I am moving offices again. For many people, "the office" is almost a permanent second home. They get into an office and stay there forever. It has never been that way with me. I move pretty frequently for a professional, every couple of years or so.
This is not generally considered a "good thing." The ideal is to get a place and stay there forever, so "people know where you are." I have never figured this one out, but it appears that we think people will really care about where their lawyer/doctor/accountant is located. And, it appears, we are right. People do seem to care. Why?
For us, as human beings, it seems there is some innate idea that staying somewhere is a good thing. We, in a world of constant change, seem to value being able to keep something from changing. When a lawyer stays in the same office year after year, it is something that does not change. He changes (getting older, wiser, less physically fit). His billing rates change. His knowledge changes. The law changes. But, still, the fact that he remains in one place is somehow a comfort to us. It makes us think he will always be there for us. If he moves, then we stop associating him with stability and we cannot help but realize that he, like us, will change.
We are the same with homes (we don't like seeing people move a lot). We are the same with many things that have no actual significance. We crave some fixed spot of reference in a world where everything changes. We want to pretend (and to feel) that something in life is fixed.
Guess what? Nothing in life is fixed. Nothing that matters can ever be fixed to one spot and, thereby, be made impervious to change.
In his book Perelandra, C.S. Lewis creates a fantasy in which, on the planet Venus, a new race of humans has begun, with just an Adam and an Eve. On this planet, however, there is no garden with a tree from which you cannot eat. Instead, the planet is covered in water and there are two kinds of land. First, there is a Fixed Land, which does not move. Second, there are the Floating Lands which move with the currents of the sea. When you sleep on the Floating Lands, you never know where you will be when you wake up, because they move.
The law in Perelandra is that neither Adam nor Eve is to sleep on the Fixed Land. They can visit the Fixed Land when they come across it on some piece of Floating Land, but they cannot sleep there. Why? Because the only reason to sleep on Fixed Land is the desire to know where you will be when you awake. The Fixed Land allows you to control some aspect of your life absolutely, but the goal is for Adam and Eve to learn to trust God through a life of constant changes.
Long ago, I gave up the desire to sleep on the Fixed Lands of my own world. God is sovereign in my life and I am willing (and sometimes eager) to go wherever He sends me, to take whatever He brings into my path.
So, here I am moving again. I have come to actually enjoy moving. I enjoy seeing what God has for me in a new place, with new people, and new challenges. I love to wake up and see what place I have found in my life on the Floating Lands.
There is something special about going to sleep and not knowing where you will be when you awake. There is something special in not knowing what tomorrow brings in such a small thing, because "not knowing" is true in everything, no matter how we fool ourselves. "Also, [God] has put eternity into man's heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end." Ecc. 3:11.
I do not know where He is taking me. But I know I can go there in confidence.
Bring on the moving trucks!
This is not generally considered a "good thing." The ideal is to get a place and stay there forever, so "people know where you are." I have never figured this one out, but it appears that we think people will really care about where their lawyer/doctor/accountant is located. And, it appears, we are right. People do seem to care. Why?
For us, as human beings, it seems there is some innate idea that staying somewhere is a good thing. We, in a world of constant change, seem to value being able to keep something from changing. When a lawyer stays in the same office year after year, it is something that does not change. He changes (getting older, wiser, less physically fit). His billing rates change. His knowledge changes. The law changes. But, still, the fact that he remains in one place is somehow a comfort to us. It makes us think he will always be there for us. If he moves, then we stop associating him with stability and we cannot help but realize that he, like us, will change.
We are the same with homes (we don't like seeing people move a lot). We are the same with many things that have no actual significance. We crave some fixed spot of reference in a world where everything changes. We want to pretend (and to feel) that something in life is fixed.
Guess what? Nothing in life is fixed. Nothing that matters can ever be fixed to one spot and, thereby, be made impervious to change.
In his book Perelandra, C.S. Lewis creates a fantasy in which, on the planet Venus, a new race of humans has begun, with just an Adam and an Eve. On this planet, however, there is no garden with a tree from which you cannot eat. Instead, the planet is covered in water and there are two kinds of land. First, there is a Fixed Land, which does not move. Second, there are the Floating Lands which move with the currents of the sea. When you sleep on the Floating Lands, you never know where you will be when you wake up, because they move.
The law in Perelandra is that neither Adam nor Eve is to sleep on the Fixed Land. They can visit the Fixed Land when they come across it on some piece of Floating Land, but they cannot sleep there. Why? Because the only reason to sleep on Fixed Land is the desire to know where you will be when you awake. The Fixed Land allows you to control some aspect of your life absolutely, but the goal is for Adam and Eve to learn to trust God through a life of constant changes.
Long ago, I gave up the desire to sleep on the Fixed Lands of my own world. God is sovereign in my life and I am willing (and sometimes eager) to go wherever He sends me, to take whatever He brings into my path.
So, here I am moving again. I have come to actually enjoy moving. I enjoy seeing what God has for me in a new place, with new people, and new challenges. I love to wake up and see what place I have found in my life on the Floating Lands.
There is something special about going to sleep and not knowing where you will be when you awake. There is something special in not knowing what tomorrow brings in such a small thing, because "not knowing" is true in everything, no matter how we fool ourselves. "Also, [God] has put eternity into man's heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end." Ecc. 3:11.
I do not know where He is taking me. But I know I can go there in confidence.
Bring on the moving trucks!