Worship is kind of like standing on the beach; the cool sand between your toes while the water laps lazily at the shore. The breeze carries the scent of salt water to your nose. Then that first touch of the water sends shivers up your spine for a brief moment. It tickles, sometimes sending your feet back to the shore like a child. That’s when you realize the stand is sticking to you now and back in the water you go.
You might even wade out into the water. Sometimes it gets just to your ankles. Other times it’s all the way to your waist. The water soaks your clothes all the way to your skin, but it feels good. It feels even better the deeper you go until your feet no longer touch the bottom. There you remain suspended weightlessly in comforting, calm, blue sea.
Then there are other times when the week just hasn’t gone well, but there you are – standing at the beach anyway. You’re reluctant to join the waves splashing on the beach. You’re body is tired – too tired to swim. You’re legs don’t feel like diving. You’d much rather be napping.
So there you stand on the beach, tired and restless. You allow your feet to carry you to the waters edge, but no farther. Though you long for another taste, your heart is distant. The salt water starts to grab at your toes, begging you to jump in. “I just don’t have it in me today,” you hear yourself say. “I’ve spent all strength on all of the chaos, but let me just stand here and listen to your waves.”
The wind rushes toward you, gently at first, pushing the water closer and closer. Though your body aches and longs for a bed, it finally begins to relax. The pulsing of that headache slowly begins to ease. The ringing in your ears stops and you can finally breath the cool salty air.
Your senses are opened all the more as the water moves in, but your feet have not moved one inch. You remain planted in place as the waves move in. At first they splash only over your ankles and then to your knees. You’re reminded again of those comforting times floating win the deep blue sea. Soon the water is at your chest; then to your neck. Before you know it, the waves have gotten bigger and bigger, until they come splashing over your head. You hold your breath, but not too long as the water pulls back once more.
Your heart rejoices against the ribs of your breast. You float there among the waves for what feels like only a moment when your feet meet the wet sticky sand. How you wish the waves would come and cover you again. Your trudge your achy legs back into the water.
“I need more,” you say.
A low rumble of the waters seems to answer you in reply. Yet wading out deeper and deeper, the water feels so much calmer – almost still. Finally the water is back at your neck, but it’s not the same feeling anymore. Your mind begins to trouble your heart, questioning if you were only imagining it all along.
Looking around you start to go back, but the water tugs at you to come back. It seems to say, “Just a minute longer.” However you’re reluctant to stay. “I have to deal with the world now,” you say. “I guess a pick me up will just have to do.”
But the waters answer back differently. “You need so much more.”
Puzzled you stay there. Your mind begins to wander as you look around. Turning your sight back to the ocean you see the reason for the strange new sound entering your ears. Of in the distance, the waters rise. Higher and higher climbs a massive wall of blue. Your mind wants to flee. You worry about what will happen once it hits you. What more damage will be done to your day? Must you struggle here too? The water about you grows incredibly still as the wave draws up with all its might. Then in an instant it comes plowing forward. Your eyes widen. It’s too late to turn back now. You’re too far out from the shore to make it back in time. The mighty waters tower over you. Its shadow falls before you just before its crashes. The waters submerge you for what seems like for ever. Deeper and deeper it carries you, pulling you back with it. The under tow takes you along in its current; the water hugging your body. You’re not sure how much longer you can hold your breath, but the waters comforting arms say other wise.
Finally when you can hold it no longer your head breaks through the surface and you take your first big gasp of air. Your lungs take it in almost too fast and you’re heaving for more. Exasperated you look around. The water had carried you out so far that the beach looks like a tiny island. You’ve never been out this far, nor had you ever thought about it. This is where your find yourself, hanging out in the deepest portion.
Then as the waters hold you, they gently carry you back. Like a parent with a child they gently return you to the sand. You lay there both dazed and amazed as your arms meet the sand. Awe escapes as you breathe. Then as the wind returns to normal you’re reminded its time to go back to daily life. However you’re reminded by the water that you can still come back to be swept up in its warm loving waves.
Copyright 2011 TheFaithBook
Dreamer_2005 · Wed Aug 10, 2011 @ 05:06pm · 0 Comments |