As for the pictures...

I said in an earlier post that God had begun to speak to me in pictures. There is an old saying that a picture is worth a thousand words. In my attempts to describe these pictures, I have found this to be true. They are very difficult to describe, but, I will try. These pictures have shaped who I am, who I believe God to be, how I perceive the world.

If you read my last post you will remember the day that God ‘held me’ in his lap, the day that changed me forever, the day I first LOVED God. Everything changed for me that day. Worship changed for me that day. I have always been a singer and, as such, had always loved ‘worship.’ I enjoyed the melodies, the harmonies, the rhythms, the lyrics. I enjoyed the ‘corporate’ness, the sound of 200 voices raised together, the rise, the fall, the highs, the lows. But, up until that day, I never ‘enjoyed’ God in any way that was real. Occasionally there were moments of a strange sense of longing, a sense that maybe there was something more, particularly when we sang this one ‘new’ song, ‘I love you Lord’. It left me feeling…well…lost, I guess, empty…like a hypocrite, a liar; exposed. This one little song played a huge role leading up to the day that God held me. I remember being so very frustrated one Sunday and refusing to sing that song…accusing God, saying, ‘How can I possibly LOVE you?! I don’t even KNOW you! I can’t see you, hear you, feel you, how can I LOVE you?’ He waited a while before He answered me… a week, maybe two…I can’t remember… but, my goodness did He answer!! If a picture is worth a thousand words, a hug is worth a million. How can I NOT love you?!! I LOVE YOU, LORD! You are WORTHY, TRUST WORTHY, SAFE! GENTLE! LOVING! ALL ENCOMPASSING! PEACE full! JOY full! WARM! STRONG!

I have never been the same….

‘Worship’ has never been the same. So… on to the ‘pictures’…

I had opportunity to go to a big city church for a ‘worship’ night. There was a band there who had ‘fallen in love’ with God. It was real. They were not in love with the ‘idea’ of God. They were in love with GOD. It was personal. The Spirit in this place was wonderful, tangible. We worshipped for several hours. Near the end we were singing Isaiah’s (?) vision "I see the Lord, seated on the throne, and the train of his robe filled the temple with GLORY, and we cry Holy! Holy! Holy is the Lord Most High!" It was a beautiful song, powerful, glorious. I again had this sense… I was singing words I had not experienced. I was not being genuine. I did not SEE the Lord seated on the throne. I wanted to. I tried to imagine him…but could not. I successfully imagined the train of his robe filling the temple, heavy white satin with gold embroidery rippling over the entire sanctuary…but I could not imagine Him… SEE Him. I imagined how I would feel if I saw him; awed, humbled, quiet, reverent, trembling, subdued, wondrous. I anticipated feeling that way, trying to ‘prepare’ myself. I asked him ‘please God, reveal yourself to me, I love you so much, just show yourself to me, high and lifted up’ The worship leaders understood something about deep worship… they understood that it is not about getting through the song and moving on to the next one…that there are other things going on besides the singing and the music…that there are dialogs like mine going on in a thousand different hearts and it’s best not to interrupt the quality ‘father-daughter’ time by rushing through things. They continued to play this song for a long time, I imagine until the Spirit led them somewhere else. It’s nice when the Spirit leads, rather than the page leading, but that’s a side bar… sorry…

I kept pleading with God to reveal himself. Eventually I sat, knees drawn to my chest, and waited…and then…there he was… It only took a second.

I saw a boy. Seventeen, eighteen years old. Blue jeans, t-shirt, lean, tanned, short wavy hair. He was standing twenty, maybe thirty feet away, one foot on the shore, one foot on a small boulder in the creek. He’d been skipping rocks. The sun was perfect, warm on my right shoulder, the light dancing off the sparkling, splashing water. I sat on the shore, downstream, watching, perfectly relaxed, happy. He turned to look at me and he grinned. A perfectly innocent, perfect day, full of life, playful kind of grin, and his eyes sparkled. He was happy, content, at peace. He was glad to be with me! He was having fun! He was in love! My heart leapt! My whole being filled -- how does one describe it? You know what it feels like. Young love! Delight, elation, a rush! You know it…, that flush that starts at your toes and rushes all the way up, forcing you to inhale as much of life as you possibly can in the moment. He was delighted with me! He LOVED ME! He PICKED ME! And, I knew it! To the depths of my soul, I knew it! We were spending the afternoon together. I was the luckiest girl in the world, to be chosen by HIM! My heart was full to overflowing, delighted, grateful, energised, lifted up. Did I say full? It was full!

And that was it! One second of my life! A moment! I can't do it justice...

I laughed out loud, there in the sanctuary! The laugh of one surprised by something wonderful, unexpected, delightful. I was caught so completely off guard! I was expecting ‘the train of his robe,’ the King of Kings. I met Jesus, lover of my soul!