Returning

Cue the piano. Cue the drums. The psalmist begins, “my heart has been in your sight long before my first breath,” responses of tears, screams and shouts erupt throughout the four walls but you don’t hear them, you’re somewhere else; lost in the moment, engulfed in His glory, swept off your feet by His love. In this moment, even with hundreds of people around, it’s just you and Him. So you’re vulnerable. Your walls come down, your soul opens up and you allow him in, into the space that was always His to fill and you let go and breathe in every moment. This is intimacy.

Then the music stops. The mics are being shifted to the back of the stage. Hands are pulling you up from the floor. You’re in a daze. Slowly you wipe your eyes, confused as you brush yourself off and the moderator proceeds, “Thank you praise team”. The room suddenly feels crowded, filled with strange faces, so you close yourself off, muttering a few “Praise the Lord” and a “Hallelujah” here and there. Not intentionally, second nature really. The order of the service proceeds as usual. Offering Time! The ushers take their place but His presence has long been ushered out. You miss Him now. You want the moment back but it feels unattainable so you go with the motions until the end of the service, anticipating the next time you get to experience His love.  

"We can’t meet this week." they say. Then another week passes and it’s the same. And so the weeks go by, then months. Now you’re stuck, in a pandemic, in a room, in your mind. You’re forced to face ugly truths and ugly souls. Frustrated because the space you once entered to find the One who knows you, is no longer accessible. So not only are you shut off from the world but now you feel shut off from His love. It’s agony, it’s lonely, it’s empty and it’s dry. You bang your head against the wall trying to figure out, how long before you can go back? How long before it’s over? How long before you get a taste of His presence again? How long? Too long. 

Oh great, another gospel song. You’re so tired of listening at this point because what's the point ? You feel so far from Him but as your heart longs for something, anything, to fill the void, you press play. “Bring me back to communion, lead me back to the moment I saw your face,” the lyrics play on as you listen absentmindedly. “No space between us, it was easy to trust”, suddenly every syllable is pulling at your attention, a chill is in the air, a tension, a stillness. Goose bumps on your arms, the kind you get from a gentle graze. A surge of emotions rushes through you all at once and tears fall. It feels familiar, a peace, a calm. You look around, your bed in the corner, your dresser to the right...the feeling is familiar but it felt strange in this surrounding. 

As the song plays on you get heavier and heavier, your knees buckle, your heart pounds, with no desire to fight back you submit. You allow Him to have His way and so you lay flat. There’s a weight, the good kind, though you don’t quite understand how or why or what’s happening, you know it’s Him, the lover of your soul. Your heart is overwhelmed. After so much time away, you’ve been yearning and longing for this moment. You have been longing to feel His love like this again. So you lay there, not wanting anything but His presence. You cry and bask. Taking in as much as you can because you’re afraid to lose it again. Wrestling to hold on as long as you can. 

“I am with you always.” It’s subtle but you hear it, “I’m not in a place, I am in you”.  This is intimacy.

-T. A. Wright