Sunday 18 December 2011

"I just live here"

I'm in the process of reading a book called, 'A Simplified Life'.  It's about Verena Schiller, a modern-day hermit, and her experience of living a life of solitude.  I think it's the gentlest book I've ever read.  Basically, she spends 25 years of her life living in a cabin overlooking Bardsey Island, a place rich in Christian history.
Though she lives a life very different to most of us, towards the end of the book, she says this:

"For some years now when I have been asked how I live, how do I pray?  Do I have a rule; a timetable; how do I spend my time?  I have come to reply:  'I just live here.'  There is nothing special or spiritualized about a solitary life.  It is just one way of responding in faith to God.   Every life has a rhythm punctuated by the need to eat and to sleep, to work and to relax with enjoyment or sadness, contentment or anxiety.  It is no different for a hermit."

Maybe that's the same for all of us longing to live a holy life.  Maybe we should be able to respond, 'I just live here'.  It's so easy to want to be living somewhere else or doing something else, but sometimes we need to put our energy into being where we are, not getting away.  Holiness is more about how we live than about where we live.  We can be set apart for God in almost any situation.  Right now, I am where I am, and you are where you are.  Let's make sure we 'just live here' while we can.  Make sure we are set apart for God wherever it is He's got us at the moment.

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