Holy No

Someone recently invited me to take on a leadership role in the community. Her request was simple enough, but it took me three weeks to ponder because of the ensuing internal wrestling match that went in in me. To begin with, she had invited me to a cause that was "right up my alley." The people I would have worked with are people of integrity. As I pondered the invitation my mind would wander down the path of imagining all the wonderful, exciting, meaningful things we might accomplish together. All of which, I soon realized, would entail more meetings, more planning, more work, more time....more than I literally have to offer. The "external" sense of calling was strong indeed ~ even seductive. But somewhere inside, I knew that saying "yes" to the invitation would pull me further off course.

In those moments when I allowed myself the quiet time to sit with that invitation in prayer, another voice....a stiller, smaller voice, began to speak from within. A voice which was quietly eager to remind me of the long list of things I've been wanting to do and have been putting off over and over because there have been too many other important things competing for attention. And over and over I kept hearing in my mind a refrain from a poem that was given to me more than twenty years ago. The author's name has long since vanished, but the essence of the poem has remained with me: "to live well, build only one barn." In other words, choose carefully and simply. Invest yourself in fewer things so that you may invest yourself in those few things more fully.

There are those scintillating times in life when the internal sense of call and the external work together as one. And then there are those dissonant times when they do not. This was one of those times when saying "no" to something good is the only way to say "yes" to something holier and better.

When Jesus came out of the wilderness, he gathered up those who would follow him. "Come, and follow me, and you will be fishing for people." He invited them to a mighty "yes!" But the only way to get there was through a thicket of "no's." Perhaps this kind of "no" is akin to blowing the ashes off a coal: we remove the suffocating crust clinging to our lives in order that the embers within might burn anew.

So I'm beginning this season of Lent with a couple of "no's." I'm beginning by brushing off the ashes of those things which pull me away from my inner compass. Not only have I turned down that person's kind invitation, but I'm saying no to a few other things as well. It is, perhaps, a form of confession and repentance. It is a first, small step in turning yet again from death to life.

Prayer of Confession

God of life, God of love, God of joy: I come to you today like a thirsty traveler to a well. In this age of overload, I thirst for life; in these days of animosity, I thirst for love; in this time of struggle, I thirst for joy. But you, O God, are the source of all these things, and I confess that my thirst must in part be a result of my having wandered from you. Forgive me for not taking the time to be with you more often. Forgive me for failing to nurture my own spirit, so that the life, love and joy I find in you might also flow back out of me. Guide my steps again toward the well of eternity, and there quench my thirst. Set me free from my sins, that I may once again dare to dream audacious dreams, extend audacious love, and be a little bit of light and life in the world, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.