Sometimes my heart whispers to me. Does yours?
It usually happens in the still moments, most often at night, when all the commotion of the day is done and the quiet overtakes me. Sometimes, my heart whispers so ferociously that I cannot sleep.
The whispers are often sweet, though I confess that when the darkness engulfs me, these whipsers can be terrifying.
Lately, my heart has been aching. And as I ache, the whispers have begun to move into my everyday thoughts. It’s distracting. But it’s also good. You see, I find that when my heart is whispering, I generally turn the whispers into prayers. If the whispers are causing fear, I pray for peace and sweet release (I’ve had terrible whispers of bad things happening to my children and I’ve spent many a night praying that the Lord free me from fear.)
If the whispers are sweet, I turn them into songs of praise. Like last night, as I sat in a chair on the beach watching the sunset, my playing children framed in a halo of orange and red – the whispers were grand – very, very grand.
Were I not surrounded by a group of strangers, I may have voiced the whispers out loud. But that is not my personality and so I just just sat, my heart swollen, and drank in the scene before me.
Sometimes, the whispers are sadness. These are the heart whispers I have the most difficult time with. The sad whispers are the ones that forbid me to sleep. When the whispers are sad, I pray that the Lord turn the mourning into dancing. But, in the still of the night, the sadness can sometimes feel too big, too great to become anything but a mournful hollow at the base of my throat.
When the light comes in, however, and the darkness has fled, the whispers once again remind me that I have a God who is far bigger than the whispers of my very human heart. As cliche as that may sound, I believe it with all my might.
Trusting God is hard sometimes. It shouldn’t be, of course, but given my tendency to want to control and fix things on my own, such independence leaves little room for trust. I’m working on that. I need to work harder on it in the daylight hours so that the nighttime would be more peaceful.
Because I have bags under my eyes, and I’m much too vain to have bags under my eyes!
I’m excited to come home and be in my house, with my routine and my husband – that will help quell the sad whispers a bit. As will time, and the Lord’s gracious healing that I await with expectancy. (It’s a healing of a spirit that’s needed – we are all well. And my heart whispers a litany of grateful praise for that…)
That was heavy, wasn’t it? Writing about the heaviness of my heart eases the burden a bit. There’s something grand in sharing a burden with others.
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But enough of that. Now for the light.
What is greater than a group of kids, enjoying ice cream on a hot summer’s day? I’ll answer that for you…
Nothing.
Yes, my heart whispers to me at night as well. I am often convicted as I rehash the days events, and realize I could’ve handled my interactions with the kids differently. Things seem so much clearer in the quiet of the night….I hope your spirit is well tonight friend.