The Cell Phone

Lately I feel as though my life has, in essence, exploded. I don’t mean for this to have a negative connotation, so please don’t hear that. I do mean that I am not the same that I was 6 months ago and I am not even the same today as I was yesterday. When I say “exploded” I am referring to the physics of an explosion completely changing the look and feel, the topography and physical recognition of whatever is in the zone of impact. The explosion is the power of the Holy Spirit and my life is the zone of impact.

In the last year or so I have endured trials of many kinds: I have been hurt and I have been hurtful; I have received Truth and I have believed lies; I have been forgiven and I have forgiven; I have been judged and I have made judgments; I have been accepted and I have felt rejected; I have loved and I have been loved; I have learned and I have slacked off; I have given much and I have received much. These things aren’t different than any other person’s life or any other season of life. So what am I learning in this particular season of trials and blessings?

I was listening to a teaching at Origins Church in Boulder Sunday night about The Pattern of Surrender. Pastor Ramin Razavi started in Ezekiel 47:1-12 about the vision Ezekiel had of walking out from the temple through the different levels of water (seriously, you should check it out!) and he posed this question: “How deep are we willing to go in the living water of Christ?”

This made me think about my own faith.

Faith: such a heavy word. So much is encompassed in just this one concept.

So as I was driving home from Denver, worshipping and praying and trying to listen, I asked the Holy Spirit about that next depth of Living Water I am to venture into. He asked me what I want it to be. I remembered some of the ministry from the Healing Path Day Retreat (based out of Robin Pasley's book) I had the privilege of attending on Saturday regarding being best friends with the Holy Spirit. Now, as I have mentioned in the past, I am kind of new to the whole concept of the Spirit’s ministry in and through me. So I expressed the desire to have that best friendship and to understand Him more so we can move together naturally as one.

He told me to call my (sleeping) husband (poor thing). I couldn’t understand what that had to do with anything. I honestly thought, well sheesh, here I am trying to spend time with You to understand You better and You want me to call my husband…

So I called Tom and he was very gracious and loving and we chatted for a few minutes but I was in the mountains and had bad reception so he kept asking me to repeat myself and I kept asking him to repeat himself and it was really just kind of silly to try to have a conversation at all. So we decided to get off the phone and talk later when I was in a place with better reception.

I hung up the phone and gave this kind of puzzled look of “Huh?” to the Holy Spirit. He then began to reveal to me how I view communicating with Him and Jesus and the Father. I realized through this conviction that I feel like I’m talking on a cell phone with bad reception whenever I am praying.

Of course, this isn’t an accurate picture of what it looks like to communicate with the Almighty God. Jesus says in Matthew 28:20: “I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”  He didn’t say “I am just a cell phone call away, and if you get lucky, I’ll answer! And if you get really lucky, there might even be good reception and you’ll be able to clearly hear My voice!”

So, why do I feel like the latter words are more accurate than the actual words of Jesus?

I wish I had an answer to share with you. I am still trying to sort through all of my issues to hopefully discover what has caused me to believe this lie that communicating with the One who loves me so dearly and rejoices over me and is with me always is like talking through bad cell phone reception. I am on a mission to discover what has caused me to think of this as normal and live the lie that I won’t ever be able to have clarity in communicating with my Lord. For surely, since He is with me always, He is as close as my own breath and He is able to whisper sweetly in my ear and I am able to confide in Him at any moment. I long to walk in faith that this is true; I want my life to reflect that I am in constant communion with my Maker.

In all of my recent learning and revelation, I feel as though my eyes have been opened and I can finally SEE clearly. I wrote about how I feel like I finally received my corrective lenses in the spiritual realm here. I truly believe that as I discover where the roots of these lies about communicating in the spiritual realm come from and I root them out of my life, I will receive spiritual hearing aids and I will hear with clarity beyond what I can fathom and I will walk in communion with my Lord like never before!

When I get it all figured out, I’ll share with you, dear readers, so that you, too, might find the freedom that is being offered me. If you have already found said freedom, please do share about your journey that I might be encouraged and blessed and find the answers all the sooner!