{Be Real} Space // A Heart Movement

He led me back onto the familiar trail that I had walked through so many seasons of my life.

This particular lake I’ve circled in so many life stages, and have met God on this one rock, watching some swans come by with unexpected grace.

And now, as God has been drawing me into peace, he led me to that trail.

I was so excited to hear God’s voice again. You know that feeling when the voices of the world are getting so loud, and the voice that matters, going so hush, that you have to strain to hear it? I was straining.

But on that walk, I wasn’t hearing God’s voice. I was starting to get frustrated.

And there was the rock. I thought, surely, He will meet me here.

And He did, just not as I thought He would.

I’ve heard it said that God doesn’t get louder, to drown out the other voices. And it’s true. He didn’t. God instead gave me a rest that would prepare my heart to encounter Him.

I realized that day that I was idolizing hearing God’s voice, when God just wanted to be with me. How many years of my life have I missed this? By idolizing my performance, I’ve missed out on presence.

The idol of performance is mean, it makes your space and mind cluttered, and it says you have to do something before you can be with God. It makes it hard to say no, and your calendar fills up before you even blink. You feel that by doing more, you become more. When truly, we lose pieces of our heart and become less.

When our space is cluttered, doesn’t it follow that we lose our peace? To recover the peace God longs to live, we need to take the brave leaps to create space, and be fully there.

That day on the rock, and this morning listening to the birds and the gentle breeze, God’s call is simply to create a space for Him, and be fully there. Which is harder. He calls us into space not so that He can give us direction or tell us what to do next. He calls us into space so that we can vulnerably be present with Him. With our whole hearts.

This is why the idea of space seems luxurious, but the reality of space is scary. Only in quietness and rest that our true selves bubble to the surface.

Space demands that you step into it and be fully there with God. Without any pieces left behind. You come into the space and all of you follows. The pieces in your heart formed by your history that you’d rather just gloss over.

The little girl in you that never felt seen or understood.
The teenager who was betrayed by our friends and learned distrust.
The dreamer who was talked into thinking of life more “practically.”
The young woman who never feels brave enough compared to other women.
The parts of you that wrestle with anxiety or comparison.
The creative who doesn’t feel her work is good enough.

To be fully present with God means to come before Him in honesty and truth. But this is what He desires.  Like the Psalmist says,

“Lord, who may dwell in your tabernacle?
Who may dwell in Your holy Hill?

He who walks uprightly,
And works righteousness,

And speaks the truth in his heart.”

-Psalm 15:1-2

When you enter into space in truth, your scars and your beauty co-exist. They aren’t separated, as we like to do. They are one. And the whole of our soul is before us and present with God.

This is why we run. We run to people and we run to things and we fill the spaces with everything but God. We are scared to live inside our own story. The story that stares at us blankly within open space.

But the truth is, as long as we don’t embrace the whole of who we are, and step into that space with God, our hearts will never become whole. He will never be able to heal us.

Dear sister, let me give you great comfort in this: you are not alone. We are all in this together. We have all been wounded. And we all have that scared little girl inside of us. I know I do.

But space is a movement away from creating our own identity and being the center of our world, toward the God who intimately created our hearts. We acknowledge our souls are weary and need to refuel and heal and form in the presence of our Lord. It’s a brave thing to pursue peace, and to create space to honestly commune with our God.

But on the other side of that bravery is a place to receive God’s greatest gifts. His purest intimacy. And wholeness.

See, all of the pieces that we would rather separate; God sees them together. And God doesn’t want us to have “this space” and “that space” separate – He wants to invade all of our spaces.

And when He sees all of you, He calls you beautiful. Beloved. Worthy. His daughter.

God soothes us with his love and we see – that creating space for peace – it’s the brave movement to trust that we are enough to Him. As is. It’s a bold declaration that God isn’t looking for our performance. He’s looking for our hearts, our truth, our honesty. Space is a soul movement to want to love Him and live as His beloved.

Because you, dear one, are His. And He is Yours.

 

“The Lord your God in your midst,
The Mighty One, will save;
He will rejoice over you with gladness,
He will quiet you with His love,
He will rejoice over you with singing.”

-Zephaniah 3:17

To help you on this journey, check out Bonnie Gray’s book,
“Finding Spiritual Whitespace.” It’s incredible!

Her words have inspired my soul’s journey to create space.