediately forgetting them and trying to figure God out. We are willing to reach out and hold tight to any tiny glimpse of God we can. Our desperation doesn’t just put God in a box, it builds a mausoleum where we put to death a living God by dissecting him to pieces, each to exist in it’s own dusty prison.

I’m not for a second suggesting God is in any danger. He is like Tupac, but better, we can’t kill him. He’s fine, however our hearts do not share the same happy fate. 2013, the year of Revelry, of merriment and enjoyment of God as a whole living being. The year I stopped thinking and dissecting and inspecting and weighing and measuring him and just lived with him.