Monday, August 10, 2009

In a cloud

I have been asking the Lord to enable me lately in giving me wisdom to deal with a hard situation. I was hoping for a word of encouragement as I opened my daily reading for the day. My heart fell at first as I saw the passage was about the Lord’s transfiguration and the heading in July 29’s reading in my Utmost for his Highest was titled “Do you see Jesus in your clouds?” What on earth has the transfiguration got to do with my difficult situation right now?

Then I read the first few sentences that go on like this…

“In the Bible clouds are always associated with God. Clouds of sorrows, sufferings, or providential circumstances, within or without our personal lives, which actually seem to contradict the sovereignty of God. But Nahum 1:3 says, “the clouds are the dust of His feet”…God cannot come near us without clouds-He does not come in clear-shining brightness.

On the mount of transfiguration Peter saw Jesus but also Elijah and Moses and he wanted to erect three shelters there on the mountains for these three. But then a cloud appeared (Mark 7, 8) and enveloped them and truth came in the cloud. The truth that it is only Jesus that they should be honoring and listening to. “And suddenly, when they looked around, they no longer saw anyone with them except Jesus.”

I have been under a cloud lately. A dark, thick cloud that was heavy, scary and sometimes felt suffocating. My thoughts have been consumed with this difficulty. All I was seeing in this cloud was this problem and me trying to work through it, and I wasn’t seeing Jesus in the cloud at all. But ALL God wants me to see is Him. This cloud has been full of the issue and I could not hear God’s voice and see Jesus. But He has been there all along.

I am heading out now still somewhat in my cloud but aiming to only see Jesus and hear his voice!