Lord, a friend of mine who is visiting the beach posted something extraordinary today, extraordinary in its simplicity, its innocence, and its honesty. She said she asked You to play with her today, at the beach. Now why didn’t I think of that?!? Why hasn’t the whole world thought of that? What parent doesn’t play with his or her kids? Even animals teach their young by playing! And yet I never, not once, thought of asking You to play with me. I’m sorry, God — it never occurred to me, and it never occurred to me that You would want to.
Remember just yesterday I said My challenge is to approach each of you on your own terms, in ways that you can receive from Me best? For all you have grown, and all your stretching into new realms of experience of My Love and My Presence, still you tend to be very serious, extremely so at times. You take life seriously! Life is serious business! You love to laugh, you love to make others laugh in an easy, gentle way…but your over-arching view of life is serious, even somber, not playful. You take responsibility seriously, you take your relationships seriously, you take your work seriously, and you take your time with Me seriously. This is part of why recess was hard for you as a child. This is why you struggle with all those creative exercises in your favorite books that ask you to dream a little, play a little, exercise some frivolous imagination. It is why, despite loving it, you abandoned most good fiction as somehow unfit for the limited reading time you have. Instead, you try to read books that are scholarly in some sense, designed to teach you something, increase your knowledge or skill or performance. Little One, you do very little for the pure fun of it. Your quest to find and make meaning has led you to profound insight at times, yet you have forgotten what little you once knew about playtime.
Here is a proposal for you. Why don’t you think about what playing with Me would be like for you? Why don’t you try to imagine a scenario in which pure, holy play was not only allowed, but encouraged? Why don’t you imagine, just for a minute, opening a serious-looking engraved invitation, in which I, the God of the Universe, invite you, the Serious Scholarly Sage, to come out and play? Can you do that? Will you do that? I tell you the truth: your best imagery thus far happened when you were closest to My playful heart. My heart that delights to delight you. So let Me ask you one more time: can Eve come out and play?
Gosh, God, honestly, I don’t know. But I am willing to try. If it is okay with You, I think I would like to try Easter Sunday.
It’s a play-date, then. And there is no better day–you’ll see!