The World and Everything In It

Full disclosure: I am the youngest of six. 

So when it comes to the topic of influence, which came to my mind basically out of nowhere this morning, I will say that I credit birth order as having had an influence on me, as I believe it has influenced my older siblings as well. 

That influence, on them and on me, has explained, at least to me, some of our personality traits. 

For me, birth order has encouraged a rebellious nature, specifically against authority.

One repeated episode is this: I am just about to do something, when someone comes along and tells me to do that very thing. Suddenly, I no longer want to do it. Though I may do it, I will not do it with the original cooperative spirit.

I would imagine this describes one facet of most people’s world of internal thought.

We are all spinning tops of perspective and information in-take. We whirl around in what, to us, is not “our own little head” but a rather intimately curated and quite large universe consisting of heart, head, soul, spirit and physical body. 

This compilation of human entity, to me, only reinforces that there is a God, because I don’t know of any human or computer who could devise so many individual beings on such a complex level. 

Evolved? 

I sat and watched a song bird this morning perched on the balcony railing, and I thought,

“Weird that some people think that that bird is a distant relative. No way. If we all evolved from the same locus, why can’t I fly and that bird compute mathematical equations?” 

And this tangent is further proof of the whirling dervish of random thought: welcome to my, and I would imagine, most people’s world.

What is on our minds is at once plain and colorful; one dimensional and multifaceted; joyful and full of consternation, morphing from one meteoric moment to the next.

We toss these conjurings about and into the air like so much pizza dough, catching them as they land and then throwing more theoretical musings—the basel and fresh mozzarella of our rapid-fire brain—on top, not able to even remember how we went down this rabbit hole in the first place.

This ponderous cacophony is what some folks attempt to distance themselves from through television, reading suspense novels, shopping, drinking alcohol, attending sporting events, playing loud music or working overtime. 

But I see these brain implodes as housecleaning, a sort of R.E.M of wakefulness, leading us to perhaps an insight—an insight of God—that stands out in that it actually makes Godly sense and transforms us, renewing our minds as the Bible reinforces (Romans 12:2; Proverbs 3:5-6).

These sprouts of wisdom, planted and watered by God and daydreamed into existence, are a worthy redeeming of our time for what they wrought in us. Which is why, I would submit, that children do it so much and adults seldom understand or allow it. 

“Johnny is distracted?” 

No, actually; Johnny is doing exactly what his God-given brain is created to do. 

Christians love the term “steward.” 

We are to be “good stewards” of all that God privileges us with: time, money, talents and material blessings. 

But what about being a steward of thoughts that begin with the question, 

“Let’s face it, what is it really, all about?” 

Or begins with a “I’m not gonna lie, I’m not feelin’ it today” (meaning, I’m just not feeling much of anything at all. Complacency). 

Many of us, especially some of us Christians who think our spiritual life absolutely does not allow for this sort of “navel gazing” or dispassionate outlook, may feel compelled to spiritualize these dispositions away by condemning ourselves for lack of faith, or claim “Satanic attack” or ask God to take this “doubt” away.

And there are times for that—where we do have a lack of faith that needs shoring up, and we are besieged with the oppression of this worldly darkness, and are plagued by something that we clearly need to return to Scripture for in order to gain clarity.

But there are also times when, opening the door to our favorite local cafe, or resting on a city bench and blankly staring out, or observing life at a bus stop, we honestly and unashamedly embrace life as it is: not as it should be, not as we think it should be, not as we think it could be but isn’t, not in defeatism, not in optimism, but just as it is. 

Only. What we see. As it is.

We simply allow the reality to sink in. And we take that—that which we platonically notice—to God. 

We put it down in front of Him and we say, 

“Here you go, God. I can’t make heads or tails of it. And to be honest, I really don’t want to. But I’ve enjoyed sitting here. Watching. And in that, being a part of it.”

Or maybe, cleansed from all pretense, our hearts and minds leap together and for this one second in time, finally, we do “get” it!

Either way, God will use it. We may never know, but He will—with us, and maybe, too, with those who are in the picture.

See, influence is not always an active verb originating with us. Oftentimes it accomplishes a lot more by being passive. 

And by that I mean, similar to the way birth order works on each one of us, influence sometimes needs to happen to us and it needs to happen to us first by the very folks we thought we were supposed to influence. 

And in this case, unlike birth order influence, this others-first influence happens to us when we stop ourselves—everything about us—long enough to wait, listen and see. We release foregone conclusions, presuppositions, cliched estimations of people or situations. 

And we no longer carry any “I’m gonna make a difference” placard. 

Influence happens when we clear the slate and just look and see. 

Two things will happen: first, “look and see that the Lord is good” (Psalm 34:8) and “be still, and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10) will come into play because we are able to see God’s perspective and potential by shutting off our warped attitudes towards people, places and groups, or our “helpiness” mode.

Second, Godly wisdom supplants our superficial summations often laced with superiority. In other words, we are greatly and constructively humbled. More of Christ, less of us (John 3:30).

We go away influenced by and in the renewed sense of God’s greatness. 

And in that attitude and disposition, we may unwittingly be a Godly influence in the world somewhere. And by unwittingly I mean not a strived for but an organic, undetected, continuous outworking of a contentment and comfortableness with simply observing, from God’s blank slate, life around us. 

That is where this morning’s pondering—which began with staring out a window—led me. 

I’m glad I took the time.

Copyright Barb Harwood