Inspired by . . . a curious harmony

Inspired by . . . a curious harmony

A cold front came in last night. The clouds are low and plentiful today, casting long gray shadows through the cottage windows.

Time seems suspended. Still.

There is a curious harmony at work in these days. While there has been a physical shift in my world out of necessity, there has also been a spiritual one.

At first, I couldn't name it. This change. So foreign it was to my being.

The striving is gone.

I no longer feel the drive to be pro-active in my faith. Rather, my spirit is content to wait and simply respond to His promptings, His leading. 

It has been a subtle shift. My life hasn't stopped being crazy.

But I have stopped being crazy.

A simple pause, ever so slight, in the middle of whatever, to acknowledge His presense. Breath prayers. A nod to His majesty. I'm learning, slowly, to pray without ceasing.

I have so far to go. Yet I already feel like a new person inside an old skin. 

As we enter the second week of Lent I feel deeply embeded in the darkness. Not a scary evil darkness. No, evil cannot dwell with our Lord. There is nothing to fear from the darkness of the Lenten season. Christ has gone before us. We have nothing to fear by following.

I have not given up for Lent. Rather I have added. Added more of Him into my every day. In walking with Jesus in His last days, as He made His way to Jerusalem, teaching and healing along the way, we have the gift of hindsight. We know what He knew.

He was walking to the cross.

This juxtaposition - the light that surrounded Him as He taught and healed even as the darkness of death overshadowed Him - this, too, is our reality.

As the days get longer, the trees and flowers burst forth with new life, we walk with Jesus into darkness. 

We do this in a spiritual sense, but we also know the reality of physical death. At some point our earthly bodies stop growing and begin dying. For some, the pain of this reality comes sooner than others.

So even as we go about our lives, living loud and joyous, we are walking into darkness. 

I don't say this to be macabre. But rather to point you to HOPE. 

For if we never acknowledge the reality of death, we won't live our lives in the fullness of the hope we have in Christ. [click to tweet]

We were buried therefore with Him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. (Rom 6:4)

We can walk by faith, I believe, because we know how the story ends.

Just as the grave could not hold our Lord, neither will it hold us.

Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality. When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written: "Death is swallowed up in victory." "O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?" The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. (1Co 15:51-57)

This is the hope we have that when our earthly life is done, we shall live eternally with Him. This is why we should take these seven weeks of the year to remember His death.

To remember His life. To meld it closely with our own. Because our lives are not always loud and joyous. Sometimes they are dark and silent.

And we need to know how to stand in the dark and silent times.

We can stand, even walk victorious through them . . . because of Him.

Shalom,

Sharing inspiration here:
Testimony Tuesday, #TellHisStory,
Thought Provoking Thursday, Grace & Truth,
Inspire Me Monday, RaRa Link Up, Intentional Tuesday,
#WordswithWinter, Titus 2 Tuesday, Thoughtful Thursdays,
Encourage Me Monday, Wholehearted Wednesday,
Women with Intention Wednesdays, Word Filled Wednesday,
#GiveMeGrace, Sitting Among Friends, #Glimpsesofhisbeauty
Counting My Blessings, Grace Moments