B_r_a_v_e_s_o_u_l

I am so caught at a crossroads. A new, strangely unfamiliar world, where convictions matter most and ambitions matter naught, beckons oh so feverishly in my heart. In this world, only a few are called, and fewer still are ultimately chosen. They are an exceptional kind, a “chosen generation,” profound in their knowledge (which they’d rather call “wisdom”), prudent on our reserves (which I’d readily call “chattels,”), yet abounding with tranquil delight (which we all know as “fulfillment.”)

In this world, as opposed to my world, a task is a calling and project is a burden that compels you to move mountains even while crouched so low or down on your very knees. In this world, there is much freedom and responsibility, not a set of rules, to pursue directions. In this world, only the called, not the driven, make the final cut.

In my current world, a task is a goading to realize commitments and deliver targets. It needs a “driven person” to push barriers for that all important need to broaden markets and produce profits. In my world, resources, all kinds of them, abound; and so are the rewards for what we’ve all come to want as “sweet success.” In this strange new world, a “called person” pushes frontiers to conquer even the thickest of thickets, with nary a resource but one ageless tome, and no tangible rewards lest you call one more fish cast unto the fisherman’s net a worthy recompense for a heart’s humble toil.

This world beckons, summoning me (or maybe not – yet - ) to seek something profound, something deep, not something extensive like knowledge or know-how, or expertise perhaps. It lures me to pursue burdens greater than my own feeble ones and no longer aspirations to gather as much as I was once determined to have.

I sit patiently now, mustering every ounce of strength to stay still …while waiting on my One. It continues to take much of my fortitude and patience I must say, but I trust that in waiting, there is a reaping that is most gratifying….                                                                                                                                                                      

Closets, in my not so distant past, were nothing but compartments. They were 3 mere walls and a door, built within the confines of yet a larger enclosure of 3 more walls and yes, another door. They were to me basic fixtures in a room much like pockets are necessary accoutrements to a trusty pair of jeans.

Well, I knew then how they aren’t ordinary aesthetic elements - how they are built to serve a purpose - a purpose that was for me as basic as storing stuff, down from dirty linens, to starched, immaculately ironed and neatly stacked white shirts.

Yes, embarassing at it was, I did use my "closets" to hide my "dirty linens" …to keep my "soiled garbs" …to hold my "tattered garments." I figured they could aptly stash my "defects" away… far and definitely safe from the prying eyes of those lions and gazelles.

Closets were brooding. Closets were taboo. Closets came to symbolize suppressed hurts, useless faults, pointless moments of anger…. meaningless bits of bitterness and resentment … all until the day I rose above my mediocrity and started to understand closets for what they’re really worth - as objects holding much more purpose and reason than hiding things… and nothings… behind closed doors.

I had been avoiding my closets for most of my life. I had been ignoring them, moving about my room, my world - not minding whether they stood meekly at a corner or held an imposing presence against the vastness of a wall. I had learned to set them aside, and at one point, mastered the art of making them vanish at whim.

Today, I step into my closets everyday. In fact, I try to step into as much of my closets as I can within a day, a God-given day.

My closets have evolved into wide open breathing spaces.

My closets have come to typify grounding moments with my One.

My closets have become proverbial pockets of rest where I, in my brokeness and unworthiness, find indescribable solitude …abounding peace …ineffable splendour.

My closets have - inexplicably - given me undeserved wings … helping me rise above life’s "superfluous things." And it took only one seemingly unrelated article on "simplicity" to unlock all these… these once rusty, unappreciated fixtures in my life…

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Simplicity by Scott Lyons

Dreams, jobs, busyness, and stuff—we fill our lives with all these things. Some are necessary. Some are not. But as we fill up our lives with more things, life becomes increasingly complex. Life becomes about something it was never meant to be about. And it begins to choke us.

Even so, we continue to complicate things, to compile all that is not life. For every necessary thing in our lives, we add ten superfluous things: ambitions, anxieties, and possessions. Still, simplicity calls to us from quiet forests, purling streams, and rippling ponds; from snow-filled lanes, starry nights, and hushed city streets: Simplify. Get rid of the extras.

Simplicity demands that our televisions, pleasures, cars, and homes remain peripheral. Simplicity demands that our dreams be of obscurity rather than celebrity. Simplicity demands that we relinquish control of our possessions, following Jesus in all things. Simplicity, at its core, is a way of thinking, a way of viewing the world in which we live. It is a state of heart that spills over into our lives. Simplicity calls us, but are we too busy to listen?

Make it your goal to live a quiet life, minding your own business and working with your hands, just as we instructed you before. Then people who are not Christians will respect the way you live, and you will not need to depend on others. (1 Thessalonians 4:11-12)

We can practice simplicity even in the midst of the increasing complexity of life. We can learn to have only one king, only one master.Our lives can overwhelm our life! But there is a levee that withstands the flood: a closet door. Simplicity starts in our closets. We step into them. We close the doors. We breathe. We pray. We pray until we’ve prayed. We don’t stop until the waters have receded and we can see the foundation again. The closet is an opportunity to step out of the ebb and flow of life and to re-center. The closet is a mini-Sabbath within each day.

And the peace of Christ will reign in our hearts.

The discipline of simplicity is worth practicing even for peace alone. To have the necessary separate itself from the superfluous is a blessing in and of itself. But there is yet more to be gained through simplicity. People will see our lives and respect them. In other words, our simplicity will be preaching the Kingdom of God to ears willing to hear. And we will be financially cared for by the work of our own hands.

Perhaps it is time for us to consider whether our lives are too full of essentials to simplify—or simply too full. As all the levees in our lives are breached and buckle, we know that there is safety. There is quietness and confidence behind a (closet’s) closed door. There is peace and proclamation that result from a life lived in simplicity.

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I strongly believe that honest prayers, springing from a heart’s noble desires, can produce results. Mine did. My prayers (seeking for direction) have brought me to countless rooms with several doors waiting to burst open… leading into closets defying both reason and space.

My fervent prayers now are for more lions and gazelles to step into grounding closets of their own… if only to keep the fort of "One-ness" intact, if only to recognise the levee that is none other … WHO is none other… than our "ONE."