Dark Night

Who among you fears the Lord

and obeys the voice of his servant,

who walks in darkness and has no light,

yet trusts in the name of the Lord

and relies upon his God?

-Isaiah 50.10

We have much to be thankful for, even if we are wandering in a strange land full of change and uncertainty. I need to use this week of Thanksgiving (and beyond) to recognize and muse upon the place I am in right now. The other night I was reading one (of my several) books purchased in Oxford, Celebration of Discipline by Richard Foster (a very thought-provoking and challenging book that hits points of being a disciple that we tend to ignore) and this passage jumped out at me and I felt it was something I needed to reflect on. I read it a few times and wrote it out in my journal:

Recognise the dark night for what it is. Be grateful that God is lovingly drawing you away from every distraction so that you can see him clearly. Rather than chafing and fighting, become still and wait.

It is so obvious when you think about it, but we don't see things that way. Did you ever think about why you might be being lead away from something, or why a certain tug on your heart won't go away? Could it be that something was distracting us? And we are so bad at practicing the part of being still and waiting. Why do we find that so hard when the plans God has in store are so much better than our own?