Rhythm affects everything

In sports, rhythm and flow are as important as strategy. There are basketball games where there is little floor spacing, teammates are not communicating well, or worse, not anticipating one another’s moves, and the ball seems to bounce out of rhythm. And there are other times when it seems like one team is dancing around the court to the tune of a hidden song. Athletes call this being "in the zone." This invisible rhythm is made visible through the consistent and dynamic movements of the players. (For example, our beloved Blazers beat the defending champs, the Celtics , tonight.)

So much more is at stake in daily life. Whereas a basketball game is only a few moments, life spans years. Habits and routines. Life is made up of a million little choices and experiences, each moving us towards wholeness or away from it. By default, we will experience the hectic chaos of entropy: lives out of rhythm with God and the Gospel. Resist the urge to live in defeat by keeping in step with the Spirit. He desires it. God writes to us:

"But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. …
If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit." (Galatians 5:16-26, vv. 16, 25 here)

There we see the connection of life and daily walking with the Spirit of Life, which plays out in a thousand directions and creative opportunities to love God and others every day.

Also, this is not just a "religious" rhythm. That is, walking with the Spirit is in all of life, including how we treat our bodies, what we eat, what we take-in for our minds to consume, and how we think and relate to others, for just a short list. People who are unhealthy in one area of life may be outside of God’s will and not as useful for His Kingdom purposes.

That isn’t to say that we should be completely healthy and wealthy materially in this life. Often it’s quite the opposite: if we are cultivating contentedness with very little and in much weakness (see Phil. 4), then Christ’s strength and His creativity will may a way for our "poor" and "weak" lives to be full of Gospel rhythm. Thus we will be "healthy and wealthy" in the only ways that truly matter: rich towards God and generous towards others. (Jesus became poor so that we could become rich in Him (2 Cor. 8:9).) But, if you are feeding your addictions and living lives out of whack, then we won’t have the bandwidth, let alone be in rhythm, to see outside ourselves.

On a personal note: I finally feel like I’m getting into a rhythm of daily life with our new church and in a better trajectory of personal health. I’ve been able to take up running again, and hope to work these feet back into basketball shape sometime. Oddly enough, the snow is what may have contributed to it. While I couldn’t do any running, it did help with relationships. "Slow down" was the clear message. Many of us remarked that it was God’s gift at this time of Advent, to send us some sabbath rest with family, unable to busy our lives to much under the tyranny of the urgent.Yes, there is much to do, but the harmony and rhythm of a life lived wrapped around God and His Gospel is showing in the lives around us. Praise Jesus for His work of harmony. He has rhythm.