GETTING BACK TO BASICS

Free week at the Rec Center means free yoga classes

One of the bonuses of living in a college town is “free week”. The first week of each semester, all of the fitness classes at the University Recreational Center are free. You can try everything from Zumba to Kick Boxing. You can take five or six classes a day for free, if you’re body is up for it. There’s a ton to learn. There’s no limit.

Me? I already take yoga classes, so when I attend the first week of a semester, I’m not getting a sneak peek at what the class is like. I’m getting something even richer. I’m getting back to basics.

There is an underlying current in the yoga room during free week. There are twice as many bodies. Barely any of the polished wooden floor peeks out from the kaleidoscope of yoga mats. Regulars shift, make room, adjust, give up their familiar spots for class. Which is a good thing. It gives us a new perspective. New faces pepper the room along with a rainbow of workout clothes reflected in the back mirrors. 

Our instructor, Holly, is especially brilliant during free week. She takes us back to basics. As the digital clock ticks 8:00 her voice begins, reminding us how to sit. Instructing us how to breathe. Reinforcing that our breath is the most important part of our practice. Breathing? Isn’t that so obvious? But don’t I forget? We spend an hour going back to the core elements of yoga. And it is beautiful. And it is extremely difficult. I discover there are multiple poses I thought I’d figured out that I haven’t. I realize there are certain times my hips are out of line or that I forget to breathe altogether. I’ve been so focused on transitions and balance and strength, I forgot to focus on the basics. Transitions, balance, and strength are all important. They all help me get more out of the class. And it’s not that I’ve never heard the basics, never been taught how to breathe. It’s just that I lose sight of them, in the midst of everything else.

My faith is like this too. It is critical for me to continuously go back to basics, to relearn how to breathe in God’s grace, to reteach myself the Gospel. God is always teaching me new things. And there are always things He helps me discover I can be working on in my life. If I flip through my most recent blog posts I get a clear picture of the recent issues on my heart—friendships in faith, following God’s plans instead of mine, turning over my fears to Jesus, slowing down. And these are all great things, things God really wants me to be working on. But want to know what He most wants me to be aware of? He wants me to breathe in the Gospel.

J.D. Greear's book entitled, Gospel, reminds us there is nothing I can do that would make God love me more, and nothing I have done that makes Him love me less. #grace

What is the gospel? Pretty simple, yet so complex:

1.     I will never measure up. Sound harsh. Not really. I’m not perfect. I fall down. I screw up. Every. Single. Day. I yell at one of my kids. Fall. It’s fine to discipline them, have certain expectations of them, but yell? Nope. I judge somebody, based on what they say or how they look or how they’re different than me. I wish I never ever did. But I do. Fall again. You get the idea.

2.    Jesus died for my sins, so I don’t have to measure up. He was “all that” and then some. He is perfect. His blood covers all of my ugliness, mistrust, pride, jealousy, and insecurities. All of them. All of the time. Time and time again. I don’t have to be perfect. Ahhh. I am loved. Double ahhhh.

Because God loves me, I strive to be the best version of myself – all those things on my heart—the slowing down and trusting. Yet knowing I’ll never be able to master them is a good place to start, because it reminds me of God’s grace. And how beautiful and loving and overwhelmingly amazing it is. And when I inhale the fact that He loved me enough to die for me and exhale all of my darkest moments, because He loves me even in the midst of them, it helps me with all of those other things I’m working on.

I don’t know what’s on your heart today, where God is working on you, but I can promise if you remind yourself of the Gospel, of what He’s already done for you, of how immense His love is for you, you’ll be off to a good start. Breathe in. Breathe out.