up from the shadowlands: part 7

[... rising again from these ashes-- raw, unedited, uncut-- the journey and the battle the last few days. again, i have come undone... empty-handed yet alive in his hands...]

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... TREASURES IN THE DARKNESS

I was given a gift yesterday.

A gift He has been preparing in the last couple months of time the Lord and I have spent together in His word. His words that He has hidden in my heart. And I found myself, like Israel, needing to be reminded that even though it feels like disaster keeps coming upon me,

He is the Lord.

That was all I needed to know.

I didn't have to figure out how it was all going to work out, or even what to do in the next few days, or hours. All I needed to know is that He is greater.

HIGHER and ABOVE all things.

That He is bigger than this. Has a plan. Already knows how it will be in the end, that He has already walked it out and knows the road, every single step of the way. He will guide us.

He is sovereign... and over and over, these verses I've shared above started running through my mind... who do you think created the heavens and the earth, who do you think held the mountains in his hands, who do you think is BIGGER, GREATER than all that is going on.

I could hear the cries of my God, simply desiring that in my brokenness and all my fears and all my questions... that I would come to him.

Just come.

And know that he is HE. The Lord, apart from whom, there is no Savior.

And slowly, as I thought of all I saw in God's pleas with His people, His beloved Israel, I could hear those same pleas being asked of me.

That I would remember that he is He.

Then, we come to the the fortieth chapter of Isaiah where the tune changes.

The title of chapter 40 is Comfort for God's People:

“Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and proclaim to her that her hard service has been completed, that her sin has been paid for, that she has received from the Lord's hand double for all her sins...” (isa. 40:1-2)

Or chapter 41, where the title is The Helper of Israel:

.:: “I took you from the ends of the earth, from its farthest corners I called you. I said 'You are my servant'; I have chosen you and have not rejected you.

So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, yes, I will help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand...” (isa. 41:9-10)

.:: “The poor and needy search for water, but there is none; their tongues parched with thirst. But I the Lord will answer them; I, the God of Israel, will not forsake them.” (isa. 41:17)

.:: “Yet the Lord longs to be gracious to you; therefore he will rise up to show you compassion. For the Lord is a God of justice. Blessed are all who wait for him!

People of Zion, who live in Jerusalem, you will weep no more. How gracious he will be when you cry for help! As soon as he hears, he will answer you. Although the Lord gives you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, your teachers will be hidden no more; with your own eyes you will see them.

Whether you turn to the right or to the left, you will hear a voice behind you saying, this is the way, walk in it.” (isa. 30:18-21)

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This hunger and desire to be more deeply rooted in God's Word is something that God alone has done. I felt a need, feeling the strength of the waves tossing me back and forth in this season, knowing that in a crisis and in a trial that more was needed. I needed perspective and for the Spirit of God to allow me each day to get my eyes on Him. To set my mind and heart on things above. To remember that I am His child and each day all that was desired of me was to come as I am, trust, love and rely upon my God.

I have never needed God more and at the same time, I have never known or seen a God like this before. He has led me to new places, deeper regions in the endless depths of His heart, He has restored me, mended me by His touch.

I was reminded a few weeks ago that this a marathon, not a sprint, I needed to find ways to receive strength and hope to endure in this trial. A strength and hope only God can provide. By His grace, He has led me on this journey though His story that He is telling, in and all around us, and in the pages of His Word.

To be able to see the progression of a God that people felt was distant. Or hidden, or unfair. In reading the One year Bible and reading several books including Yancey's Disappointment with God, the Story of God has taken on a whole new meaning.

To see the progression of God simply desiring the love and affection and trust of His people. A God that refused to come by force or exert His power, as all the previous kings who had came before had done. No, He chose to come as a baby. In the most vulnerable of forms and to lead His kingdom in the way of love, humility and sacrifice, not by forcing his subjects to follow him by brute force, fear, terror or power.

There was another way.

Two words struck me in the reading yesterday.

Listen and forgotten.

The reading in Isaiah 48 yesterday picks up in verse 12,

“Listen to me, Jacob, Israel, whom I have called:

I am he; I am the first and I am the last. My own hand laid the foundations of the earth, and my right hand spread out the heavens...

Come near me and listen to this...

I am the Lord your God, who teaches you what is best for you, who directs you in the way you should go.

If only you had paid attention to my commands, your peace would have been like a river, your well-being like the waves of the sea.

Your descendants would have been like the sand, you children like its numberless grains; their name would never be blotted out nor destroyed before me.” (isa. 48:12-13, 16, 17-19)

Then we get to the middle of Isaiah 49, where the title is now Restoration of Israel:

“This is what the Lord says:

'In the time of my favor I will answer you, and in the day of salvation I will help you; I will keep you and will make you to be a covenant for the people, to restore the land and to reassign its desolate inheritances, to say to the captives, 'Come out!' and to those in darkness, 'Be free!'

They will feed beside the roads and find pasture on every barren hill. They will neither hunger nor thirst, nor will the desert heat or the sun beat down on them.

He who has compassion on them will guide them and lead them besides springs of water....

Shout for joy, you heavens; rejoice, you earth; burst into song, you mountain! For the Lord comforts his people and will have compassion on his afflicted ones.

“But Zion said, 'The Lord has forsaken me, the Lord has forgotten me.”

That was when it hit me. Despite my morning of staring at my beloved feelings chart from counseling and recovery ministry and trying to “pull out the weeds,” as my counselor says, and identify all the emotions I was feeling and why. I hadn't found a word that quite captured it perfectly, till I read that word,

forgotten.

Hmmm. Acknowledging that word hurt. The sorrow welled up again within me, like a little child who was left waiting after school for a ride that hadn't come, I felt the sting of feeling forgotten. Not just by anyone, but by a loved one. A parent. Oh could I relate to Zion. I felt like the Lord had forsaken me, I felt like the Lord had forgotten me. With all that was within me, I felt crushed because I couldn't understand how He could or why He would.

I remembered that while feelings are valid, they are never right or wrong, they just ARE, that even though I FELT forsaken and forgotten by God, was that really the case? ...