The "Gift of Limits"

by Judy Bevilacqua

I just read an article in our local paper about “the worst Christmas gifts ever received.” It got me thinking. In this season of giving and receiving gifts, it might be a good idea to unwrap some of those unwanted gifts in our life -- the less obvious ones that may still be lurking under the tree, or thrown out with the fruitcake from Aunt Thelma. For New Year’s I’m going to try and look at one gift in my life that often remains unopened...unused…unwanted. That is, until I’m in deep trouble!

One of my most neglected and unacknowledged gifts is the "gift of limits." I don’t want this gift, but I need it. When I don’t pull it out of the back of my underwear drawer and wear it, I suffer -- and so do others. This gift is a bit binding, a bit restricting and not immediately comfortable. It hampers all my wild, impulsive and frankly addictive tendencies. Whether it is over-spending or overeating, or over-anything! Saying "yes" when I should be saying "no." It whispers to me when I’m being the indispensable workaholic whose body is really crying for a nap. I should be in Foxe’s Book of Martyrs. I make a great martyr!

Jesus received the “gift of limits” for Christmas. He left eternity to be birthed into the restricting confines of time and space. He left inexhaustible riches to experience our exhausting poverty. He set aside limitless power and freedom to put on flesh and bone, emotions, pain, weakness, and narrow social and cultural identity. He became a vulnerable diapered baby in a cheap hotel - dependant on the likes of us! Yes, “He was in every way tempted – just like we are.” The Master became the servant and the Lord became the serf. This is what I mean by the gift of limits. God appears to do his best work through human limitations. (A quick survey of the personal weaknesses of the prophets, apostles and Holy Fathers would certainly prove this point!)

So where’s the “gift” in the gift of limits? Surprisingly it seems to be in the very DNA of “limits.” This was brought to my attention the other day, as Jack and I helped a friend prepare for a songwriting assignment that had him baffled and overwhelmed. We suggested he narrow down his choices to only a few notes, and then to give himself a short deadline to complete it. He shared with us later how miraculously that worked! Amazing. Less became more. Limits brought freedom. How many times have I experienced a surge of creativity when I only had limited time or resources to complete a project. All the juices get going! This is not to praise procrastination. But hey, we all know it works!

What other limits have I experienced as a “gift?” Steve, the grotesquely handicapped man at the gym, hobbling through a huge room of buff strangers, approaches me to share about his upcoming surgery and make me feel loved and privileged to learn of his hopes and fears. How many more amazing gifts have I received from those with very limited education, advantage or opportunity. No wonder Jesus loved the children. They were so comfortable with their limits.

The limits of age are becoming all too apparent. I’m slowing down in every way. My memory seems laced with molasses and I can’t seem to care about multi-tasking anymore. But what a gift to have arrived at the age where I value nothing more than to be “idle” with my grandkids, or my aging parents, or a friend. Or to stop and acknowledge the finches at the thistle-sock, or weep with my neighbor who only stopped by to bring me the eggs. These are but homely examples of a much deeper awareness. The reality that we are mortal after all, (sigh.) My struggles and weaknesses bind me to my human family and keep me awake to my own hunger, weakness, poverty, and blindness. Yes, like that church in Laodicea in the book of Revelation. They forgot too! I need God, and I need others.

The gift of limits is, in fact, the BEST gift I could ask for. Hmmm, so why don’t I ask?

O God, turn your Spirit loose now,

and me with it,

that I may go to where the edge is

to face with you the shape of my mortality:

the inescapable struggle and loneliness and pain

which remind me

that I am less than god after all,

that you have made me with hard limits,

limits to my strength,

my knowledge,

my days.

Facing those limits, Lord,

grant me grace to live to the limit

of being unflinchingly alive,

irrepressibly alive, fully alive

of experiencing every fragile, miraculous, bloody, juicy, aching, beautiful ounce

of being a human being……

from a poem by Ted Loder