Talitha Cumi

Sometimes Most times,  breakthrough doesn't always look the way we anticipate it to.   I have felt for some time now, that along with this huge physical move, that something inside of me was really going to shift as well.  I'm not really sure how I expected it to look....maybe meeting an influential person or having some huge positive life event, I don't know.  I didn't have a super precise picture painted, but I thought it would somehow entail flowers and rainbows.  pffff.

It seems where others breeze through life, I have to push.  Where everyone around me has things provided for them, I have had to contend for them.  Sometimes it's been out of my own strength; not giving any room for help.  But there have been a lot of times when I have something in my spirit that I just know to be mine for the taking, but I have to fight and fight and fight to attain it.

So we move.  We have a house lined up, things are great.  Except that everything falls apart when we actually got here. That's a little dramatic I guess.  Our own housing situation fell apart, but we still live in a safe place with people we love (and in a city we are so happy to live in).  So I really can't complain.  We've been here about 5 weeks, and have had some great leads with homes, only to be left disappointed.  It seems like every unforeseen circumstance has happened, every weirdo landlord has been met, and we still have few leads that I hate to say I have been pessimistically hopeless about.

I have been praying a lot lately and asking what the heck is up with this hold up. Where is the disconnect?  Who can't find a suitable house in 5 weeks in a city where there are hundreds of options daily?   I knew that there was something very specific that was being eluded to.  And since I have rarely taken the easy path in life, I know that this stagnation was most likely a part of the great breakthrough that is yet to come...

Bunny trail...so Sunday at church, our pastor directed us inwardly;  to glimpse into our own hearts, and to try to find the areas where we feel disappointed by God.  He challenged us to ask ourselves  in what areas do I feel God has left me hanging?...where in my heart do I absolutely question God's faithfulness to me?  And when I am able to answer these questions, I will see where my heart has led me to other things.  Idols after all, are individually crafted of things that offer 'comfort.'    He went on to remind us that when we give up our idols, we will trade them for a God who will fulfill everything we fashioned those idols to accomplish.

So 30 years worth of disappointments later, I have still been delaying the ever-needed understanding of what it's like to be able to trust completely.  I have a glimpse.  I trust my husband.  But I can see him.  But what about a God who I realized I thought left me hanging on those dark and gruesome childhood nights?  What then?  My body has formed these memories that my mind says have been forgiven...but what about when there's pressure? I tend to slow down, revert back into myself, and slowly hide from those feelings of where were you.  These questions are slowly being peeled back to expose the rawness of my own feelings and the faith they are perpetuating. 

I have a promise.  To not have to stay where I am.  A promise that turns ashes from a ravenous and destructive fire into something beautiful.

There's a story of a man whose daughter died.  This man, Jairus, sent for Jesus to heal her.  When Jesus arrived, everyone was mourning.  But Jesus walked over to this child who everyone gave up on in death, and spoke the words, 'Darling....wake up.  Wake up.'  And as she arose, I felt a jolt within my own Spirit urging me to wake up as well.  World, I am not dead.  God is answering my questions and overtaking my heart with a trust that I have not known before.  I thought my wake up call would come with sunshine and blue skies, but instead it has come to a girl who God has given a place to wait and trust in him.  When I have asked him where he's been, he's responded with 'Right here darling, giving you an opportunity to wake up; to trust the voice that is calling your name out of slumber.'  The words were 'talitha cumi - darling, wake up'.  Those words also mean 'blessed.'  So as He is calling me to new life, I am not just to passively accept...I am to rise to action.  All of this time I thought I had to DO for myself what God wasn't.  But all he was doing was calling my name and waiting for me to wake up, stand before him, and walk into his blessedness.