Words! We think them (hopefully) before we speak them, but they originate within our heart and from our life story. Language varies in both region and country, but we use words to communicate. Thus in reality, we speak one language and for the purpose of sharing ideas, experiences, love … who we are.
With so many words to choose from, to find just the right ones can be a challenge. Spock’s “mind-melding” (Star Trek) is actually far more effective; only not possible! And yet, a picture does speak a thousand words. I will do my best to weave the words I can so that you might know me better.
God called my heart to “Run a Prayer Center” in 2017. Until that time, I did not know what a “calling” felt like; it was no “choice.” Everything within me wanted to answer the call, but it was more like a compulsion and something that I could not-not do! (Yes, English majors, I know that’s a double-negative, and it conveys my meaning.) I didn’t know exactly what God meant, and that didn’t matter; over and over, God confirmed this calling in many ways that I will not elaborate on here or now.
Problem was, that directly after this call the lights went out in my spiritual life and I was unable to pray. It was as if my words were taken away from me; they wouldn’t form, and I found myself cut off from communicating with the One who had walked beside and within me through all life. This was excruciating. I felt cut off, but not alone. I’d experienced nothing like this. I was desperate to talk to God, but I could not for six long years.
As part of the cohort for the course, ‘Becoming a Spiritual Director’, the assigned reading included, The Dark Night A GIFT OF GOD, by Daniel P. Schrock. The term was familiar, but I’d reserved “dark nights” for Super-Christians and I didn’t have the cape! I soon learned that didn’t matter. The description matched what I was experiencing, and I learned that it was actually God who turned out the lights in order to say, “Reach! Reach for Me! I’m bigger than you know!”
Turns out, the six years spent in this “dark night” have become some of the most cherished years of my life. I have learned in a new way that I can trust God with anything that comes, and that I will never, ever, walk alone.