Baggage

Lately I’ve been carrying around what feels like a lot of baggage.  Things weighing on my mind, things I wish I didn’t have to deal with, things that I wish the answers to would just become abundantly clear, trying to figure next steps to take.  Nothing major.  Just the challenges of trying to figure out how to live as a Christian and how to live as an adult (I’m seeing more and more that we are all just trying to make it up as we go along though…no one really knows…which is actually slightly reassuring).

As I packed my suitcases to go to El Salvador a month ago, I hoped that I would be able to leave some of my figurative baggage behind in El Salvador.  I was looking forward to an experience that would help put things in perspective.  I was eager for God to speak through my experiences in El Salvador and through the Salvadorans.  I was praying for a revelation, for things to be made clear.  I wasn’t looking for a audible voice from heaven, but I was hoping some time away from home and work and being among some incredible people would help we sort things out.  Through past trips to El Salvador I have gained clarity and direction in living life.

But as it turned out, I left El Salvador with more questions than I came with, less clarity, and even a little more frustration. 

Really it was foolish to think seven days in a foreign country could help me figure out life. 

The only thing that seems to becoming clearer is that I may never have as much clarity as I would like about most things.  My life will never be mapped out for me, there will always be something else to deal with, and I will always have more questions than answers. 

As a control freak it drives me crazy to not know and not have the answers.  I keep trying to gain knowledge and wisdom and I keep trying to find the answers, but it seems that as soon as I get one situation sorted out there’s something else to discern.

I live in the tension.  Perhaps life will never be settled and will always be unresolved.

But even though it often feels like heavy baggage, what if what seems like the burden of trying to figure life out is actually the proof that life is open-ended?  What if we looked at all these questions and situations to figure out as signs of the freedom we have to answer those questions and act in ways that make us feel alive?   The minute we stop asking questions or the minute we feel like everything is set and figured out is the minute we give up our opportunity to truly live.