6th December
Work, Interrupted
I love a white Christmas, but only if I don’t need to go anywhere. One year I was due to be at a meeting which was a three-hour drive away.
Local breakfast radio spoke of trains being cancelled and motorways closing but I thought, ‘Well, no bit of snow is going to stop me!’ I packed a shovel, a big coat and a large family-sized packet of Maltesers. Bear Grylls, I think not!
It was then announced all schools were closing. At which point my young daughters screamed with excitement and quickly ran upstairs to change out of their school uniforms to play outside.
In the end someone much wiser than me decided to cancel the meeting, but it was in this moment I realised that I had been given a precious gift– a gift to stay home and make a snowman with my children.
The snow was no longer a nuisance but a joyful experience. As I watched the snowflakes gently knock against our windows, I wondered what would happen too if I could learn to be less hurried and more attentive on less snowy days.
I am reminded of Jesus’ words in Matthew’s gospel chapter 6:26-27, ‘Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?’
If only we didn’t have to wait to be interrupted before we find our reason to stop and notice and appreciate what is around us. How much more God could show us about himself and his love for us.
