“Therefore my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices;
my body also will rest secure,
because You will not abandon me to the grave,
nor will you let your Holy One see decay.
You have made known to me the path of life;
You will fill me with joy in your presence,
with eternal pleasures at your right hand”
Psalms 16:9-11
You will fill me with joy in your presence…
This past week I got to see one of my favorite things, the ocean. I was able to take some time off from “life” and escape to the beach for some much needed R&R.
If I could put one word on this week it would be: Restoration
Coming into this past week I was dry and barren, hard even. I was living in my flesh and not allowing myself to be filled up. A week of so before I left for my get away the words Be Still kept showing up. I knew that He was trying to tell me something. I knew I was worn down, I knew I needed to find rest, but there just wasn’t any time for that.
As I hopped into the car with my friend, I prayed. I prayed that this past week be something I will remember with Him, something that will draw me closer to Him, and something to fill me back up again. Needless to say, He delivered.
I had become raw and hard to the world around me. Over a year ago I got the words “Lose your life just so you can find it” tattooed onto me. I knew then that I would constantly need a reminder. This past month I had grown to dislike these words permanently inscribed on my arm. I was living the opposite of these words. I was living out of my flesh and out of my mind. It wasn’t that I had changed the way I was living outwardly, but inwardly I was hardened. The lines of communication were down, and I wasn’t making much of an effort to restore them. Joy had left me.
Restoration: the act or process of returning something to its original condition by repairing it, cleaning it. The act of bringing back something that existed before.
Being still. Something that I am typically pretty bad at. I have a list of things to get done and I live to put a check next to those things. Even on a day off there is still the list. This week I was taught that being still is actually something so refreshing an important for my heart.
As we awoke to the damp air and sun shining, I was ready to take on the day ahead. For the first time in forever I didn’t have a checklist of things that needed to get done. I just had one thing on my list: Restore the broken lines of communication.
Every morning I woke up and was a creature of habit. Wake up, eat the same breakfast that didn’t require any effort from me to make, pour myself some coffee, spend time reading my bible, pack the same lunch, head to the beach, come back, shower, eat. sleep. repeat. It all seems like simple non enthusiastic tasks, but something was different this week. I was being still in my Heavenly Father, and that made each of these tasks filled with His presence.
This week I sat in the lap of my Heavenly Father and the world around me was filled with His presence.
His presence danced as each wave crashed. He danced in the wind as it swept up the sand it brought it back down to land. He danced in the joy that filled the toddlers (that always seems to be set up next to our towels) as the felt the waters rush over their toes. His presence was all around us.
His presence has always been around me, but instead of looking up and out was looking down and not seeing what was around me.
This week I learned that my Heavenly Father is always waiting with arms stretched out wide. He is always welcoming me into His lap and His warm embrace. He wants us to embrace His hugs. He loves it when we sit in His lap. He loves when we adore Him.
Adoration. “a way to bridge the chasm between my perceptions and God’s truth… I aligned my haphazard thought life with the Truth that changes. And I let His Word reframe my experience. God was working every single angle to change our knowledge about who He is. We realized that our lives aren’t, in fact, a series of rewards for doing things “right.” They are strung-together surprises that continue to speak more of who He is than who we aren’t.”-Sara Hagerty, Every Bitter Thing is Sweet
Our God is great. He is always present and will meet us where we are at. He longs for us to adore Him.
This week was a week of reminders of how great my Heavenly Father is. It was a week of restoration and a week of adoring every part of who He is.
“Work six days. The seventh day is a Sabbath, a day of total and complete rest, a sacred assembly. Don’t do any work. Wherever you live, it is a Sabbath to God.” -Leviticus 23:3
Remember the sabbath day, be still in His presence. Sit in your Father’s lap and adore all of Him. He is waiting.
