The Deepest Waters

The last few months I have lived a quiet life, spending most of my time with Scott, our boys, and the Lord. Occasionally I would venture out for lunch with a friend, but often, outside of church on Sunday, I was home. It wasn't a conscious choice, but I do know it was from the Lord. There was so much healing I needed, more than I was even aware.

The days seemed to run together, undulating with familiar tasks and different rhythms. God was so near as I battled loneliness and discouragement. While I longed for connection, I also felt weary - too weary to have anything to give outside my immediate circle of family and friends.

For the last four+ years, I have gone from grief to grief. I have faced, felt, and lived in the darkness, and I can testify what's true in the light is true in the darkness.

In the deepest shadows, God has given me incredible treasures of His deep peace, deep trust, deep love. And, He's taught me what it means to hope in Christ.

My hope is not to have an easy life.

My hope is in the life God has presented to me.

My hope is to fully live God's will for me.

I accept my pain is His perfecting love.

God's voice has become much louder than the world. He speaks over me His delight and love. He has heard the deepest groanings of my soul, prayers only my heart prayed for.

I'm attending a day class of Bible Study Fellowship. Being new to this location I didn't know anyone, and I felt very overwhelmed, battling discouragement and anxiety as I navigated a new space. But God ... the second week, as I came up the aisle, I heard my name. And there was my friend Renay, with whom I attended an evening BSF class for many years.

And, at our house church, God has given both Scott and I deep connections and new friendships. He saw our loneliness and tended our hearts, giving us the gift of true community.

My heart overflows as I consider the great love of God. The God of the universe knows us intimately and pursues us. He hears our every prayer and delights in those who pursue and seek to know Him. I join the psalmist in praying:

The Eternal is my shepherd, He cares for me always. He provides me rest in rich, green fields beside streams of refreshing water. He soothes my fears; He makes me whole again, steering me off worn, hard paths to roads where truth and righteousness echo His name.

Even in the unending shadows of death’s darkness, I am not overcome by fear. Because You are with me in those dark moments, near with Your protection and guidance, I am comforted.

You spread out a table before me, provisions in the midst of attack from my enemies; You care for all my needs, anointing my head with soothing, fragrant oil, filling my cup again and again with Your grace.

Certainly Your faithful protection and loving provision will pursue me where I go, always, everywhere. I will always be with the Eternal, in Your house forever.