To You Alone May My Spirit Yield

I've just listened to yet another incredible sermon at Door of Hope.  The tables are now open for Communion (my church does dip 'n' dunk style - my favorite), and since the worship team is playing a song I don't know, I decide now is as good a time as any to make my way over to the station set up near the front of the sanctuary.  I select my piece of bread, dip it in the juice, and begin to wander back to my seat, as per usual.  I do this every Sunday.

Every Sunday, that is, except for this one.  Instead of returning to my row filled with friends, I now find myself leaning against a wall on the periphery, my head bowed and my eyes brimming.  I'm beginning to wonder how it is possible to feel so horribly alone in such a crowded room when something wonderful happens: I am embraced. Lovingly and wordlessly, my friend Katie has just joined me in my sad state, wrapping her arms around me and stroking my hair as if she were comforting a small child.  Which is precisely how I feel at the moment.

You see, beneath my barely put-together exterior, I'm throwing an internal temper tantrum.

It sounds a lot like this:

Hey God?  Remember how the past year of my life has been so full of heartbreak and confusion and spiritual stretching and desperation?  Do You think You could maybe cut me a break here?  I feel like every time I start down a path and begin to hope it's finally the correct one, You build a road block so quickly I smack right into it and am forced to turn a completely different direction.  You've allowed so many of my dreams to shatter, I don't even know if I should bother having new ones.  And now this?  Lord, I feel like you are just leading me into the desert!

And that's when I realize: that is exactly that He is doing.

God, in all His wonder and wisdom and mercy and magnificence is literally calling me into the desert (otherwise known as Las Vegas).

Why? (other than the obvious reason: to help my family during a time of great stress) Because He knows me.  He knows my heart.  He knows how distracted and "busy" I make myself so I can avoid healing.  He knows I love to speak in metaphors because He also knows how much I hate living them out. So He makes them a reality.  (Seriously, He once gave me strep throat - twice - to teach me a lesson about listening)

I stand there silently weeping, my friend's hand slipped into mine, squeezing it tightly - reassuring me with her prayers.  The worship band moves on to the next song, one of the few traditional hymns we sing.  Growing up in a tiny little Baptist church, I've sang it thousand times.  But today, this line catches in my throat and makes it way right back down into my heart:

"to You alone may my spirit yield"

My spirit is anything but at rest these days, but perhaps that is because I'm attempting to find solace in everything but Jesus.  I'm so busy moving (literally), I seem to have forgotten what it means to be still.