Tag: Linger

Linger With You

2 Corinthians 4:6 For God, who said, “Let there be light in the darkness,” has made this light shine in our hearts so we could know the glory of God that is seen in the face of Jesus Christ.

Do you have a place you go to talk to God? A place you go to open you heart to hear His heart? I don’t mean a physical place, like your bedroom or the kitchen table (even though having a prayer “closet” is a great thing too). I mean a place you go to in your heart and soul to linger with and talk to God.

I read a book by Eden and Brad Jersak called Rivers from Eden that says, “Your heart is God’s temple or home, a place designed specifically for meeting with him.” I know this may sound crazy but give it a chance and hear me out. God wants a personal relationship with you and in order to get personal you must spend time together and you must communicate back and forth.

If you sent a dozen text messages to your friend each day, you would be communicating with them but unless the communication goes back and forth, you really aren’t growing your relationship with your friend. You need to listen to what your friend has to say too.

It is the same way with God. You can go through your day shooting off comments to God like, “Thank you Jesus for this parking spot” or “Lord please give me wisdom to respond to my child” but unless you make time and create a space to hear what God is saying to you, your relationship will be very one sided.

So, take time to ask God where he wants to meet with you today. I like to close my eyes and allow him to present me with a visual scene. Sometimes it is under a tree on a pink and green blanket in a meadow with wildflowers next to a slow-moving stream, sometimes it is at a farm on a wooden swing under a big shady oak tree, and sometimes it is on a circular couch where we relax and recline to have our talks.

You should try it. Close your eyes and let God take you to a quiet place where you can talk. Then open the eyes and ears of your heart to have a real conversation and deepen your relationship with our living and loving God.

Heavenly Father, thank you for loving me and wanting to spend time with me. My heart is full of your glory and I long to linger with you today. Amen.

Be Still and Linger with Him

Psalm 46:10 Be still and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations; I will be exalted in the earth.

Have you heard the saying by Ralph Waldo Emerson that says, “Life is about the journey, not the destination”?  To me, that means that we should search for joy in the preparation of the journey and savor every event along the way.  We have been on a journey over the past 5 weeks of social distancing and working from home and we have been preparing to return to normal (whatever that may look like).  For me, the preparation and journey has included lots of quiet time, quiet time to be still and to linger with God. 

One of the words God gave me in my heart this year is LINGER. The definition of linger is to stay in a place longer than necessary because of a reluctance to leave.  Up until now, it has been hard to be still and linger with God because of the demands of my career and being a mom of 3 teenage boys.  But now I can.  I have found time during this journey to linger with God and to hear from God.  In Job 33:5 it says, “For God does speak – now one way, now another – though man may not perceive it.”

In order for me to hear from the Lord, I need to be still.  I need to tune my ears to Him.  Jesus says in John 10:27, “My sheep listen to my voice, I know them, and they follow me.”   What a sweet time it is to hear His voice over all the other noise that is normally around us.  If we use this time to be still, hear his voice and become familiar with it, then when things go back to “normal”, we will still be able to hear Him.

I do not know where this journey is taking us, but I am making it a point to enjoy the quiet time with my Lord.  I am savoring these moments with Jesus, and I will continue to be still and make time to linger with Him.

Lord, thank you for wanting to spend time with me. Fill me with peace and hope and love so that I may be a blessing to others. Amen.