In a world that screams for our attention this way and that, all day, every day, I say, "No."
Life is made of a million little choices mixed with a few big ones. One of my big life choices was to move to a small town up in the mountains. We live here with next to no neighbors but for a few months of the year. It is quiet. It is brimming over with wildlife. It is beautiful every season of the year. But still, we can fill our time with activities, ignoring our surroundings and feeling the stress of the world. We can fill every hour, leaving no time for the wonderfulness of just being; resting and seeing and listening.
We must be intentional if we want to be rested, truly rested. We must take time to feed our souls with truth, beauty, and goodness.
Leisure for me, those things that really make me feel at peace and content, are Sunday morning worship with fellow believers, reading a good book, and being outside with my family.
We turn up the music at home and sing together but there is something so magical that happens at church when a group of us sing to the Lord and sit, receiving the Word of God in harmony. The Spirit of God meets with us and there is nothing like it.
This poem had me contemplating life's gift of leisure:
Leisure
What is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.
No time to stand beneath the boughs
And stare as long as sheep or cows.
No time to see, when woods we pass,
Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass.
No time to see, in broad daylight,
Streams full of stars, like skies at night.
No time to turn at Beauty's glance,
And watch her feet, how they can dance.
No time to wait till her mouth can
Enrich that smile her eyes began.
A poor life this is if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.
William Henry Davies
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