"I have stilled and quieted my soul; like a weaned child with its mother; like a weaned child is my soul within me."
You've seen me post before of the times of blooming, harvest and pruning. Perhaps you've even heard me talk of the dry seasons, the dormant season of winter or as I'm understanding more clearly...the season of quietness. It's probably my toughest of the spiritual seasons. I love the bright blooming season with all it's beauty and new life. I love the harvesting season, reaping the fruits of service in Christ. I can even handle pruning from time to time knowing that my correction on my direction needs to occur and although painful there is somehow a sense of renewal still in the pruning. But the dormant season, the season of quietness within my soul...that one is hard for someone who just wants to keep moving forward in service.
I relate all of this to my physical love of gardens and I have to admit that the dormant season allows for the fresh blooms to be bigger, brighter and more colorful than the season before. I can't imagine what a plant would think, if a plant could think, blanketed in the soft white snow all around knowing that it was frozen in place and prevented from growing or even being seen for a season. Instead it was being "quieted" and fed instead of producing for a season.
The last couple of months I know I definitely have been in a dormant season of my life. Not due to my prayer life changing or in reading his word but a purposeful quietness that the father has chosen for me. It's been hard and I've been wrestling with him almost demanding that he share with me what my next steps are to be. Not too long ago I had an anointed woman of God share with me that she saw me wrestling with something and that she'd be praying that God would give me answer and direction. I thought to myself, ok, he's going to show me now for certain where he has me going and what he wants me to do but instead he continues to teach me that he is God and that my control issues are not. I left Bible study that night and began praying that God just reveal to me what I needed to know to have the restlessness within my soul quieted. He gave me a picture of a grand man without a face and a little girl standing before him with her feet on top of his dancing a beautiful dance. The little girl at first was so uncomfortable but as the music continued and she began to listen to the gentle music she looked up to see the man and looking back at her was her father, eyes brilliant, smile wide and with the softest voice he said, "daughter, let me lead this dance. You need to do nothing but hold my hand, look into my eyes and know that I have you." At that moment, I began smiling in my car. I knew that was my heavenly daddy telling me, Heather... let go and fully trust me.
Brokenness can sometimes be my companion and some scars run pretty deep. I find that sometimes I allow that brokenness to rule and take over in my life and my trust and faith grows weak. But as I begin to pray for God to release me from the pains of the past to allow me to heal, he reminds me that there are blessings in my brokenness as well. Recently I've begun working on a song for church that a special little girl in the congregation loves and I plan to sing it very soon. The song talks directly to my heart, especially lately as sometimes I find I get angry that I don't feel God near or speaking to my soul. He is quieting my soul, preparing the grounds for a fertile growing season again in his time.
Please quiet your mind and your soul for a few moments as you too listen to the song I am learning not just in the sense that most understand but I'm learning to truly listen to it in the quiet deep places of my heart and soul. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SGniRk_GcLs
Where are you today? Are you blooming, harvesting? Perhaps you are being pruned or maybe you are like me and are being asked to be dormant and quiet for a season to begin the next leg of the journey? Wherever you are, God has a plan and we simply need to trust that even in the quiet... he is ever near.
Blessings,
Heather
