It was deeply, dark-clouded and a fiercely windy day. While walking, no... stomping..., my way up the green, muddy hill, I asked the Lord, "Are you really with me?"
This day was just another day in a string of hard days... my husband lay ill in bed with Covid. He still suffered and we were waiting, praying, hoping for sickness to leave. Days on days... weeks getting lost into months. This illness and it's horrible touch lived with us every moment of every day.
I had ventured out into the rough weather to get some fresh air and stomp out my prayers, my grief, my frustration, and my pain. Muddied, wet, tired and emotional, I had the passing thought: I am with you always...
With you always, Stephanie...
With irritation and despairing tone, face upturned to the dark clouds, I shot back... "Are you really with me? Really!? Right here, now? Are you really with me?"
Lament is not my forte. It is not something I normally do... nor have felt comfortable doing most of my Christian life. My personality and my upbringing have not encouraged emotional outbursts, to be sure. But, it seemed lately, that without lament... with out this ever-increasing honesty with my Jesus... I would run dry. It seemed necessary and right and very good. In these days, lament had become my doorway, my window, ...my deep well which accessed living water. I was thirsty and God was teaching me to tell Him how very thirsty I was. Oh! How very thirsty I am!
So, stomping up the hill, my face lifted, my honest response to the whispered Scripture, "I am with you always"... was tear filled retort. Really, Lord?! Are you really with me?
Like a flash, I had His response. Instantaneously, I heard one clear word quietly whispered to my heart... Within.
I am within you, Stephanie.
Like lightening, the flash of truth filled me with the ever living water and it was another piece of manna. Food for my days, for the weeks to come... for the days that would turn into months.
Whatever would come, I felt my courage rise. My faith was filled with His Presence and I knew...
I am always within you, Stephanie.
So much closer than with... even closer than walking alongside... My Jesus is within me. His Spirit lives and abides IN me. Closer than my very breath.
Paul tells us in Ephesians that Jesus makes "his home within us". Jesus, Himself, tells us His Spirit abides with us and within us... (John 14) I believe we spend too much time looking up and out for Him... seeking Him outside of ourselves... seeking Him in the skies (where He also dwells, just to be clear!) We need to remember that He is within.
Jesus said in John 16:5-16: "I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. In a
little while the world will see Me no more, but you will see Me. Because I
live, you also will live. On that day you will know that I am in My Father, and
you are in Me, and I am in you….If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word. My
Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our home with him."
His home is within us. And, all fullness of life and joy and peace lives in Him. If we are lacking, He is not. He will give to those who lack. Do you need wisdom? Ask Him... He is full of it and He lives in you. Fullness of wisdom abides in you... abide in Him! Do you need patience? or love? Or do you need joy today? Ask Him, He is full of it... and He lives in you.
I walked home that day... that dark, pounding day with a full heart. I was full of Him and His truth. He responded to my lament. His loved welled up and filled my heart and mind with more of Himself.
The difficult days continued onward... days turned into weeks. Weeks fell away to months... In fact, as I write this, we still live with the reality of this horrible illness. We've stopped counting time passed. But still ...and still... that piece of manna ---within----feeds me.
Just to be clear, I don't hear from His Spirit these type of "words" often--- this is why I call it manna. Or, better yet, I should call it a feast. He feeds me manna from the Bible and I collect what I can for each day. His Scripture is my daily bread. These special moments--- these flash moments ---are like a feast day.
Even when I don't feel it... I can remember the taste of the feast. I know it to be true.
He is within me always, even until the end of the age.
