Dirt and Breath

This isn't really a new thought, but I think it is really important in any study that I'm doing to point out some understandings that have been and continue to be significant to me. Lord, it's so amazing the thought behind creation and what it means, and how we see it play out even now.

The thing about creation of man that always gets me is how we are half physical, half spiritual. Formed from the dirt, breathed into by Your breath, Your spirit. It's something that has not gone unnoticed by the Christian community recently, as I've heard Rob Bell talk about that, David Crowder has the song "A Beautiful Collision" when this physical and spiritual, when heaven and earth collide. But the meaning behind this is intense.

What I see, is that if I am half physical and half spiritual, to be fully human I must make sure that I am attentive to both needs equally. There is no doubt that the physical life often takes precedence for me: what I am going to eat, what I am going to do, what is going to be pleasurable, what is going to be painful, etc. But how often do I try to balance that with what is important to You, the spiritual?

It's only when there is a balance that I am truly living rightly. Going way back to another one of my blog thoughts last winter, this is probably why we are often instructed by You to sacrifice the physical things that are good. Because they put too much of our attention back on the physical. And we forget to live with our other half.

And just think, it's not really possible for us to be alive without both halves. If You don't take the dust to be formed, we never take shape and never come into being. At the same time, if You don't blow into us we never come alive either.

So where do I find myself this evening/morning? Wondering how I live so blindly to this reality all the time. I have found myself most balanced when I denied the physical almost altogether (when I was fasting). That maybe should be a sign to me of how drastically I must cut back my physical thoughts and actions, and how much the spiritual is lagging behind. What's difficult is to separate myself from all the freaking busy-ness, because the spiritual cannot be attended to well in noise and rush.

So now Lord, even today, less noise, less rush, please, more breath!

UPDATE: As I thought about this through the day yesterday Lord, I realized that maybe there are other solutions as well. For example, when I am heavily involved in the physical things, maybe I can invite Your breath into those. However, I want to be wary of just believing I can keep up the pace at which I live and somehow slow my thoughts enough to bring You in.

By the way, I'm going on a mini-fast this week to remind myself of this reality. Hopefully it will jump start the spiritual to balance it with the physical. I hear You calling me to it, and I don't want to deny that call anymore.