Tuesday, December 11, 2012

This season

It's hard for me to understand this season.  It's unlike any I've ever encountered.  Course, probably each new season is that way and if I looked back I might have said the same thing.  But there really is something different, in a harder sort of way.

This one is requiring a different kind of trust, a deeper faith.  Plenty of balls have dropped for me, way more things fallen through the cracks than I care to count, and through it all I fight to believe that God is working and has a plan.

Because a lot of days I feel thwarted on every side to accomplish the tasks that I used to get done with minimal effort.  Even if it took maximum effort, I could get them done.  These days I can't even muster up effort.  It's just not there.

My friend says that it's the undoing of a performance way of life so that I can get to living life.

I waiver back and forth with doubt and doesn't James talk about what that's like?  A man blown and tossed about by the sea.  Yep, that's me.

It's just that everything looks so...different than I anticipated or thought it would...really, thought it should.

Somewhere in all this blowing and tossing and back to re-grounding in trust and faith, I hear a voice whispering that all my undoing is setting the stage for great trailblazing back to an ancient path of peace and faith and trust in the voice of the Holy Spirit saying, "This is the way.  Walk in it."

See, even though I've known Jesus for most of my life and followed His ways and known His voice, I still find myself walking a whole heck-of-a-lot by sight.  And I think He keeps telling me that a day is coming where if we don't know how to walk completely by faith, we will flounder in ways that will have unprecedented repercussions.

But He's so good and kind and gracious that He is relentlessly training me to walk by faith, and He's starting with seemingly inconsequential things like grocery shopping and gift shopping and calendar planning and home schooling.

Gift shopping...occasionally God will highlight a particular gift (usually a book) for someone and I purchase it with the hopes that I have heard correctly, particularly if it's a book I know nothing about.  My aunt has been the recipient of more than one of these books and has always come back to tell me how timely the gift was.  Once I purchased a book for a friend after a nudge from the Holy Spirit but then never gave it to her because I wasn't sure, in the end, if I had really heard correctly.  A year or so later, she was visiting and "randomly" mentioned that she was reading said book and how much it was ministering to her.

So, yesterday, I was looking for gifts and came across a couple of books that I felt a nudge to buy, but then I kept doubting...and not because of the cost because that was minimal...not really sure why I doubted.  And then I came across the title of that book I had bought but never given to my friend and it was as if the Lord was saying, "Remember?  That was a lesson and now I'm bringing it to mind so that you can have peace that this is My Voice.  No need to fear or doubt or worry.  You're hearing Me."

Hearing Him.  That's really what it all boils down to.  Bill Johnson says, "The life is in His voice."

True.

Join me on this journey from sight to faith?

2 comments:

  1. You are a blessing. The posts from October to now are my testimony too. Only I didn't write it out. What a huge blessing this was to come here and read this post (and then go back a bit) and see the same struggles and thoughts and revelations and to see that the Holy Spirit is speaking the same to all of us. It is such an encouragement! This post in particular, blessed me with this : "My friend says that it's the undoing of a performance way of life so that I can get to living life." I have had the same struggle - I used to be able to do several things well at at time (homeschool, make meals, keep the house clean, be hospitable...) Now, I feel as if I can't even muster up the same brain that used to do these things. This sentence released me. Totally shifted my perspective to see the good in my ... ineptness? I hear His voice, I know Him well. I think I thought I would look shinier. :) But from all around me, I am discovering that I have a ministry and that it is because I "am not afraid to let my failures show" (quote from a friend). God is so good and will be faithful. I am encouraged right now to go write some of my own testimony down. It isn't really a testimony till it's been said by you is it? Before I speak/write it, it is just my own memory. Well, my testimony to you is that this has been a huge blessing. God has used you to speak to me and clarify some things and turn my face to see my circumstances and mostly my own messiness as a gift from Him that WILL show His Glory!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thank you, Ami, so much for leaving your encouraging comment. I hope you will write it. There are so many that need to hear your story. We find elements of our own story woven in the threads of others and this vast net of the world wide web helps remind us that we are not alone. Thanks for letting me know how my testimony helped you. Encourages me to keep writing :-)

    ReplyDelete