Solidifying Joy

I lay awake last night, somehow exhausted and frustrated after a day of fellowship, rest, and play. I’ve been learning to intentionally take sabbath once a week, and it’s rough, inconsistent, and amazing all at the same time. 

But yesterday, while the day was filled with activities that normally refresh my spirit, the gift of sabbath slipped through my fingers. Like sand that is sloppy wet, I couldn’t quite make anything out of it. In my heart, the day refused to hold the shape of refreshment, connection, and joy like I wanted it to. 

Instead, questions about the future, unfinished projects, and plans for tomorrow stood like a concrete fortress in the front of my mind. 

My puddling sandcastle of sabbath joy was losing its shape by the minute, while the tower of anxiety seemed to grow stronger. 

This past summer, my dad and husband built a dam. Just a small dam in a mountainside stream to create a more usable reservoir of water. The kids and I “helped,” watching as he carefully stacked bricks and topped it with natural stone. Bricks and rocks — good, strong materials. But over time, the force of the water would have toppled them, were it not for the concrete that essentially glued them together. 

Even concrete itself is a mixture of the filler (usually sand) and a binder (cement). Mix those together with water, and you get a chemical reaction that turns it all into a paste that basically hardens into a man-made rock.

Hang in there, I’m going somewhere with this.

The difference between a melting sandcastle and a skyscraper? Essentially, the binding, hardening action of concrete. My sabbath joy was missing its binder.

But what in the world is that binder?

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This is my first guest post featured at The Mudroom Blog. Read the rest here: