My favorite part about the morning here is the dew covered grass and the golden morning light exposing the some of the most intricate and giant spider webs I’ve ever seen. whats better than all these things, though, is being able to rest in it or walking along the trail picking flowers and humming my favorite heart tunes: sabbath! On the race we practice sabbath once a week. Basically, its just fancy word for rest ( Exodus 35:1-3) and we get to sit and do just that! It can look like a lot of different things, sitting with the Lord, watching movies, painting, processing and grieving your week, or just playing a card game with your friends. Three weeks ago I laid on my favorite hill with full intention to have the best time in my Bible and in prayer. Being it was the first Sabbath, they asked us to leave our phones and just simply spend time with the Lord for the first hour or two. When I finally made my way to the hill and after the faint sound of guitar and the birds morning chirps finally died down, I was alone. Alone?! Here?! That’s pretty much unheard of, so I cracked open my bible and reached for my phone to take a cool picture of the way the grass looked. “Ugh. No phone. Okay. fine. Oh its fine! I can listen my new favorite song ‘Taste and See’!” I reached for my phone again. haha. funny. No phone. I – sort of angrily – took to God.
“HOW do you expect me to connect with you if I don’t have the two best ways – photography and worship??”
“I gave you those gifts to use to glorify me and emphasize my creation but you’re using them in place of me, so I don’t want you to pick up those things again until you’re ready.”
ouch.
As I sat in that and began to process what I heard, I started to see things and their beauty in the most unfiltered way. I took a walk along the trail on campus and talked to God about what I was seeing. On my second loop around the trail, He said, “okay. Now get your camera” The butterflies that I feel like are my best friends at this point were landing on flowers and flying circles around me. It felt like a perfect Disney movie ending to my first sabbath and I told everyone how cool it was! And it was cool! But!! I still didn’t have my voice.
I never lose my voice. Normally, no matter how loud I scream or how much I talk, my voice is never gone. Suddenly, though, after this sabbath my voice was completely gone. Not connecting the dots, I still joined the worship team and showed up to the first practice. I was a mess. I felt unprepared and like there was no way I could belong. Every time I opened my mouth I messed up, couldn’t find harmonies, when to start, anything. and the worst part, most of the time I opened my mouth no sound came out. “My voice isn’t usually like this, I’m so sorry!” Was my common sentence of the day. I did it and, annoyed with myself, moved on and promised myself I’d do better next time. Next time comes around and my voice is now…worse. To spare you the gory details, I quit. I couldn’t do it. Convincing myself it was a noble thing because “I don’t want to do it if I can’t do my best!” I walked out with a heart heavy in conviction. I spent my day speaking lies over myself. “God gave me an ok voice but anything beyond that is bad. How could He just give me half a talent? I’m only a little bit good at a lot of different things.” After talking to a leader of mine about the root of my problem, I took to Sam (one of our team leaders and the worship coordinator). After a lot of back and forth, I finally rested in what she was saying. “The Lord gave you a talent, which is beautiful in itself. However, He didn’t give you a talent to sound good. He loves the atmosphere you bring to worship. maybe thats why you lost your voice, because He’s waiting for you to step into that before you’re ready to worship.” I was brought back to my sabbath day and the pieces began to fit together perfectly. I was putting the way I led worship above what worship really is – giving glory back to the Father. It was like the Lord was screaming to me all these beautiful truths I can now sit in.
“Negative self talk holds you captive”
“I delight in what you give me”
“You lack nothing in me”
“You are chosen”
“You are a new creation”
(Ephesians 2:6, James 1:4, 2 Corinthians 5:17, Zephaniah 3:17)
The next week and a half (and still) were filled with unpacking those truths and constant conversation with God about it all. And what you’re hearing is only a quarter of the freedom and knowledge I’ve gained since then!
After a while I decided my voice loss was unrelated because I felt like I was pretty much walking in the freedom I was meant to and still didn’t have it. Last Sunday, after squad church, a bunch of us got in a circle to worship for the 30 minutes before lunch. with voices and guitar filling the room, I was worshipping. Worshipping the Father for giving me this freedom. And all the sudden, like a breath of fresh air, my voice was literally breathed back into me. No more rasp, no more random notes not coming out. I celebrated and worshipped in that. After worship, my friend Anna said to me, “Hannah, Ive never seen you worship with that much freedom it was so cool.”
Dang. There ya have it.
In the Lord I lack nothing. Not a thing.
Thank goodness for a God as good as that.
