Comfort, Comfort My People
I sang this sweet babe to sleep. He's hit the stage of year two that says naps are for babies & destroying the room is a much better option (much to the frustration of his almost 9 mo pregnant mama). When she made yet another attempt to put him down (by rocking him on her legs on a pillow) I started to sing. Peace filled the room, his eyelids miraculously closed, his mama sweetly smiled & so did I.
I've entered a season of weeping, not out of hopelessness, but because my heart just plain breaks for the ones He's given me to love. I weep for a land lashed with storms & not comforted, a people He longs to draw close to His chest. In the same moment that I feel my own need for the Comforter, I acknowledge a deep well of hope collecting in the depths of my soul to be given freely.
“He will comfort her waste places. And He will make her wilderness like Eden, and desert like the garden of the Lord. Joy and gladness will be found in her, thanksgiving and the voice of song.””
I hear over and over in my spirit the words: comfort, comfort My people. I hear them echoing in my heart even as tears come to my eyes from my own need, and as I walk through neighborhoods where refugee friends live. As I sit on the floor & drink tea, I listen, and I open up my mouth to sing from the depths, knowing His presence releases life. It's really simple. I can only comfort to the degree that I've received comfort. So I pour it all out to the very last drop and anoint His feet in worship with a costly perfume. This is worship in spirit and in truth.
“As we live truly from the heart, we live from where the Spirit is dwelling within us. We see people as God sees them; we see their wounds and their pain; we no longer see them as problems. We see God in them. But as we begin to live this way, unprotected by barriers, we become very vulnerable and terribly poor. ‘Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom.’ It is this poverty which becomes our wealth, for now we no longer live for our own glory but for love and for the power of God manifested in weakness.” ”