He stands behind and slightly to my right, takes my right hand in his own. His left arm encircles me, embracing as he reaches around to cover my eyes. I stiffen and want to pull away. It makes me nervous, not being able to see where we’re going. A million questions loom. I want to know.

“Come, my love.” I soften a little. He’s not blinding me to make me uncomfortable. He is loving me, leading me toward a surprise.

Sometimes it’s the most obvious things that, when finally realized, set us the most free. He is leading. He has kept me from seeing where we’re going. So He doesn’t expect me to get us there. I don’t have to be in control because He is.  He has planned things this way.  Maybe because He wants me to lean in closer.

Learning to lean in: it’s what this whole life is about. There are different words for this leaning: trust, abiding, faith. They all mean the same thing: leaning hard into the One who holds us close. Staying close enough to learn to move as one.

I have a choice. I can squirm and pull away from his love, trying to see, to figure it all out and get there myself. (Of course I usually don’t think that’s what I’m doing. I’m just trying to be faithful, responsible.) Or I can lean into the one who leads, focus on the arm around me rather than the darkness clouding my sight, and take one small step after another as he shows me where to put my feet.

I have a choice. But grace has ways of helping me choose well. And in this process of learning to lean, not being able to see is an indispensible gift. She learned that when she took ballroom dancing lessons.

It didn’t take long for the instructor to see that she struggled to follow. And so, week after week, she was blindfolded.  She could not lead. She learned to lean. To feel. To move as one with her partner.

She learned to dance.

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