Does anyone else sing the song ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’ as you lay your head gently on your keyboard after you’ve pressed one button and your work just went away?

Yeah, me neither.

That is one of the many things I wish were different right now.

You too?

There’s a scrambling and restlessness to life that’s happening right now. A pouring out of energy and ideas that drifts away from you and you’re not entirely sure where into the vortex it went.

A restlessness that comes from endings that came too soon and beginnings and learnings that came too quickly.

Yesterday was my last lecture for this semester, for this school year. Saying goodbye to students and holding them in my prayers. Taking a deep breath after the unexpected push of a semester completed too soon.

And the learning curve of new methods, of new ways of being with each other even just to connect in life.

It’s enough to make you….I don’t even know what.

It’s a turmoil of emotions and a non-recognition of self. I’m seeing emotions and responses in myself that I haven’t seen for a while. Insecurity, jealousy (for things I don’t even want or care about), feeling unappreciated even when people are encouraging to me.

A mixed bag of unwanted and undeniable emotions and circumstances.

And I’m trying, oh, I’m trying. I’m trying to do my best in the midst of doing things in new ways. I’m juggling and siloing and emailing and zooming. I’m producing content and hearing hearts.

But there are these emotions underneath the optimism and competency that are alien in the seeing an old friend from childhood grown up way. Familiar yet unexpected.

Jealousy and insecurity come in the midst of struggles for identity. I remember how those feel but why are they coming up now? Even in the midst of busyness and productivity, why do I feel unteathered?

Because things aren’t what they should be. They aren’t recognizable and I’m not sure who the person in the mirror is.

Usually when this happens it’s because I’ve lost sight of my identity in Christ. Where I’m relying on the approval of others to show me who I am. But that’s not what it is this time.

So what is making me lose my grip on who I am?

Grief, change, loss of stability and routine. The feeling that things have come to a halt and yet, are spinning and I’m trying to catch up.

When this happens, and I’ve written on this before, I know that I’ve lost sight of who I am in God’s eyes.

Not this time.

That’s a surprise.

Sitting with God, Spirit tells me “This is different. This is new. This is unexpected. This is grief and coping. This is hard. There will be courage needed, and imagination tapped into mine, but there will also be grief and tears and growing pains. And that’s ok”

There is some reassurance that this time it’s not just all me.

I think about people from the Bible a lot. And in this time I’ve been thinking of King David.

David had times in his live when he didn’t know which end was up. He cried out to God in caves and in palaces. He spent time in the in between of not yet king but anointed.

We’re in an in between time. The call to action and the call to stillness. It’s easy to get caught up in both. To immerse ourselves, to hide in diligent online presences and spring cleaning or passively screen our time away.

We don’t know who we are, for this moment in time. We are teachers without classrooms, pastors without sanctuaries, providers without security, children without playmates.

It’s enough to make you weep. And I’m sure we all have.

Where is the touchstone? God.

In the midst, God is there.

He’s there in restless vacuuming and cleaning. He’s there in the head down keyboard groaning. He’s there in the late night dark kitchen tea drinking. He’s there at 2am when the only sound is your heart beating too quickly. He’s in the empty churches and full zoom meetings.

He inhabits the bodies and prayers of his people.

We will make it through because he has gone before. He knows us in our uncertainty, holds us in our grief and frustration, and offers us his unlimited imagination. He’s our link to who we were and who we will be, person and Church.

He is with us, he goes before us, he comforts and fuels us.

We are not lost because he is not lost. He is courage, comfort, and breath.

Aren’t we lucky to be known by him?