Let The Walls Fall Down

In a typical day I'll ride my bike between 15 and 20 miles and walk another 4 to 6 miles. For the most part I do this for exercise and for fossil fuel use reduction. It's good to ride. It's good to walk. It's good to spend less time in the car. It makes me feel a lot better, physically. It also makes me feel better spiritually, and feel a lot more connected to other people.

Let me explain what I mean by that. We have a lot of walls in our lives. Generally we travel in our little mobile fortresses with our windows up and our stereos blaring our music. We are isolated and insulated. We are in our world, our comfort zone. We travel in these to and from our home fortresses, with our gated communities, locked doors, privacy fences and the like. We are safe and secure from what's out there. We are isolated and insulated. We are walled in.

We are physically but also emotionally walled in. We are safe. We are impenetrable. We are invulnerable. We are disconnected. This is no way to be.

As I have been traveling primarily by bike or foot I have removed some of these physical walls from my life. I am often quite exposed, almost uncomfortably so when cars decide the bike lane would be better used as a turn lane for them whether I'm currently occupying it or not. But I also see a lot more people. Not people in their cars going from one fortress to another, but people at bus stops, people walking their dogs, people biking, people panhandling, people just hanging out. I see God's children, just like me. I connect with them, if only for a moment. We are not objects, but people. It's hard to describe but a rather amazing thing to experience.

I am a lot more open than I was when I started this. I am a lot more connected. I am a much happier person.

While I was walking today I noticed that I had Let the Walls Fall Down stuck in my head. This song is one of Caleb's two favorite songs that the Praise Band plays. (David Danced is the other. If you're sick of either being played at the church be thankful Caleb hasn't gotten his way on us doing both every week yet.) Let the Walls Fall Down just felt like a perfectly natural song to get stuck in my head at the time because that's what was happening. The walls were coming down. I have met so many interesting people in the neighborhood by my office. I have encountered so many interesting people on my morning and afternoon commutes. I have connected with people that, if I were in my car, I would never have noticed were there. But I'm out in the open. There are no walls. There are just wonderful, beautiful children of God all around me.

Like I said, it's hard to explain how it feels. But I hope that all of you can share in this experience. Let's knock down some walls in our lives.