I had an awesome picture while praying tonight. It was quite a busy, noisy prayer meeting, and I was finding it hard to connect with God and concentrate on interceding for Wandsworth. After I had sat there feeling frustrated for a while, I asked God to speak to me through the volume and distraction.
In my picture, I was standing in a market place (Specifically, it was the market square in Northampton… I don’t think that is prophetically relevent, I guess it’s just that’s the market I am most familiar with!) Anyway, the stalls were brightly coloured, all peddling an assortment of wares. Market traders were shouting and advertising their products, customers were milling around, pointing and dawdling.
I felt quite overwhelmed by the senses that surrounded me. I could smell typical market smells – fruit, cooking donuts, fuel in generators. I could hear and see so many sounds and colours. It was busy, hectic and crowded.
In the picture, someone took hold of my wrist and begin to gently lead me through the crowd. I am not claustrophobic at all, but I do like space, so I was pleased when I was lead out of the busy melee of people and stalls. I knew it was God who was leading me, and so I felt perfectly safe.
He led me to this big rock thing. Like a Tor you’d get on Dartmoor (not many of those in Northampton so no locational familiarity here). Still leading me, we went between two tall stacks of rock, a pathway that could only have been a few feet wide. When it felt like we had walked right into the centre of the rock formation, we stopped. It was like a niche, a small round area with space only for the two of us. I stood there and God stood there. Neither of us moved and neither of us spoke. I was struck by the way my senses were stilled. It was utterly silent, utterly peaceful. So different from the frenetic energy of the market.
It reminded me that in the most hectic moments of my life, I need to allow God to lead me to that place of serenity and stillness. When I feel the most jarred and jolted by the pace of events, He is faithful, and he knows I need that tranquility. In the moments when I long for a quiet space, He is waiting to lead me into it…
I will endeavour to remember this.
