Sitting here at my computer on a gray evening...no sunset out my bedroom window tonight...I just breathed a heavy sigh. I told someone recently that I think it is amazing and wonderful that somehow we live happy lives when all around us the outlook is grim. Oh, I'm not really talking about the world outlook or the election outlook or even the future of the economy. I mean the grim outlooks in our individual lives.
Right now, at this very moment, there is a crisis in my life. Humanly speaking, there is no sense, really, to call it a crisis. Humanly speaking, it's a done loss. But I've been through too many storms in my life and weathered them until the calm, to not fight for survival. With the most intense feeling possible to put "down on paper," I tell you that God has been mighty and strong and loving and faithful, so much so that to doubt Him would be not only evil, but foolish.
In saying this, I do not mean to give the impression that I am breezing through this troubled spot in my life. Every day is a fight for faith...but God told King Ahaz that if he did not stand firm in his faith, he would not stand at all. So, it is my resolve to figure it out, to learn more about how its done and to receive the promise.
Memorizing Hebrews 11 did much for me. It is still plowing up my fallowed ground. Listening to rich sermons has bolstered me, and Christian music, as always, is strengthening my spiritual muscles. But I think the most effective faith builder in my life right now is remembering...remembering what God has done for me in the past.
We had a crisis several years ago. I fasted and prayed and wept. And waited. God answered with a miracle. I tell people that it was my Red Sea. Now there is another...Red Sea 2 I call it. How faithless it would be of me to ignore the memory of God's great power and loving answer in Red Sea No. 1.
I know God. I have grown to know Him pretty well...oh, in reality it's just a tiny smidgen...but I know HIm much better than I did even five years ago. His power and love and faithfulness are always the same, from Noah to Sharon. So, I wrote this poem, soon to be a song. It too is just a tiny smidgen of what is going on in my heart.
LISTENING FOR THE WIND
I am standing at the Red Sea without a hope in sight
Mountains on the left side and mountains on the right,
The enemy behind me; in front of me, the sea...
I am helpless and alone in this impossibility.
But there's something I must tell you: I’ve been here before...
With fearful heart not knowing how to reach the other shore;
And now, for me, that other side is a place where I have been...
So I’m not looking at the water...I’m listening for the wind.
Once before I stood here on this mighty rock
And I heard the words of doubters in the crowd.
I had a choice to falter from their faithless cries,
Or stand still and see the salvation of my God!
Oh, He blew with His nostrils and made a pathway through the sea,
And I walked through on solid ground, safe and dry and free!
So, my eyes are fixed on yonder shore...that place where I have been--
I’m not looking at the water...I’m listening for the wind.
2009
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