Acknowledge Him
By Lara Lunsford --
In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight. Proverbs 3:6
Dear friends,
Life, as we all are very aware of, is quite different these days. Personally, I feel like I have been walking through a revolving door of change for nearly six months now. Just when I started to familiarize myself with you all and the rhythm of our church community—wham! The pesky COVID-19 pandemic hits, and much of my time now is spent pivoting and readjusting and figuring it out each day.
I say that for two reasons. One is that I recognize many of you, and I have never had more than a few words spoken between us, so when we get to come back together again, it will be a wonderful experience to re-build new relationships and connections. The other reason I mention it is that the amount of energy it can take for me to deal with change can result in two possibilities: either being distracted by all the details and going into a tailspin OR becoming keenly aware of my utter dependence on God and relying on grace to see me through. And these two possibilities determine much of how I cope and how I come out on the other side.
The following is my offering to you of contemplation and confession and prayer. I first wrote this piece three years ago, but I keep coming back to it as a reminder to my heart that I need Jesus just as much in the calm as in the chaos.
You are in my very breath. You are with me when I wake with groggy, half-opened eyes, stumbling into the kitchen for my cup of coffee. You walk with me through the tasks of the day, from meetings to family time to preparing a meal or pulling those pesky weeds that won’t stop popping up. When I fall asleep with remains of laundry half done and a sink piled high with dishes, you are there. In all those small, everyday moments—there you can be found.
You accompany me in the unknown, too. In the waiting. The fear. The holding pattern that seems to have no end. The difficulties and losses and grief and heartache. The very depths and hidden parts of my soul. That pain which seems unbearable and incomprehensible—nothing is a mystery to you, for you know suffering all too well. You have held that weight before, even more intimately that I ever could.
You are in the spectacular and the mundane. You are in the glory and the mess. You are in my weeping and my joy. No minuscule detail of life is apart from you. Your fullness is evident in the simple and the intricate.
And yet…
I confess—that though I know these truths in my heart, I still can move through a day without acknowledging you. It’s easy to see you when your big and beautiful glory is on display. When I take in a sunset or climb to a mountaintop or dip my toes in the ocean waves, my whole being pauses and drinks you in. But in that which is ordinary or routine, I may fail to recognize all the many ways that you show up, all the opportunities you provide to reveal yourself to me. I sometimes forget that it’s all about you, and end up convincing myself it’s all about me.
So God, by your grace, would you remind me to practice speaking your name on my lips and in my heart? If your gentle voice beckoning me to yourself gets muffled by the din of distraction, would you break through and awaken me to the way of life? When the difficulties I face seem like giants and consume my hope, I pray that acknowledging your presence would testify of your goodness to my soul. Give me the desire and discipline to acknowledge you in every little thing, in every single day.
Amen.