A few days ago, I remarked that merely reflecting on the day to find something for which to be thankful doesn't give opportunity to be proactive, which I am learning is essential if gratitude is to be more than an afterthought. When I started this particular discipline, I followed a schedule of suggestions that stretched my imagination. That's good, because sometimes my imagination is pretty unimaginative. Feeling particularly unimaginative this morning, I revisited that list. Today's suggestion was to find three gifts of enthusiasm. That's easy. This morning Isabel brought a few friends over to Sunnyside to swim. One thing about Izzi: she's enthusiasm personified! Whether organizing friends or cousins for some activity, jumping on the trampoline, doing backflips across the yard, or plotting to break school records for swimming, she breezes through life with a joi de vivre that is a wonder to behold. She wasn't long in this world before I started thinking of her as "Busy Izzi." I hope she keeps her enthusiastic spirit all through life. It rubs off on you, and if there is one thing this sad world needs, it is a bit of enthusiasm.
Tomorrow little Gemma will spend the day with Linda so her mother can have a bit of a break for her writing. Gemma is another bundle of enthusiasm, dancing and smiling her way through each day as if to challenge it to try to keep her from wringing every last pleasure from it. Tomorrow afternoon when Jess comes to pick her up, I'm guessing Linda's enthusiasm will have waned just a bit, even though she will savor every moment.
Enthusiasm is actually a religious word. It comes from the Greek "en Theos," ie. "In God." For all those who imagine that being a Christian is a dull, drearisome life spent avoiding anything that is fun or pleasurable, and looking as if one were weaned on a pickle, I would refer them to the origins of the word. Anyone who is not enthusiastic about life hasn't grasped even a basic understanding of what it means to be "in God." In his letter to the Ephesian church, St. Paul reiterates over and over how we are "in Christ," a status that elevates us above the misery and aimlessness of this world, not by removing us from it, but by giving purpose to even the troubles that come our way. Elsewhere, he reminds us that God has given all things for us to enjoy. That's not an invitation to debauchery, but to receive with joy all the good that is present even in the most difficult situations. When one's life is not circumscribed and controlled by all the ills of this world, it is no longer necessary to be depressed or worried. By virtue of being in Christ, the joy and hope of resurrection invades every aspect of life, deepening the experience and infusing it with purpose and hope.
I am grateful tonight for Izzi and Gemma's enthusiasm for life and for the reminder that taking ourselves too seriously cuts us off from the joy God intends us to have. I like enthusiasm, being "in God." And I like how one person's enthusiasm can infect others. It's not enough for only a few people to be "in God;" God intends enthusiasm to be communicable, and the more we realize where real enthusiasm comes from, the more we connect with its Source, and the more we spread it around, the better this old world will be.
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