Accepting and Grasping…

Don’t you just love the way the Holy Spirit often adjusts us when we least expect it?

Bible school was over, our itinerant music ministry had taken off in earnest and living by faith was exciting but also a stretch. Funds were adequate but not plentiful, so we all shared a small ‘2-up-2-down’ house that we had cleverly adapted to accommodate the 8 of us, our family of 5 and Oliver’s family of 3. Often, we would also have someone else living with us for a while, a hopeful musician perhaps or a nanny if we were travelling during school time. It truly was life at close quarters.

One morning, I sat on my bed (there was no other place to go), talking to the Lord, feeling somewhat overcome and stifled by a sense of over-occupation! Even the garden was hardly the size of a postage stamp, and I longed for the wide spaces of my South African roots. I picked up my Bible and opened it randomly. My eyes fell on Psalm 18v19: “He brought me out into a spacious place; he rescued me because he delighted in me.”

In that moment, eyes blurry with tears of gratitude,  I clearly understood 2 things: despite all my years of ministry, I had never really accepted that God delighted in me for HIS own sake, and I grasped that he had not only heard the cry of my heart – he was already making provision for the rescue.

Shortly after this life-giving Word, God provided us with a large and beautiful house that also had its own apple orchard, much to the joy of our children. We had our own lounge, Brigitte and Oliver had theirs. Oh joy 😊.

To this day, when God speaks, I accept the correction, I grasp the promise, and I remind myself – The King of the universe delights in me!

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