Walking it out – Page 3 – Our God is a consuming fire

African waters

Posted on February 7, 2016February 7, 2016 by Sara

I am thinking about water tonight.

Specifically, I’m thinking about water in Africa.

Because today, while sitting around a table with precious friends, we talked about what it looks like to be close to Jesus. And it seems like such a simple question, but we found ourselves groping for words to describe – even understand – what that really means.

So I’m thinking about water tonight. Deep, clear, clean, cleansing water. And I’m remembering…

I guess when you have to work for your most basic necessity – water – you remember it a little more. In this case, I remember great rivers, deep rivers, flowing with mighty streams of life giving water. For some of the year. But when the dry season would come, and the rains would stop, that roaring river would slow to a trickle, and the life supply would dry up.

dry riverbed

When you need life, and the rains have stopped, and your river dries up – where do you go? How do you quench that soul sucking thirst?

Deeper in the jungle – down a dusty trail stairstepped with gnarled roots of jungle trees – lay a quiet spring. It didn’t rush, it didn’t roar. In fact, it never seemed be more than a couple of feet deep. The water was clean and pure, flowing up from within the earth, fed by unseen underground sources. Every person in my village would get their water from that one spring. It never mattered how many filled their bucket, the spring never ceased to provide life.

Water up Water kid

But the true miracle waited for those dry, dusty months when the rains stopped. Though the surrounding rivers would dry up, that spring remained the same – never changing, never leaving us thirsty. It was always enough.

spring

Doesn’t that sound just like our Jesus? “… whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” John 4:14

I don’t know about you, but I usually prefer the big, loud rivers. They seem more exciting. They seem more safe – you can SEE that the water is deep and oh how I like to be able to SEE. It feeds that illusion of control, that sense that you know what’s coming, what’s left, and when you need to move on. But then it dries up, and I’m left with that same dry, cracked, thirsty, soul hunting for another source of life. -“For my people… have forsaken me, the fountain of living water, and dug out cisterns for themselves, cracked cisterns that can hold no water.” – Jeremiah 2:13

But Jesus promises us a spring of water WELLING UP to eternal life. Clean, pure, life-giving water. And we usually can’t see the source, but that doesn’t stop us from “tasting and seeing” that the LORD is good! Oh may I drink deep today of His water, and may I camp here and not be lured away by the promises of deeper waters.

And then the transformation! “Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.” John 7:38 We get to participate in the miracle! He feeds us, He nourishes us, He soothes our thirsty souls, and then we get to refresh others with the same water He’s given us!

This, my friends, is what it means to me to be close to Jesus. I still can’t comprehend it, but here is where my soul finds rest.

never thirst

Walking it out

this is my story – this is my song

Posted on January 17, 2016January 19, 2016 by Sara

There are some moments in life that pass by quickly and get covered by the dust of passing time, only to be re-discovered years later as a pivotal moment in your life.

Not too long ago, I found myself driving through my old college campus, and as I rounded the backside of the parking lot, I suddenly felt like I had stepped back in time about 20 years… feet in darkness

I was walking back to my Mission Ave apartments after an evening class with Dr. Dorsett. I don’t remember what class was about that night, only that I was talking with God as I walked. And then I heard something stirring in my heart. It sounded like the voice of my God, and it asked me this: “ Will you speak for me? Will you go where I ask and say what I want you to say?”

I didn’t answer. I couldn’t.

I heard the same question again. And my heart leapt at the possibilities – of where God may take me and what I might live for Him … and yet my lips uttered a quiet, resigned “I can’t”. My heart desperately wanted to, and yet my head was clamoring with all the insecurities, questions, self-doubts … all the reasons why I would mess everything up. “I want to,” I found myself muttering under my breath, “but don’t you see I just can’t?”

And quietly life went on. I found myself wandering a bit. From Minnesota, down to a handsome young man on a reservation in Arizona, and then away… far away to Amsterdam.

beautiful Amsterdam , canals in downtown There my heart was stripped bare. Like Aslan with Eustace, the strong claws of my God cut deep through my dragon skin and I was given new skin, a new life.¹ And Jesus quietly whispered to my heart, “here, in this rawness, in the pain of finding your way, I will walk with you”

I wandered some more. Back to the US, back to Minnesota, and on until I finally found my home with that handsome young man in Arizona. I found my home among a beautiful brown skinned people, so similar in heart and culture to the dark-skinned people I had grown up with in Africa. I love them as my own family – I got married among them and had my first two children among them.

Hopi Sunset

In the midst of such wonder and joy, I found myself in the middle of a wilderness I had never imagined for myself. A vast, dark, consuming cloud of fear descended on my life. A barrage of worry, a fear of loss, of death, of life – this world that I had always been enamored with now just seemed to hold threats, and I thought at times I was losing my way. And in the swirling madness, my sweet Jesus, gave me His Word, showed me the way out by the power of His promises, and whispered to my heart, “here, in this darkness, I will walk with you”

Then came those words a mother dreads. In the dark of the ultrasound room, the doctor told us that there was an “anomaly” with our baby boy (a boy! We were going to have a boy!) Next came the barrage of tests to determine exactly what the “anomaly” was – the doctors called my baby a “fetus” and offered to run tests to see if we should end the pregnancy – the horror of such words still make me shudder. Months of tests and monitoring and not knowing, until that beautiful day my baby boy exploded into our world and it has never been the same since. We experienced the truth that there are no “anomalies”, only perfect creations of God, knit together as He sees fit. We saw miracles, unexplained healings and parts held together by invisible hands – and yet God saw fit to use the hands of doctors to do more healing. Surgery on my 3 day old, 10 days in NICU, a baby having to go home with oxygen tubes in his nose – swirling confusion, loneliness – nothing makes a mother feel smaller than knowing she can do nothing for her baby but pray. caleb

But pray! There is nothing a mother can do that is more powerful than that – pray! And in those exhausting, breathless days, my Jesus came close and whispered to my heart, “here, in this place, I will walk with you”

Life has moved on, as it always does. Years have passed, that fragile little baby boy with a weak heart is now a strong big boy with an irrepressible belly laugh that takes over a room. We have different scenery out our front door than we did back then. Our days are filled with all the joy and stress, laughter, tears, and busy-ness of full time marriage-ing, all-consuming parenting, and constant ministry. But some things will never change. He continues to whisper to me, “here, in this place, I will walk with you”

And so when I found myself in that parking lot last year, the memory – those words- came flooding back and took my breath away. “Will you speak for me? Will you go where I send you?” And my heart knelt, and I saw Him in a new way. He didn’t give up on me, on my halting and ashamed “I can’t”. He didn’t move on to the next better candidate. He just kept walking with me. And as He walked with me, I discovered that He was never asking if I could … He was simply asking if I would. He, who walked with me in the brazen streets of Amsterdam, through the swirling darkness of fear, in the midst of such confusion and pain in the NICU, in the daily pressures of now, will continue to walk with me through whatever He asks of me. And He will give me the words to speak.

And so today I echo the words of Moses in Exodus 33:15 when He begged God to simply walk with him.– And I rest on the promise of God that followed his bold request: “My Presence will go with you, and I will give you rest” (Exodus 33) There is no other life for me.

You can fight outside

Posted on November 30, 2015 by Sara

“…if they want to fight, they have to go outside”, she said, “because my home will be a home of peace”

The words struck my young heart. And have been lodged there ever since. They weren’t directed at me – but part of me wonders if they were intended for me.

Some moments never leave you. Some moments come to us in a single sentence, and transform our lives forever… or shape our futures… or heal our pasts.

You rarely know it when it’s happening. These moments don’t contain lightning bolts. They come as a gentle whisper to the soul. Sometimes I feel like Elijah, looking for the presence of God, and not finding Him in the wind, the earthquake, or the fire… “but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper. When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face…” 1 Kings 19

food

How was I to know, at a mere 12 years old, how my God would shape my life through this simple woman’s words? Standing in her kitchen, watching her make dinner while eavesdropping on a conversation intended for someone else, she simply explained the power of peace in her family. She articulated a concept that I had never heard anyone put words to.

I wonder how many years passed before I thought of those words again. But they lay like a seed, planted deep in the recesses of my heart. But those simple words gave me framework on which to build my marriage. A foundation on which to build my family. The courage to take a stand and declare, “My home will be a home of peace.” Though life became tumultuous – there existed an idea – a possibility. I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.” John 16:33

There are more words in me – planted by people throughout my life. Gentle whispers sent into my life like shafts of light. Some I harvest – some are still growing. But today, I celebrate all those moments. I celebrate every person who has spoken into my life.

And I think about the words I speak – the crumbs I leave behind as I walk. ”Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.” Ephesians 4:29 That unsuspecting bystander who sees me and my entourage of 3 in a grocery store, all of us at wits end. That it may benefit those who listen. That child who’s done something wrong and looks into your eyes- waiting for what’s to come… That it may benefit those who listen. That person sitting next to your family in a restaurant… That it may benefit those who listen. That nurse caring for your sick child… That it may benefit those who listen. Every soul, longing for some crumbs of grace to fall – something to point us to our Maker. crumbs 2

May I leave behind a trail of grace that changes lives as mine has been changed.

What words have been spoken into your life that have changed you?