Chaotic Rest

The other day, I brought my son to the playground. I said, "You want to swing?" And he nodded his head and grunted in a way that said, "Yes! Ooooh yes I do!"

Adrian's favorite thing to do at the playground is to go in the swing - although I think he might be starting to like the slide a bit better. He once sat in the swing for up to 40 min. I would push him, and he would just keep saying, "More, more!"

So I brought him to the playground after we had been at the gym. I could tell he was tired, and I thought this would tire him out more so that he could go down for a nap. As I pushed him on the swing, I noticed that he was making the swing sway side-to-side as well as up and down. It made the movement look kind of chaotic. I thought that it was kind of bizzare, but then again, Adrian is my crazy man. He likes to throw his head into me with his mouth wide open and saying "Aaaaaah" just so that he can hear the sound of his voice change as it is muffled. He is my crazy man because every once and a while he will do this and he will chomp down on me...ouch! So, hey, if he wants to ride the swing in chaotic fashion - as long as he isn't complaining about it - who cares right?!

Well after several minutes of swinging, I decided it was time to go home for naps. I stopped pushing. The chaotic movement of the swing subsided into a slower-and-much-more-peaceful sway. Soon the swing was barely moving at all...and Adrian wasn't asking for more. When I walked around to the front of the swing, I discovered that Adrian had fallen asleep.

My thought was this: How many of us can find peace in the midst of chaos? How many of us can find rest in turbulent change as well as in the quiet sway of life? I thought it must take a lot of trust to fall asleep in a swing - you must know that even when the movement is rocky and unsettling, that there is someone there holding you. It made me think, "I wish I could rest like that in life - knowing that God is there.

Now I still believe there is time for action and reaction. God didn't intend for me to be lethargic. I just appreciate the reminder not to let all that is going on around me to dictate the rhetoric of my being.