Make Room for Play

We opened church by playing with playdough last week. One person on a team created something from a list of words, and the others had to guess what it was. I am sad to say, my husband and I lost by a significant margin. I guess it’s good for the pastor to be humbled.

We’re in the middle of a series about resetting our lives to decide what we want in them as we return to “normal.” Equally important, we’re deciding what we want to jettison as part of the old normal that was neither normal nor healthy.

One of the practices we are choosing to retain—or rather begin—is creative play. Hence, the playdough.

In her book Happy Now, pastor and author Courtney Ellis tells us, “The paradox of play is this: we engage in whimsy not because life is easy but because it is difficult.”

In these days when “difficult” can describe the entire last two years, what better time to embrace play as a value? What could be a more important thing to practice in resetting our lives than to set aside time for some stress-relieving creativity?

A pre-pandemic Gallup poll says the US is among the most stressed/anxious countries in the world, and that this is most felt among those ages 15-40. High school counselors can’t keep up with skyrocketing demand.

Playdough is beginning to sound like a great idea.

The first image we have of God is one of creativity. God’s first act is to create unimaginable beauty and order out of nothing. Then, God tells humans to make something even better out of that creation. The first humans’ job was to create and play. If creativity was God’s first visible action and first command, doesn’t it seem like it’s a valuable practice that God fully endorses?

Given that playing improves our mental skills, cooperation with others, and problem-solving ability, it seems perfectly created for people whose main assignment in life is to love God and neighbor.

I love to picture Jesus enjoying himself as he spent time among the humans he created. Can’t you picture it? Laughing by the seashore. Picking up a stray lamb as he tells captivating stories. Dancing at a wedding in Cana. Engaging in wordplay and banter with a Canaanite woman. Jesus’ mission was as serious as it gets, yet his demeanor suggests that he took time to engage in simply enjoying life.

Increasingly, we don’t play. When I talk to groups of adults about play and ask them what they enjoy doing, I’m met with confused silence. They don’t know. They don’t remember what used to be fun. Their lives are so full of schedules, work, and busyness that they have to sit for a while and ponder what they truly enjoy doing just for play.

Just for play. Not for a side hustle. Not as a coach or other means of playing with their kids. Not as a means to anything productive at all. They don’t remember how or why to just play. When they do remember, their faces light up. They’ve reimagined a moment of joy.

Play is difficult for me. I’m all about producing. “How much did I get done on the list today” seems to be my mantra. Taking time to have fun? Not so much. Paradoxically, I have to force myself to schedule play into the day. For me, it might be sitting down at the piano, busting out a jigsaw puzzle, scrapbooking, baking, or reading a book that has nothing to do with my job. It could be taking a morning to visit a grown daughter, a museum, or a nature preserve.

I’m convinced God’s people need to make room for play. Certainly, it might make us less angry. We might find that in playing with others, we learn more about other points of view. In having to work on a problem together, we might discover we have more in common with people on the “other side” than we thought. We will definitely lower our stress levels.

Our world is struggling under a load of unprecedented anxiety, depression, and stress, but what if believers looked different? I’m not saying we can solve mental illness through a game of Scrabble or paintball. But what if we intentionally lightened our load by choosing to reset this new year, in a new normal, with some time for creativity added into our schedules? Is it possible we could eliminate the phrase “I’m so stressed!” from our vocabulary and actually change the way we look at our lives?

Humans were created to be creative. Made in the image of a creative God who received enjoyment from that effort, we lose something valuable in our souls by cluttering our lives so that there is no room for play, no time for wondering and wandering, figuratively or literally. We’re cutting off a piece of our humanity, and we’re suffering for it. Play gives us the chance to fully embrace who we were created to be. It gives us a chance to be whole.

What would we have to cut out to make room for play? Wouldn’t it be worth the exchange? What would it feel like for the light to return to your face, too, as you reimagine what it is you used to enjoy doing for fun?

The new normal is here in this new year. We have the choice of what to intentionally include in it and what to leave out. Let’s include play as one thing that makes us more whole.

Now excuse me while I go bake something.

Jill Richardson is a writer, speaker, pastor, mom of three, and author of five books. She likes to travel, grow flowers, read Tolkien, and research her next project. She believes in Jesus, grace, restoration, kindness, justice, and dark chocolate. Her passion is partnering with the next generation of faith. Jill blogs at jillmrichardson.com.

Photograph © Julietta Watson, used with permission