I play a game on my phone called “block jam”. Like many games the aim is to unblock the square and clear all the shapes. There are levels and different challenges are always set each game. When it gets very hard, I can be on a level for days before I get it out. Days of trying different ways to combine the moves to unblock the shapes. Once I finally get it, after days of trial and error, I simply press start again and begin the next challenge. I never just sit in the empty cleared out space and revel in it, enjoy it, celebrate it or just savour it. My brain is wired to move onto the next challenge, the next level, a harder level still…why is that ?
Whether it is empty spaces in a game or completed tasks for the day I find myself simply moving on to see what else I can accomplish. Yes, I am list person who finds joy in seeing the whole page highlighted or ticked off. That is a good day. Maybe it is just me, but I realise it can be somewhat troubling when my day is judged on what I did or didn’t do. I spend my life filling the gaps, adding one more task.
2025 began with the discipline of silence and solitude. Choosing to sit in the empty spaces, with no to do list … but to be with myself and God. I am working my way up to no journal as I can write something down, even God’s word, and that can become a distraction to sitting in silence with God.
“Without solitude it is virtually impossible to live a spiritual life”
Henri Nouwen
Boy, I tried it with the game, once I had finished a hard level, to just sit and look at the empty, the achieved clear space where all the blockages were gone. Just to sit there and not press re-start. I just wanted everything blocked up again. There seemed to be no point to the game when you didn’t have some blockage that meant nothing could move around. And yet Jesus desires us to start the day, end the day or live in a way where the space is cleared and full of space.
Jesus’s first piece of advice for his disciples about prayer was not what to say or what to do, but where to go and simply be.
“Here’s what I want you do: find a quiet, secluded place so you won’t be tempted to role-play before God. Just be there as simply and honestly as you can manage. The focus will shift from you to God and you will begin to sense his grace.”
Matthew 6:6 MSG
It’s one thing to want a game to be challenging and blocked in order to problem solve, it is simply a bit of fun. But when it comes to life, do we really want it? I don’t like being blocked with impossible problems, things that stop me from moving or that block me and take away my path to joy. Or do I? Have I become used to this being what life is about or sadly do I even seek it at times? Is this the irony of the Western life when being busy and stressed is a measure of success? A status symbol. Where the average person is depressed, has mental health issues, or on stress leave or medication of some sort. And it feels like our kids are dealing with this younger and younger these days.
The call to follow the way, His way, to abide in Him, to find your secret place and simply be with God is so counter cultural. If I want to be more like Him and I do, then my daily rhythms need to reflect this.
“As often as possible Jesus withdrew to out-of-the-way places for prayer.”
Luke 5:16
The call to abide in Him is the call to do less and not more. I am so blessed to live in a place that calls out to me every day to slow down, enjoy the wide and empty spaces and be in out of the way places with Him. And yet it is still a choice every day to do so, as there will always be something that we can DO to fill our time. I may like to play “block jam” as a game, but in life I seek to be unblocked and learn more and more the joy of BEING with Him.
I wonder what blocks up your daily life?
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