Stunning news.

It was six years ago I received stunning news. Just five weeks before our wedding, my fiancé called–not-face-to-face–mind you, and told me the wedding was off.

I needed to be alone and think.

I was shocked to my core. I took off that Easter weekend, not wishing to hang around and pretend things were fine, for they were not. Instead, I drove to the Oregon Gardens to be alone and think.

The early blossoms soothed my soul….

I sat still.

While reading in my room by the fire, I came across a verse in the Bible I’d not noticed before. Their strength is to sit still. That’s what I did. I sat still. Thinking. Praying. Reading.

I realized I was not alone.

Later, I strolled among the few flowers that were blooming at the Gardens and as I sat in the spring sunshine, I realized I wasn’t alone. Jesus was walking with me in my sadness and shock. He knew and He cared. I drove back home, knowing I’d be alright. Just not right away.

I was wrong. I needed to sit still for awhile.

I didn’t know the future, just like all humans don’t. But if I did. Would I be surprised! Just a few miles south and east of my home, lived a man named Jim, who was mourning the loss of his wife. He needed another year to work through his grief and be ready to meet me.  Though I thought it was the other guy, I was wrong. I needed to sit still for awhile.

Sit still.

It was good to sit still, though that is not my ordinary response to most anything. I’ll share one stanza of a poem that fit my situation and perhaps yours today, too:

 

O Soul, keep silence on the mount of God,

Though cares and needs throb around you like a sea;

From prayers, petitions, and desires unshod,

Be still, and hear what God will say to thee. Mary Rowles Jarvis

Be still and know…..

 What will He say to you?