Wednesday, August 07, 2013

Dryness

It's been a dry time. I'm not really sure when the moisture slipped away and the ground became hard and cracked, I only know that I am thirsty...

Four years ago I felt the presence of God. He was close, He was near, and He was speaking to my heart. In early 2009 He whispered to my heart and I knew that He would be there to carry me through the storm that lay ahead. I couldn't see down the road and around the bend, but I knew He held me tight and I know He continues to hold me today, even though my heart often feels like a hardened lump of clay.

The past several years have brought a multitude of tests and trials from my father's cancer diagnosis and death four weeks later, to a change in churches and family challenges. Life, unlike our Father in heaven, can be cold and indifferent. Life doesn't slow down when circumstances around us are spinning out of control. Time marches on and so must we, often at a faster clip than we ever imagined possible.

Gratitude... Although the world spins on and it often feels as though chaos reigns, I can be thankful that God is still in control. My heart, though possibly dry, is not really a hardened lump. God hasn't let that happen. He's growing roots deep within, the kind of roots that hold one steady when all of life literally is out of control. I thought the other day of our lawn, which during a normal summer turns dry and brown. It looks dead and feels dry and crunchy, but when the rain comes it isn't long before it once again grows lush and green. If God so looks after the grass (Matthew 6:30), then I can be sure He hasn't forsaken me.

God always knows just what I need. Tonight I looked back through my Blogdom and found some answers to my own questions in my own writing. The world spins, yes, but so does the lump on the potter's wheel and hadn't I prayed to be flexible? Hadn't I wanted Him to shape and mold my heart and life? And doesn't that time of drying come after the potter has shaped the vessel? Perhaps I've just been "set on the shelf" for a time. Maybe it's not really the kind of dryness I'd imagined. Maybe it's the kind that come just before the pitcher is ready to be filled... Maybe...

Yet you, LORD, are our Father. We are the clay, you are the potter; we are all the work of your hand. 
Isaiah 64:8

11 comments:

  1. Very thought provoking, Martha...

    Cheers!
    Linda :o)

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    1. What's really weird is when I make myself think. Sometimes I look back in my blogs and say, "I wrote that?"

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    2. You are a wonderful, thoughtful,spiritual writer...
      And witty as well...
      Quite a talent!

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  2. I love the analogy of you feeling like life is spinning out of control...and then maybe it's really just that the potter's wheel is spinning! :)

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    1. If the lump of clay on the wheel had a mind, it would probably be thinking, "What ARE you doing to me?!" First a "smack-down", then some spinning and drenching, then more spinning and lots of pressure. And that's just to get it centered.

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    2. Actually, an analogy can help me feel just a little bit better. :)
      And life isn't really bad, just a bit dry.

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  3. "and hadn't I prayed to be flexible?"

    That speaks to me Martha!

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  4. Martha, you have shared your heart so beautifully. I thank God for you because you have remained constant and faithful. Press on. Heaven is so close. We're almost there!

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    1. There was something profoundly beautiful about my father's battle with lung cancer. He faced his own mortality with his faith intact and his heart set on heaven. When God feels distant, I think back to Dad. He was constant and faithful.
      Yes, heaven is close and we are almost there!

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  5. " 'smack-down', then some spinning and drenching, then more spinning and lots of pressure. And that's just to get it centered."
    Yep, that's how we feel sometimes, but forgetting the purpose is to get centered.

    This has been a year of change for us, too, as we break ties with a church that we've been with since we were married, and Benny all his life. Not easy. Necessary and the right thing, but not easy.

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    1. Changing church fellowships is never easy and is often made harder by the fact that other members don't understand and can make us feel ostracized. When we all get to heaven, what a day of rejoicing that will be!

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