The word restlessness carries with it many different images. One of a person tossing and turning at night, unable to attain the deep sleep that they desire. Or someone unsettled in what they are doing. Being unable to decide where to go or what to do. Maybe it’s someone struggling with a major life decision and just can’t reach a conclusion that they feel good about.
As much as I hate to admit it, that is me on any given weekend to a large degree. It’s not the sleep example either. It is the feeling that I need to be about something important but feel like I just arrived and missed the informational part of the expedition. The door was locked on the briefing room and I forgot my entry badge. I’m trying to figure out my role in the whole mission. I absolutely know that I have one. That’s the component that causes the restlessness; what is it exactly? Someone is somewhere waiting for me … to do …something. There is a trajectory that could be altered in a good way if… If someone was at their assigned post, performing their duty. I may be the one asleep at the wheel. Maybe I’m the Snoopy that is supposed to stop the Red Baron (It’s a Christmas song from the seventies, for the younger readers) from his appointed destruction. But instead of suiting up and resolving to protect the skies to the death; I am making faces on the mirror that I fogged up with my breath. I’m deaf to the voice shouting, “Come on Man! The world is waiting! It needs you. Move now!”
Please don’t misunderstand. I am not a deadbeat. I’m out there in the world getting it done every day, every week, every year. It pays the bills. But I know there’s a lot more urgency to the world we live in than just keeping the cable hooked up for another month.
I almost admire some people I’ve met over the years that just live for the weekend; the allotted time to do whatever they feel like for as long as they like. It may be pointless, or a little stupid but they don’t care because it’s their chosen indulgence. It could be sports, alcohol, or the opposite sex, but they pursue it like there is no tomorrow.
I have traveled down those avenues to a dead end and find little satisfaction in it. I like to have fun but it’s not a life pursuit I suppose.
I comfort myself in the fact that surely everyone has these suspicions and doubts. Maybe they ignore them better than I do. Or maybe it is more settled for them. I know it is for my kids. They KNOW what they’ll be doing in this life. They make music, serve in the military; they write and take incredible pictures. There’s not much questioning or searching for them. They have it down and they have me beat me by twenty plus years.
For the rest of us weary travelers, carry on. Continue on the journey. Explore. Probe. Question. Seek. The Lord guides our steps. We’ll get there. Maybe a little late, but we’ll get there.
