As I reflect on the past month's theme of "Being Transformed through the Bible," I am amazed at how the Lord used the readings, especially Meditating on the Word by Dietrich Bonheoffer, to prepare me for what was to come. This past month, I was taken from the very normalcy of my life into a whirlwind of a crisis where I was to care for my mother who became ill while traveling abroad. As situations hit us like lightning, one by one, the only response we could give was to be silent before Him and just take in what had been allowed us by the Father.
Prior to leaving for Korea, this passage from Bonhoeffer really spoke out to me:
To be silent does not mean to be inactive, rather it means to breathe in the will of God, to listen attentively and be ready to obey. The time of silence is a time of responsibility, a time when we must answer to God and to ourselves; but it is also a time of blessedness, because it is a time when we live in the peace of God. p. 49
In hindsight, I believe the Lord was speaking to prepare me for that silence, to breathe in what He would be speaking to me through the circumstance. He was preparing me for the call where I would have to yield to everything by offering myself and praying for His peace to continue reigning in our lives.
Bonhoeffer also states that “the righteous person knows that God allows him to suffer so, in order that he may learn to love God for God’s own sake” (p. 88). Being in the midst of the storm was learning more about Him and thanking Him for keeping us constant in the midst of it all. As one wave hit after another, I clung onto His steadfast and loving hands to deliver us from the not-so-great news that kept penetrating into our lives. I learned to withstand these trials so that I may see His perfect will unfold, not the mere desires that would only serve me selfishly.
What I had to give to God was my own poverty—my emptied self that was not at all capable of fixing the situations before me. It is with this “unfeigned heart” that Bonhoeffer speaks about when receiving His riches in exchange for my impoverished self (p. 111). In this, “we are to think of misfortune, misery, need of all kinds, in which God leaves us for a brief moment.” It was not my prayer that God eradicate all hardship before us but that He would sustain us so that we would make it to the end of the race that He had somehow placed us on, a race that seemingly looked grim yet offered abundant hope and blessings (p. 113).
At the end of it all, He, as usual, required my whole heart. He is continuing to teach me what it is to give completely to Him. I imagine this will be an ongoing journey until I see the Father someday, but I look forward to the incremental pleasures and rewards that will come as I navigate through this journey called life. And it was through the Word that He brought this new, yet not-so-new revelation in my life. For this I am grateful and look forward to what He will continue to do in my life.
