Originally written: July 24, 2015
This morning I parked once more on my favorite street, where the Lord has met me so graciously at least once a week this summer. I pulled down the front shade to block the blinding sun and began to pray. God has been compelling me to clear the stage, and so this weekly time outside of my morning prayer and devotions is an exercise in obedience and an attempt to draw nearer to God. I am constantly amazed at the Holy Spirit’s work in my life, and I write this now with no less awe.
A desire—no—an urgent necessity to hold my Bible suddenly came over me. I reached over to the passenger seat and retrieved my Bible and felt a sense of relief, of safety--just to hold the Word of God in my hands while I prayed.
I was reminded of a story a wise woman told about a tragic time in her life. She said, “You know, I just carried my Bible with me, everywhere I went. I just needed to hold the Word of God.”
And I felt that pull in my heart, as so much weighed on me this morning. And as the song so rightly puts it, I cried out from the driver’s seat of my car: “Father! Can you hear me?” (“Without You”).
And I know that He did. I know that He does. I prayed specifically for my time after prayer—that the Lord would show me where to turn in my Bible, what exactly I should be studying during this time with Him. And when my time was done and I opened the soft pages of my Bible, He took me to the Armor of God, to Ephesians 6:10-18, a chunk of verses I have been memorizing since April.
It’s hard to imagine that in April God knew I’d need to know all about the armor of God, even when I didn’t know I had MS. How could I ever question His sovereignty? These verses have raced through my head so many times since my diagnosis—I recite it often in my prayers and it decorates the background of my phone. I have many notes scribbled down in the margins from my study notes I copied directly out of The New Bible Commentary (21st Century Edition). But I know this morning which verse He wants me to see as soon as I read the note. Verse 16 reads,
“In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one.”
I’ve been praying He’ll help me take up the shield of faith over the past several weeks, but this week has been a particular challenge. There is a note pointing to the “flaming arrows,” and my eye is drawn down to what the commentary said: it designates the arrows as a “steady rain of temptations to fear, bitterness, anger, and division… .” These are the devil’s ways--his tools to pull me from trusting in my Savior. They are everywhere. And I am reminded, so certainly, by the Holy Spirit, that not only must I take up the shield of faith, but I must draw upon the sword of the Spirit, “WHICH IS THE WORD OF GOD.” He doesn't just desire me to hold my Bible. He wants me to open it. I am reminded by my notes from the commentary that the shield of faith requires a focus on God and suggests a “firm and resolute dependence on the Lord,” while the sword of the Spirit is the weapon I need to fight against the devil’s schemes, to “strike back” with Truth.
Dependence on the Lord--this is what the Lord speaks to me. I know that I must surrender again and again and again. Even as I write these notes in my journal, my Bible sits on my lap in the front seat of my car. And I cannot let it go.