Be Still

It was one of those nights. I was displaying my awful communication skills to my husband who had had a long day and didn’t have the mental energy to keep up. What started out as relaxing, fun evening at home turned into an argument between a frustrated husband and a crying wife. I was frustrated because I couldn’t communicate what I was really feeling and taking his exhaustion as a sign that he really didn’t care. I fell asleep with my mind racing and woke up at 3:30 in the same lane.

Now, I feel like I should pause and let you in on two little Kala secrets. First, one of my biggest faults is overthinking and over analyzing. Second, I cry a lot, but mainly when I’m frustrated or angry, not actually sad. Weird.

So I wake up analyzing the entire conversation we had the previous night and over thinking what everything means until I’ve doomed parts of our marriage for certain failure. In an effort to regain some of the control I feel I’ve lost, I decided that my house needed to be spotless. Right now. At 4 AM. To be fair, my house and my marriage were both fine, but I needed to be able to fix something.

Brandon suggested that I take advantage of these morning hours and sit and relax, sip a cup, of coffee, read my Bible. Right- I had other things to do. My Heavenly Father agreed with my husband and pushed that idea a little bit the further. I still said no. Finally, I heard an almost audible voice in my head that yelled “Stop!”. So I figured God must be serious. I grabbed my Bible, coffee, and fried eggs and headed out to the deck to watch the sun rise.

After sitting down, I felt immediate peace from just stopping. The verse that says to ‘be still and know that I am God’ came to mind. So I found it and read the rest of the verses in Psalm 46, and found some other words I really needed.

Words like,

“God is our refuge and strength, an ever present help in time of trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea.”

Then, right as the sun was coming up, I came across a less familiar one-

“God is within her, she will not fall; God will help her at break of day.”

I stopped short as tears, happy ones, filled my eyes. God knew that it would take a loud “Stop, be still!” for me to be silent long enough to hear Him say “I’ve got your back.”. He knew that my anxious mind creates illogical things to be worried about. He knew that the best solution was to just BE in His presence. To soak Him in and let me disappear.

So I did. The birds chirped. The fog lifted. The cows mooed. The sun rose. And ‘God helped her at daybreak.’ All I had to do was stop my own striving long enough to let Him.

What makes your heart anxious? What keeps you awake at night? What makes you feel out of control? Let me encourage you….stop for a moment, be still, and know that He is God. Then just rest there.