Ahhh…the beautiful invention of the hammock.
I always begged my parents for a hammock growing up (and by that, I mean last year…seriously!) No such luck.
One of the best parts of the World Race community is in fact the COMMUNITY. Your squadmates let you use their super awesome stuff that you never thought to bring (or couldn’t fit, because I “needed” all those extra clothes.)
So in desperate need to escape from a house full of people, I climbed into one of the guy’s ENO hammocks (shameless plug…in case someone has one waiting for me in my room when I get home!) hanging in a tree.
Finally alone! Finally some time to connect with God…find some peace and rest.
I lay in the hammock looking up in the huge tree. I started to draw the tree, which is quite hysterical considering my level of artistry. I was actually getting overwhelmed at how many branches and leaves are overlapping, how many detailed knots are on the bark and just really how complex this thing is. Weird!
THEN I SPOTTED IT…
Yet another hammock farther up in the tree. (Leave it to your super outdoorsy squad leader to put his hammock literally IN a tree.)
Completely engulfed by the tree, you wouldn’t know it was there unless you really went looking for it. Literally being supported by the tall branches and just hanging in mid-air. Even protected from the sun.
Then it hit me…God. This tree represents God. How powerful and huge. How complex, yet simple. How protective. How calm and peaceful. How sustaining.
How much I cannot see and understand at one time. Or even fathom at all.
I felt an invitation to CLIMB IN.
To stop looking at God from the outside and literally climb into all those good things that I had merely acknowledged about Him.
See there is a difference between recognizing who God is and what He can do and then truly RESTING in that. Truly TRUSTING. Letting that be your REALITY.
Let Him support you. Surround you. Protect you.
REST IN THAT!
So I did. (Well, I ran to get a chair first, in order to give my short self the needed boost to start my assent.)
For that time, I felt completely invisible, but completely surrounded at the same time. Literally hanging in mid-air by mesh, but fully supported.
I reminded me once again to CLIMB INTO God’s presence every day. To let Him fully support me and be my only place on this earth where I find PEACE and REST and calmness in a REALLY crazy time of my life.
You will keep in perfect peace those whose minds are steadfast, because they trust in you. Trust in the Lord forever, for the Lord, the Lord himself is the Rock Eternal. Isaiah 26:3-4
Truly my soul finds rest in God; my salvation comes from him. Truly he is my rock and my salvation; he is my fortress, I will never be shaken. Psalm 62:1-2
