Being Still

“Be still, and know that I am God.”—Psalm 46:10a

I don't know about you, but I know all too well about me, that I am rarely still before my God. My prayer life is very weak. It's a struggle to pray for me in the morning. Reading my Bible and asking God to open my eyes that I might understand His precepts and principles better in His Word comes easy. But prayer and resting in His presence is difficult. I could easily blame the ailment of our age—busyness—and its ripple effects in my life, but the truth is I am just not a very still and patient person. I am so busy with all the activity of my day that I find it sometimes “slow” work just to spend quality time with my precious daughter as she explores every rock, leaf, and branch on our walks together around our block. Sometimes I like concentrating on her explorations because in it I do find rest. I am struck with the awareness that there is much about this life that begs slow and easy exploration, the kind my daughter exudes.

But being still also has another meaning in the presence of our Almighty God. This application came to me the other day in the quiet of my heart when I was meditating on a particular prayer request. Because I didn't quickly see how this particular request could be answered and I was contemplating another of my own ideas to try to quickly achieve the result I was praying for, God had stopped my thoughts in their tracks. In that moment, while I was reading Psalm 46, the Lord clearly, gently, and pointedly told me to “Be still, and know that I am God.”

Again, I don't know about you, but when my eyes don't see what my heart is begging to see, I have a tendency to work in my flesh (not walking in the Spirit) toward accomplishing what I believe and perceive to be God's will. The result being that I often find elusive the rest and the stillness this verse addresses. So, it was nice to be reminded at just the right time that God is in control. No matter how big or small my worries and concerns are I can trust God. He wants me to be still from my own works and ideas, and to know that He is in control. He can turn my burdens and my cares into the directions He wants them to go, and all I need to do is just rest in Him.

I know I've often discussed this in previous posts, but I wanted to mention again that I am so grateful for a God who wants to and does communicate to my heart's needs through His word. This is why I try to avail myself of His counsel daily in the morning before all the day's activity begins. I hope I don't come across self righteous or somehow laudatory when I say I really do love reading God's word for this very reason, as if I am somehow better than those who don't or don't even have these kinds of moments with God while reading His word. That's not my hope. My prayer is all who read this do have those very sweet times of fellowship with the Lord, and if they don't, that somehow they may be encouraged to ask God for them. With that said, God's counsel may come in other ways, but it will never contradict His word. So it is still wise to read His word to familiarize yourself with it so that you will not be tossed to and fro by every wind of doctrine (Ephesians 4:14).

In the end, I believe God is asking us all to be still, and know that He, and He alone is God, and that every care, every worry, can be placed in His hands. He knows what He is doing. Sometimes, He may guide us in such a way to be a part of His work, but sometimes I believe He simply calls on us to rest in Him, as He takes care of our heart's desires and needs.

This was such a timely lesson for me in all my busyness, in all my assumptions that somehow my prayer requests need to be answered by me and my plans in my way. To use a modern phrase, we can sum it up with, “God's got this.”

He does. So, let's honor Him by trusting our needs and hopes and all of our despair and care into His precious hands.

“Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”—Matthew 11:28-30

Ponder the Path of Thy Feet

“Ponder the path of thy feet, and let all thy ways be established.”—Proverbs 4:26

“Let thine eyes look right on, and let thine eyelids look straight before thee.”—Proverbs 4:25

“Drink waters out of thine own cistern, and running waters out of thine own well.”—Proverbs 5:15

In a most tender and loving way, God encourages me in these verses to look to my own path before Him - to rejoice in my own walk with Him.

Simply, He is telling me to concentrate on my relationship with Him.

Too often, my walk gets distorted by my judging others, either in a loving or a critical way, and how they are or are not walking with the Lord, and I get side-tracked from my own walk.

It’s like this. I am walking down the road God has for me. I am walking with joy in the closeness I feel toward Jesus, I am feeding on the Word, and I am rejoicing in the knowledge it gives me about Him. And then, all of a sudden, I see someone struggling in life because I perceive they are not walking with the Lord. I see them perhaps making a foolish decision and then I allow it to affect my walk in Christ. I think, if they would only [fill in the blank], they would be right with God.

Unfortunately, because of that direction of my thoughts, I soon lose focus on my own walk. And it is a struggle to find my way back to basking in the sunshine of His love on my own path!

So Lord, when my vision gets a little distorted, please teach me to pray for those who are struggling in You, and help me leave them in Your perfect care. If You decide to use me to help assist them in their struggles, then, please grant me the grace and love to speak Your truth into their hearts, giving You all the praise and glory for the insight. Or should You decided to use my actions to help and serve them while they are in this phase of their lives, please help me surrender my will to Yours that they may see my good works and glorify Our Father in Heaven.

Then, Lord, help me me go on to perfection – a maturity in You – because that is what You are encouraging me to do in these verses above and in other passages of Your Word.

In Your precious Name I pray, Amen.

Onesti, Romania (June 2005)

Long Enough

“And the LORD spake unto me saying, Ye have compassed this mountain long enough: turn you northward.”—Deuteronomy 2:2-3

Reading the Old Testament can be such a faith boost. The story of Israel's wandering in the wilderness for 40 years captures that spirit for me—how that God was with them and guiding them each day through the pillar of fire by night or of cloud by day.

“He spake unto them in the cloudy pillar”(99:7a).

“And when the cloud was taken up from over the tabernacle, the children of Israel went onward in all their journeys: But if the cloud were not taken up, then they journeyed not till the day that it was taken up. For the cloud of the LORD was upon the tabernacle by day, and fire was on it by night, in the sight of all the house of Israel, throughout all their journeys” (Exodus 40:36-38—Emphasis mine)

The story of Moses receiving God's Ten Commandments is another great example of God's divine direction—how God gave us His Law so that we may obey it and live the consequences of our obedience or disobedience to it. (Not for justification before God but for an unburdened conscience before Him along with a freedom to be in fellowship with Him.)

God also spoke through Moses, as was the case in the featured passage above. I love the clarity of direction in this passage. I love the phrase “long enough.” It's as if God is saying, My child, your trials, your journeys, are finished. You are now going to the next phase of your walk with Me. Oh, this phase, too, comes with its trials and battles, but this is the phase I have had for you all along. See, you are now going into the promised land. Despite your little faith, doubting the plan I had for you all along, I was always guiding you to this place in subtle and non-so-subtle ways. You may not have always had the sight to see it afar off, but nevertheless, your promised land was always there for you.

So it is when God speaks to me through my devotional Bible reading from His word with the teaching of His Holy Spirit, guiding me into all truth. It is as if I'm Israel with my own personal pillar of fire by night and of cloud by day, where He is guiding me to the right or left, but always into the direction I should go. When a verse strikes me in its clarity, I trust God is using that verse to guide and comfort me.

There were many years I had pined for a husband and of a family of my own. Upon giving my life to the Lord in my early twenties, God had planted that desire in me. Before then, I had it in my mind that I was going to be a career woman. I told myself I was allergic to men.

I believe getting married and having a family was God's promised land for me, but I had to wander in the wilderness for 14 years while I waited. During that time, God slowly changed my heart and made me ready to receive the man He had for me. God, in effect, at the end of my journey, had said I had been in my wilderness long enough!

So, dear reader, whatever your trial, whatever your waiting, whatever your journey, take comfort in the fact we have a God Who guides our steps along the way, many times despite our lack of faith in Him or despite our grumbling along the journey. He has a promised land He's leading you to. It may not be the promised land you were hoping for or expecting, but He wants you to trust Him that it is the promised land He has for you.

Someday, the promised land He has for all of us who call upon Him for salvation, will be Heaven, itself, where we will forever be in His presence. He will in effect say to all of His children, You have wandered long enough. It's time to come home.

View on Drive Home to Spokane from Seattle
(September 2007)

Little by Little

“I will not drive them out from before thee in one year; lest the land become desolate, and the beast of the field multiply against thee. By little and little I will drive them out from before thee, until thou be increased, and inherit the land.”—Exodus 23:39-30

I don't know about you, but sometimes I can get so frustrated praying because that prayer request is not being answered on my time schedule. Above is a good portion of Scripture for me to keep in mind when my frustration level boils too high. I am human and fully admit to my lack of understanding of God's time frame when I don't experience immediate answers. Most of us, as His children, know that God is loving and kind and works all things together for good for those that love Him. (Romans 8:28) And yet, we get frustrated, confused, and easily discouraged if we don't see the answers we are looking for to our prayers right after we pray them.

Then, like a breath of fresh air, God can kindly and gently guide us into the truth of what He's doing by delaying the answer. Like He said to Israel about inheriting the Promised Land in the book of Exodus, this promise's fulfillment was not going to come right away, or even speedily. And He blessed them further with the explanation why, so that they can increase in numbers before they take over the land and so that the beasts of the field would not overrun the desolate land thereby making it uninhabitable for them.

In fact, He was going to approach His promise little by little.

Well, I think the same can be applied to our prayer requests that are Biblical and in His will and yet not answered within our time frames.

This passage above comforts me in this truth. I begin to understand that God is Sovereign and sees the end from the beginning. We do not. He is the Master Potter, molding and shaping us in preparation for our desired answer. We are not. He can change hearts and fertilize the ground upon which our prayer requests can be accomplished. We cannot. He alone knows what He's doing in our lives and in the lives of those around us. However, sometimes, in His precious love and kindness, He lets us get a glimpse behind the scenes. When that happens, I need to purpose to rest in Him for the answers and to never give up praying for the things desired, trusting that He will guide my prayers toward their expected end.

Thank You, Jesus, for Your Word, and the way it equips me to keep pressing on.

“Hope deferred maketh the heart sick: but when the desire cometh, it is a tree of life.”

—Proverbs 13:12

Spokane, WA (June 2013)

Winter is Past

“For, lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone; the flowers appear on the earth; the time of the singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land.”

—Song of Solomon 2:11-12

Winter passes. Hope begins. Life renews.

After a long season of winter, we see the green grass, observe the flowers budding, and watch as the trees extend their leaves. We hear the birds sing and smell the sweet expressions of new life all around us. Without that winter season, though, this new life would not be as vivid and our gratefulness would not be as fully realized for those little things that brighten the spring days.

So, too, are the seasons of the soul. We ought not despise the chill of the air that God perhaps is using to prepare us for the time when He will warm our hearts with His love. Without that chill, we might not completely appreciate the warmth of communing with Him as He stokes the fire within.

The monotony of the snow in making the earth one color, albeit at times a beautiful sparkling color, must not be dismissed either because that snow is nourishing the life beneath. In the same sense, the monotony of daily living must not drive us to a despondency in our walks with Him, but rather be used as a time of rest and refreshing, in order to be better prepared for the next season.

We should not let the quiet and stillness of the snow lull us into a deep sleep of the soul, but rather use this quiet for purer conversations with the Lord in prayer and Bible reading for a time of sweet communion with the One Who ordained this silent season.

O, that we would not let the winters of our souls come to nothing. May they be seen by us as a time of God's choosing. May we ask Him during these seasons how to be content and how to redeem that time with Him properly, having great expectation that when the winter passes, we will experience a new season filled with its own benefits.

And may we be reminded that all seasons of the soul are designed by the Lord to bring us closer to Him.

Spokane, WA (January 2007)

Five Minute Friday: Song

See the birds in the sky. Flying above all the cares, all the tragedies and all our sadness.

They soar on the songs of the wind. Higher and higher they go, until at some point, they are out of our vision.

But with them, they carry a vision of our own making. Taking with them the lost moments of the day. The frustrations. The ill will we carry in our hearts.

So, that when they are removed from our sight, we can see clearer than before. We see the present and tomorrow with hope and joyful anticipation that something better will settle into our hearts.

Once the past is removed, the ugly past. The past that we don’t like reflecting on in our soul’s mirror. That past. Once it is removed. We begin to soar, like those birds who carried away our longings.

We start to sing the songs of flight coasting in the air with our wings. But for perfect peace. For perfect soaring, we need to recognize that our wings need to rest under God’s wings.

All because in order for our song to have that perfect pitch, it needs to be yielded, humbled, and settled under the loving wings of our Heavenly Father.

Spokane, WA (2013)

God of Hope

The God of hope.”—Romans 15:13

“Ye were without Christ … having no hope.”—Ephesians 2:12

So often I go through the circumstances of life without hope. It’s as if the cynicism of my youth still has its grip on certain areas of my life that I have a difficult time trusting God in. Once I feel that cynicism settle in, my view becomes pessimistic and doubting.

The end result becomes despondency and discouragement, something the old man of my past, the one who lived according to the world’s philosophies, knows intimately. Then, the new man, the one who is of Christ’s workmanship, created in Him unto good works, pleads with the Lord and His Holy Spirit to save me from the sinfulness of my lack of trust.

It is when I trust God that I can begin to feel His hope again.

Hope that He has a plan for my life and the menial and profound circumstances that separate my days.

Hope that because of Him, my life is so much richer, purer, and sweeter than I could have possibly imagined.

Hope in knowing that He is the One Who settles my heart and gives me rest in the day to day.

God, You are so much in our lives and You generously share Your being, Your person, and Your attributes to Your children—hope being just one of them.

Lord, I find myself often in the grips of doubt and unbelief of Your goodness. Thank You for this little reminder that You are the God of hope and that before You, before giving my life to You, I truly was without hope.

Thank You for this beautiful encouragement.

“Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen.”—Ephesians 3:20-21

Stehekin, WA (2010)

The Sand that Binds the Sea

“Fear ye not me? saith the LORD: will ye not tremble at my presence, which have placed the sand for the bound of the sea by a perpetual decree, that it cannot pass it: and though the waves thereof toss themselves, yet can they not prevail; though they roar, yet can they not pass over it?”—Jeremiah 5:22

This tremendous verse speaks to me of man’s ceaseless and futile struggle with God. We, strangely enough, are like that ocean with its waves tossing and roaring - never able to prevail. Such drama and visual displays of angst and turmoil in reaction to the circumstances of our lives. And then, there is this sand, this “weak instrumentality” that represents God. This humble, yet fixed point, that maintains our existence. No matter how violent we become, how visibly we react, God is this sand that keeps us always where we need to be. Granted, God is the Creator of this part of nature and is far superior than the sand, but in concept, we cause all the ruckus, while God contains our sea. 

 

Lake Sullivan near Ione, Washington. (Fall 2007)

Five Minute Friday: Rest

Last week, when I was reading my friend's blog, Four For France, she had this funny "button" located at the bottom of her entry. Well, I was curious, and I clicked on it and discovered an online writing forum that sung to me! It was called "Five Minute Friday," and it was started by Lisa Jo Baker at Lisajobaker.com. She sends out a writing  prompt, every Friday, and the writer then takes five minutes to write anything that comes to them, without editing or over thinking. They are supposed to just write. What fun! I thought.

I then read some of Lisa's writings and was not only impressed with her talent and musings but I was also inspired to begin writing "outward" to an audience, and not for myself alone ... thus, my blog.

The other inspiration came from Jenn who writes the above-mentioned "Four For France," a blog about her life as she and her family serve God as missionaries to France. I love how she uses her writing to share her daily moments and how they often relate to Jesus and His work in her life.

Anyway, here goes my first "Five Minute Friday," and I have to be completely honest, I did some minor editing. (Old habits, you know.)

Next time, you will see the flaws and all!

And do click on that funny little button at the end of this post!

Today's prompt, as the title of this post alludes to, is rest.

_________

What is that word in my daily life? Is it the time (quiet or otherwise) when I spend time in conversational prayer and Bible reading with my Lord? Is it when I am forced to hold my child in my arms as I feed her the nourishment she needs to grow? Is it in front of a stove, when my child is playing by herself on the floor in the room next to me, as I lovingly prepare a meal for my husband?

Or is it the time I spend – the few minutes of time, that is – when I rest my body on my bed, with my back to the pillows and that soft light emanates from my table lamp, and I can quietly read a passage from whatever book has captured my interest at that time, when, while I read, I can hear the soft sounds of my baby sleeping in the room next to me?

Or could my rest be looking out of my home office window into the forest of trees and nature my husband has so tenderly nurtured in the years he’s lived in this house, as I watch the wind blow on the branches outside and the squirrels lovingly do their “dating” rituals?

I don’t know what rest is for you, but I think for me it’s in the little moments like these I experience throughout my day.