Experiment 14: Sit.
Last fall, my husband and I had the privilege of hosting my brother-in-law Michael on his first visit to the US from Ethiopia. One evening when my husband was away and son asleep, Michael cracked open a story. Just a hair. We were standing on the hardwood floors, probably tired after a full day. Sensing my fatigue, he seemed ready to tuck the story away, stow it back in the inner depths of his heart. The truth is, I was ready to plop somewhere soft with a book. But I felt the Spirit nudging: Sit. “Would you like to sit down?” I asked.
Reading the Gospels of late, I’ve been struck by how often Jesus sits. In the rabbinic tradition of His day, Jesus sits down to teach: in boats, on mountainsides, in the temple (Matthew 5, Mark 4, Luke 5, John 8:1-2). Before feeding the 5000 (plus women and children), Jesus sits down with His disciples on the grass (John 6:1-15). Like all hungry humans, Jesus also sits down to eat, breaking bread and drinking wine (John 21, Matthew 9:9-17, Luke 7:36). When His disciples vie for first place in the kingdom of heaven, Jesus gently rebukes them from a seated position rather than a power pose. After explaining that the last will be greatest, He welcomes a little one to sit on His lap as a breathing model of faith (Mark 9:33-37).
It is no small thing that the God who holds every atom of the universe, who breathes worlds into existence, who needs nothing from humankind, chose to sit on the earth with those who were made of it. That He acknowledged His own frailty in choosing to rest legs weary of walking. That He modeled the unrushed posture of sitting down, as if He had all the time in the world to share the Gospel in terms of sparrows and lilies, coins and pearls.
If a sitting child embodies the kind of faith Jesus desires, if Jesus Himself chose to sit, the posture must be worthy of imitation. What would it be like to weave rhythms of sitting into daily life? Is it even possible in the workday rush?
Pause and Presence
Sitting can transform the tenor of a room, the energy in a relationship. Standing while trying to teach my son a lesson (don’t climb on the table, take that lid out of your mouth) is largely ineffective. My standing communicates the conversation (and the one it is addressed to) has little value and will likely be short. In a flash I can pivot back to the dish-washing or onion-chopping or text-sending that tugs on me like so many small chains.
But sitting allows the conversation to unfold at a gentler pace. It can meander, ebb, gush, wander. Sitting roots me in place for a few moments of pause and presence. Sitting says, You matter more than anything else I could be doing right now. Nestled next to my son on the ground, humbled to his height, I can look him in the eyes. And when I sit with him, he is far more likely to listen.
A Posture to Receive
Sitting down not only opens up space for sharing wisdom. It is not only an expression of love towards the person you are speaking to. It also places us in a posture to receive. When we sit with the “little Christs”* around us, we allow ourselves to receive the gifts they give, even as we seek to give the gift of our attention, presence, and Spirit-led words.
After Michael and I each took a couch in the living room, he shared how God led a city boy to an unpopular university in a rural Ethiopian town. How no one wanted him to take that eight-hour bus ride from the capital to live in the middle of wilderness. Least of all himself. He told me of his parents’ tears, of his own anguish. And then he told me how, in that desolate corner of the world, God brought him the beautiful, gentle-souled woman who would be his wife. Open-handed, Michael offered me the gem-like lessons he gleaned in an unexpected place.
Like a student, I listened. My soul needed those words.
It was the longest, deepest conversation we’d ever had in the nine years we’d known each other. A brief reference to the past meandered deep into the heart’s tender terrain. Our conversation became a time of worship, thanking a God who sees and guides; of fraternal intimacy, growing deeper as brother and sister.
All in part because we had chosen to sit down.
An Invitation from the Universe-Maker
When feeding the 5000, Jesus told the disciples to seat all of the people before offering them torn chunks of barley bread and fish. Only in first sitting down could the hungry receive spiritual–and physical–nourishment. And in sitting at Jesus’ feet– the only necessary thing–Mary could receive the rivers of living water gushing from the divine heart (Luke 10:38-42).
The Universe-Maker is inviting us to sit with Him. When we sit at Jesus’ feet like Mary (behind the closed door, in a thousand secret places), we acknowledge our finity, our weakness. For a few moments we become rooted like trees, abiding in the presence of Jesus, receiving His living water, His sweet, ever-renewing manna (John 6:22-59).
And once we’ve been nourished, we can rise again.
* C.S. Lewis refers to believers as “little Christ’s” in Mere Christianity.
This blog is part of the “Experiments in Inefficiency” series, which explores what it means to resist unbiblical cultural and personal pressures to produce in favor of Jesus’ easy yoke.
