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I've just read the words someone else
wrote about Austin and once again the box that I put
that experience in has been shattered and expanded.
Instead the truth of what we experienced in Austin has
been revived and I can once more feel it in my heart.
Naïvely I thought that the amazing sense
of community we experienced in Austin, the overwhelming
love of God and His people, I thought that it was something
we had travelled to find in a geographical place. But
instead God brought us together. HE made us family,
HE choreographed who we are and how we were together.
What is it that I'm talking about? I'm
not sure words can describe it.
It was a love that melted my heart - completely
and unequivocally, to the point where I could no longer
keep up the walls that had been long established and
had to let myself be loved. It was being open and unguarded
to the people who looked after me as a sister. It was
the safety of being able to sit at a table holding hands
with a friend, and weep for the acceptance and love
it gave me. It was love that makes you so weak you can
only be yourself and try to love back. It was the people
with whom I dared to be myself. And not only did they
embrace me, they celebrated who I am.
I thought I was going to Texas for a conference.
God had other plans. Instead he taught me about family.
He showed me a group that weren't just there to talk
about God, they were there to live it out.
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The reality of it was people who supported
me and shared with me in whatever was going on - joy
and fun, grief and healing. I was fathered, mothered,
sistered and brothered in a place so very far away from
home.
And now that I am back home what has changed?
Well, I thought nothing had. I thought there was only
memories to be cherished and remembered. How little
room I gave God to move! Instead I've had my eyes opened
and my heart melted again where it began to put up those
walls. I've found myself loved to tears in a group of
people who hardly know me, being that very same family
- loving me and ministering to my broken heart in words
and prayers and meals and hugs and phone calls. That
amazing love I went to a far away land to experience,
it was with me all along.
I thought what we experienced was something
we needed to bring back, to import. Don't get me wrong,
it was fantastic. But it's not a commodity to buy or
sell. What God did to me was to plant in my heart the
truth of really being loved, so that it will go with
me wherever I end up and touch other people's lives.
If you wanted a review on the conference
you'll have to find someone else - I heard the amazing
stories of 'God's circus' around the world and they
did bring me light and touch my heart. But of all the
wonderful things I listened to in Austin, only one of
them I really heard:
"This is my son whom I love. With him
I am well pleased."
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