It felt a bit weird and somewhat uncomfortable, but there was something in me that knew it was what I needed. So every morning I joined others from the community we were part of, to read scripture and liturgy aloud, and to bow low to the ground at regular points during the prayers. And that bowing did something within me that I never would have predicted.
This was during a significant transition in our lives. We had left South Africa after 10 years of living and working there, and we left because we knew it was the right thing to do but not because we wanted to! We were back in our home nation, for what turned out to be a two year interlude, and places inside me were kicking and screaming to find myself there. Somewhere inside myself I knew I was being invited to surrender to a process I could not understand. And I had no idea how to come to that place of surrender when there was nothing in me that wanted to say yes to this experience.
Somehow, then, my body led me to into experiencing the truth that God knew what He was doing even though neither my head nor my heart were sure. Every morning, as I prostrated myself on the floor of that small chapel, joining my voice with the laments of the psalmist, or verbalising scriptures honouring of God’s greatness, something happened inside me. This was more than reluctant acquiescence to what someone else was telling me; this was a sort of entering into truth with my body leading the way.
You see, our bodies know things before our minds, sometimes. And my body knew the experience of surrender and was able to lead my emotions, my mind and my spirit into that place.