Embracing the Gift of Limitations

In this chaotic season of an explosive pandemic, social distancing, and a panicking population, it's easy to survey the chaos and see only the negative.

Disrupted work environments, cancelled social activities, and limited supply availability can make reality feel like a dystopian world.

In the midst of chaos, we're faced with limitations.

I've never liked feeling boxed in by limitations or expectations. (All the Enneagram 4s said, Amen.) Rather, I prefer the "freedom" of unlimited choices and possibilities. I enjoy the sense that I can go anywhere, see anyone, be anything.

In the face of pandemic and restrictions, though, I'm forced to examine my longing for this "freedom" and absent limitations through a new lens.

While our culture resists the idea of limits, it is critical we embrace
them ... They are the hands of a friend, keeping us grounded so that we don’t hurt others, God’s work, or ourselves.

—Pete Scazzero, "Pastors and the Gift of Limits"

As my choices have been limited and my possibilities restricted, I'm beginning to experience a new, truer kind of freedom.

A freedom that allows me to rely on His strength and rest in His goodness. A freedom that doesn't need endless possibilities to feel secure. A freedom that is content to live smaller in remembrance of how big He is.

In his recent publication, To Hell with the Hustle, Jefferson Bethke speaks to this freedom. He writes of our human need to accept limitations in order to live more fully:

“Being human means embracing the limits, not trying to cheat them.”

Maybe limitations are not a punishment so much as an invitation.

An invitation into greater depth, into intentionality with God and with people, into a simpler way of life, into the kind of rest that comes with surrender.

Though the circumstances may be less than ideal, we're all invited to embrace the gift of limitations. We weren't meant to do it all.

Rather than attempting to do more and be more in this chaotic season, I encourage you to do less and remember that we are not God. In surrendering to these limitations, rather than seeing them as inhibitions, perhaps we can all experience true freedom.