Remembering to Breathe....

Do you ever feel helpless? I mean, completely helpless? Like you absolutely don't know what to do? The kind of deep feeling in the very pit of your stomach that won't seem to go away that sometimes is accompanied by that lump in your throat that never ceases? The feeling like you have to keep reminding yourself to breathe? Yeah...well..that seems to be the feeling I have today. Although, all day I have just spent so much time reading God's word and trying to let His words comfort me and for the most part, they have. Psalm 143 absolutely blew me away when I read it. Isn't it funny how you may have read the Bible cover to cover, but then you stumble along a verse later that you may have forgotten and how refreshing it is when you do?? Psalm 143 is lengthy but this is what it says,

"O Lord, hear my prayer,
listen to my cry for mercy;
in your faithfulness and righteousness
come to me relief.
Do not bring your servant into judgment,
for no one living is righteous before you.

The enemy pursues me,
he crushes me to the ground;
he makes me dwell in darkness
like those long dead.
So my spirit grows faint within me;
my heart within me dismayed.

I remember the days of long ago;
I meditate on all your works
and consider what your hand have done.
I spread out my hands to you;
my soul thirsts for you like a parched land.

Answer me quickly, O Lord;
my spirit fails.
Do not hide your face from me.....

Show me the way I should go,
for to you I lift up my soul.
Rescue me from my enemies, O Lord,
for I hide myself in you.
Teach me to do your will,
for you are my God;
may your good spirit lead me on level ground...."

This Psalm is such a cry out to the Lord! It's exactly how I feel right now! David is crying out and asking God not to bring him under judgment for his sinful nature for he knows no one is good enough to be in His prescence and he confesses his sin that the enemy is constantly pursuing him and it hurts him to know that what he does is so displeasing to the Lord. He even is so bold to say, "Answer me quick, O Lord".... WOW!! That's how I feel at this very moment! I want the Lord to breath through me, the speak to me, to guide my steps, to show me what He wants me to do. I think so many times I go to God in prayer and I feel like I can't say those types of things to God, but that shows me that I can! I can cry out to Him, I can ask Him to reveal anything to me, I can beg Him for mercy and quick answers! He is my heavenly Father and because Jesus died on the cross, I am able to do that! How awesome is that?!?!


Something else that really spoke to me was in the book of Hosea. I got in bed last night and flipped to this book...I think sometimes we forget about the small books in the Old Testament, but Hosea really is a great love story. If you have ever read or heard of "Redeeming Love", that books was based off the book of Hosea. Something in Hosea caught my attention along with something I had written in my Bible next to that verse a while back. Verse 6-7 says,

"Therefore I will block her path with thorn bushes;
I will wall her in so that she cannot find her way.
She will chase after her lovers but not catch them;

she will look for them but not find them."

And next to those verses in my Bible I had written, "God says He will thwart our efforts to find life apart from Him. He does this in order to wear us out, get us to turn back to Him in thirsty longing. He often takes us aside from every other source of comfort so that He alone can have our heart's attention". I felt like that was God telling me that I need to be totally complete in Him before I can be ready for someone else. It's like I have all this "junk" that I thought I had dealt with and apparently, I haven't. You know sometimes we think we have given something to God to quickly realize it's right back in our hands? And that's not God's fault by any means...we are totally the ones to blame. Have you ever felt like your walk with God isn't what it could or should be? I know I have felt like that before and sorta feel like that right now....I heard Brother Steve say in a sermon a long time ago that God isn't the one that "moves"; we are. God stays still while we go off and frolic and do what we will and He is there the whole time and then welcomes us back with open arms. How awesome is that? There is a song by Mark Schultz called "Back in His Arms Again" and in the chorus is says,

"I believe that He loves where you are,
I believe that you've seen the hands of God
I believe that you'll know it when you're back in His arms again.
I believe that He never let you go, I believe that He's wanting you to know,
I believe that He'll lead you til you're back in His arms again."