Flora Doesn’t Like to Stop Playing. Could I be so wise as to enjoy the good that is in front of me in this moment?

Flora doesn’t like to stop when she is playing.

This can be inconvenient. As adults, we have schedules to keep and things to do. There comes a time when we need to be finished and, on our way.  And yet 4 year old Flora does not want whatever she is doing to stop.

Her mother knows her well and understands this. She works to be patient with Flora as she processes things. She works with her so that eventually she moves away from what she was doing and on to what is next. This is possible many of the times but not all. Often she has to be coaxed to move on.

Sometimes we stop at their house and find them in the car sitting in the driveway. For you see, Flora is happy in the car seat, playing, and she does not want it to stop. Other times she is at our place  and her toys are around her. She doesn’t want to stop playing. The joy of the experience is so wonderful that she does not want to give up that sensation. She wants it to go on and on.  Eventually, with some coaxing, she can move on to whatever is next.

We forget as adults.

We forget what it means to experience things for the very 1^st time. We begin (at least partially) to forget the joy of experiencing things with real pleasure. With repetition and with years we become accustomed to it all. We become respectable. We would feel silly to give ourselves in to fully enjoying something so much that we would refuse to stop when it is time to do so.  We become responsible. We do what we ought to do in its proper time which I suppose is necessary.

But perhaps we should not always give in or not give in so readily.

Recently I listened to an audiobook version of Perelandra by C.S. Lewis.[1] In that book, the Green Lady (who is a new, innocent and so far sinless Eve) is being persistently and repeatedly tempted by the Unman (the demon or tempter figure). I found it fascinating that one of the Unman’s strategies was to constantly try to pull her away from what she had to what she did not have. The Green Lady could not understand this. Everything she had was good. What was in front of her at the moment was good. Why did she need to long for what she did not have?

“Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the father of lights…”[2]

But I am not as wise as the Green Lady. I am so foolish that I find my eyes wandering away from the joy that is in front of me to other things. The Green Lady has the ability to simply enjoy the good things that God has given her. There is no rush. She enjoys the good that each moment has for her. There will be time for other joys when those moments come. 

But I, in my foolishness, take a quick taste, and then am easily tempted away to a wide variety of other things. Often these things are worries or concerns of what might happen, but of which I can do nothing about in that moment.

Dorothy and Steve took the girls to a carnival. The pictures showed utter joy on Flora’s face. Her excitement at being so high up on the Ferris Wheel, and then the other rides brought us joy just to look at them.

It is important for me to see this all and remember.

God created this world with so much in it for us to enjoy. Seeing Flora be excited and happy makes me happy. Seeing her parents be happy with her brings me joy.

I look at the sunset, and often what is even better, the amazing pastel colors that shift and change as they paint the sky in the minutes that follow. On the boat we sometimes stop and just watch with wonder and joy. In those moments, I wonder if God who created such beauty is taking joy in how we enjoy it. Sometimes a piece of music fills me with wonder and inspiration. In those moments, is it perhaps true that God takes joy in seeing me so moved? There are times when a new task fills me with creative energy.  I love to think that in those moments the creator God smiles at how we are all created in His image to ourselves be creative.  When my heart is filled with love for my wife and children or when I am filled with compassion for others, I imagine a God of love again seeing His creation fulfilling His purposes.

I know this may be a theme that I have written about in various ways in the past but perhaps it is because I so often need to be reminded of it and its reality.

Flora doesn’t like to stop playing. That is inconvenient but so wonderful.

Teach me Flora.

Remind me. 

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[1] Perelandra. C.S. Lewis, Scribner, Chicago, 1963.

[2] James 1:17