My time in the Desert

Wow! Where to begin?

For the last several years, almost 7 years, I have been in a "desert" experience in my life. Oddly enough, I lived in the Sierra High Desert for most of it. While I knew God was with me, and I knew it was a learning journey, and I knew that God wouldn't leave me there, it was a very difficult time. It wasn't as though life was horrible. I was able to have good times, I was able to serve, I was able to have times of joy and fulfillment, but I also had many times of frustration, seeking to understand, and the more I tried, the less I understood. I knew that God had called me to something, but there was no clarity, no forward movement, and often times, it seemed no response. It felt as though God was silent. As much as music was one of my primary means of talking with God, I couldn't write anything for almost 2 years. It was very difficult, and heartbreaking. Maybe the hardest part in this journey has been our journey back here. Having moved many times in my life, I have never felt such a longingfor something there in Reno, like there is a piece of me that is missing. Yet God instructed us to "GO", so we obeyed.

That brings me to now. Part of my journey through this desert experience has been my discontent in my occupation. Please don't get me wrong...it is a noble career, with a huge ministry, but in the past 6 plus years, I have grown more and more discontent. The more I seek to be passionate about it, to be positive about it, the harder it has become. And yet, God continued to say, "This is where I have you, this is where you'll stay." That is until now...

Tuesday, was definitely a crazy day, but it seemed amid all the chaos and craziness that was going on around me, I heard so clearly, more clearly than I have heard in a long time, "You have completed your time on this part of your journey. You don't have to continue this anymore." It was such a freeing experience. While I have absolutely no idea how we will be able to make end meet or what I am supposed to do next, I am faithful that He knows and will guide each step I know it seems rather crazy, but I know that God has something in store. While he called me to ministry almost 12 years ago, and didn't really clarify what "ministry" that was until 5 years ago, and has continued to change my perception of it since then, I know that this is His timing. I am not sure where I am going, or what I am actually going to "do". I do know that in my time in the desert, He has really opened my mind and my heart to some hugely different perspectives.

God is not confined to a church building, a Sunday School class, a Wednesday night service or even a particular denomination. He isn't this God that is distant and doesn't care about anyone or anything. In fact, He's much like the example we saw in our Savior, Jesus...eating with tax collectors and sinners. Speaking to the prostitues and the beggars. Healing those who most would never touch, much less speak to. Doing His work on the Sabbath, of all things! And yet the world was turned upside-down. Today, it's not about the separation of church and state, it's simply about Christ living in us, reaching through us in every single aspect of our lives to touch the people that the world sees as worthless. To give hope to those who can't see it anymore. To love with His unfailing, incomparably marvelous love. To be His hands, feet and heart to this lost and dying world.

Over the past few months, I have slowly been able to start writing again. It has been such a release! The first song to come of it, "Set Me Free" was really my heart cry to get through this desert time. The second (words) was completed today. It comes from the passage Malachi 3:3 "He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver..." The context of this is that as he refines the silver, He watches it ever so closely, for one moment too long would destroy. The result is that when it is refined, pure, He can look at it and see His image.

It is my prayer as He uses me to reach people and to change lives, in whatever avenues He brings my way (all for HIS glory!).

Refine me
Burn away my impurities
Purify me
Wash away all the stains
Restore me
Bring me closer to You
As the fire consumes me
Make me clean

I feel the pressure rising
There is no end in sight
The more I seek protection
The more I have to fight
It seems that there’s no rhyme or reason
To all that I am going through

The more I seek solutions
The less I understand
I strain to hear Your voice
Yet I can’t see Your hand
I want to give up fighting, throw in the towel
And let the fire consume me

Yet I hear a voice inside me crying out
Set me free from all that captures me
Make me clean…

I feel Your warmth around me
Although I cannot see
And though I walk through valleys
I know you carry me
You are the silver lining around this
Cloud that covers me

Refine me
Burn away my impurities
Purify me
Wash away all the stains
Restore me
Bring me closer to You
As the fire consumes me
Make me clean