“This is the day the Lord has made; We will rejoice and be glad in it.” Psalm 118:24
I want to be a person that celebrates the days. Not just the days that rise with gusts of glitter and set with dancing with the fireflies but also the days that come blazing trails loneliness and crashing waves of doubt.
If I am honest, right now my life looks like a classic case of: she fell off the map. Between school and trying to work some, there just isn’t much time for grabbing coffee with friends or movie nights. In a rare case of actually getting to meet up with a friend, I told her today, “I feel like I am just in a season of loneliness.” I don’t want you to think that I am friendless and go through an entire day without hearing from someone. That is not the case. The reality is that right now I might not have time to drive to Atlanta to talk about Jesus with a friend but I have time before I leave for class to get in the word.
At the beginning of the year, I asked the Lord to teach me that there is beauty in something just being between us. I wrote it and circled in my journal: be more intimate with the Lord. I didn’t know that intimacy with the Lord is really just being along with the Lord. I wanted intimacy with the Lord but I wanted my version of it. I wanted revelation upon revelation and then I wanted conversation after conversation to tell people about it. Sadly, the Lord doesn’t work that way. He will give us what we ask for but He will also give it to us in the way that He knows we will be able to best receive it.
Most of you know that this summer I will be working at Winshape Camps as the senior camp worship pastor. I get the privilege of delivering a message to hundreds of high school girls every single day this summer. Right now it feels as if the Lord is almost hiding me. God hid Moses in the rock so His glory could be revealed to him. I feel like the Lord is hiding me in order that He can reveal things to me that I would never be able to see. I feel like the Lord is hiding me because He is preparing me for this summer. But here is the hard thing, nobody can hide with me. Nobody can go be in the secret place with me. It is something I have to do on my own.
The truth that I have to accept right now is that this is right where I am supposed to be. The truth that I have to accept right now is that the Lord is giving me the intimacy that I asked for and He is giving it to me in the form that is best for me. The truth that I have to accept right now is that having the Lord and nothing else is enough.
What does that look like?
It looks a lot like it just being Him and me. It looks a lot like me learning that there is still unbelief in my heart that He is all I need and it needs to be chiseled away. I know it is there because if it wasn’t I wouldn’t have days where I throw out a picnic blanket and have a pity party for myself. It looks a lot like me learning that I don’t have to share with the world everything the Lord has graciously shown me or is teaching me. It looks a lot like learning that intimacy with Jesus must always be set before and remain more important that anything I could write, publish, start, or create. It looks a lot like realizing that the loneliness is just a chance to get alone with Him.
I have been reading in 1 Samuel recently. I got to the well-known story of David and Goliath and almost skipped over it. But what I saw was that the reason David defeated Goliath wasn’t because He had been away at boot camp learning the way of a battle. The reason David defeated Goliath is because he stayed right where God had him and did what was right in front of him. We know David was a shepherd. Who knows how many hours David sat in that pasture, alone, just the Lord and Him. When the time came for him to show up, he did. He didn’t grab Saul’s sword and run off to the battlefield. He actually put Saul’s sword down and said, “I am not used to them.”
David had found what worked for him in that shepherd field. He found it and then he worked at it. I like to think in his spare time he would find little objects to shoot with that sling of his. We all need to find our own sling. I think we all have to have a season where we sit in the shepherd field, alone with the Lord. What if God had just handed David a sling and said, “Okay go. It is your calling.” David would have been no use. David had to stay. He needed that time to prepare. He needed that time to learn. Tending to those sheep mattered. Being in that field all day by himself mattered.
Where I am at right now matters. Where you are at right now matters.
It is has been clear to me that the Lord has called me to Winshape this summer but now more than ever it has been made clear to me that I am not ready yet. But I will be… If I am willing to stay in this field with the Lord and learn how to use my sling.
Find your sling. Learn how to use it. Go do what you are called to do.
But just know that sometimes stepping into you calling requires you to take some time to step away from people and step into being alone with Him.
So I am learning. I am learning how to be someone who celebrates the days. Even those days where I feel so alone. Because the truth is, we are never alone.
Hey you, yep you. Come along with me. Let’s celebrate the days together.
The good.
The bad.
The lonely.
The messy.
The lovely.
All of them
Here’s to being day celebrators.
