Margin & Magic

There’s no doubt that things have slowed down. This will probably be the only time in my life that all around us comes to a standstill in such a definitive fashion. And yet, as things have slowed in some areas of life, it has created margin for other aspects that may have gone overlooked or underappreciated. 

And by the term ‘margin’ I mean time. That created thing given to us to measure and process much of our lives and the world around us. God invented time to be a succession of moments and events. It can be dispensed but never regained. In other words, once today is gone, there is only tomorrow. The writer of Ecclesiastes taught us that there is time for everything that needs to be accomplished: For everything there is a season, a time for every activity under heaven (3:1). 

I think life is a lot like a ‘mom purse’. My wife has a purse that seems to possess magical qualities. And by magical, I mean she can fit enough stuff in it to survive a zombie-apocalypse and still have gum leftover. Maybe she is a wizard like Newt Scamander in Fantastic Beasts and actually has a briefcase full of magical creatures living in a sanctuary…and it’s not a purse after all! Anyways, it seems like the longer I live the more stuff I attempt to cram in my mom-purse-kind-of-life. And when that happens there really is no more margin for magic. By magic I mean the beyond comprehension reality that I have been created infinitely valuable by a God who loves me and wants me to tell a story with my life that makes much of Jesus. Yeah, that kind of magic. And when that magic is gone, the wonder of life and all its moments seem to evaporate. The more we try to fill our lives with a multiplicity of activity and responsibility, the more we miss out on: 

the wonder of staring into a star-filled sky

the enchantment of hearing nature wakeup with a sunrise

the loving warmth of a hug from a friend who truly cares

the literal pain in your stomach from laughing so long and hard

the sense of time lost just wandering or wondering 

the community experienced when shouldering another’s burden

So, let’s make a decision, let’s empty out the mom purse (figuratively speaking of course) and create margin. Then, allow the margin to facilitate a new paradigm for experiencing the moments of life. I promise that when you do you will discover that the star-filled nights and sunrises, hugs and tears, laughter and joy, and all the wandering and wondering weren’t interruptions to your life; rather they were kind of the point all along. In those moments the human experience is heightened, for in those moments we experience the magic.