Each morning I stir awake, check the time projected in red digital numerals on my ceiling from the bedside clock, remind myself of what day it is, then reach for my phone to open the seedbed.com daily Wake Up Call devotional.
Before Bill died our morning routine was to watch the morning message from David Jeremiah. But the Wake-Up Call has replaced that morning routine, especially now given my awareness of David Jeremiah’s theology of end times, with which I am less and less inclined to agree.
I had written before about how many mornings after Bill’s death I found myself waking at 4:22. As I interpreted that time stamp through the lens of the system of numeric meanings in which God has trained me to communicate with Him, I read “4:22″ as ” going forward (4) with Christ (2), as I walk humbly with Him (2).” I understood that I would not be alone, that everyday Christ would be right beside me.
It was further confirmed in the sweet dream a few weeks after his death of Bill and Jesus Christ sitting and talking about me when Jesus said, “Watch. She is going to awaken in a minute and her first thought will be of me, then of you.”. It made me laugh because that’s exactly how I think in my early stirring of my days. Bill would not have been surprised by that word from Jesus! Jesus went on to tell Bill, “She is connected to me there. you are with me here. Because you are both connected to me, you are still connected to each other, also.”. It was a wonderfully comforting thought for me in my grappling with the reality of widowhood.
This morning as I turned toward the projection of red numbers on the far left side of my bedroom ceiling, the time was 3:34, which for me translates as Spirit of God (3) with my own spirit (3) going forward into another day (4). I smiled, glanced at the soft flickering light of the electric candle on a shelf with Bill’s picture on the wall opposite my bed, and reached for my phone and glasses to hear and read the Wake-Up Call:
https://emails.seedbed.com/view.html?x=a62e&m=SD&mc=O&s=PZ2&u=3&z=m14OsGw&pt=view
JD Walt’s continuing series on Fruit of the Spirit focused on patience today, or long suffering as translated in some Bibles. JD had begun including a morning hymn at the end that many of us sing along with him, made all the easier with the new seedbed.com hymnal “Sing Our Great Redeemer’s Praise.”
When he got to the end of the scripture, reflection, prayer and questions, JD invited us to turn to the hymn “Trust and Obey,” number 334……
Trust and Obey has been a standard in my life and God’s banner over me since 1992 when Christ challenged me to get off the fence and get “all in.” In 1997 it was trusting and obeying God that brought me through one of the most difficult emotional crises of my life. It was the theme of the Emmaus Walk I lay-directed in August 2002 and it is heart-song for me always.
God guides the moments, even directs every minute and every minute encounter of my life. When I am attentive and responsive to His invitations and cues, it is quite a ride!
When I had completed the morning Wake-Up Call, all 13 minutes and 54 seconds of it, I glanced at the red numerals again….. 3:55, a 21-minute passage of time to read the clock, glance at my night-light electric candle beside Bill’s picture, pick up my phone and glasses and listen to the Wake-Up Call….. Somehow I think God filled some of that 6 minutes and 6 seconds of “extra” time with kairos time, leading me into gentle awareness of Him, untangling, attuning and aligning the “vines” of my life’s desires to His, sealing my attachment to Him to feel His affection and establish abiding for the day as I abandon them to His will.
Another thing God has taught me is that He is not confined by the chronological constraints of my physical existence. And when I am In Christ, neither am I.
It is now 6:01a.m. My phone’s 5:50 morning alarm has already reminded me it’s time to get up and get actively engaged with the day. Speak, Lord, for your Child is awake and listening.