Once a week, Killy and I go to Pilates. Our teacher is Tala, and Tala is an absolute tonic. She is warm, encouraging, cheerful and completely ruthless.
For sixty minutes she commands the room with the authority of an air-traffic controller. Not a minute is wasted. We stretch, bend, twist, reach, balance, breathe and discover muscles we didn’t know we had.
At various points Tala says, ‘Now stretch a little further.’ I think I am already stretching further. Then Tala comes over. Apparently, what I thought was my absolute physical limit was merely an opening offer. She takes hold of a leg, an arm or some other reluctant part of my anatomy, and gently but firmly stretches it further.
Killy and I occasionally exchange that look married couples develop over the years. No words are required. The look says, ‘We are paying for this?’
The following morning, we ache. I discover that getting out of bed is itself an advanced Pilates manoeuvre. But here is the strange thing: we feel better. Fitter. Healthier. More flexible. And we definitely walk straighter.
Which got me thinking.
Perhaps what is true of the body is also true of life. We spend a lot of time trying to make life comfortable, yet some of our greatest growth comes when life stretches us. Perhaps we all need a regular life workout.
Here are seven stretches worth practising.
1. Stretch our patience
Patience is rarely developed when everybody does what we want, when we want it. It develops in traffic jams, delayed trains, long queues, slow websites and conversations with people who take twenty minutes to tell a five-minute story. And then there are those who take forever to make a decision. You ask, ‘Tea or coffee?’ They respond as though you have asked them to select a pension plan.
We live in an instant world. Instant messaging. Instant downloads. Instant answers. We want everything immediately, including patience. But patience cannot be microwaved.
The Bible says, ‘Be patient with everyone’ (1 Thessalonians 5:14 NLT).
Everyone? That is quite a stretch.
Patience means giving other people room to be human: room to think, room to decide, room to change, room to grow and, occasionally, room to finish the story.
Patience is love refusing to look at its watch.
2. Stretch our generosity
Most of us are generous up to a point. The stretch begins just beyond that point. Generosity isn’t only about money. We can be generous with encouragement, hospitality, forgiveness, attention and time. Sometimes the most valuable thing we can give someone is not something from our wallet but something from ourselves.
Jesus said, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive’ (Acts 20:35 NLT).
Generosity loosens the grip possessions can have on us. A clenched hand may hold on to what it has, but only an open hand can give and receive.
We sometimes imagine generosity will diminish us. Actually, it enlarges us.
Generosity doesn’t make our lives poorer; it makes our hearts richer.
3. Stretch our kindness
Kindness sounds soft. It isn’t. Kindness can be remarkably muscular. It takes strength to be kind to somebody who is difficult, gracious to somebody who is rude and thoughtful when we are tired.
Anyone can be nice to nice people. The stretch is being kind when kindness is not deserved.
The Bible says, ‘Be kind and compassionate to one another’ (Ephesians 4:32 NIV). A smile. A phone call. Remembering someone’s name. Thanking the unnoticed person. Asking, ‘How are you?’ and actually waiting for the answer.
Small things? Perhaps. But small acts of kindness can have enormous consequences. Kindness costs very little but can be worth an enormous amount.
The world has enough critics. Let’s increase the encouragers.
Kindness may be a small gift to give, but it can be a very large gift to receive.
4. Stretch our listening
We have two ears and one mouth. This may be a design specification.
Sometimes, while another person is talking, we are not really listening at all. We are simply waiting for them to stop making that irritating noise so that we can say something important.
Listening means making room for another person. The Bible says, ‘Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak’ (James 1:19 NIV). Imagine what might happen to marriages, families, friendships, workplaces, churches and even social media if we stretched ourselves in listening.
We don’t always need to give an answer. Sometimes we simply need to give attention.
Listening is love with its mouth shut.
5. Stretch our forgiveness
This one can hurt. When someone wounds us, everything inside wants to contract. We replay the offence, rehearse the injustice and preserve the resentment.
Forgiveness stretches us in the opposite direction. Forgiveness doesn’t pretend the wrong didn’t matter. It matters precisely because there is something to forgive.
The Bible says, ‘Forgive as the Lord forgave you’ (Colossians 3:13 NIV).
Forgiveness says, ‘I will not allow what you did yesterday to control who I become tomorrow.’
Jesus put forgiveness at the heart of his teaching because unforgiveness eventually imprisons the person carrying it. We think we are holding on to the offence; eventually, the offence is holding on to us.
Forgiveness doesn’t change the past. It changes our relationship with the past.
Forgiveness is refusing to let yesterday have the final word on tomorrow.
6. Stretch our courage
There are moments when life invites us to stay exactly where we are. Safe. Familiar. Predictable.
Courage takes another step. Perhaps it is starting something. Ending something. Speaking up. Asking for help. Trying again after failure. Making the phone call we have been avoiding. Saying yes when it would be easier to say no – or saying no when everybody expects us to say yes.
Courage is not the absence of fear. It is refusing to give fear the casting vote.
God says to Joshua, ‘Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go’ (Joshua 1:9 NIV).
That final phrase changes everything. God doesn’t simply tell Joshua, ‘Be courageous.’ He gives him the reason he can be courageous: ‘I will be with you.’
Joshua’s confidence was not in his ability but in God’s presence. The promise was not that the road would be easy. The promise was that Joshua would never walk it alone.
And that is still at the heart of Christian courage. We can face what is ahead because God is with us. Comfort keeps us where we are. Courage stretches us towards where we could be.
Courage is not knowing what lies ahead; it is knowing who goes with us.
7. Stretch our faith
And here is the deepest stretch – faith.
For some, faith means trusting God more. For others, perhaps it begins by becoming open to the possibility that God is there. Either way, faith involves stretching beyond what we can see, measure and control.
The Bible says, ‘We live by faith, not by sight’ (2 Corinthians 5:7 NIV).
Jesus was constantly stretching people: Follow me. Forgive. Love your enemies. Do not worry. Seek. Believe.
Again and again, Jesus called people beyond the cramped confines of the life they already knew into something bigger.
Faith is not believing without evidence. It is trusting beyond what we can presently see.
Perhaps some of us have allowed our lives to become too small. Small dreams. Small generosity. Small expectations. Small prayers.
God may be saying, ‘Stretch a little further.’
And just when we say, ‘I can’t possibly go any further,’ he may, like Tala, gently take hold of us and say, ‘Actually, you can.’
Faith stretches beyond what we can see because it trusts the God who sees everything.
Of course, stretching can be uncomfortable. Growth usually is.
There is a difference between pain that damages us and discomfort that develops us. Wisdom is knowing which is which.
So perhaps this week we should ask ourselves: Where have I become a little stiff?
In my patience?
My generosity?
My kindness?
My listening?
My forgiveness?
My courage?
My faith?
Bodies become inflexible when they stop stretching. So do lives. Killy and I will therefore continue turning up for our weekly encounter with Tala. We will stretch. We will groan. We will discover previously unknown muscles. We will wake up the following morning wondering why the stairs have suddenly become steeper.
And then we will notice something: we are walking straighter.
Perhaps that is what the right kind of stretching does.
God doesn’t stretch us to break us. He stretches us to enlarge us. Because a life that never stretches never grows.
And sometimes the stretch that makes us groan today is the stretch that helps us walk straighter tomorrow.
J.John
