overwhelmed
Earlier this week I felt overwhelmed. Aside from the “normal” responsibilities that go along with the blessing of a large family, aside from needing to answer email & return phone calls & write thank you cards & finish packing, aside from walking with several loved ones through really difficult stuff, aside from being assailed by some heavy duty spiritual warfare, there’s the whole moving-the-family-across-the-world-again thing that adds an element of “overwhelmedness” at times. When I feel really overwhelmed, I can’t seem to get anywhere on even the simplest tasks. So instead of pretending I’m of any use to anyone, I retreat to my favorite hangout, which in Atlanta is our outdoor fire pit. The Lord always meets me there and restores and refreshes my soul. But this week I needed more than an afternoon by the fire. I didn’t realize what I needed, but God did.
A few days ago I had shot an email to my friend Larry to see if I could join his church intercessors on Tuesday night, something that’s been on my wish list all summer. I hadn’t heard back yet, so debated with myself about going; I wasn’t sure if they were even meeting. After a lovely walk / talk / pray in the park with Susan, my friend Kathy and I and our girls wound up at a Chick-fil-A across town that I’d never been to before (they are the most anointed fast food restaurants in the world, I am convinced – God things happen there). In our short time there, the Lord gave me 3 wonderful surprises (4 if you count the Icedream :)). One would have sufficed, but He seemed to have a plan in place to completely overwhelm me with His love and care. The dictionary defines “overwhelm” as “to surge over and submerge”, “to engulf”, “to present with an excessive amount”, “to affect deeply in mind or emotion”, “to turn over or upset”, “to defeat completely and decisively”. God’s love seems to do all of these. He pours out His love and care on His people in such abundance, to submerge us, deeply affect us, sometimes upsetting us, bringing us to the end of ourselves and defeating us. He surges over us, engulfs us, spills over us with an excessive amount. As soon as I walked into Chick-fil-A, the Lord gave me a brief divine appointment with a close friend’s sibling that left me thinking – “sweet!” A few minutes later I received a phone call from our Nizhny Vineyard friend Azelia (now a graduated dentist soon heading back to Malaysia), who was in Atlanta for a few days (we met this morning). Another “sweet!”
But the clincher for me happened right as we sat down in the play area to thaw out. I did a double take as I saw Helga approaching from across the parking lot. Helga is one of Larry’s intercessors, and a Holocaust survivor. Helga and I bonded a year ago when we prayed together, and reconnected in June at the prayer conference in South Carolina. She has a special heart for the Slavic nations, and is one of those rare individuals whose life verse could be 1 Thessalonians 5:17. The Lord had put her heavily on my heart, and I’d left her a prayer journal as a parting gift, thinking it would be a long time till we saw one another again. It’s a mystery . . . 70-somethings do not eat at Chick-fil-A, unless maybe they have small children in tow. But God sent Helga at just that time and place, and He used that encounter to encourage me so much (and to let me know when the prayer meeting started :)). I sensed Him saying, “I see you. I know what you need. I will help you. Don’t let anything steal your joy. I have many more wonderful surprises for you. Watch for me.” The prayer meeting last night was yet another “sweet!” God always commands a blessing when ordinary people get together to share their hearts with Him and with each other. Helga shared with the group how the Lord had blessed her in a Christian bookstore a few days earlier. As I gathered my things to leave, Helga presented me with her newly acquired prayer journal, one I will always treasure as a sweet reminder of the overwhelming love and care of our sweet Lord Jesus.
Psalm 42:5 – 8 (The Message) –
5 Why are you down in the dumps, dear soul?
Why are you crying the blues?
Fix my eyes on God—
soon I’ll be praising again.
He puts a smile on my face.
He’s my God.
6-8 When my soul is in the dumps, I rehearse
everything I know of you,
From Jordan depths to Hermon heights,
including Mount Mizar.
Chaos calls to chaos,
to the tune of whitewater rapids.
Your breaking surf, your thundering breakers
crash and crush me.
Then GOD promises to love me all day,
sing songs all through the night!
My life is God’s prayer.
May the Lord overwhelm each of us with His love and care in the waves and breakers of His choosing. No matter what we feel, we can trust Him because His love is constant and our lives belong to Him.
