He says, “Be still, and know that I am God.” Psalm 46:10a NIV
Sometimes I just don’t hear Him. I know He’s there. But for reasons unknown to me, He’s choosing to remain silent.
I wonder if I’ve done something.
I wonder if He’s testing me.
And…I wonder if, for now, the silence is okay.
Maybe there’s nothing more to it than knowing God is always with me, even when I don’t hear Him and can’t feel Him.
I keep talking to Him and spending time in His Word, and I know He hears me.
Maybe I’m like a child who learns to trust her mom is there when she calls to her.
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I’ve been battling voices in my head lately. Not the audible kind. But the ones that tuck themselves away beneath the gaps in my heart. They like to come out and share their opinions of me when I am weary, or when I’ve let my guard down. These voices come with words that are not intended to build up, but to tear down and destroy the very foundation that I’ve worked hard to build.
These words tell me that,
I am not good enough.
I am not strong enough.
I am not loved enough.
I’ve been tired. I hit a wall and have been zapped of strength.
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“You have collected all my tears in your bottle. You have recorded each one in your book.” Psalm 56:8
I tiptoe into to my daughter’s room to check if she’s asleep. It’s been a busy week and she’s had a lot on her plate.
Quietly, I stand next to her bed and look at her–my little girl, asleep, her head resting sideways on her pillow.
My little girl who is not so little anymore.
Slowly, silently, I sit on the edge of her bed and look around her room—at the pictures of her friends on her dresser, at the plaque on her wall that says Chase Your Dreams, at the pile of books on her desk.
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It was Valentine’s Day weekend of my Junior year. The lanky basketball player, future preacher to whom I had given my heart dropped to one knee and officially asked me to spend my life by his side. Of course I said, “Yes.” And he slid the ring we had chosen together onto my left hand.
Fast forward a few days . . .
Back on my own campus I had hurried from class to my weekly ironing job. I walked a little more lightly that winter afternoon in Chicago as I began dreaming of wedding plans and married life.
Ironing board in place.
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We were running late. The baby was screaming though his diaper was clean and he was freshly nursed, shoelaces were needing to be tied, one child was still in the shower, dinner plates were strewn all over the kitchen with some still on the table, and my hair still up in the disheveled knot on the top of my head that had kept it out of my face during the early morning garage sale we held and the 2 soccer games we played in (well, I cheered at) immediately after. One child yelled from the other room how he couldn’t find the matching shoe, another was digging in the basket of clean clothes that had sat in the living room corner all week trying to find socks, while one more ignored every effort to insist he get ready quickly.
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Sometimes marriage can become as stale as the box of Cheerios your ten-year-old left open on the pantry shelf. What once burned hot and bright may now be a cold, black dirty log in your fireplace.
Do you drool over those married couples that look as if they share a secret no one else knows? The secret is they know how to be intentional in their marriage. A good marriage takes work. A great marriage is like wallpapering your two-story den – it seems impossible. But, alas, it is not.
Here are 5 easy tips for turning up the heat in your marriage.
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The lights burn my tired eyes. The dishwasher hums. Kitchen chairs sit askew. Bicycle helmet and badminton rackets lay on the couch next to the book I was reading this afternoon. The fridge is littered with schedules and lists and reminders — all my attempts to organize this life. A glass bowl full of ripe pears on the counter along with three huge donated butternut squashes.
The kids asleep. The husband away. And me.
Me feeling like somehow life has gotten away, taken its joy and its wonder and sneaked away like a bandit.
Me feeling faithless, dried up and empty from so little time spent thinking and so much time spent doing.
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“Step. Slide. Hang on tight. Breathe.
Okay. Good. Now, repeat.
One more thing.
Whatever you do… don’t look down.”
I whispered these words to myself as I stood on a wooden bridge, high in the air. I was attached by a simple harness and pulley system, facing a fear I didn’t even know I possessed.
Going to Stone Mountain Park was my idea that hot summer day. Standing in line for Sky Hike, the adventure ropes course, was my idea, too. But fear was never part of the agenda.
Following each platform pit-stop is a pair of apparatus. Each climber must choose which path to take.
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