In A Pew Next To My Mother

In a pew next to my mother.

In the floor of my bedroom in the house where I grew up. The carpet was chocolate brown.

On that navy blue, and off-white-dotted couch in that same little house. It had extra-cushiony arms.

On the 16^th Floor of Blanding Tower at UK, again, on the floor.

On my bed in that same room.

In a circle in Africa playing duck, duck goose with 30 kids, one in my lap.

On a plane to China.

Behind the balcony at New Orleans Seminary.

On a wooden bench in South Carolina.

The night of that tear-draining cry.

I am considering not sharing this list of places with you. I’m not just saying that to increase your intrigue. They are the places where I had moments when I was certain I was in the presence of God. Typing them out and blasting them into cyberspace does more than betray intimacy, it’s because I know that if you were to go to any one of them, retrace any of the steps that lead me to them, they would hold no significance to you. Especially the Blanding Tower dorm room floor, gross. 

But today I know I need to dwell on those places. You’ve been here right? You’ve had these times when you’ve thought, “Welp, can’t really feel you right now, God. Real nice. See you later?” Is anyone else sarcastic with God during these times? Please, I’m not the only one?

I’m in a place were I want to feel God. There’s not anything crazy going on in my life: just a gentle nudge of being homesick. If I could write down the directions for getting to a  place of a soul-settling, arms-wrapped-around you moment with God; bind up my wisdom and put a pretty cover on the front I wouldn’t have to write anything else ever, or work again.  I could tell you and myself how to get "there". My work on this earth would be done... Harper Lee and I could hang out and drink coffee and we wouldn’t even have to discuss the fact that our one-writ wonders brought us there, we would just know. 

The reason I can’t pen it down, is because God came to me. Sure, I sought him out, as I have before and since, but these were places in time when my seeking seemed almost inconsequential. He was already where I was. I did not move Him towards myself. In these places, everything else diminished. Wondering if he could have really been there would have been like worrying whether there will be enough oxygen for the entire human race tomorrow.  You just don’t do it.  The circumstances of my life, either forged by my own determination or a result of obedience and grace swirled together with my emotions and my thoughts and my surroundings and the Truth invaded.

I think about Hagar, seeing the well in Genesis 21, and I wonder if God did not send her out into the wilderness just to meet with her there. Just to show her, beside that well, (a recurring theme) that she was not alone, that he was real. She had resigned her son to his death, and God made a way for them.  

I cannot call you or myself to any action other than to consider who He really is. Consider his very essence of being everywhere, at all times, and his ability to break into our blinding circumstances and redirect us towards himself.  He gives us special places where we get a glimpse into eternity; where we can see what it must be like to be with Him forever. Another place will come. Just wait.

“Desire not emotion to feel God, but desire God, and you might feel his presence.” Tim Keller