“the gift of God” John 4:10
For the last several weeks I’ve been feeling… “off”. I couldn’t quite put my finger on what was off, just that something was. And honestly I didn’t have a whole lot of time to think about it either. I’ve been busier than a one armed paper hanger (whatever that is). So, on this past Sabbath I could feel God calling me to truly rest.
Every so often He calls me to the couch.
It’s old and dilapidated and comfy as all get out! It’s stained and dirty and really, kind of ugly and very outdated, but I love it all the same. This couch has been with us since my husband and I moved into our first apartment. It was a few months before the wedding and Sean had just gotten a job in Lafayette so that he could be closer to me before the wedding. I remember that glorious feeling of signing the papers at the office and getting the keys, then running back up to the barren apartment and walking through it hand in hand. Standing in the very place where our life together would start. We had nothing, and that was Ok, because we had each other. That couch was the first piece of furniture we bought together for our first home. And we bought it for $30 from a friend of his sister’s who’d got it from her parents. Yeah, this couch is OLD.
And yet it is so loved.
So many movies have been watched from this couch.
Several date nights have ended on this couch. Sick children have been snuggled on this couch,
tickled on this couch,
and unfortunately even hurt on this couch. This couch has been a part of our family since before day one.
And it was to this very couch where God called me to rest in His arms and allow Him to work in me.
Sunday at church while I was singing God had me look up. (I worship with my eyes closed focused only on Him.) When I opened my eyes, directly in front of me was our churches first baby born in the church. He’s about a week and a half old at the moment, dark hair and the most precious tiny hands and feet you have ever seen. And there he was, right in front of me being held by his gorgeous mother who was standing directly under a light. She held him in her arms and just stared down at him while she sang with us.
And God said, “This is how I hold you. That is how I look at you. With those eyes of such tremendous love you could never understand the way I love you. I sing to you songs of love and protection, songs of healing and grace. I hold your tiny hands in Mine while you sleep in My everlasting arms. You are loved my Dear One; loved so tremendously. You have no idea.”
Is God calling you to the couch today? Is He calling you to rest in His arms? To allow Him to touch you and your pain and allow Him to heal it more completely than you ever thought possible? Are you going to allow Him to do that for you? Sometimes the most powerful thing we can do in life is to just be still. Be still and know that HE is God.
I lay on that couch and prayed until I ran out of words (and that’s saying something). Then I lay there and just listened to the silence in the room around me, waiting, listening for His still small voice. It was there, He was there, in my pain, in my hurt, in my healing. Healing is a process. It doesn’t always come all at once, it peels back in layers. Like a scab it sheds away revealing a fresh new pink layer underneath, tender and fragile.
Tamar Knochel 