Always a Way Through

Image credit: Nikola Knezevic (2018), Unsplash.com, CC0 Public Domain[/caption]

Blue Sky Over Me Vast and unending Warm, peaceful, still. With depth and breadth, expansive Abundance all around me Always available to me Full, grateful, with ease.

This is a poem (can I call that a poem?) I wrote in prayer a few years ago. I was journeying through a particular valley in my marriage and I had fallen into an emotional habit of being sullen, even joyless. I know, hard to imagine me that way, huh? As I moved through the valley, I knew that my best hope of climbing up and out was to look up and out -- Look up at the Lord and move out of my head. One morning during this time, I was sitting on my deck, in prayer, eyes closed with the sunshine warming my face. As I opened my eyes and wondered at the sky, I felt through my whole being the truth that the Lord is far bigger than any circumstance in my life. At every moment He is holding me and taking care of me. His abundant love is all around me, and it is for me! The poem above burst into my heart in that moment. I wrote it out and kept it with me, reading it to myself every day. Reading those words became a pattern-interrupter for me. In moments when I felt myself sliding towards the valley floor, the visual of the unending blue sky and the physical sensation of the warm sun upon my skin pulled my heart and mind upward, and I found my peace in Him once again. Except for when I didn’t. Like those times I colluded with the old beliefs of, “But I deserve ...” or “It isn’t fair,” and down I would slide! It was on one of those days that my revelation happened. I was out for a jog on a very cloudy morning. The entire time, I was listening to an old tape running in my head, over and over and over. I was fully absorbed in conversation with myself about “he never …” and “I always …”, feeling more and more victimized by the second. I blurted aloud, “Blue sky over me, yeah right!” Where are you God!? No expansiveness here for me, the sky is completely overcast, just like my marriage!” I glanced accusingly up at the sky and the image pictured below is what I saw in that moment. I was stunned into silence and literally sat down on the curb (and snapped the picture!).

Copyright 2018 De Yarrison. All rights reserved.[/caption] Blue sky had broken through the clouds and there it was, a pathway across the sky. Oh, it was narrow. And mostly surrounded by clouds. But no mistaking, it was a way through. A promise, to me from God. How cool is that?! God is really here with me. And oh, so patiently waiting for me to stop complaining and simply be quiet so I might listen and hear Him. His words in that moment were clear as a bell, “I always make a way through.” "God patiently waits for me to stop complaining and simply be quiet. -@DeYarrison"] Talk about pattern interrupter. Doesn’t He have a way of commanding our attention and convicting our hearts? What are we to do in those moments but surrender? Oh God, I surrender myself to You, take care of everything. I surrender my marriage to You, take care of everything. And He did. And He is and He will, over and over and over. Closing Prayer: Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for Your loving, faithful presence in my life. Thank you for caring about my every concern and for covering all my needs with Your mercy and grace. Increase in me the gift of Fortitude that I may stay steady of heart and mind. I pray in Jesus’ name, Amen!

Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; in all of your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight. Proverbs 3:5-6