Birds. And me.

This weekend I took part in the first ever Spiritual Orders Retreat with Lake Pointe Church.  We went to Daingerfield State Park in east Texas for a few days of isolation from the world.  We observed a number of the spiritual disciplines exercised by the saints of old in an attempt to reconnect with the way spiritual growth should be attained.

Friday we exercised Silence and Solitude.  Some of you may think I found it challenging to remain silent for 6 straight hours.  Oh, you would be wrong.  I love silence and I love solitude.  After I graduated from college, I moved to Houston for about 6 months.  I didn’t really make much of an effort to make friends there, which I know wasn’t healthy, but it suited me just fine.  I would leave work on Friday afternoon and not speak to a soul until Monday morning.  And I loved it.

It’s amazing what you learn when you spend that much time in quiet.  I was out looking over the water Friday morning and all I could hear was nature.  And then suddenly I heard a sound I didn’t recognize.  It almost sounded like traffic on the highway, but I knew it couldn’t be.  I looked up and saw a flock of birds flying overhead.  The sound I heard was the sound of their wings against the wind.  I don’t think I had ever heard that sound before.  It made me smile.  

I continued to watch the birds and as they flew across the lake, they must have found something that interested them because they started flying in a circle, sort of hovering over the trees.  It was this tall vortex of swirling black birds.  I stood and watched them for a few minutes and I noticed how long the birds could just soar on the wind without having to beat their wings.  They just gracefully, slowly descended.  

Part of our devotional material that day included an excerpt from Introduction to the Devout Life by St. Francis of Sales.  Here is a quote: The first point in these exercises is to appreciate their importance.  Our earthly nature easily falls away from its higher tone by reason of frailty and evil tendency of the flesh, oppressing and dragging down the soul, unless it is constantly rising up by means of a vigorous resolution, just as a bird would speedily fall to the ground if it did not maintain its flight by repeated strokes of its wings.

But wait.  I just watched a bird float in the air, without speedily falling to the ground AND without beating its wings.  At first I thought I found a flaw in the analogy, but I realized that it is simply incomplete.  Often times, without constant proactive effort on our part to maintain ourselves spiritually, we quickly fall to the ground.  But other times, we simply descend, slowly, almost imperceptibly.  We have fallen from great heights before we even realize we have begun to fall at all.  

The Spring was very hard for me.  Sometimes spiritual growth involves feeling empowered and encouraged.  But other times it involves the destruction of our own will so that it can be replaced by the will of God.  That’s what I dealt with this spring.  I felt like a ratty old rocking chair with peeling paint and rusty nails.  But then it was like God took a sandblaster to me and blasted away all the nastiness of myself until all that was left was just the raw wood.  It’s interesting how such healing can come from such pain.

But then I felt like I plateaued.  There was no more spiritual growth.  I wasn’t falling back into any of the sins of yesteryear, so I felt like I was doing okay, but I wasn’t growing.  But now I understand that I hadn’t plateaued at all.  I was on that gentle descent.  The imperceptible fall.  

Reminded me of a quote from The Screwtape Letters by CS Lewis:
It does not matter how small the sins are provided that their cumulative effect is to edge the man away from the Light and out into the Nothing.  Murder is no better than cards if cards can do the trick.  Indeed, the safest road to Hell is the gradual one – the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts.  
Your affectionate uncle,
SCREWTAPE

In my pride, I allowed complacency to set the tone of my life.  I decided that I was doing well enough, and didn’t need to put forth much effort to maintain the ground I had gained.  I realized this weekend that I was mistaken.  I require communication with my God, or I will stumble.  The way I live my life is never neutral to God.  I’m either living for Him, or I’m not.  

I pray that tomorrow is the beginning of a new era for me.  A time of growth, of maturity, of closeness with God.  A time that isn’t about me at all.