When I first moved away from the City of Leeds, the thing that struck me the most was the noise...or rather the lack of it! We had lived in the same house for 35 years. It was right next to a main road and the London main-line railway was just a stone's throw away. At the time, I rarely noticed the noise. It was just there and something that we had always lived with. Maybe that's why I love silence? Over the past four years, I have become used to the quieter pace of the traffic and don't miss the hustle and bustle of city life. On the TV the other day, it was said that the traffic levels are down to what they would have been in the 1950s. It's certainly quieter in the street where we live and there's only a fraction of the people passing by. So although I had considered it quiet, compared to my city life, the coronavirus lockdown has slowed things right down.
We have been in lockdown now for five weeks, longer for those who self-isolated a week or so before. It has seemed like a long time and we don't know yet when things will ease. Some have find the lockdown no problem at all, others may have struggled. For many people, the lockdown is no different to normal. It is the way their life is and may have been for many years. Makes us think, doesn't it?
This slower pace of life sometimes forces us to sit down, take stock and notice some of the things going on around us that we might not have noticed before. Or we might have given something a go that we've never done before. I must admit that I am the sort of person that makes myself busy if I've nothing to do. The problem with that is that, in our busyness, we might miss out on what God has got in store for us as part of the lockdown. We all have new things to learn about God and about ourselves. Perhaps God wants to show us fresh things? Maybe even wants us to slow down and do things differently? I wonder what it is, in this change of pace, that God wants to say to us and to show us? The times that we are living through can't fail to change us in some way or to change our outlook on life...maybe the thing that changes is change itself!
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| View from my garden |
The recent sunny weather has been a real gift to us and for the past couple of weeks, Chris and I have been eating our lunch in the garden. It has been lovely to sit in the sunshine, enjoying the peace, amidst the sounds of nature. We have sight of a huge tree from our garden and the crows have been nesting. They have been busy bringing food for their chicks and when the food arrives, the noise is deafening. I can hear the chicks as their cries grow louder as they grow. This is all new to us as we didn't get crows anywhere near our garden in Leeds! In fact we got very few birds, just sparrows, pigeons, magpies and maybe a blackbird or two. And if we saw a robin we were overjoyed!
We have been in lockdown now for five weeks, longer for those who self-isolated a week or so before. It has seemed like a long time and we don't know yet when things will ease. Some have find the lockdown no problem at all, others may have struggled. For many people, the lockdown is no different to normal. It is the way their life is and may have been for many years. Makes us think, doesn't it?
This slower pace of life sometimes forces us to sit down, take stock and notice some of the things going on around us that we might not have noticed before. Or we might have given something a go that we've never done before. I must admit that I am the sort of person that makes myself busy if I've nothing to do. The problem with that is that, in our busyness, we might miss out on what God has got in store for us as part of the lockdown. We all have new things to learn about God and about ourselves. Perhaps God wants to show us fresh things? Maybe even wants us to slow down and do things differently? I wonder what it is, in this change of pace, that God wants to say to us and to show us? The times that we are living through can't fail to change us in some way or to change our outlook on life...maybe the thing that changes is change itself!
"Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever."Hebrew 13:8
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