My wanderlust led me to a little coffee shop. The vision I had for myself was a hybrid between a lumberjack sipping black coffee and a surf rat with my bare feet propped up on the mismatched material of the chair across the table. But I ordered a decaf green tea. I wonder if lumberjacks ever order decaf green tea.
This place breathes familiarity. The the man in a poser name-brand sweatshirt cussing in the manliest of forms about a lost kitty. The hipster concerts. The tentative touches my fingers made as they encircled the wind-chime magic of a chipped, twelve string guitar. In my stupor of nostalgia, the friendly smile behind the counter reminded me that my frequent flyer card only counts toward espressos, not decaf green teas. When have I ever ordered a decaf green tea? After carefully climbing the squeaking, narrow, old-man-groaning, rickety stairs, I sat catacombed in the loft like a nesting pigion, pinning my beady eyes at a tree outside the window encased by concrete and cigarette ash.
Wild. What does it mean? My dictionary.com tab is legioned with definitions. Not tamed or domesticated. Uncivilized. Of unrestrained intensity. It's the title of a book I'm reading about a meth addict who backpacked the Pacific Crest Trail with no training. It seems there are more definitions of what it is not than what it actually is. Is it's ferocity something to run from? Or is it's whispering something to draw close to?
All I know is I would rather have my life be free then domesticated. Fierce than tamed. I'd rather fill my lungs with the breath of adventure than be constrained by safety. God is wild. In the Narnia series, Aslan is a lion, the essence of wild. Fierceness in it's purest form can not be captivated by the restraints of a cultured mind. It's a risk to believe in the wilderness of God. Just as Mr. Beaver said about Aslan, Who said anything about safe? ‘Course he isn’t safe. But he’s good. He’s the King, I tell you.
By risk, I don't mean that believing in God is stupid. His freedom is balanced by love. What good is something that is not tamed or domesticated if it isn't doing something? God's love for us is what hung Jesus on the cross. ‘Course he isn’t safe. But His love is what makes it possible to draw close to the heart of God, and I believe the essence of God is the definition of wild. But he’s good. I am thankful that the heart of God is wild. His love for me is not tamed or domesticated. Uncivilized. Of unrestrained intensity. I think believing in something wild means that you won't ever be able to understand it, because it's very definition cannot be tamed. But I'd rather believe in that than something I can understand, but does not have that same all powerful strength that I can trust in. He’s the King, I tell you.
When we run from God, we run from the essence of wild. We run from freedom. Take a risk. His love can hold us and comfort us in a way that something we can understand and constrain could never do. Take it from a girl with sand between her toes drinking decaf green tea in an little coffee shop who has only gotten through life by clinging to the wings of the wilderness of God and the unrestrained love He bled for us.
He is the playfulness of creation, scandal and utter goodness, the
generosity of the ocean and the ferocity of a thunderstorm; he is
cunning as a snake and gentle as a whisper; the gladness of sunshine and
the humility of a thirty-mile walk by foot on a dirt road.
~ John Eldredge
