Walking on the beach

I’ve been going to my grandparents lake house in the summer all my life.  Out of 30 summers, I’ve probably been there for 25 of them.  I took my first steps in that house.  Since I moved around so much growing up, it’s been probably the most constant “location" in my life.   Every time we go, it feels a little like coming home. 

It’s nearly a 100 year-old house nestled on a quiet stretch of Lake Michigan, and I have countless memories of the time spent there, memories filled with chocolate donuts and stale Oreos, running in wet sand at dusk, and the whistles of trains early in the morning. 

We didn’t have Oreos this year.  Admittedly, that was a disappointment.

  But the rest of those details remain, year after year,  and beautiful new memories form as I get to watch a next generation experience what always feels to me like magic.    

There is however one thing that is entirely unpredictable, year after year.   The beach.  Some years it feels like you're walking a mile in soft sand to get from the steps of the path to the water, with football fields worth of beach.  Other years the beach is much less expansive.  It changes as the lake changes, as the seasons change, as the years change.  This year, there was only a 10 foot stretch of beach, less than I’ve ever seen, and a steep drop off from the grass covered dune to the beach with mere steps from there to the water.  Sometimes there’s soft golden sand, and sometimes it's dark with tiny pebbles.

It’s so familiar being there each year, and yet the landscape can be totally different.  It’s really astounding how much the same place can change.   It’s equally surprising how much the landscape of our faith can change across the years.  We’re the same person, sometimes doing the same things, the same prayer routine, the same devotions, and yet we find ourselves in what looks like a totally different place.  The fruit of our prayers is not golden sunshine anymore, but haziness and rocks under our feet.  Or what used to be full of exhilarating waves crashing is now still, eerily so.  Even as we try to keep things constant, to stay the course when the landscape is wide open and easy, it shifts on us.  The very ground we’re standing on has been changed, moved, and sometimes without warning a new season brings a completely new view. 

I think it’s easy to look back at past seasons in our faith journey and long for the easiness or the confidence or the discipline of years gone past.  I've certainly done it.  I’ve noticed (through my vast and very unofficial research) that young adults who had an especially positive faith walk in high school often long for the faith of that season again.  Their eyes light up when they talk about it, and you can see them yearn for that sense of…I’m not even sure they can describe it…certainty? passion?  structure?  When, in reality, they’re probably deeper, more mature in their faith now than they were then.  But their faith doesn’t have the same feel.  Even our relationship with God can change in the way it feels; different; colder sometimes, warmer others, more intimate or frustratingly distant. 

We all have seasons of faith that are more comfortable, feel more fruitful than others, and of course we want to hold on to them.  We end up chasing the feeling.  You know, the way it was when you were part of that Bible study, or after you went to that retreat.  If only it could feel like that again.  It can be frustrating to show up at the same spot, do everything the same, and find that you’re staring at something entirely different, unable to force the shape of what was onto this entirely different picture.   

And it’s hard, because now you have to figure out how you’re going to adapt to this new beach you find yourself on.  How you’re going to set up camp, what it’s all going to look like.  Sometimes it feels like starting over.   And it feels like it was stronger, more sturdy, before.  Of course it did.  You’d already learned that beach.  This is not the same, and won't be. 

At the now very wise old age of 30(!) I caution friends who look nostalgically at other points in their faith walk, wishing it could feel like “that” again.  I caution myself too.  Because it’s always tempting to want what once was.  But when we chase the feeling of what it once was, we end up facing backwards looking for something that is no more.  What the beach looked like before doesn’t exist now.  There is only where we stand in the present.  Faith doesn’t go backwards.  There is only the current beach with which to seek sacred spaces, intimate moments.  Only the current beach on which to walk.  And sometimes the sand is scorching hot and the rocks sharp under your feet.

 But if you pause to look, and usually you can find it somewhere, the light dancing on the water is still like magic. 

                                              “…and the spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters…”

In many ways the lake house has changed a lot.  My grandfather is no longer alive.  My grandmother only comes up for a day or two.  I see things like chipped paint and slippery stairs.  The days are spent chasing after a toddler instead of finding the secret stash of oreos. 

But even with all the changes, it still feels like home. 

Even when the new place we find ourselves in feels disorienting, ultimately, it’s the same.  

From John 21:

At dawn Jesus was standing on the beach, but the disciples couldn’t see who he was. He called out, “Children, have you caught any fish?”

“No,” they replied. 

Then he said, “Throw out your net on the right-hand side of the boat, and you’ll get some!” So they did, and they couldn’t haul in the net because there were so many fish in it.

…When they got there, they found breakfast waiting for them—fish cooking over a charcoal fire, and some bread… “Now come and have some breakfast!” Jesus said.

 None of the disciples dared to ask him, “Who are you?” They knew it was the Lord.  Then Jesus served them the bread and the fish…

 Then Jesus told him, “Follow me.”

When we find ourselves on a new stretch of sand, it seems rocky, unfamiliar.  It’s different, and forever will be.  But it's also the same. 

It’s the same one who meets us on the beach,

even when we can’t recognize him,

giving directions,

providing all that we need,

inviting us to the banquet prepared,

and urging us ever forward with the words “Follow me”

For there is new ground to be covered, 

                       new magic to be found. 

And the good news is we don’t have to know the way, or how it’s “supposed” to feel, or even feel comfortable or at ease.

We just need to know the one we’re following.  

And though the landscape may change, in following Him, 

we find home again.