Don’t flay the sheep.

Sowing with Abandon

There’s something about the last few days of being pregnant, where you are bursting with possibility (OK, there’s something about reflecting on the last days of pregnancy: at the time, you just feel like you’re bursting…).

A year ago, I hugely pregnant. Abram’s birth was only 3 days away (my grandmother had a massive stroke the day before he was born, too…and died 5 weeks later). I knew (sort of) where I would be a year from then. We’d already made the decision that I would be leaving Fox Valley and that we would move back to the city. I was fairly certain that, a year from then, I’d be spending my time in an apartment in the city with a toddler, and a child in kindergarten. I thought I might be working, but I wasn’t sure.

Overall, a year later, things are about as I expected. I’m home with this lovely boy-child, and in a few minutes I’ll wake him up from his nap so that we can walk a couple blocks in the snow to pick his sister up from school. Erik will come home from work while the kids and I are working toward bedtime. We’ll have a luxurious expanse of family time together over the weekend.

But I sometimes feel like this new life has become a hermitage for me. I do love it, the quiet. I love the long walks and runs I take during the day. I love the deep quiet of Abram’s naptimes. Sometimes (like yesterday afternoon, when Zora and Abram happily played kazoos together for a few minutes) I love the afternoons. (Sometimes the afternoons and evenings are the witching hour for my kids…)

I am very isolated. A few months ago, a friend pointed out to me that I’ve gone from a job where I saw a steady stream of a variety of people every day to a life where I mostly see Zora, and Abram, and Erik. I don’t know that I mind that all the time. Often it feels like a sabbath. And truth be told, I am not very outgoing with my life right now. I’m not joining the PTA or finding many new friends. I’m carefully tending a few old friendships, and going to church, and seeing my family. But I’ve become a bit more of an introvert.

While walking this morning, and listening to a podcast devotional, I heard a few of the sower parables read. And I was hit by this thought: God asks us, in spreading the kingdom, to scatter seed with abandon.

In my ministry position, I scattered seed with abandon, no question about it. There were so many people, so many hours spent with teenagers and little children and their parents, so much good and wonderful chaotic noise, and wonderful wonderful hours of interaction with all of these people who were God’s beloveds. I’m not trying to be prideful, and I know there may be a few who would disagree with this, but I think I took good care of the patch of soil God gave me, and I think I often did it with abandon. I have every hope and faith that somehow, God used me to scatter a few seeds of gospel into some lives. I can’t wait to hear news of green shoots some day.

There’s not so much of the scattering with abandon anymore these days. I am very measured about things.

And maybe that’s what I am waiting for: the next point where I can scatter with abandon.

To everything a season, right?

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