the real work

It may be that when we no longer know what to do, 
we have come to our real work 
and when we no longer know which way to go,

we have begun our real journey.
The mind that is not baffled is not employed.
The impeded stream is the one that sings.

                                  ~Wendell Berry

How necessary it is in the spiritual life to "come to the end of ourselves."  Oh sure, we can go through life pretending like we have it all together, like we actually know where we are going and what we are doing, but there comes a day when all of that comes crashing down--and, unfortunately, it usually takes a crash.  There comes a time when we see all too clearly that what we have experienced of God, and of life, up to that point was just a prelude for the work God really wanted to do.  And now we are finally ready, he just needed to get our egos out of the way first.  So he allowed us to run out of gas, or into a brick wall.  Just enough to stop us in our tracks.  A severe mercy, some might call it.  Not something we would have chosen, but something that we would never trade.  A difficult time and a hard season that brought us to a spacious and abundant place.  A place where we were finally able to stop trying and start being.  Because that's when the best work, the real work, takes place.  It just took a while to get us there.