Time seems to be flying at warp speed… the 2020 election is next week, we are now about eight months into a global pandemic, there are only 2 months left in this year… and the list goes on! The end of this month brought with it a humbling contemplation of the past four weeks as my time of planning to write a blog always has a way of doing. Most of the time, I feel like God is really faithful to me in putting one specific journey I have walked through in the past month on my heart to share. The story is not the same this month as October has instead been a more obscure adventure, its days bleeding together and its moments all bundled in the arms of Jesus. In a way, October has been a particularly humbling month, a month I feel God has called me to abide in Him, to depend on Him alone for rest when the only other option would be a wave of overwhelmingness due to how fast life is happening. He’s undone the knots of previous struggles in finding my worth in productivity or family or anything my life before college offered in security and comfort. His goodness has seeped into all corners of my life here, and my experience of this is best described in a text conversation I had with a friend after asking for prayers of clarity in this time: “I feel the temptations to believe lies that I am falling behind, but then I come back just to pure elation that God is bringing me such joy and peace in this season in a way I have never felt. A way that it is almost bizarre and surreal, so much so that I psych myself out about it sometimes in thinking that it cannot be this good, like I should be struggling in more. It’s not that there are not trials, but it’s just that for the first time I believe God is really coating me in His joy, something that I prayed for but had never experienced in such fullness until now.” The past month has been a whirlwind, a kind of beautiful mess, a time of faithful dependence on Him for joy that I crave but cannot create and peace in situations far beyond my grasp. This patient joy He is teaching me is learning that because His ways are so much greater than my own, His understanding so far beyond what I can conceive, this season that seems to lack direction is not to be rushed. It is to be relished and dwelled in with eager anticipation that what He has began in this time, He will be faithful to complete (Phil. 1:6). I do not have any answers or clear cut path to impart with you; if I forced one, they would be my words alone and not rooted in the truth to what God has called me to in this month. Instead, I want to share a few things that have been foundational in my learning to just be, to just rest, to just soak in what He wants to teach me even as life moves lightning speed around us:
- Repeating “this is the day the Lord has made; I will rejoice and be glad in it” (Psalm 118:24) or “Satisfy me in the morning with your steadfast love, so that I may rejoice and be glad in your days” (Psalm 90:14) as many times it takes in the morning until I believe it in my heart for that day. Jesus tells us in Romans 10:9 that “if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.” There is power in what we proclaim with our mouths, even if it be an internal proclamation you repeat in your head 20 times on a groggy Monday morning while you brush your teeth (a common occurrence for me).
- Being in the Word every morning. I know this may be a daunting encouragement to some. It would have been to me a few months ago in what seems like such a sacrifice to make. However, spending time in the Word does not have to be in the morning as I choose; it could be between classes or in the car or in the late afternoon before dinner or in the quiet moments before you go to sleep. Joshua 1:8 calls us to meditate on the Word day and night, and in a world that is go, go, go, meditating for 5 minutes (something I have been practicing) seems like a feat, much less meditating all day, which seems like an impossibility. However, 2 Timothy 3:16 promises us that ALL scripture “is breathed out by God” and that it acts as our teacher and trainer in righteousness. In this, how can we not desire to be filled by it? My prayer for myself and you in this is that we would ask God to augment our affections for His Word, that He would silence and shut out the enticements of this world and hone our hearts to His heartbeat, His breath in Scripture.
- Relationship. The multilayered experience of God’s joy in this season has been most vibrantly played out in the relationships He has called me to here. Conversations with people that were only strangers to me a few months ago, a campus ministry small group who pours His truth and accountability into me, opportunities to spread His love to a whole new world of people; all of these have revealed a new facet, a new dimension to the great joy He gives us in relationship with others. Through my small group, I am learning the power of fellowship, relationships centered in Jesus, in new ways. I am still discovering the beauty in this, but if I can attest to anything at this moment, it is God’s faithfulness in promising that where two or more are gathered in His name, He is there too (Matthew 18:20).
I only pray these three places of learning for me will translate into encouragement for you in this season. We need His joy, His sweetness, His promise of life especially now amidst a world desperate for reprieve, for light. While there is no clear path before me right now, and maybe there isn’t for you either, I thank God in advance for the time He is taking now to prepare our hearts, our minds for the abundance He has for us to come, yet even more, I pray that we would not be in a hurry to rush out of this season. I pray He would still our hearts and rest our minds in the presence His joy calls us to every day in a way that only His restoring power can.
With love, C