“I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.” John 15:5

The evidence, compiled over the last few days, strongly suggests that I am married to a crazy woman! As I lay on the couch, she flits here and there, doing one thing after the next. The air doesn’t even settle before it gets stirred up again by her passing. And all I can do is watch! You see, I am out of gas!

For the last few days I have had an intestinal thing that prohibits movement too far from a porcelain throne! And you know what that is like. When sickness comes, it changes the whole direction of my usual activity to zero! I WANT to get up, feel better, do things and accomplish something. But my body says, ‘No!’ Meanwhile, there she goes by again… zzzip! And a strange sensation is left in her wake. One that I haven’t really noticed much before? It is called ‘guilt!’ And I don’t like it!

Thankfully, I have never experienced a long illness. Lots of people have been hammered with debilitating diseases or circumstances that have left them immobile for weeks, months, years… or even a lifetime! This little experience of mine is teaching me something I didn’t go looking for. And it is embarrassing, humbling and yet, strangely holy!!

Society categorizes people for convenience. We are validated by what we ‘DO’ or contribute. One is either a ‘giver’ or a ‘taker.’ A ‘provider’ or a ‘user.’ And while that mentality may not always be a bad thing, it CAN have the depressing result of stamping someone’s life as ‘IN-valid.’ Which, Biblically speaking, can be an OUT-right LIE!

The scientific definition of ‘Work’ is the force required to move an object a distance…blah blah blah! Words that go along with it are toil, labor, accomplishment and activity. But in God’s economy, that definition doesn’t stick. God wants us to GIVE UP our OWN activity and yield to HIS. In HIS world, HE is the worker who gets things done. WE are to be the branch through which HE produces fruit. OUR job is to simply ‘ABIDE!’

This little bout of sickness will go away. But I pray the lesson I am getting from it does not. I am NOT ‘SOMEBODY’ because of what I DO or ACCOMPLISH! I am who I am because of who ‘HE’ is in me! And even if I am only BREATHING with Him… my life is validated by His connection to my sigh! And THAT, my friends, is not nothing!

He must increase… I must decrease!