Journal | peace, be still

The infant cries and whimpers in my arms as I rock her back and forth.

Her sobs are loud and violent, she will not be comforted.

I sing to her...

You call me out upon the waters,
The great unknown, where feet may fail...

I murmur words of comfort to soothe her, but she cannot hear me above her own voice.

and there I find You in the mystery,
In oceans deep, my faith will stand...

Back and forth in the rocking chair, surrounded by the cool darkness of the nursery. Her sobs turn to hiccups; her hiccups to sniffles.

And I will call upon Your name,
Keep my eyes above the waves.

When oceans rise, my soul will rest in Your embrace.
For I am Yours...
and You are mine.

And now she is still.

Lord, as I rocked the little child to sleep tonight, I recognized something.
I recognized that in those times I despair, and cannot be comforted, there is not one moment that You are not holding me in Your arms, whispering Your words to me, and trying to give me rest.

Blinded by my tears, I cannot look about the proverbial nursery, at the many framed memories on the walls, and see the proof of all You've brought me through. I forget the victories, forget the joys. Yet they are there, if I would only see.

You do not forsake me. I cry for answers, for affirmation-- but I cannot hear You above the roar of my sobs. My tears are an ocean. I stare at the crashing waves.

But You? You speak in a still small voice. You walk above the waves.

And I? I must be still so that I may listen.

For You walk upon the water, and You call me out to join You.

Song lyrics from..
Hillsong United. "Oceans (Where Feet May Fail)" Zion.  Hillsong, Sparrow, 2013. CD. 

"Writer's Anxiety Syndrome"

I have written blog posts so many times in the past where I would whip out everything I was thinking and feeling- good and bad- and flood my words out through a keyboard.

They were let loose, only to be accompanied by second guessing myself, the feeling of nervousness, hasty editing, and anxiety clenching my insides...

"What if someone finds a flaw with what I wrote? What if I said something wrong?

It sounds ridiculous, I know. But I struggle with intense anxiety about pleasing people.
I should write that in past tense, because I'm on my way to kicking this thing right our the door of my brain! And I want to view it as an issue already discarded.

I say this a lot: but it is hard to share your writing. Because it makes you vulnerable. You're handing over a piece of your soul when you hand someone your notebook. Your writing is a reflection of you, and is just as subject to flaws. You don't want people to catch them.

When it comes to blogging for me, there are two probable causes for my past anxiety:

• What I was writing was totally of myself. It was not God-led, and therefore not God-centered, and therefore ultimately not of His will... and my Spirit was trying to tell me that.
• I was allowing myself to worry about what people would think of me for it, rather than caring about what God thought of me for it, letting the enemy whisper Fear into my mind.
  

I am so done with that crummy way of existing!

People pleasing. We all do it to some extent, but to those of us with a high tendency for it, we need to step back and ask ourselves, "Are we serving God, or man? Is the purpose of our actions to make us look good to everyone, or to glorify our Heavenly Father?"

If you choose God, then follow Him with reckless abandon. That's it. Even (and especially!) when it conflicts with man's approval.

And it's a process. A tough one: undoing all your tangled past ways of thinking... this will take a while. But it is worth it.

To know rest.

If I am allowing myself to heed that still small voice, and am being led in my writing by the Lord, then I am going to know His unshakable state of peace. I rest here in His arms, content with His will, His plan, and His perfect timing. 

This is something I know God wants to instill in me. And I want it so badly, too. Peace! The skill to stop worrying. And more specifically, the ability to cease worrying about how others perceive me. 

My focus must be Jesus's gracious acceptance, not man's temporary and fickle acceptance.

That said, I want to be real.

And that's the topic of my next post. :)