How has God been at work in my life? When I think about describing this I think of a locomotive. I see how easily it is to stop a steam locomotive from moving at all. A single quarter on the tracks lodged under its wheel can keep it from budging, if it has no momentum. But no quarter in the way, leaves it free to begin moving with power from within, and as long as the fireman keeps the coal coming. Once it is moving at a steady pace no one can stop it with outside force, it must be reigned in from within. Strong and steady, moving down the tracks, as bystanders we stand in awe of its graceful power, thundering down the line. It goes exactly where the tracks tell it to go; locomotives don’t make their own decisions regarding direction. Direction comes from outside reasoning, people who know more and see where it can go without destruction. Like a flight tower, the command central for trains keeps the locomotive moving in a direction clear of other locomotives doing their own work. If it looses that connection, even for a little while, and it has to make a choice to switch the track or not, there will be definite consequences if it chooses wrong. Staying connected to those who can see over all the tracks is essential to survival. Someday, that locomotive will be placed in a museum somewhere, and elegant things will be written about its “glory days;” even while it is asleep, people will be impacted by it’s stories.
My story begins many years ago. I can see that I was dormant, waiting for God to bring someone into my life to show me how life could be with Jesus. Eventually God brought that person into my life, and that person gently helped me to see how Jesus could heal parts of my heart that ached. Parts that were left sore and empty because I was always searching for approval in an earthly father who really didn’t know how to express that and in a mother who was struggling to keep everything together, when she couldn’t possibly be strong enough. Looking back, I can see a very broken family, trying to stay together with their own strength and skills. I learned how a family and a marriage without Christ looked. I knew that wasn’t what I wanted for me. Eventually I “prayed a prayer” to ask Jesus to be the Lord of my life. But even then I really didn’t know what that meant.
It took many more years, several of marriage, and a few children thrown into the mix to show me that I couldn’t do it on my own. I realized that I just didn’t have enough strength or love on my own; I was tired of trying to hold everything together. I asked God again to be my Lord, and fell back into knowing that with Him, I could do anything. I felt alive again, and I wanted to read my Bible. And even though I didn’t understand a lot of what it was trying to say, and couldn’t see how it was relevant to my life, I just wanted to keep reading. Somehow I knew that I needed to learn more about how God has been involved in the world.
My locomotive was slowly moving, but gaining momentum. Christians go through stages, sometimes we feel really connected to God, like a “spiritual high.” Things seem really easy, we feel like we are learning more about our purpose here on earth, we feel like we can encourage others by showing what having faith has done in our own lives. Then sometimes we feel “stagnant” like a pond that has seen too much summer heat and has some sludge growing on the top. When this happens, we don’t feel like we are learning much, we don’t feel like we have anything really to offer. We will wonder if God has any significant job for us to do, or is it just this ritual day after day of mind-numbing jobs. Being a Christian doesn’t mean that our lives are always supercharged and full of inspiration! I had been feeling a bit like the latter until about three years ago. Sure, I prayed sometimes. I prayed with my kids, I knew that was important. I tried to make good choices that God would be proud of. I just felt like everything was so bland and that I really didn’t have a reason to reach out for anything if things were just going to be like this forever. As a mom of four children, it is easy to get stuck in ruts or laundry, cooking, cleaning and just “being.” I was “being” a Christian, but I wasn’t “doing” anything that seemed to matter.
Three years ago, God gave me a free ride to a Christian women’s conference. It was fabulous, and though I can’t go into it here, I left with new ideas of what living my life dedicated to Jesus could look like. I learned that He wants to talk with me, but that because I was letting “life” get in the way I had put ear-plugs in my ears and couldn’t hear His voice. I began praying every day, sometimes all day long. Then I went to a few great Bible studies with women at my church. I learned how we can become calloused to God’s voice if we don’t diligently listen for Him on a regular basis! I learned how to ask, listen and wait, expecting to hear His voice!
Then my husband lost his job, under somewhat weird circumstances. It seemed that the circumstances surrounding him being fired were not what would have been “expected.” Like if the same thing had happened a few years earlier, or perhaps to someone else, the outcome would have been entirely different. We knew that God’s hand was in it, and we could almost see it with our own eyes! Then we wondered why God had removed him from that position… Was something bad going to happen at the plant, and God was trying to keep him safe? We could only wonder. We wondered, and prayed. We went through a Bible study together, one that I had just finished doing on my own. We clung together as a family, and to God! My daughter wrote my husband a note and slipped it under the door. As an eight year old, she was speaking God’s voice to him. “It’s a miracle my dad lost his job.”
A few weeks later, I was determined to hear God’s voice at our Sunday sermon. I just had this unexplainable and undeniable feeling of expectancy, like waiting for Christmas. And I heard it! God spoke to me, and now we are here, picking up speed, trying to see ahead at what tracks we will be sent on, but knowing that God is flipping the switches that need to be flipped. I just have to do my part and keep feeding the fire.
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