Sanctuary light

If you grew up in (or still worship in) a sacramental church, you may remember the sanctuary light, a candle lit to represent God’s Presence in the church. This morning I was reading from my Tozer devotional a reminder that we are God’s sanctuary,  and as such our hearts should be a pure and holy place for Him to dwell:   Build that invisible altar from within. Let the spirit of God produce the living, cleansing flame that marks your devotion to Christ, our Lord.

A wisp of a prayer from the recesses of my memory surfaced from the evening service called Vespers,  a sunset service of evening prayer. In fact, long ago bells in towns used to ring six times per day to call people to pray throughout the day. (You can read more about the Book of Hours or Prayers of the Hours, if you’re interested.  Or you might enjoy Davis Bunn’s fiction book, The Book of Hours, which includes some of this history.) Perhaps we might all benefit from reminders throughout the day to stop for a few moments and connect with our Heavenly Father. To put our current activities, responsibilities, and concerns into perspective. To stop, look up from our work, give Him a smile and let Him know how grateful we are. To affirm that our hearts are still devoted to Him.

Vespers is still practiced by many throughout the world. O Gracious Light is an ancient prayer from that service: O Gracious Light, pure brightness of the everliving Father in Heaven, O Jesus Christ, holy and blessed! Now, as we come to the setting of the sun, and our eyes behold the vesper light, we sing Your praises, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. You are worthy at all times to be praised by happy voices, O Son of God, O Giver of Life, and to be glorified through all the worlds.


Remember the phrase, she’s carrying a torch for him (or vice versa)? The image evoked a flame in one’s heart which has continued to burn, despite the circumstances which might have easily snuffed it out. ADONAI’s flame of love for us never goes out, and neither should ours for Him. Is our heart cleansed so that His Presence can burn a sanctuary light within us? Do we carry His torch, which burns faithfully and ceaselessly throughout our days on this earth?

Some of us are in our sunset years. Do we carry the Vesper light? Or have we allowed it to dim through the challenges, disappointments, or weariness of life?  Have we become weary of fighting the good fight of the faith? If so, we need to devote more time to the One Who first lit that flame and can cause it to burn brightly. It should emit such a deep glow from within that it warms the cold hearts of others around us.  They should be drawn to its warmth and light. And we, ourselves, should be acolytes dedicated to its tending.

Moving in tandem

Sometimes the trees here in Vernonia are very still, waiting for the breeze to come and stir them. They never move of their own volition. In fact, it seems sometimes as if all of creation within my purview is holding its breath, listening and waiting  for the wind of His coming.

At this moment, one lone, tiny leaf has adhered itself to my shirt, and God immediately prompted me to remember, in the same way, to wait and ride along attached to Him. I sometimes picture myself riding on His sandal...or in the pocket of His robe...or on His shoulder, peeking out from under His hair. That way, when He moves, I move with Him. I don’t have to worry about waking up from the distractions of either busyness or a dreamlike inertia, only to see that He has moved forward and only His back is visible in the distance.

When you were small, did you ever attach yourself to a parent’s leg so that he or she had to walk stiff-legged in order to move across the room? It might have irritated your parents, or it might have made them laugh. Or you might have had a parent whom you’d never dare approach in such a way. Your Heavenly Father , however will always be laughing. He loves to have you seek ways to stay connected to Him. To move when He’s ready to move. To rustle and sway in the Wind of His Spirit. Or, He might just stand still, look down tenderly upon you, and swing you up into His arms. You can hear His laughter even better from up there.

Distillation

So many of you, my readers, minister to others in a variety of ways.  Some of you are in a position of direct teaching or preaching; some lead Bible studies, counsel, mentor, disciple, pray for inner and outer healing, or even take people into their homes.  Whatever ministry(ies) God has called you to, there is an instructive word He spoke out to me this morning:  distillation.

When God shows us something, it’s often over the course of time or experience...or in the context of other thoughts or messages.  When He calls us to share the heart of the message with others, the heart of it sometimes gets lost in our own convoluted thoughts. We want to tell the whole detailed story of the trails we followed and our stops along the way.  We want to share the whole, big picture, but instead, the burning truth of it gets buried, or even diluted in the extraneous.

This morning I was given a picture of both dilution (a watering down) and distillation, which produces the dripping concentrate. Despite all the thoughts and progressions which eventually produced the rich liquid we are to share, let’s not feel the need to take other people through the rabbit holes and circuitous travels of our minds which landed us there.  A friend once called it a ‘tightly wound’ message which people will remember and take to heart.  To switch analogies, one golden nugget to hold and turn over in one’s hand can be worth a wheelbarrow of unmined rock.

The Holy Spirit will take others on their own, mindful  journeys. Let’s joyfully share our most recent God-given teaching or insight via only its critical milestones, extending in our hands the nutrient-rich distillation for others to drink.

Musical transformations

As much as I love contemporary worship songs, I also still love many of the old hymns.  My only issue with them is that they were often written about God rather than to Him.  One of my favorites (I confess I have a lot of ‘favorites’) is Praise, My Soul, the King of Heaven, based on Psalm 103, and written by Henry Francis Lyte in 1834. This morning I turned the lyrics into the first person, which immediately ramped up the level of intimacy. The lyrics in various hymnals sometimes vary slightly, but using the version I learned as a child, here’s my personalized adaptation.  Try it yourself, if you know the tune...or just speak the lyrics as a prayer.

I praise You, Lord, the King of Heaven
To Your feet my tribute bring
Ransomed, healed, restored, forgiven
Evermore Your Praise I Sing
Alleluia, Alelluia, I praise You, my everlasting King

I praise You for Your grace and favor
To Your people in distress
I praise You still the same as ever
Slow to chide and swift to bless
Alleluia, Alleluia, glorious in Your faithfulness 

Fatherlike, You tend and spare us
Well our feeble frame You know
In Your hands You gently bear us
Rescue us from all our foes
Alleluia, Alleluia, widely yet Your mercy flows



Angels help us to adore You
They behold You face to face
Sun and moon bow down before You
Dwellers all in time and space
Alleluia, Alleluia, we praise You, Lord, the God of grace

Sometimes I find myself singing or humming secular songs whose lyrics are untrue, misleading, or deceptive.  So through the years, I’ve made my own versions.  For example, we used to live near the port in Cape Canaveral, from which the cruise ships departed.  Multiple times per week I’d hear “When You Wish  Upon a Star” emanating from the Disney ships. The tune got stuck in my head, and I ended up hollering to myself, “Why are you singing that song?!!!”  So I created this one. Go ahead and sing along:

When you pray to God above
You will meet a heart of love
When you pray to God above He’ll answer you

If your heart is in your prayers
You will  never need despair
When you pray to God above He’ll answer you

God is kind; He brings to those who love [Him]
The fulfillment of their deepest longings 

When you prayer to God above
You will meet a heart of love

When you pray to God above He’ll answer you

I also sing secular love songs to the Lord. Sometimes they don’t even need much adaptation. Like
Unforgettable or The Very Thought of You or, I Can’t Help Falling in Love With You... . See how many you can find and share them in the comments section for this post.

Julie

Woodland Ballet

It is deliciously cool, and I am tucked under the fleece blanket on the deck, watching the trees dancing to the music of my Pandora station (Katherine Jenkins, with a touch of Jackie Evancho, Andrea Boceelli, and Celtic Woman). Evergreen and deciduous, large and small, close and distant, the trees move with their own form and speed, yet in unity under the direction of their Conductor.  The light plays with the shadows at different levels of the hillside, as the sun moves toward its setting.

I run to get my iPad and try to capture the breath-taking performance before me. I want to share it. But my camera can’t capture its glory. Not even remotely.  I adjust the angle for the light, switch positions, but no; this amazing concert cannot be recorded.  Some things cannot be shared, no matter how much we want to. We want to run tell someone else to run outside and watch, but by the time they do, they’ll miss it. And some are halfway round the world. There’s nothing for it but to rejoice in its spectacular beauty and applaud at the finish.  To say, “Well done, Lord!  If I’m the only one who saw this performance, I want You to know I am in awe of Your creativity, Your lavish display for an audience of one. Bravo! Bravissimo! Will there be an encore tomorrow? Yet I know You rarely repeat Yourself.  With You, there’s always something new in the offing. I can’t wait.

The scent of earth

Rarely but here in the Northwest do I smell the same scent of earth: the damp ground, the perfume of flowers, the aroma of ferns, the undefinable mix that breathes freshness into the air around me. I miss it when I’m away but have difficulty expressing to others exactly what I’m talking about. The memory is like a vapor. I only know when I return and say, “Ah, yes...I’ve missed this!”

When I was young, we used to travel to our grandparents’ cabin in the Adirondacks, where a walk to the spring yielded fresh drinking water for our stay. We would fill up our jugs and lug them back to our ‘camp.’  I remember there, too, the scent of birches and evergreens and the spring-fed lake which would shock us with it’s cold welcome. Once we adjusted to the temperature and lay back into the water, our hair felt like cornsilk as we swished it about.

When we remember something, it’s not always like being there.  We try to re-member everything so we can dwell in that place once again. But it eludes us. The memory provides us a snapshot of both sight and emotion, but we usually can’t recapture the actual beauty of the experience.

Sometimes our experiences with God are like that.  We know there was power, there was deep joy, there was indescribable peace, and we were enveloped in overwhelming love.  But we see it as a snapshot from the past, rather than being in the midst of it once again.  We sometimes even wonder if it really happened, or if we only imagined it.

After decades of these experiences, however, we cease to wonder, and instead develop a profound faith in God’s tender love and faithfulness. The scent of His Presence lingers. We only have to close our eyes and we are there once more.  We don’t remember Him from a distance in time. Instead He is ‘re-membered’ at that very moment and in that very place where we whisper to Him.

Being with others of kindred heart and spirit gathered together, however, will often magnify this ‘re-membering.’ He has set this up on purpose, I believe, to draw us together in encouragement, in joy, in thanksgiving, and also in times of sorrow, grief, persecution and struggle. His Body is ‘re-membered’ (the members put together in a wholeness in which His life is found). His scent contains both earth (His Creation) and Heaven. If we find ourselves making other choices for our time, week after week, we are missing out on one of the greatest blessings He has for us.  And the memory of what it is like to be in the midst of His glorious presence will become like a faded photograph. We may fold up the album and tuck it away on the shelf and later wonder how we ended up so bereft of that indescribable fragrance in our lives, both the receiving and the emitting of it to others.

If you are not part of a fellowship where He delights to show up, offer your gifts to help it become so. Or if they are not willing, find one where His fragrance can be found, though it be the smallest of mangers.
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“Where Sky and water meet, where the waves grow sweet,
Doubt not, Reepicheep, to find all you seek...”
—CS Lewis, The Last Battle

Loaded

I love the King James translation of Psalm 68:19:  “Blessed Be the Lord, who daily loadeth us with benefits, even the God of our salvation. Selah” (Selah: Pause and calmly think of that.)

Are you feeling ‘ loaded’ or disappointed? Are you rejoicing in thankfulness or feeling disallusioned? If it’s the latter in both cases, try writing down, as Anne Voskamp (One Thousand Gifts) did, every single thing for which you’re thankful. She started by challenging her deeply depressed self to list 100. What started as a seemingly impossible task changed her life.

For my fellow White Christmas fans, remember Bing Crosby singing “Count Your Blessings instead of sheep?” Sometimes our worries or dashed hopes overshadow even the smallest good in our lives. It may sound prosaic to talk about counting your blessings...like something out of an old greeting card. However, God’s Word never fails to bring life if we come to it with openness.  “Give thanks in all circumstances” is not a last ditch suggestion; it’s a command that God knows will cause life to spring up in the midst of every form of struggle, whether a mere skirmish or a life-and-death battle.

Scour the Scriptures for the terms ‘thanks,’ thanksgiving’ and ‘thankfulness’ and you will unearth treasure.  Start or renew the practice of a journal just for thankfulness. Include the Scriptures you discover, as well as an ongoing list of things for which you thank God, Things visible and invisible. Look up and see all He is daily pouring upon you, including His beaming countenance. Partner with a friend and share what God opens your eyes to see, and I’ll do the same. Let’s bubble over with such grateful hearts, despite our pains and struggles, that we hear His delighted laughter echoing from Heaven.
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*1 Thessalonians 5:18
“The people of God ought to be the happiest people in all the wide world. People should be coming to us constantly and asking the source of our joy and delight...God is our Father, Christ is our Brother, the Holy Spirit our Advocate and Comforter...”     —AW Tozer

Spiritual jet lag

Do you ever feel as if you have spiritual jet lag?  Everything seems off kilter and ‘out-of-timing,’ like a car that needs a tuneup?  Your pistons are firing, but not in coordination? You don’t seem to be getting anywhere?

Sometimes you feel that God just answered a burning question, but you missed it. It’s like a whisper that just flew past your ear. You’re out of step with Him, and you know the problem isn’t His.  You know those nightmares where you’re running to help someone (or away from danger), but it’s like you’re mired in a Scottish bog?

I’ve discovered that the best thing to do in this situation is to sit still. You know the advice they give you about being lost in a forest or a cave? Don’t try to find your way out. Stay put and rescuers will come. If you keep moving to try and rescue yourself, you will probably bury yourself deeper, where it’s less likely they’ll find you.

In one of the Mitford books, Father Tim and Cynthia experience this very situation in a cave, where they end up miles away from the cave entrance.  It is not only fear that prompts them to keep moving, but pride...the sense that they have been reckless and stupid in entering the cave in the first place and now have caused havoc in the lives of those who must search for them.  We tend to want to get ourselves out of our own fixes and to not even admit we were ever in need of rescuing in the first place.

However, the best thing we can do is admit to our Father that we have gotten completely lost and
can’t find our bearings.  He’s quite fond of humility, but less so of pride.  In fact, He says He hates it. Getting lost doesn’t always mean not knowing where we are. Sometimes it means we’re thoroughly confused or have lost our vital connection with His Spirit. We’re spinning round in circles wondering what happened.  Regardless, sitting still and waiting for and on Him is the best remedy.  Don’t worry, you’re not lost. He knows exactly where you are and is already on His way. In fact, if you listen, you’ll hear His footfall in your heart.
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“There’s no shadow You won’t light up, mountain You won’t climb up comin’after me
There’s no wall You won’t kick down, lie You won’t tear down comin’ after me”
—Cory Asbury, Reckless Love

No darkness at all

 “God is Light and in Him there is no darkness at all...” 1 John 1:15

Creeping into our post-Christian culture are eastern religious terms like Karma and Yin & Yang.  Popular New Age (actually 'old age') teachings declare the necessary 'balance' between darkness and light.  Remember Jim Henson's movie, The Dark Crystal?   In this tale, there were evil creatures and good creatures, and the happy solution in the climax involved the two merging into single beings, composed of both elements.  If you know me at all, you know I loved The Muppets. However, Henson was an avowed New-Ager. He declared his intention, in partnership with Ted Turner, to inculcate the children of our world with the tenants of his philosophies in order to develop a higher order of human beings who would be at peace with one another in a more perfect world. A lovely thought which nearly every other religion holds up as a goal achieved by man’s climbing the rungs of
a ladder of self-improvement until he attains ‘heaven’ or its equivalent. Unfortunately, the millennia have proven otherwise.

A variety of other groups predicate their ideals on the concept of darkness and light (evil and good), bringing wholeness through a union of the two, including Mormonism and Masonry at their elite levels.  My apologies to my Star Wars friends, but Lucas presents the same philosophy within The Force.  Listen again to aged Luke near the end of the newest production, as he explains the Force's power.  It is not defined as simply a battle between good and evil but of evil as a necessary part of the whole.

We say these are just entertaining movies, but E.B. White declared, "Whoever tells the stories, owns the culture." You would be surprised at the number of my students who, after reading The Lightening Thief series, believed the Greek gods were really wandering the earth involved in the affairs of mankind.  We have certainly seen this over the decades in the way television gradually changed (and is changing) the mores of our nation, defining a new normal as something which would have been thought unthinkable in its early years.  We the Church hold a substantial responsibility for allowing this to happen with very little protest.

As Christians, we must not banter about terms like karma, as if they were not wholly contradictory to our stated beliefs.  If we are saved by grace and not by works, then we should not be placing ourselves back under the law.  "We foolish Christians, who has bewitched us?"**  Yes, the Bible speaks of the concept of sowing and reaping. However, Yeshua's great sacrifice for us covers us in a grace that doesn't demand we reap permanent death or suffering from our sins. We do often experience the consequence of them in our daily life.  And the Father does, indeed, desire us to exhibit the fruit of His Spirit in the way we treat others; yet this does not subject us to the oriental law of karma. Do we really want to step out from under the Umbrella of Grace He graciously holds over us? Then let's not declare it.

Years ago I was praying for a friend for the Baptism of the Holy Spirit.  We were getting nowhere fast, despite her having gone through the renunciation process for anything involving the occult.  God always answers someone’s sincere prayer for the Holy Spirit, with its accompanying sign of a prayer language.  This gift is for everyone.*** So I knew there was some reason God was withholding the Baptism to protect her from opening herself up, not to the Holy Spirit, but to the Enemy of her soul. When I asked her if there was something she could think of, some philosophy, for example, to which she was clinging, she knew immediately what it was. She had always been fascinated with the concept of reincarnation. After she became a Christian, it still hung in the background of her mind. She couldn't quite let go of its fascination, despite the fact that it represented an eternity of struggle
through various lives, trying to attain a perfection she would never be able to accomplish.
Reincarnation is the total antithesis of Christianity, the only religion in the world based on pure Grace, the agonizing Sacrifice of another in our place so that we we are carried up the ladder, so to speak, on the shoulders of  a merciful God. That night she went back home and talked with the Father about it, repented, and renounced it. The following day we prayed once again and she immediately received her prayer language.

As believers, we should also not be ‘knocking on wood,’ a practice which dates back to the belief that the goddess Gaia resided in the trees (a form of pantheism). Nor should we cross our fingers or search our horoscope to determine our course, or define ourselves by any ‘sign’ other than the cross.  We either desire our future to be directed and guided by our Heavenly Father's loving hand, or we choose to place ourselves under the influence of every possible 'force' out there, all of which are used as doorways for the machinations of the enemy of our souls. 

Mindfulness is the new term being bandied about.  I think it's wonderful, if we are talking about mindfulness of God and of what we are thinking and speaking into our own lives and also the lives of others.  Let's, then, be as mindful as possible...and as 'spiritful,' also.

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**You foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? Before your very eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified. 2 I would like to learn just one thing from you: Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law,or by believing what you heard? 3 Are you so foolish? After beginning by means of the Spirit, are you now trying to finish by means of the flesh?      Galations 3:1-3

***If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!” Luke 11:13

Delusional?

     Some friends have said (not in my presence, of course), “Yes, she’s highly educated and obviously intelligent, but somehow she’s still been deluded into believing a fairy tale all these years. If it makes her happy, ok...but how can so many seemingly intelligent people believe such foolishness?”   Like Paul, I would say “For we did not follow cleverly devised stories when we told you about the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ in power, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty."* .  Once you’ve become an ‘eyewitness’ to the very Presence of God, all intellectual arguments disappear in the Reality of the I AM.

   Some friends I’ve known have walked away from an encounter with Him and convinced themselves that in their earlier years they were simply caught up in an ‘emotional experience' which met a need at that time. Supernatural encounters with God can be a flash in the pan and in retrospect seem unreal to us, if they aren't implanted in the greater ground of the Word and His Body, the fellowship of believers. God’s presence is so Super Natural that it sometimes seems like a dream. However, when we stay close to Him and other believers, we experience that ‘dream’ on a regular basis and our lives are transformed in the process.

  Most certainly, an 'emotional experience' would not have sustained me during the last 40 years.  Only continual fellowship with the One who first made Himself known to me, along with the support of those who have also met Him in a very personal way, have grounded and rooted me in Him.  We
cannot assume that because people have a powerful encounter with their Creator, they will go on to grow and rejoice through an ongoing walk with Him. People need nurturing, mentoring, discipleship, encouragement, via regular communication.  Otherwise, they are often robbed of their awareness of His reality and presence.  It is often relegated to a time of psychological delusion during a period of insecurity.

   Unless someone is truly mentally ill, a lifetime of living out a delusion is unlikely to happen.  Certainly people have been sucked into various cults over a lifetime; however their fruit, or lack thereof, will serve as a ‘tell’. The problem is, those who haven't experienced His unarguable reality must find another explanation for what they witness in sold-out, sincere Christians who bear abundant fruit.  They certainly find explanations for the superficial ones.  Television and movies depict most Christians at best as hypocritical or greedy and at worst as sick, demented abusers of their fellow man.

   May we exude such Light, accompanied by such tender mercy, that no other explanation is possible but the reality of the One from Whom it streams...

*2 Peter 1:16

Casting or dropping?

   I have always loved Peter’s admonition regarding worries, anxieties, and cares: “casting the whole of your care [all your anxieties, all your concerns, once and for all] on Him, for He cares for you affectionately and cares about you watchfully.” [1Peter 5:7, Amplified]

I don’t know why I never noticed before, however, that this Scripture is a continuation of verse 6, with a comma at the end: “Therefore, humble yourselves [demote, lower yourselves in your own estimation] under the Mighty hand of God, that in due time He may exalt you,”.  I knew this Scripture by heart, too. I just never connected them as one sentence.

So, in essence, in order to truly ‘cast your care,’ as Dave Meyer is found of quoting, you must be in a position of true humility, knowing you are incapable of solving or fixing even the least of your concerns on your own. Or using another analogy, if we think God is our copilot to help us in those times of crisis for assistance or support, and that we can handle things as pilot the rest of the time, we must change seats, as the expression goes.  Our humility must stem from a daily, root awareness of how much we need Him and how ready He is to be involved in all aspects of our lives..

We truck about on our own, get ourselves into a pickle (or find ourselves in one due to outside circumstances) and then realize we need His assistance. What if you had an acquaintance whom you called a friend, yet you never talked to her except in emergencies?  What kind of friendship would that be?  Rather than a friend, she’d be more like a ‘roadside assistance’ plan.

The invitation to ‘cast our cares’ is intricately woven into our daily relationship with a loving Father
whom we recognize as not only strong in our weakness but also desirous of ongoing daily dialogue with us. He’s merciful enough to not turn His back on our roadside calls for help, but this is not how
He wants our relationship with Him to be.  And, truly, the latter will never bring transformation and
sanctification in our lives.  We’ll just keep hopping from emergency to emergency with no real change in who we are or how we live.  We also have to heed Yeshua's warning in Matthew 7, "I never knew you."

This is not news to many of my readers. However, like the Drifting Out of Lane post, even devoted followers of ADONAI may find themselves slipping out of intimate relationship and into this danger zone, too busy doing God's work to spend significant time with the One for Whom they're working.  Many a minister (whether ordained or lay) has self-combusted in this way.

Ask the Father to do as David asked in his 139th psalm:  "Search me, O God, and know my heart..try me and know my thoughts...."  Ask Him for the results of your lab report in humility, purity, tenderheartedness, faith, trust; and, most of all, in the transformation that comes from daily disappearing into All He Is: the Great I AM.  Cares tend to become impotent in that encounter. Meditate for a moment on the word ‘carefree.’ Or ‘care-free.’ If we are to be truly free from worry and anxiety, we must ‘cast’ our cares onto His strong shoulders. He has  invited and encouraged us to do so. We musn’t just drop them on the ground for the moment to rest as we have a short chat with Him, later picking them up and slinging them over our own shoulders once again, or even leaving them by the roadside. Flinging them to Him with every bit of strength we have is an act of our will and our ongoing deep trust and faith in Him. It shouts, “I know Whom I have believed and am persuaded that He is able to keep what I have committed to Him...! ” “I am my Beloved’s and He is mine...”!**
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*2 Timothy 1:12
**Song of Solomon 6:3
“The one who is caught by [love] is bound by the strongest of bonds—and yet it is a pleasant burden....Nothinng makes you so much God’s, nor God so much yours, as this sweet bond. The one who has found this way will seek no other.”  —A.W. Tozer

A Whisper of His Presence

One day you're just looking at the light playing on the grass or the leaves of the trees fluttering in the breeze, and you hear God whisper His Presence to you.  When I was young (elementary school age) I remember drawing my finger through the dusting of snow on a low wall by the school, as I walked to early church.  There wasn't another soul about.  I loved the early service in the little chapel beneath the main sanctuary, its altar area hewn from stone which, when cut, had revealed fingers of iridescent color within it. There was a peace and a sense of holiness there...and the palpable presence of God.  At that time, I hadn't what I would now call a personal relationship with Him; yet, I was very aware of His reality and believed in His goodness.  I truly did sense His goodness, not just an impersonal force.
   I felt Him there, arms wide open to me.  Later, however, I wandered from those arms into the intellectual snobbery and arrogance of the college culture. Obtaining the success and relationship which I had been sure would satisfy, I remember feeling a great emptiness and crying out for something more. As it turned out, it wasn’t something, it was Some One. The One Who had whispered to me from the very beginning.
   Now, after over 40 years in His tender care, I’ve never looked back, never even wanted to. It would be like choosing to go back into a dark closet after being in an open field with the sunlight streaming over me and a gentle breeze caressing my face.  Like going back into a dark cloud cloaked in the appearance of light.
   I’ll never stop being grateful to Him,  not only for opening the door and freeing me from my own lost self, but also for showing me the illusory nature of satisfaction in my own self-enthronement.
His peace is deep in my bones, His Person and ministry both that of father and mother to me, His Shepherd nature a balm to my soul.